A quiet audio companion for moments when you long to pause, listen and be met by story.
Story Aloud is a gentle listening space where reflective stories and quiet invitations are offered in an intimate, unhurried way. Each episode invites you to slow your pace, soften your attention and let words meet you with warmth and steadiness.
All pieces in Story Aloud are original works written and read by Dr Susan McLaine, shaped to meet you with presence, tenderness and care.
Story Aloud is not a podcast for analysis or discussion. It is an experience of listening. A place to breathe, settle and be quietly accompanied by story in the flow of your daily life. You may choose to listen while walking, commuting, resting, journaling or preparing for sleep.
Long before Story Aloud emerged, many people first encountered my voice through the two podcast seasons I created for State Library Victoria entitled Bibliotherapy with State Library Victoria. These episodes, still available on Apple and Spotify, have been listened to more than 30,000 times.
As featured in The Guardian
The Guardian reviewed a selection of wellbeing courses and apps and chose Dr Susan McLaine’s bibliotherapy podcast as their favourite, describing it as “the closest thing to a hug,” even among programs created by major influencers and commercial wellbeing platforms.
You can read the Guardian review here.
Listeners often told me that the stories kept them company during late evenings, long commutes and moments when life felt a little unsteady. For years people have asked me to create more. Here they are. Story Aloud continues that lineage of warmth, presence and care.
However you arrive, the intention is the same. To offer a small, steadying moment of connection with story.
What Story Aloud offers
a quiet listening space that steadies and soothes
a reflective rhythm that deepens your reading life
stories chosen for their beauty, depth and gentleness
reflective invitations woven gently through each episode
a simple way to reconnect with words when reading feels too full or too fast
This is not a podcast for analysis or critique. It is an experience of listening, shaped with presence rather than interpretation, offering you a small moment of ease in the flow of your day.
Season begins July 2026
Season One explores how the stories within us ripple outward into the world. The readings and reflections invite you to notice the subtle ways a private story becomes a public footprint. How an inner narrative shapes the choices you make without realising. How the foods you reach for, the pace you move at and the comforts you seek all participate in shaping the world’s future.
Across the season, it becomes an invitation to a different kind of attentiveness. It asks how our inner stories guide our outer movements, and what shifts when we begin to choose stories that nourish rather than deplete.
Episodes are released every three weeks, to allow each story to settle before the next arrives.
If you would like to be notified when new episodes are released, you are warmly invited to join the mailing list.
Season One: Reading the World, Living the Story
Why Season One is offered as a ‘gift’
The first season of Story Aloud is offered freely as a gift.
Story Aloud began as a quiet impulse within my own reflective practice, and offering the first season freely honours the way beginnings often need spaciousness rather than structure. It creates room for you to simply listen, notice and feel your way into what this work offers, without expectation.
How to listen
When the season begins, episodes will be available on the Bibliotherapy Australia website and on major listening platforms. You may wish to listen:
on a slow morning
during a walk
while resting with a cup of tea
at the end of the day
during your commute
Choose the rhythm that feels right for you.
Story Aloud will be available on the Bibliotherapy Australia website and major podcast platforms (Apple, Spotify, Google)
Season One begins Monday 27th July 2026. Episodes are released every three weeks.
A gentle invitation
Let yourself be read to.
Let story move at its own pace.
Let listening become a quiet practice of care.
You are warmly welcome here.
If you are seeking books that steady or inspire, Rosy tends a bookshelf for you.