This is Love
Love is more than you think. From the creators of Criminal. New episodes twice a month. Part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.
Episodes
July 16, 2025 • 42 mins
When writer Rachel Carson built a house on Maine’s Southport Island, her new neighbor, Dorothy Freeman, sent her a note to welcome her. Rachel wrote back. And when the summer was over, they kept writing to each other.
Lida Maxwell’s book is Rachel Carson and the Power of Queer Love.
Martha Freeman's book is Always, Rachel: The Letters of Rachel Carson and Dorothy Freeman, 1952-1964
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July 2, 2025 • 43 mins
An episode all about hot dogs and the people who love them.
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June 18, 2025 • 40 mins
In 1910, a group of British men set off on an expedition – they wanted to be the first people to reach the South Pole. Over a hundred years later, in the journals and letters that survived, a writer discovered a love story.
For more, check out Allegra Rosenberg’s article, “From Antarctica with Love.”
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June 4, 2025 • 32 mins
In 1963, Jeanne and Alan Abel traveled to Washington, DC to picket in front of the White House. They said they were part of a campaign that wanted to put clothes on animals — including the first lady’s horse.
Jenny Abel and her husband, Jeff Hockett, made a documentary about her parents called Abel Raises Cain.
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May 30, 2025 • 24 mins
Two years ago, we started making Criminal Plus episodes — behind-the-scenes conversations featuring Phoebe and Criminal co-creator Lauren Spohrer. Today, we’re sharing some of those conversations with you — about everything from Phoebe’s jangly bracelets to the reason a judge ordered a man to watch Bambi.
And we’re also sharing a promo code if you’d like to support our work and join our membership program. Use the code “JOINUS” fo...
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May 21, 2025 • 34 mins
For the past 40 years, people have been sending Sally Winey their damaged stuffed animals, and she's been doing what she can to repair them. "That bear's been with them through everything.”
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May 7, 2025 • 44 mins
Terence McPherson and Shawnika Giger met at a party in Atlanta, and went on their first date a few weeks later. Things were going well, until they started to talk about money.
This episode is in collaboration with our friends at This Is Uncomfortable.
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April 23, 2025 • 38 mins
When The Guardian sends two strangers on a blind date, the last question they have to answer for the newspaper column is “Would you meet again?” We asked people how their dates went – and what happened next.
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April 9, 2025 • 43 mins
At The Guardian newspaper, there’s a person who has to find two complete strangers to send on a blind date every week.
In our next episode, we hear about how things really went from the blind daters themselves. You can listen right now by signing up for Criminal Plus.
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March 19, 2025 • 45 mins
About twenty years ago, D’yan Forest considered getting into stand-up comedy. “People told me, no, don’t go into comedy. Everybody is going to make fun of you. They’re gonna heckle you. You’re an old woman.” D’yan ignored them.
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March 5, 2025 • 33 mins
When his older brother died of cancer, Patrick Bringley quit his New York office job and got a new one at the Metropolitan Museum of Art—as a security guard. He stayed for 10 years.
Patrick Bringley's book is All the Beauty in the World.
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February 19, 2025 • 43 mins
On August 28th, 2000, Danny Stewart got on the subway to meet his boyfriend Pete Mercurio for dinner in New York City. As he was exiting the station, he noticed something on the ground. It looked like a baby doll wrapped in a shirt. And then he saw the doll's legs move.
Pete Mercurio's children's book is Our Subway Baby. His forthcoming memoir is called There: We Found Our Family In a New York City Subway Station.
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February 5, 2025 • 33 mins
When Cody Bryant suddenly stopped communicating with Haley Woloshen after weeks of hanging out, she assumed she was being ghosted. It was only later that she found out he’d forgotten about her entirely.
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January 22, 2025 • 41 mins
The day Edgardo Griffith met Heidi Ross, he asked her if she’d like to come with him to look for frogs. He was looking for a particular kind – bright yellow, with black spots: the Panamanian golden frog. But by the time Edgardo and Heidi were engaged, the frogs had started to disappear.
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January 8, 2025 • 40 mins
Everything you didn’t know about Goodnight Moon, the book that’s put children to bed for generations — and the woman who wrote it. "She could write very well for young children because she remembered exactly what it was like to be one of them."
Leonard Marcus’ book is Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened by the Moon
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December 18, 2024 • 50 mins
Stories we love about animals really going for it.
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December 4, 2024 • 30 mins
One night in 2018, Ahmed Ali Akbar rented a car and drove two hours to the Detroit airport. He was picking up a package for his cousin – over a dozen boxes of a very special fruit.
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November 20, 2024 • 42 mins
“After more than a hundred years of hard work from some of the greatest cryptological and linguistic minds on the planet, we still don’t quite know what this object is. There’s really nothing like it in the world.”
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November 6, 2024 • 40 mins
Recently, Phoebe told a personal story about her mother, who died this year. In this episode, she talks to journalist Sebastian Junger, who was rushed to the hospital one day after feeling sick – and then, he saw something strange.
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October 16, 2024 • 42 mins
For our 100th episode, a story from Phoebe about her mother, Valentine, who died this spring.
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