Grim stories of how people died, told between friends.
People Keep Dying pairs host Angela with a guest, often a friend or relative, to talk through a death story in loose, joking conversation. Recent subjects include a three-part Jack the Ripper series, the Daegu Subway Fire, the Virginia Tech Massacre and the death of Nevada brothel owner Dennis Hof.
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People Keep Dying is a podcast about how people die, told as a conversation between host Angela and a guest. Several of those guests come from her own life. Her neighbor and friend Chrissy leads a three-part series on Jack the Ripper. That series gives real time to the women who were killed. One stretch follows a victim named Kate through a broken marriage, a common lodging house and a partnership with a man named John Kelly, and notes that the people around her remembered her as scholarly. Another stays on a coroner's inquest and the exact medical cause of a victim's death, spelled out in unflinching anatomical terms. By the third part, the two are openly speculating about the killer's identity, weighing one suspect's background as a doctor's son and a rumor that the Ripper drowned himself in the Thames. A half-serious aside about Charles Dickens gets parked for later. Other guests change the dynamic. Stephanie, a former co-host, comes back for the Daegu Subway Fire, which Angela introduces as one of Stephanie's favorite kinds of story, a Korean one. Their conversation lingers on the chain of safety failures that let the fire reach a second train, from fire protection that did not do its job to train cars that burned fast. For the Virginia Tech Massacre, Angela opens with a guessing game, feeding her stepbrother Brandon early details and asking him to name the case. The discussion covers the shooter's childhood in South Korea and what he did in the hours after the attack, including mailing recordings and writings to NBC News. Not every episode involves violence. With guest Alice Little, a sex worker at the Moonlight Bunny Ranch, Angela looks at Dennis Hof, a Nevada brothel owner who died in his sleep after a night of partying with friends. Angela says plainly that she is glad, for once, not to be covering a murder or a strange death. The tone throughout is loose and candid. Voices crack with colds, one recording apparently took several attempts, and strong language comes easily. Sign-offs lean on gallows humor and hope the audience is still alive for the next episode, and several recent ones add an offer of free custom socks to anyone who gets in touch. What comes through is one friend walking another through a grim story, with gasps, guesses and side comments along the way.
Made for: Suits a listener who wants true crime and disaster stories as a candid chat between friends rather than a polished documentary, and who is comfortable hearing graphic detail alongside dark humor.
What sets it apart: Angela fills the second chair largely from her own circle, including a neighbor, a stepbrother and a former co-host, so each case plays out as a real exchange of questions, guesses and reactions. The range also reaches past murder, to a subway fire and a brothel owner's death in his sleep.
A Podcast About People Who Die. Angela discusses murders and deaths from around the world, covering natural disasters to serial killers.
A Ripper suspect has cricket matches to explain; you get Angela and Chrissy testing the alibi.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A skeptical suspect rundown where medical rumors run into trains, cricket matches, and a Charles Dickens joke.
People Keep Dying shifts from the Ripper victims to the people named as suspects, with Angela and Chrissy first brushing past candidates they see as too foolish to hold much weight.
A humane, loosely conversational episode that sets Jack the Ripper's fame against how little is actually known.
Jack the Ripper's fame frames this single-episode review, as Angela and Chrissy weigh his lasting reputation against how little is actually known.
A familiar legend opens into victims, violence, and a stark failure of police communication.
Jack the Ripper begins with the familiar outline, then shifts toward the distance between the legend and what people assume they know. Angela and Chrissy keep the tone conversational, while the account of a woman who survived a brutal attack but later died in hospital pulls the…
A subway fire episode weighs apparent safety failures against the passengers' final messages, where the disaster becomes painfully personal.
The Daegu subway fire episode follows the February 18, 2003 blaze through host Angela's conversation with returning old co-host Stephanie. It starts with Kim Tae-han, a 56-year-old unemployed former taxi driver, then traces how an unextinguished fire moved from one train to…
A compact, conversational look at Cho Sung-hee's post-shooting actions and Virginia Tech's delayed campus email.
People Keep Dying frames the Virginia Tech shooting through Cho Sung-hee's childhood in South Korea and the nearly two hours after the attack, with Angela's narration and Brandon's attempts to situate the case giving it a conversational shape.
Hollywood access with memory and depth.
Angela and Chrissy compare the royal conspiracy, Aaron Kosminski, and Sir William Gull against the actual 1888 murder timeline.
Angela and Chrissy trace how the September 27 "Dear Boss" letter, written in red ink and sent to the Central News Agency, helped turn the Whitechapel murders into "Jack the Ripper." They argue that the press environment after the 1850s and 1860s repeal of newspaper taxes made sensational coverage, hoax letters, and public fear much easier to spread.
Emma Smith was found with a shawl stuffed between her legs after an attack that tore into her peritoneum.
On February 18, 2003, Kim Tae-han carried two green milk cartons of flammable liquid onto Daegu subway train 1079, and the fire spread through six cars in about two minutes.
Angela and Brandon follow Cho Seung-hui from his 1984 birth in Asan, South Korea to Westfield High School, Virginia Tech, and the April 16, 2007 attack on Norris Hall.
Angela interviews sex worker Alice Little about the life and death of brothel owner Dennis Hoff, who died peacefully after a night of partying.
Hosts Angela and Stephanie introduce their true crime podcast covering deaths and murders worldwide, addressing listener feedback and their approach.
Hosts Angela and Stephanie introduce their true crime podcast, discuss the new year and holiday gifts, and set up the show's theme of discussing deaths.
Angela and Stephanie discuss a happy death story from Nagpur, India, touching on violence against women.
Hosts Stephanie and Angela introduce their Christmas special episode of a true crime podcast about people who die, discussing murders and deaths from around the world.
Angela and Stephanie discuss the life and crimes of William Chandler Shrubzall, a murderer from Niagara Falls.
In this 10th episode, the hosts take a break from discussing deaths to do a Q&A and let listeners get to know them.
The hosts discuss the mysterious death of country singer Taylor Mitchell, hinting at a stalker situation.