Former narcotics agent, John Shobbrook battled corruption when investigating an audacious plan to air-drop heroin into Far North Queensland in the 1970s

Conversations

Stupid crooks, crooked cops, and honest John

Roland de Chazal is best known for being the 81-year-old motorbike postie on Magnetic Island, but his earlier life in Rhodesia had its moments too — it was there he met the Queen Mother and kept his pet cheetah, Jackals

Motorbikes, cheetahs, and the Maggie Island mail run

Judy on life with her late husband, the politician Tim Fischer, and how her son Harrison helped inspire a new beginning on her farm (R)

Judy Brewer's Mudgegonga love song

Stories from Dave Grohl about his life in music, including how he went from being "that guy from Nirvana” to a superstar rock star fronting the Foo Fighters

Rock and Dave Grohl

John Baker on hunting down a cache of rare and impossibly valuable French wine hidden away by Josef Stalin, deep in the Republic of Georgia (R)

Finding Stalin's wine cellar

Music was always a friend to Ed, but while he struggled to come to terms with being trans, he couldn't face his beloved instruments. Once he accepted himself, his relationship with sound flourished

Ed Ayres' life in music

Monica McInerney with tales from her childhood in a railway family in the South Australian town of Clare (R)

The railway child: Monica from Clare

Australia's most famous landscape architect on learning from the garden, Greek school and his Yiayia

Costa Georgiadis: Heart and Soil

Philippe Sands on how a cache of letters sent him on the trail of Nazi war criminal Otto Von Wachter, who escaped to Rome on the 'Ratline' (R)

The Nazi Brigadeführer who got away

Designer Jenny Kee with the story of her wild and creative life, including how she and Linda Jackson began a movement which changed Australian fashion (CW: discretion required. Drug references, suicide and content that might be upsetting)

Jenny Kee's incandescent life

The ABC Sports presenter describes his life at 17, a year dominated by football, girls, beer, and a serial killer stalking his neighbourhood

Paul Kennedy on finding his way

While they greet one another with soft "woohoos", carefully feed their fat, fluffy babies and bleat at sunset, field naturalist Tanya Loos keeps an eye on the beautiful and ferocious population in her backyard

The Powerful Owls of Wombat Forest

When an eruption began in 1994 in Papua New Guinea, the last thing singer-songwriter Ngaiire expected was a second volcano to begin spewing ash. Tuning in to the mystery and majesty of PNG has become a lifelong project (CW: Some listeners may find parts of this conversation upsetting. Please use discretion when listening)

Surviving two volcanoes — Ngaiire's story

Zen priest and writer Ruth Ozeki takes us into world brimming with the voices of people and household objects, and her own experience of hearing her father's voice in her ear after he'd died

The needle in the tofu

David Hepworth charts our fascination with that most earth-bound of gods, the rock star; and discusses some of music history's striking examples (R)

The rise and fall of the Rock Star

Spend an hour in someone else's life. 'Conversations with Richard Fidler' draws you deeper into the life story of someone you may have heard about, but never met.

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Conversations

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