As part of this year’s festival Essex-based Packing Shed Film and Theatre has released its very first radio podcast.

Marking 100 years since Marconi made his first radio broadcast in Chelmsford and the 70th anniversary of George Orwell’s death, 1954 re-imagines Orwell’s classic 1984 taking its inspiration from the line in the book where Winston Smith recalls “perhaps it was the time when the atomic bomb had fallen on Colchester”.

Set 30 years previously the radio podcast series follows the events that lead up to that explosion which in turn led to the dystopian nightmare that becomes Big Brother.

Further episodes will be released every Friday during the running of the Essex Book Festival.

To have a listen, or download, go to https://packingshedtheatrecompany.co.uk/1954/