There is nothing better in the romance world than finding community and getting closer to the books, authors and fellow readers you love most. Though the romance and podcast spaces tend to be a bit crowded, trust us, you need to make room for one more.
If you’re looking for a place to turn down the noise of BookTok and turn up the heat on the stories you adore, we have great news!
Zipless is an immersive romance podcast that brings you a brand-new approach to the romance podcast space. Combining the intimacy of an author interview, the artistry of professional audiobook narration, and the voices of real romance readers, this is an entire listening experience that takes you deeper into a book’s world. And it’s getting well-deserved attention as a 2025 Webby Award Nominee for Best Experimental and Innovation Podcast.
The host of this feet kickingly good new show, Allie Martina, is a talented actress who has narrated over 50 titles in the romance space. So she’s well versed in all things in this spicy corner of the bookish community. From age gaps to sub-dom, praise kinks and beyond, she holds conversation about these sub-tropes and how these topics are living in the real world of sexuality and the impact of these stories on culture.
Today, a new episode has dropped, and it is one you can’t miss! Featuring the author of The Hunting Wives, May Cobb, this salacious book has become a Netflix sensation that everyone is talking about. So if you were fanning your face from the show and dying for a season two, here’s an opportunity to go deeper into the dark lives of these Texas “vipers”—as the author refers to them in the interview.
Allie and May talk about the reckless and messy lives of her characters, the lust and sexuality that women aren’t often afforded the way men are, and the conversation around the taboo of including cheating in the romance space.
We got the chance to chat with the Zipless host about this budding—and fabulous—new podcast. Read on to hear from Allie about how she’s disrupting this space with delightfully delicious content.
She Reads: What inspired you to start Zipless and forge this new approach to romance podcasts?
Allie Martina: The inspiration for Zipless came from wanting to empower women to own their sexuality, explore it, and claim it for themselves without shame. Romance books did that for me; they opened my eyes to new ways of looking at sexuality and showed me how powerful and universal these stories really are. I knew I didn’t want to focus only on the details of individual books, but instead to explore romance in a broader sense, as a reflection of women’s desires, needs, and hopes. That is why we approach the show through history, language, performance, and the voices of our listeners. But inspiration can only go so far. Without Jill Ruby, our series producer, my creativity and passion might have been lost. She is the one who channels my ideas into stories that truly resonate with listeners.
SR: What can listeners look forward to about the new episode featuring May Cobb?
AM: This episode has everything that makes Zipless unique. I sit down with May Cobb to dig into The Hunting Wives and her gift for creating women who are sexy, complicated, and shockingly flawed. Cobb’s novel is more of a salacious thriller than it is an HEA romance, but her exploration of sex, love and complicated women is very much in our wheelhouse. May explains why she has no interest in smoothing out their edges or justifying their mistakes. You’ll also hear a steamy and controversial reading by me from The Hunting Wives, plus a cameo from narrator Gideon Frost. He always brings an extra layer of fun to the show. To top it off, we end the episode with a powerful “Dear Allie” letter from a listener who admits she was irresistibly drawn to someone she knew was probably a reckless romantic choice. Her story is raw and honest, and it’s a perfect example of how real life and story collide. That’s what to expect with this episode. Hope you enjoy it!
SR: How has the romance genre impacted you and what sort of experiences are you hoping to bring to readers?
AM: Narrating romance opened my eyes to how universal sexual and romantic fantasies are, and how deeply readers and listeners connect to them. Coming from a generation where women often hid or watered down their sexuality, it felt liberating to read romance. With Zipless, I hope to celebrate that freedom alongside the romance community and create a space where women’s desires can be spoken, explored, and never silenced… all through the pages of books.
You’ll definitely want to catch the May Cobb episode on Zipless if you’ve been as obsessed with The Hunting Wives as we are, but there are twelve others you need to download as well. The discussions take great books and pull you in many layers deeper to explore and discuss not only the nature of this genre, but of sexuality and pleasure in the current era. So don’t miss this chance to get under the sheets of some of your favorite spicy tropes and books. Run for your headphones—you’re going to need them—and plug into this new podcast that we promise you will binge. And stay tuned, we’ll be featuring Allie even more in the upcoming months!
Allie Martina is a classically trained actor with thirty-five years of professional experience in voice acting and a BAAS in Theater Arts from University of North Texas. As a narrator for audiobooks, she has narrated over 50 titles. Her commercial and corporate voice acting client list includes Nike, Fisher-Price, Expedia, Cracker Barrel, McDonalds, Mattel, Keebler, and Aquafor, among many others. Allie also voices the iconic characters of Catwoman and Black Canary in the long-running massive multiplayer online action game, DC Universe Online.
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