WHEN GOD WAS A RABBIT by Sarah Winman, chosen by Harry Trevaldwyn

Music producer and composer Xantoné Blacq joins actor and writer Harry Trevaldwyn to share the books they love with presenter Harriett Gilbert.

First up, Harry brings to the table a book by The Sunday Times bestselling author Sarah Winman. A book about childhood and growing up, friendships and families, triumph and tragedy and everything in between. When God Was a Rabbit celebrates the magic of the everyday for Harry, but what do the others think of it?

Next up, Xantoné chooses The Alchemist by Brazilian author Paulo Coelho, which since publication in 1988 has become a widely translated international bestseller. A blend of spirituality, magical realism and folklore, Xantoné finds it an incredibly motivational read. Are Harry and Harriett also inspired by it?

Finally, Harriett puts forward Percival Everett's most recent book, the 2024 Booker Prize nominated 'James'. Both funny and horrifying, soulful and thrilling, Everett reframes the story of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of Jim. Harriett is blown away by it - do the others agree?

Producer: Becky Ripley

Photo credit CK Morrison

BIG SWISS by Jen Beagin, chosen by Nussaibah Younis

Big Swiss is a 29-year-old gynecologist who has never had an orgasm. Greta Work is an audio transcriber for a sex therapist who is infatuated by one of his clients. After an encounter at the dog park, they strike up an affair. Nussaibah calls this one of the funniest books she's ever read. What do the others think? A Heart So White, by the Spanish author Javier Marias and recommended by Josh, has a shocking opening page. What unravels after is a harrowing tale of family secrets and their resonances through different generations. First published in 1992. Finally, The End of Eddy, Harriett's pick, was a sensation when it was first published in France in 2014. An autobiographical novel of a violent and mostly difficult childhood, it also can be read as a portrait of a poor, rural community in Northern France.

Josh Cohen is a psychoanalyst and writer, whose many books include Not Working: Why We Have to Stop; How to Live: What to Do and, most recently, All the Rage: Why Anger Drives the World.

Nussaibah Younis is an expert on contemporary Iraq who for several years advised the Iraqi government on de-radicalising women affiliated with ISIS. Nussaibah’s debut novel Fundamentally was shortlisted for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction.

Produced by Eliza Lomas, for BBC Audio Bristol.

AN INSTANCE OF THE FINGERPOST by Iain Pears, chosen by Peter Kosminsky

Thorne and Kosminsky are great friends, but don't fully agree on the books discussed. Topics raised by their choices include toxic masculinity, empathy, and whether or not Succession is a great TV series.

Peter has chosen An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears, a restoration murder mystery told by four unreliable narrators. Jack advocates for Heroes of the Fourth Turning by Will Arbery, a play about four right-wing Catholics meeting at a college reunion. Harriett has gone for Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico, a satire telling the tale of a millennial couple living in fashionable Berlin.

Produced for BBC Audio Bristol by Sally Heaven

Douglas Stuart author of Booker Prize winning novel Shuggie Bain chooses his favourite book - Train Dreams by Denis Johnson - a short novel encapsulating the history of America in the early 20th century through the life of a lonely man in the forests of the Pacific Northwest.

Producer: Maggie Ayre

Photo credit Sarah Blesener

EVERYONE BRAVE IS FORGIVEN by Chris Cleave, chosen by Lucy Speed

Former Eastenders and present-day Archers actor Lucy Speed and comedian Sarah Mills talk about books set in wartime London, a 1990s underground train, and Graham Greene's MI6.

Lucy's choice is Everyone Brave is Forgiven by Chris Cleave, Which tells the tale of Mary, a woman who becomes a teacher at the beginning of the war, only for her life to take some unexpected turns during the Blitz.

Sarah has selected 253 by Geoff Ryman, the novel originally published on the Internet which tells the stories of 253 passengers on a London Underground train.

Producer for BBC Audio Bristol: Sally Heaven

Join the conversation on Instagram: agoodreadbbc

Photo: Louise Cole

Actor Nina Sosanya and prize winning poet and writer Joelle Taylor talk favourite books with Harriett.

Nina chooses Sally Jones and the False Rose by Jakob Wegelius, a children's novel with a mute gorilla engineer as its protagonist. The book appeals to Nina's love of engineering, and the city of Glasgow!

Joelle nominates Booker Prize winning The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Sri Lankan writer Shehan Karunatilaka, about a man killed in the Sri Lankan civil war, seeking answers in the afterlife.

Harriett's choice is Tasting Sunlight by Ewald Arenz, a novel set in the German countryside at the tail end of summer, featuring two women with mysterious back stories.

Two of the choices are novels in translation, which prompts a chat about whether translated books are becoming more common.

Produced for BBC Audio Bristol by Sally Heaven

MOON TIGER by Penelope Lively, chosen by Sara Collins

"I'm writing a history of the world" - so begins the choice of novelist and broadcaster Sara Collins: Penelope Lively's Booker Prize-winning novel Moon Tiger. Claudia Hampton, a famous writer and historian, lies dying in a hospital bed, her mind flitting across the years of her remarkable life and the people she's known. Sara Collins loves the book's romance, its jagged structure, and its unlikeable heroine. Do the others agree? Sara is the author of The Confessions of Frannie Langton, which won the Costa First Novel Award and was adapted for television in 2023. She was one of the hosts of the How to Write a Book Podcast and is a former judge of the Booker Prize.

As a newspaper columnist, for many years Oliver Burkeman wrote This Column Will Change Your Life in The Guardian. He is the bestselling author of Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals and, more recently, Meditations for Mortals: Four Weeks to Embrace Your Limitations and Make Time for What Counts. His choice is a non-fiction book by the investigative journalist Zeke Faux about the characters who have made and lost billions in the wild and volatile world of cryptocurrency.

And Harriett's choice is Lord Jim at Home, a novel by Dinah Brooke. Giles Trenchard is born into a life of privilege, but also into a world of hidden cruelty and emotional deprivation. Everyone agrees it's brilliantly written, but how do Harriett's guests feel about its dark content?

Producer: Mair Bosworth

WHEN WE CEASE TO UNDERSTAND THE WORLD by Benjamin Labatut (translated by Adrian Nathan West), chosen by Ted Hodgkinson

As Head of Literature and Spoken Word-programming at the Southbank Centre in London, writers and writing are at the heart of Ted Hodgkinson's work. In 2020 he chaired the judging panel of the International Booker Prize and he has judged many other awards, including the Orwell Prize for Political Writing. His choice of a good read is a slim, genre-defying book by Chilean author Benjamin Labatut which packs a huge punch. It's about the scientists and mathematicians whose work has shaped our world, and the unintended - sometimes horrifying - consequences of scientific advancement.

Inua Ellams is a playwright, poet and curator. His work includes Barber Shop Chronicles, The Half-God of Rainfall, and an updating of Chekhov's Three Sisters, set during the Biafran Civil War, and he's recently been announced as one of the writers of the next series of Dr Who. His choice is Isabella Hammad's 2023 novel Enter Ghost. After a disastrous love affair, British-Palestinian actress Sonia goes to stay with her sister in Haifa. Intending the visit as a holiday, she finds herself investigating her family's history and getting involved in a production of Hamlet, to be staged in the West Bank.

Presenter Harriett Gilbert's choice is Ghosting by Jennie Erdal. A fascinating account of Jennie's time as ghostwriter for 'Tiger' (the publisher Naim Attallah), penning everything from novels to love letters in his name.

Producer: Mair Bosworth

Photo copyright Tiu Makkonen.

How to Stop Time by Matt Haig, chosen by Julia Bradbury

TV presenter, author and walking enthusiast Julia Bradbury recommends a fiction book by Matt Haig, How to Stop Time, which brings to life the idea of living forever.

Award-winning British-Iranian investigative journalist, documentary maker and author Ramita Navai shares the epic novel A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry, his Dickensian masterpiece of modern India.

And Harriett's choice is An Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim, capturing four ladies' unforgettable holiday on the Italian Riviera.

Produced by Beth O'Dea for BBC Audio Bristol

Photo credit David Venni

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind, translated by John E. Woods, chosen by Iszi Lawrence

Historical fiction author and broadcaster Iszi Lawrence adores the sensational novel Perfume, and has done since she was a teenager. For her, it immerses her in another world and is wonderfully cynical about the futility of chasing ultimate fulfilment through creating art and performing to a crowd.

The poet and novelist, author of Submarine, Joe Dunthorne chooses the forgotten cult classic Two Serious Ladies. It makes him happy because every sentence is a surprise, and that makes him want to write. But he admits that it's not for everyone.

And Harriett's choice is Oh William! by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author Elizabeth Strout. Which prompts the discussion, can you love a book if you loathe the central character?

Produced by Beth O'Dea for BBC Audio Bristol

Photo copyright Tom Medwell