BOOKED IN

As another day of jury deliberations in the Lindsay Clancy trial continued, I sat down with Boston-based journalist Dave Wedge to chat about another Massachusetts case that captured international attention - the Karen Read trial. His new book, Blizzard of Lies, went straight onto The New York Times bestseller list, and provides captivating insight into the death of John O'Keefe, the explosion of online speculation and the accusations of police corruption.

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For much of my life I knew nothing about Belgium's King Leopold II and his brutal subjugation of millions in the DRC - what was ironically then called the 'Congo Free State'. To be clear, millions were killed, terrorised and utterly exploited by a monarch who used the country as his personal colony. Adam Hochschild's powerful book, King Leopold's Ghost, makes for a deeply uncomfortable but essential read. I had the honour and privilege of speaking to him earlier this week.

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How will future generations look back at the media reporting of Gaza in the years since October 7? In her new book, The Complicit Lens - US Media Coverage of Israel’s Genocide in Gaza - Professor Robin Andersen outlines a damning case against many of the most recognisable mainstream outlets. It’s a longer episode than normal, but because I believe the topic warranted the time. 

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We live in a world today where millions of people are serving time for drug offences, while others are making the most the now billion dollar cannabis industry. I had a wonderful chat recently with Kojo Koram about this shift from mass criminalisation, to mass commercialisation. His new book, 'The Next Fix', explores the winners and losers in the future of drugs and raises so many interesting questions for our society to ponder.

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Over the course of eight years, a man called Stephane Breitwieser stole more than 300 objects and pieces of art. In total, they were worth an estimated $1.4 billion. He is now widely considered the most prolific art thief in history, but he was never motivated by money - just a love for art. 

The fascinating true crime story was documented in the 2023 best seller, 'The Art Thief'. Author Mike Finkel kindly granted me a rare interview to chat about the book, and the crime itself.  

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Pope Leo is the first American Pope in history, yet remarkably he has not yet had a conversation with President Trump. 

They did, however, get into a war of words in April, after Pope Leo criticised the Trump administration's mass deportation policies. Things escalated further when Pope Leo said Trump’s threat to destroy “a whole civilisation” in Iran was “truly unacceptable”. 

CNN’s Vatican Correspondent, Christopher Lamb, has written a timely book called ‘American Hope, and spoke to me all about the Chicago born pontiff and his impact on the international stage.  

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Professor Omer Bartov is a leading scholar on the Holocaust, and history of genocide. He is also a man who was born and raised in Israel, served in the IDF during the Yom Kippur war in 1973, and was raised in the country just a decade after the end of World War II and the Holocaust - in the beginning years of the establishment of the state. 

In July 2025, Bartov wrote a piece in The New York Times entitled; ‘I’m a Genocide Scholar, I Know It When I See It’. In it, he wrote about reaching the ‘inescapable conclusion’ that Israel was committing genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza. He recently spoke to me about his recently published book called ‘Israel: What Went Wrong?’, where he argues Zionism in its current form is beyond repair.

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What is it like to be a female spy in the CIA? It’s a mysterious world we as members of the public have very little access to. However, Christina Hillsberg - herself a former agent - has written a fantastic book called Agents of Change. It explores the untold stories of some of the most revered and respected women to have worked for the intelligence agency despite the significant challenges a life in espionage often presented to them.

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