Books and Authors

By BBC Radio 4

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How many episodes does Books and Authors have?

The podcast currently has 947 episodes available.

Books and Authors episodes:

July 21, 2024 Irenosen Okojie
Irenosen Okojie talks to Johny Pitts about her new book, Curandera.
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28min
July 15, 2024 A Good Read: Helen Lederer and Ilaria Bernardini
BOOKS:
WISHFUL DRINKING by CARRIE FISHER
FORBIDDEN NOTEBOOK by ALBA DE CESPEDES
YELLOWFACE by REBECCA F KUANG
Harriett's guests today are comedian and writer Helen Lederer known for so many roles including as Catrionia in Absolutely Fabulous. Recently she has published her memoir Not That I'm Bitter and set up the Comedy Writing In Print Prize. She has opted for the hugely witty and knowing memoir Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher detailing her tumultuous life as the child of two Hollywood stars who often couldn't separate fantasy from reality.
Ilaria Bernardini is an Italian novelist and screenwriter. She is currently working on Bernardo Bertolucci’s final script which Ilaria co-wrote with hi -The Echo Chamber. Her choice is the seminal feminist Italian novel Forbidden Notebook by the Italian-Cuban writer Alba de Cespedes about the inner life of an Italian housewife and Mama of the family.
Harriett's choice is Yellowface by Rebecca F Kuang - a cautionary tale for our times of plagiarism, cultural appropriation, social media storms and more.
Producer: Maggie Ayre
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28min
July 14, 2024 Garth Risk Hallberg
Johny Pitts speaks to Garth Risk Hallberg about his new novel, The Second Coming.
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28min
July 08, 2024 A Good Read: Gyles Brandreth and Hannah Critchlow
Writer and broadcaster Gyles Brandreth has chosen EF Benson's entertaining tale of competitive snobbery in the 1920s, Mapp and Lucia. In a contrasting choice, neuroscientist Hannah Critchlow advocates for Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi, a story of a Ghanaian family transplanted to Alabama which takes in neuroscience and opiate addiction. Harriett has gone for a real crowd-pleaser in E. Nesbit's The Railway Children and all three enjoy a bit of nostalgia for the times when children could run free having adventures around the railway.
Produced for BBC Audio Bristol by Sally Heaven.
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28min
July 01, 2024 A Good Read: Sebastian Faulks and Tessa Hadley
VOICES IN THE EVENING by Natalia Ginzburg (trans. DM Low), chosen by Tessa Hadley
THE ZONE OF INTEREST by Martin Amis (trans. Jessica Moore), chosen by Sebastian Faulks
EASTBOUND by Maylis de Kerangal, chosen by Harriett Gilbert
Two authors pick books they love with Harriett Gilbert.
Tessa Hadley (Late In The Day, Free Love, After The Funeral) takes us to post-war Italy with Voices In The Evening by Natalia Ginzburg. The drama, suffering and fascism are in the past, but traumas surface in the day-to-day, with first loves and lost chances.
Sebastian Faulks (Birdsong, Human Traces, The Seventh Son) chooses The Zone of Interest by Martin Amis, after watching the hit film by Jonathan Glazer and wanting to read the book it was inspired by. The haunting novel follows a Nazi officer who has become enamoured with the Auschwitz camp commandant's wife, and goes inside the minds of the commandant, who lives with his family right next to the concentration camp.
Harriett Gilbert brings Eastbound by Maylis de Kerangal, a gripping novella set on the Trans-Siberian Railway, with a chance encounter between a desperate Russian conscript and a French woman.
Produced by Eliza Lomas for BBC Audio Bristol
Join the conversation on Instagram @bbcagoodread
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28min
June 30, 2024 Rita Bullwinkel
Rita Bullwinkel, Mohsin Hamid and Téa Obreht
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28min
June 25, 2024 A Good Read: Doon Mackichan and Bruce Robinson
Recorded at the Hay Festival
SHUGGIE BAIN by Douglas Stewart
ON THE BLACK HILL by Bruce Chatwin
AGAINST NATURE by Joris-Karl Huysmans
Harriett Gilbert takes to the stage in the BBC Marquee at the Hay Festival for a special edition of the programme recorded in front of an audience.
Actor and writer Doon Mackichan known for her outrageous character Cathy in the sitcom Two Doors Down chooses Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stewart as her good read. It's a touching but heartbreaking tale of a young Glaswegian boy's desperate efforts to save his mother Agnes from the alcoholism that ruins and degrades her. It won the Booker Prize in 2020.
As we're in Wales Harriett's fitting choice is Bruce Chatwin's On The Black Hill an account of rural Welsh life in the mid 20th century. It's the story of two brothers' lives over 80 years and their connection to land and community.
Bruce Robinson actor, director and writer of the hit film Withnail and I which has been adapted for stage chooses a book that features in the final scene of the film. The I character places two books in a suitcase at the end of the film, one of which is A Rebours - Against Nature by Joris-Karl Huysmans. Bruce confesses that he's not the book's biggest fan but the ensuing discussion provides an entertaining insight into books we might read when we're younger and how differently we feel about them in later life. It's the story of an eccentric recluse Jean des Esseintes in 19th century France who loathes people and creates a fantasy world for himself but ultimately suffers from his self-inflicted pretentious ennui.
"I wish I hadn't chosen this book" proclaims Bruce Robinson as he introduces it. "I wish you hadn't chosen it" agrees Doon Mackichan. They then elicit a lot of audience laughter from their deconstruction of this seminal French novel that all three find pretentious.
This is a longer version of the broadcast programme.
Producer: Maggie Ayre
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40min
June 23, 2024 A Passage to India
Shahidha Bari discusses EM Forster's A Passage to India with Neel Mukherjee, Elizabeth Lowry and Dr Chris Mourant.
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28min
June 17, 2024 A Good Read: Denise Mina and Simon Brett
ABSENT IN THE SPRING by Agatha Christie (writing as Mary Westmacott) (HarperCollins), chosen by Simon Brett
IN THE GARDEN OF THE FUGITIVES by Ceridwen Dovey (Penguin), chosen by Denise Mina
HIDE MY EYES by Margery Allingham (Penguin), chosen by Harriett Gilbert
Crime writers Denise Mina and Simon Brett join Harriett Gilbert to read each other's favourite books.
Simon chooses Agatha Christie under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, with Absent In The Spring. It’s a story without any detective and one that, perhaps, reveals a more personal side to Christie's writing.
Denise picks the novel In the Garden of the Fugitives by South African-Australian author Ceridwen Dovey, an epistolary novel which begins with a letter that breaks seventeen years of silence between a rich, elderly man with a broken heart and his former protegee, a young South African filmmaker.
And for the occasion of having two crime authors, Harriett Gilbert picks a golden age crime book, Hide My Eyes by Margery Allingham, where private detective Albert Campion finds himself hunting down a serial killer.
Producer: Eliza Lomas for BBC Audio in Bristol
Join the conversation @agoodreadbbc Instagram
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28min
June 16, 2024 Open Book - Kevin Barry
Johny Pitts talks to Kevin Barry about his new novel, The Heart in Winter
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28min

FAQs about Books and Authors:

How many episodes does Books and Authors have?

The podcast currently has 947 episodes available.