Brendan O'Connor

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock, you’ll know that Taylor Swift’s new album The Life of a Showgirl was released on Friday. As Swift is famous for using her lyrics to settle old scores, journalist and broadcaster, Jenn Gannon, dropped in to decode the latest songs and explain whose noses should be out of joint this time around.

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Actor and broadcaster Baz Ashmawy joined Brendan to talk about first discovering funk and disco in Cairo, backpacking, the return of his TV shows ‘The Money List’, ‘DIY SOS: The Big Build’ and ‘Faithless’. He also chose five songs to reflect his life ranging from Duran Duran to Weezer to Foster The People.

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Joining Brendan to discuss the Sunday papers are Dr. Laura Bambrick, Social Policy Officer, ICTU; Larry Donnelly, Law Lecturer at the University of Galway; Ellen Coyne, Political Correspondent with the Irish Times and David W. Higgins, Economist.

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Just three weeks after Manchán Magan’s remarkable final interview with Brendan, two of Manchán Magan’s friends, Blindboy and Liam Ó Maonlaí, pay tribute to the writer, documentary-maker, and thinker.

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Chef, writer and co-founder of Ballymalloe Cookery School gives Brendan a lesson in making traditional Irish soda bread, which she claims is baked from start to finish in less than 30 minutes. She covers white, brown, gluten free and even gives a few pimped-up versions with fruit and chocolate!

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Is there such a thing as a ‘good‘ separation? What are the right words to use when breaking-up? How can we move on afterwards? What should – and shouldn’t - you tell the children? Psychotherapist, Richard Hogan, joined Brendan to talk through break-ups, separation, and divorce.

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Author and Broadcaster Manchán Magan joined Brendan to open-up about his widespread cancer, his disdain for pity, drinking his own urine in the Himalayas, the curse of being a writer and his latest book, "Ninety-Nine Words for Rain (and One for Sun)".

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Scandanavia is an increasingly popular holiday destination, but its different countries sometimes merge into one in our imagination. So Stockholm-based Irish journalist, Philip O’Connor, gave Brendan a guide to Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and – controversially - Finland.

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Do discount shop reading glasses harm your eyes? Does staring at screens really harm our eyesight? If you need glasses to eat a meal, is something wrong? Kirk Stephenson, consultant ophthalmic surgeon at the Mater Private Network, gives Brendan tips on minding your eyes as you age.

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Donegal-born visual artist Myrid Carten has made her first feature-length film, ‘A Want In Her’, chronicling her mother Nuala’s mental illness and alcoholism journey. She offers a behind the scenes look at how her mother, who was once a social worker, then became a street drinker and how their mother-daughter relationship was affected.

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