We're bringing you a conversation from the Kobo Writing Life Podcast, where writers talk about how they're navigating the many publishing options available to authors today. Check out Jackie Lau on the Kobo Writing Life Podcast, with links to Jackie's books and the books discussed in this episode: KWL – 310 – Writing Romance, Working with Kobo Originals, and More with Jackie Lau

And here's our Q&A with Jackie on the Kobo blog: Jackie Lau on writing romance, fake dating, and Asian representation

We spoke with author and book designer CS Richardson, whose first novel The End of the Alphabet won the 2008 Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best 1st Book. His new book, All the Colour in the World is a kaleidoscopic novel about a boy's love affair with art and a man's struggle with loss. And while we had him on the line, we took the opportunity to talk a bit about his other career as one of Canada's most celebrate d book designers.

CS Richardson on writing with all the colour in the world

We spoke with Kai Thomas, author of the novel In the Upper Country. It's a story set in the fictional Canadian town of Dunmore, a place where people fleeing slavery in the southern United States build new lives.

Kai Thomas conjures fiction from the history of the upper country

Because you can never hear about too many great books, here's another batch of the best books Kobo staff read in 2022. There's memoir, investigative journalism, fun facts, romance, and more (also moors)!

The best books we read in 2022

We asked the staff of Kobo about the best eBooks and audiobooks they read in 2022, and we heard about memoirs, literary masterpieces, page-turning non-fiction, family sagas, mind-opening nature writing, sci-fi love stories across time, and so much more.

The best books we read in 2022

We spoke with award-winning science writer Harold McGee, author of the new book Nose Dive: A Field Guide to the World's Smells, a wondrous and entertaining guide to the smells of food, yes, but also of our surroundings—indoor as well as outdoor, from rotten eggs and wet dogs to coffee and perfume—and offers readers a whiff of the very building blocks of the universe itself.

Harold McGee on the science of smells

The final of three interviews we recorded at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre as part of the Toronto International Festival of Authors.

With novelists André Forget author of In the City of Pigs, and Naben Ruthnum author of A Hero of Our Time we spoke about their darkly comic novels that play with themes of work, art, and the unreality of even so-called real estate.

Beneath the veneer with Naben Ruthnum and André Forget

The second of three interviews we recorded at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre as part of the Toronto International Festival of Authors.

We interviewed novelist Jean Hanff Korelitz, author of several critically acclaimed bestselling novels, but most recently The Latecomer. It's the story of the Oppenheimer family, who are materially very comfortable, and fairly uncomfortable in just about every other way.

Jean Hanff Korelitz, live at TIFA 2022

Over the next few weeks we'll be sharing recordings of live interviews conducted at Toronto's Harbourfront Centre as part of the Toronto International Festival of Authors.

The first of these features international bestselling author Marian Keyes speaking about her pandemic project, Again, Rachel, the unexpected (to her) sequel to her breakout 90s bestseller Rachel's Holiday.

We spoke with Marian back in 2020 as well: Marian Keyes on getting older... but never feeling grown up

We were joined by actor, playwright, and novelist Ann-Marie MacDonald, author of the international bestseller Fall on Your Knees, to talk about her new novel, Fayne, a work of historical fiction about a girl named Charlotte, her father Henry, a painting of Charlotte's late mother and infant brother—and a secret that lies between them.

Ann-Marie MacDonald on staying open to surprise.