This month World Book Club visits Paris, France to be guests of the iconic bookshop on the Left Bank of the River Seine, Shakespeare & Co. There Harriett Gilbert and a bookshop audience talk to acclaimed French writer Marie Darrieussecq about her extraordinary novel Pig Tales. Pig Tales is the story of a young woman who works at a shady Parisian massage parlour, becoming a favourite with her lustful clients until, that is, she slowly and alarmingly metamorphoses into a pig.  A dark feminist fable of political and sexual corruption, and a grim warning of what can happen in a society without a soul, Pig Tales scandalised its readers when it first came out and became the most popular first novel published in decades. (Picture: Marie Darrieussecq. Photo credit: Charles Freger.)

Marie Darrieussecq: Pig Tales

The world's great authors discuss their best-known novel.

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Percival Everett will be discussing his Booker-shortlisted novel The Trees. This powerful and fiercely funny satire centring on revenge and racial justice in America shifts genres between police procedural, magical realism and horror with wit and consummate skill. Percival Everett addresses some of America’s darkest history with an unusual mix of playfulness and political seriousness.

Percival Everett: The Trees

Award-winning Australian novelist Charlotte Wood joins Harriett Gilbert to answer questions from readers around the world about her novel, The Weekend.  It's a story of grief and friendship; three women meet to clear their deceased friend’s beach house and find themselves uncovering secrets and stirring up memories. (Image: Charlotte Wood. Photo credit: Carly Earl.)

Charlotte Wood: The Weekend

Multi award-winning novelist Ann Patchett will be discussing The Dutch House.   A dark modern fairytale set against the very real world of post-WWII Philadelphia, tracing the love between a brother and sister, their vanishing mother, distant father and jealous stepmother. Ann Patchett tells the story of a family over five decades with a finely balanced mixture of wit and heartbreak. (Image: Ann Patchett. Photo credit: Emily Dorio.)

Ann Patchett: The Dutch House

World Book Café heads to Madrid to talk to writers about a new boom in feminist fiction. A few month after the resignation of President of the Spanish Football Federation over a non-consensual kiss of footballer Jenni Hermoso at the World Cup final, World Book Café investigates how Madrid’s women writers are challenging gender roles in the books world.

Madrid

Presenter Harriett Gilbert and readers around the world talk to acclaimed Italian physicist and writer Carlo Rovelli about his runaway bestseller Seven Brief Lessons on Physics. A compact and engaging exploration of some of the most fundamental ideas in modern physics this book takes readers on a captivating journey through seven concise chapters, each dedicated to a different topic. From the theory of relativity to quantum mechanics and the nature of time, Rovelli presents complex concepts with remarkable clarity, making them accessible to a wide audience. Throughout the book, Rovelli weaves together the history of scientific discovery with his own personal reflections, creating a narrative that is both poetic and thought-provoking. Delving into the mysteries of the universe and examining our own place in the cosmos Rovelli invites readers to ponder the profound questions that physics raises about the nature of space, time, and existence itself. (Photo: Carlo Rovelli. Credit: Christopher Wahl.)

Marie Darrieussecq: Pig Tales

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