01 Feb 2020: Hafsa Lodi has covered fashion in the region for a decade, and is a seamstress and designer herself. Her non-fiction book Modesty: A Fashion Paradox is an in-depth look into a multi billion dollar retail sector that is no stranger to controversy.

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08 Feb 2020: Montegrappa Writing Prize winner Stacey Siebritz explains what the prize means to her, and UK literary agent Luigi Bonomi explains the role he'll play mentoring her and helping take her manuscript 'The Leap' to publication.

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08 Feb 2020: Tayari Jones shares the sofa with Annabelle Corton on Talking of Books live at the Emirates Festival of Literature 2020 to discuss her novel 'An American Marriage’ which traces the lives of Roy, a man wrongly convicted of a crime, and his wife Celestial. 

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08 Feb 2020: The man behind the scenes of 17 of Sir David Attenborough’s nature documentaries, award-winning cameraman Gavin Thurston, shares his secrets on how to capture cheeky monkeys at their cheekiest and chats about his book 'Journeys in the Wild: The Secret Life of a Cameraman’.

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08 Feb 2020: Scottish artist Ross Collins has illustrated over 100 books for children and written a few too. He shares his insights on drawing for children in favourites like ’There’s a Bear on My Chair’ and 'This Zoo Is Not for You’.

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08 Feb 2020: Sara-Jane Arbury and Fiona Ross are the wordsmiths behind 'Roald Dahl’s Rotsome and Repulsant Words’. They explain to Annabelle Corton how their lively lexicon lets children discover etymologies, definitions and fascinating language facts along the way.

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08 Feb 2020: Poet Kevin Crossley-Holland met Syrian refugee Nujeen Mustafa here in Dubai at the 2017 Litfest which resulted in him writing her story 'Everyday Wonders: The Girl from Aleppo’. They discuss their collaboration on the eve of a multinational choir performing their work at the Festival Finale.

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08 Feb 2020: The former foreign minister of Somaliland, Edna Adan Ismail, joins Annabelle Corton live at the Emirates Airline Festival of Literature to discuss her work reducing maternal mortality.

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08 Feb 2020: Historical fiction writer, Esi Edugyan, explains to Annabelle Corton the ideas and process behind ‘Washington Black’ the story of an eleven-year-old slave who finds himself pursuing a promise of freedom.

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08 Feb 2020: Bestselling Australian author Markus Zusak explains to the Talking of Books team the pressure of finishing a book that was 13 years in the making, and why his daughter is perhaps the sharpest critic of his productivity.

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