Datshiane Navanayagam talks to two writers of romantic fiction about their passion for creating stories that end happily ever after.

Kiru Taye wanted to read stories about Africans falling in love. When she couldn’t find those books, she decided to write the stories herself. The books in her Essien series about millionaire banker brothers are international bestsellers, she also writes about crime gangs and tribal rivalry. Kiru founded the publishing firm Love Africa Press and is a co-founder of Romance Writers of Wonderful Africa, a support organisation for African romance writers.

US writer Nisha Sharma’s books have been included in 'best-of' lists by The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, Cosmopolitan, The Washington Post, Time Magazine and more. Growing up in a South Asian home she enjoyed the romantic storylines of Bollywood movies and traditional folktales like the epic Rama and Sita. Nisha joined the corporate world but quickly turned to writing Romantic Fiction and Young Adult novels too. Her books feature business mergers and re-imagine Shakespearean comedy with a South Asian twist.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

Image: (L) Kiru Taye credit Kiru Taye. (R) Nisha Sharma credit Marco Calderon.)

Rising sea levels and increasingly powerful storms are threatening coastlines, low-lying island states and coastal cities around the world. Ella Al-Shamahi talks to two women from Sri Lanka and France about how they’re using satellites to track coastal erosion and develop strategies to reduce its impact on populations.

Sarah Dole is a Sri Lankan physicist and entrepreneur leading a satellite image analysis project in the Maldives, the world’s lowest lying country, looking at the rate at which beaches erode. She co-founded Invena – a company carrying out research and helping develop technology that aims to preserve low-lying nations.

Anne-Laure Beck is a French geomatic and remote-sensing engineer. She's the EU lead on coastal erosion for the environmental consultancy Argans. They use satellite-based earth observation and geographical information systems to map and monitor environments in order to track coastal erosion and accretion to inform coastal management and protection plans.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

Image: (L) Sarah Dole credit Ali Amir @aliaerials. (R) Anne-Laure Beck credit Anne-Laure Beck.)

Less than 0.001% of the deep ocean has been explored. Ella Al-Shamahi speaks to two women from South Africa and the US who have dedicated their careers to finding out more about our planet's most uncharted depths.

Dr Katy Croff Bell is an American ocean explorer and deep-sea technologist. She has over 15 years of experience leading ground-breaking oceanographic and archaeological projects. Katy is the founder of the Ocean Discovery League, an organisation dedicated to expanding global access to deep-sea exploration by developing affordable, durable technology for scientists and researchers.

Dr Zoleka Filander is an award-winning South African marine biologist with South Africa’s Department of Fisheries, Forestry, and Environment. She leads pioneering expeditions into uncharted marine territories, gathering crucial data to inform conservation strategies. Zoleka is passionate about sharing the deep ocean’s wonders to inspire public respect and a sense of urgency for its preservation.

Produced by Emily Naylor

(Image: (L) Katy Croff Bell courtesy of Katy Croff Bell. (R) Zoleka Filander credit Logan Lambert.)

Women fusing tech and agriculture to farm food - indoors, local and soil-free

The music industry is notoriously competitive, making it difficult for artists to break through. Datshiane Navanayagam speaks to two music scouts to find out what they look for when signing musicians to their labels and how to succeed in the business.

Jane Abernethy is Managing Director at Omnian Music Group, a Brooklyn-based label group comprised of Captured Tracks, Sinderlyn and 2MR. Originally from Scotland she began her career music scouting in the UK before becoming the Director of A&R at the US label 4AD, where she signed groundbreaking artists like Grimes and contributed to the discovery of Bon Iver.

Produced by Emily Naylor and Elena Angelides

(Image: (L) Jane Abernethy credit Dan Bessini. (R) Laura Tesoriero credit Catalina Bartolome.)

According to the UN, the fashion industry is responsible for 8-10% of global emissions. That's more than aviation and shipping combined. We talk to two women making climate-friendly clothes and developing innovative textiles in a bid to reduce the waste produced by fast fashion.

Regina Polanco is the founder and CEO of Pyratex, a textile company making fabrics from seaweed, banana and orange peel for some of the biggest brands in fashion. Born in Vienna, she has also lived in Morocco, Mauritania and Switzerland but she returned to Spain, the country where she grew up, to found her company in 2014.

Sasha McKinlay grew up in Singapore and moved to the United States to study architecture. Now a design researcher at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, she's developing so-called 'active' textiles. They're essentially textiles with embedded functionality without the need for electronic inputs. These include materials that can be either warm or cool depending on the weather, and garments that can be made in a single size and robotically tailored to fit the wearer or to be customised into new styles.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

(Image: (L) Sasha McKinlay credit Katie Koskey. (R) Regina Polanco credit Pyratex.)

Everyone wants to feel confident in the workplace. But knowing what to do to perform at your best isn’t always easy. Datshiane Navanayagam is joined by two entrepreneurs and career coaches to explore strategies to help women thrive in their jobs.

Jo Wimble Groves is an award-winning British entrepreneur, writer and motivational speaker specializing in women in the workplace. She has a blog tacking work-life balance and resilience called Guilty Mother which has a global following of 55,000 readers. Jo's expertise in leadership and productivity has earned her multiple Women in Business awards.

Alexandra Roxana Popa from Romania built her successful business career with the guidance of inquisitive mentors who helped her grow by asking the right questions. After training at CTI Coaching school in London she became a career coach and focusses on empowering women in their professional journeys.

Produced by Emily Naylor

(Image: (L) Jo Wimble Groves credit Leana Catherine Photography. (R) Alexandra Popa credit Ioana Dodan.)

Datshiane Navanayagam talks to translators from Turkey and Argentina about giving a writer's work a new life in another language, and whether the age of digital translation is putting the craft in jeopardy.

Ekin Oklap is Turkish and grew up in Italy. She's the English language translator for Nobel prize-winning Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk and was shortlisted for the 2016 International Booker Prize. She also translates books from Italian to English for novelist Francesca Manfredi and crime writer Ilaria Tuti.

Erika Cosenza is an Argentinian translator, interpreter, editor and proof-reader. She translates English, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese. She now lives in Spain and helped set up a gender, diversity and inclusion network for the International Association of Professional Translators and Interpreters.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

This episode was edited on 6 November 2024

(Image: (L) Erika Cosenza credit Gisela Caffarena. (R) Ekin Oklap credit Alev Arasli Oklap.)

Femicide is defined as the intentional killing of women and girls because of their gender. More than half of these murders are carried out in the home. According to UN figures 89,000 women and girls lost their life to femicide in 2022 alone. Datshiane Navanayagam talks to two women in Puerto Rico and Kenya about their efforts to reduce the number of deaths.

Judy Gitau is a Kenyan lawyer whose work involves gaining access to justice for victims of sexual and gender based violence. She works for Equality Now, a campaigning organisation using the power of the law to protect and promote the human rights of women and girls.

Debora Upegui-Hernandez is a Colombian analyst working for The Gender Equity Observatory in Puerto Rico. The Observatory was founded by a coalition of feminist and human rights organisations in Puerto Rico following increases in gender violence after hurricanes Irma and María in 2017.

Produced by Jane Thurlow

(Image: (L) Judy Gitau credit Equality Now. (R) Debora Upegui-Hernandez credit Prisma Fotografia.)

What happens when women bring traditional folklore into the horror genre and subvert it? You get award-winning feature length films, Iranian vampires and Mayan werewolves to name a few examples. Ella Al-Shamahi is joined by Iranian-American filmmaker Ana Lily Amirpour and Mexican filmmaker Gigi Saul Guerrero to discuss how to create horror on screen.

Ana Lily Amirpour’s award-winning debut feature film, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, is a Persian-language Western-horror. It follows a skateboarding vampire who wears a chador and haunts the fictional Iranian ghost-town of Bad City. Feminist readings have interpreted the vampire as a vigilante who preys on men that disrespect women. Ana's later films have included big stars such as Kate Hudson, Suki Waterhouse, Jason Momoa and Keanu Reeves.

Gigi Saul Guerrero is known by fans as La Muñeca Del Terror, which means The Horror Babe. She gained recognition for La Quinceañera, a horror series based on the Mexican traditional celebration of a girl’s fifteenth birthday. Her film Culture Shock follows a Mexican woman who crosses the border into the US in hope of finding the American dream. What she finds instead is an American nightmare. Gigi's work often draws from Mesoamerican folklore and Mexican tradition.

(Image: Gigi Saul Guerrero. Credit: Luchagore Productions. And Ana Lily Amirpour. Credit: Gilbert Flores/Variety/Getty Images)