The Book Club

My guest in this week’s Book Club podcast is Yann Martel, talking about coming late to Homer, definitely not being influenced by Pale Fire, why he can’t resist a silly animal, and his new book Son of ...

1 Apr 33min

My guest in this week’s Book Club podcast is Stefan Fatsis, whose classic Word Freak: Heartbreak, Triumph, Genius and Obsession in the World of Competitive Scrabble is 25 years old this year. Stefan t...

25 Mar 49min

My guest in this week’s Book Club podcast is the Booker Prize-winning novelist Howard Jacobson, whose new novel Howl emerges from his rage and despair at the response to the 7 October massacre. He tel...

18 Mar 38min

My guest on this week's Book Club podcast is Lionel Shriver, whose new novel A Better Life offers among other things a savage send-up of liberal pieties on immigration. I asked Lionel what she was try...

11 Mar 38min

My guest on this week's Book Club podcast is the historian Jane Rogoyska, whose new book Hotel Exile: Paris in the Shadow of War tells the bloody story of the Second World War through the lens of Pari...

4 Mar 44min

My guest this week is Francis Spufford, whose fabulous new novel Nonesuch is a fantasy adventure set during the Blitz containing magical Nazis, nerdy TV techs and honest-to-goodness angels. He tells m...

25 Feb 30min

My guest in this week's Book Club podcast is the philosophy professor Hanna Pickard, whose new book is What Would You Do Alone in a Cage with Nothing but Cocaine? A Philosophy of Addiction. She tells ...

18 Feb 46min

In this week’s Book Club podcast my guest is Eric Schlosser, the investigative journalist whose Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal is being reissued as a Penguin Modern Classic 2...

11 Feb 41min