Book It In

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What do books tell us about the world we live in? Join Lucy Clark, Paul Daley and Zoya Patel for conversations with top authors about the ideas that shape their work. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify

The Guardian


    • Apr 29, 2022 LATEST EPISODE
    • infrequent NEW EPISODES
    • 39m AVG DURATION
    • 16 EPISODES


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    Latest episodes from Book It In

    Paul Cleary on land rights, native title and big mining

    Play Episode Listen Later Apr 29, 2022 38:01


    Paul Cleary documents the Yindjibarndi community's resistance and fight against Fortescue Mining Group. It's an ongoing David versus Goliath story that has taken decades, and even gone to the high court

    Omar Musa on using humour to talk about racism, colonialism and inequality

    Play Episode Listen Later Apr 22, 2022 49:20


    Drawing on a printmaking technique he learned from punk-rock climate activists in Borneo, Malaysian Australian author and poet Omar Musa wrestles with race, family and isolation in Killernova, his new book of poetry and art. He talks to Zoya Patel and also performs poems from his new book

    Hannah Kent on challenging shame through historical fiction

    Play Episode Listen Later Apr 15, 2022 33:16


    Hannah Kent's novel, Devotion, is a queer love story that is set in a pious, nineteenth century religious community. In resisting the narrative of shame that has dominated the retelling of this time in history, Kent is challenging the way authors represent the past

    Craig Sherborne on love, death and complicated mothers

    Play Episode Listen Later Apr 8, 2022 31:07


    Craig Sherborne's novel The Grass Hotel tells the story of caring for a mother who is declining with dementia. He talks to Paul Daley about his own complex upbringing – one that was affectionate, but also filled with stilted and misunderstood expressions of care

    Yumna Kassab on how we imagine Australia in literature

    Play Episode Listen Later Apr 1, 2022 22:13


    Australiana is a novel set in a nameless town in rural Australia, where Yumna Kassab explores interconnected experiences of inequality. In doing so, she also makes us pause and reflect on how Australia is represented through literature

    Chelsea Watego on sovereignty, survival and self-determination in the colony | Book It In podcast

    Play Episode Listen Later Mar 25, 2022 45:43


    Paul Daley speaks to Chelsea Watego about why she says ‘fuck hope' and why she wants to take her book, Another Day in the Colony, to Aboriginal readers in prisons

    Heidi Everett on foxes, care and language of the mental health system

    Play Episode Listen Later Mar 17, 2022 46:25


    Based on more than four decades of lived experience in the public mental health system, Heidi Everett uses the lyricism of music and the drawings of a four-legged friend to describe her various mental states. In doing so, she expresses the difference between treatment and cure, recovery and healing, and existing and living

    Emily Bitto on gender and the hero's quest

    Play Episode Listen Later Jan 27, 2022 40:43


    In a road trip prompted by an Australian man's imagination of America, Emily Bitto explores the literary trope of the masculine hero's quest – through her novel Wild Abandon

    Marion Frith on hope in the aftermath of war

    Play Episode Listen Later Jan 20, 2022 35:24


    Paul Daley talks to Marion Frith about how she wrote a novel about life after loss and human resilience in the midst of trauma – by telling the story through an unlikely friendship between two fictional characters

    Debi Marshall on the popularity of true crime

    Play Episode Listen Later Jan 13, 2022 41:30


    Through personal tragedy and time spent telling the stories of victims, investigative crime journalist Debi Marshall says she's found that closure doesn't exist. So why do people read, and why do authors write, true crime?

    Rawah Arja on how to get inside the mind of a teenage boy

    Play Episode Listen Later Jan 6, 2022 48:24


    Rawah Arja was determined to write a YA novel for – and about – teenage boys in Western Sydney. She tells Zoya Patel about how she created a story about religion, rivalries, romance, racism and redemption in The F Team

    Tony Birch on writing true characters in fiction

    Play Episode Listen Later Dec 30, 2021 56:25


    Paul Daley talks to Tony Birch about finding affection on the so-called margins of the inner city, the injustice of climate change and Blak humour. Birch also describes why he doesn't view his fiction as having a political message

    Kathryn Heyman on fury, trauma and personal transformation

    Play Episode Listen Later Dec 23, 2021 39:56


    Features editor Lucy Clark talks to Kathryn Heyman about the indignities that women endure throughout their lives and the craft of writing a memoir

    Alice Pung on writing as work

    Play Episode Listen Later Dec 16, 2021 51:37


    In conversation with Zoya Patel, Alice Pung talks about the writing life and having a separate job – while also navigating the publishing industry as a woman and person of colour

    Tara June Winch and Thomas Mayor on Indigenous masculinity

    Play Episode Listen Later Dec 9, 2021 54:07


    Dear Son is a searing anthology of letters by First Nations fathers and sons. Two of Australia's best authors discuss the tenderness and strength of Indigenous masculinity, in conversation with author and journalist Paul Daley

    Introducing: Book It In

    Play Episode Listen Later Dec 2, 2021 0:58


    What do books tell us about the world we live in? Join Guardian Australia features editor Lucy Clark, author and journalist Paul Daley, and writer and editor Zoya Patel for a weekly conversation with a top author about the ideas that shape their work

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