The Author Archive Podcast

This conversation looks back at the post war time when all the world aspired to be young and American. America was really perceived to be great back then.  How times change ........ Joseph Connolly paints a rock 'n roll picture.

After Ashley Kahn had published his book on the Miles Davis album Kind of Blue he turned his attention to the timeless John Coltrane record A Love Supreme. Not only is this still a highly regarded jazz performance, A Love Supreme is now the title of the biggest open air jazz festival in the UK.

Duke Ellington is famous, but what was he really like. In this biography published in 2000,  Stuart Nicholson writes about the man who was a brilliant  instinctive and  sophisticated musician. Was he then a bit of a goody goody? As Stuart Nicholson told me he was not in any way a goody goody!      

The Oxford Companion to Music is probably the most famous music reference book of them all. The latest edition was first published in 2002. It has over 120 contributors and covers covers the whole universe of music. I spoke to the editor Alison Latham soon after publication. A huge task to pull such a tome together ..... but maybe an enjoyable job?    

As the news from America becomes more and more worrying it's good to look back to the last century when everything was different and some American rock musicians brought joy to the world.  Peace and Love meant something back then. The Grateful Dead were very successful despite having no chart hits and they had a huge dedicated fanbase. They were formed in California in 1965 and performed regularly for 30 years. The anniversaries have spawned renewed interest in the band. Dennis McNally was their official archivist. This conversation was recorded in 2015.

Kind of Blue is the most successful jazz LP ever made. It was recorded over two sessions in New York in 1959 and is still revered as a masterpiece. Ashley Kahn told David Freeman the story behind a historic music event.

A Line in the Sand is a novel about two friends on an adventure in the Middle East based on an actual journey two real life friends took to Saudi Arabia and Damascus in 2006.  One of the inspirations for the trip was T.E Lawrence - Lawrence of Arabia. The two authors Miles Spencer and Wells Jones had worked on a stage play based on the life of Lawrence and they decided to take a trip to see the landscape for themselves and meet the people Lawrence identified with. This conversation with Wells Jones took place on 15th January 2025 when a cease fire had just been signed between Israel and Hamsas. Line in the Sand explains some of the long history behind the conflict in the Middle East.      

Joe Boyd is a man about music, record producer, a film producer and author. He arrived in London in 1964 with Muddy Waters and a host of blues musicians who played to sold out UK audiences when they were unappreciated in their US homeland. In this conversation he talks about Nick Drake, Paul Simon, The Incredible String Band, Paul Butterfield, MIke Bloomfield and the enduring power of real music. A thought provoking podcast.

Steve Kershaw has two personas .... he is Steve the musician and Dr Stephen the classics tutor. He is involved in two new projects. One is a magnificent illustrated childrens encyclopedia of gods, monsters and mortals from ancient Greece. The other is a jazz trio recording. Steve is the Oxfordshire based bass player. The pianist and saxophonist Leonid and Nick Vintskevich are Russian . As Steve tells me the wide geographical distribution sometimes make rehearsal tricky! The record is called 'I'll Show You a Beautiful Country.

Bitter Crop is a superb biography of Billie Holiday who was probably the very best jazz singer there has ever been. The book title is takes from one of Billie's signature songs, 'Strange Fruit'. There have been films and many books about Billie's career but not all of them came close to telling the whole truth of a remarkable life. True there were drugs and alcohol but there was so mucah more than that. There was huge musical success and adulation -  Billie considered her life to be a triumph. The conversation took place in July 2024 ..... 65 years after Billie died.

Taylor Swift attracts huge interest in her song lyrics. They are studied as poetry. Rowland Bagnall is a different sort of poet. Near - Life Experience,  his new collection is just published When I spoke to him we talked about his poetic motivation and the process of writing these concentrated nuggets of observation. His replies are thoughtful and enlightening.

Tim Coulson talks about his book which tells the  amazing story of 13.8 billion years of history from the Big Bang to you! It is a wonderful read - inspiring, gripping and fascinating. And just a thought .... did a deity have a hand in the story? Tim explains his view!    

This glorious popular science books tells the story of how black holes that were  thought to be too ridiculous to exist in 1916 had by 1971  been proved to exist. Einstein thought they were impossible but in 1971 Paul Murdin and Louise Webster discovered the very first black hole, Cygnus X-1 Marcus tells the story of these extraordinary people who discovered that black holes are centre stage in the cosmos. Indeed without black holes it is unlikely that we would exist. Fasten your seat belts and prepare to be amazed. A great book for the curious!!      

Truddi Chase lived with dissociative identity disorder a condition that used to be called multiple personality disorder. On the cover of her book the author was named as 'The Troops' - the name she gave to her 90 plus identities. When I interviewed her she was with her therapist Robert Phillips. The whole story was very difficult to assimilate as you can probably hear. Truddi died in 2010 but there is a website dedicated to her and her autobiography is still in demand. It seems that her condition was a result of abuse in her childhood. A story like no other!

This interview is one I remember with huge affection. Mostly I would talk to an author for 20 minutes or so but this conversation is twice that. It was recorded in the spring of 1984 when 'Oranges are Not the Only Fruit' was first published. I was very fortunate because I was one of the very first broadcasters to interview Jeanette. I had been reading the book in bed the night before and was buzzing with enthusiasm for it when I met her. Hear the author talk about her life in religious Accrington and rejecting the faith will make reading the book essential

This new book is terrific - its a revelation. Catherine has studied texts written around the same time as the writings we know as the gospels.  Some of these ancient documents tell the story of the bible characters we are familiar with in a totally different way. Listen to Catherine talk about her research and you will be surprised ..... probably very surprised!!

Ashley Mullinger is a commercial fisherman. She used to work in an office but found it dull and stressful. She  decided to go on a half day fishing trip with a couple of her friends just to make a change. The friends sort of liked it but Ashley REALLY liked it and now does it as a full time job. She is so good at it she was awarded the title of 'Fisherman of the Year'. In this conversation she explains her passion for the life and her fears for the future of the whole commercial fishing industry.  

Eric Bibb remembers his introduction into music via his dad Leon and the musical luminaries who visited the family home. Paul Robeson was his Godather, and a very young Bob Dylan gave him some sound advice. Now 72 Eric is still touring, playing, and writing songs. He is one of lifes gentlemen!

This novel is set in the 1960s with a backdrop of The Beatles and other music of the time. It tells the story of Daisy Shoemaker who is 15 in 1964. She was born into a fundamentalist Mormon community on the US - Canada border. In a ceremony called Placement she is given as a teenage wife to a much older man. She finds this intolerable and runs away. The church official who makes the decisions is known as Bishop and he assures his followers that he has a direct line to God. Amazingly they believe him. It's a gripping and enraging read. It's fiction but events like the book describes are still happening today. The fundamentalist cult is vey much alive and well. There is a Netflix documentary about the group .. Keep Sweet : Pray and Obey.

This novel, written by an environmental activist who lives in Ibiza, is about a young environmental activist who travels to Ibiza to meet her biological father for the very first time. It's a story of family drama, but it is also the story of a paradise island under threat. A great holiday read!

This brand new book examines the astonishing extent of American ownership in UK business. Whether you are interested in 'taking back control' or how much of our day to day financial transactions happen via the US, you will find this fascinating and possibly horrifying.

Sunken Lands is about a journey through flooded kingdoms and lost worlds. Gareth tells of places he has visited to see history and extrapolates forward to imagine the world we are leaving for future generations. There is anger, poetry, myth .... and David Bowie.

This conversation was recorded in 2000 when Robin Eggar's biography of Tom Jones was first published. At this time Tom's wife, Linda, was still alive and Tom himself was a mere 60 years old. It emerges from this interview that the man born Thomas Woodward was driven by two passions. What they are is revealed in this Author Archive episode.

Jon Ronson was not so well known when this conversation was recorded in the early 2000s I was very taken with the subject of the book and the way Jon talked about it. Being a Jewish journalist getting involved with people money raising for Hamas seemed improbable. It's true of course, as was Jon's interest in the wilder fancies of David Icke. 'Them' is a terrific read.

This conversation was recorded when the very last Maeve Binchy novel was published in paperback. Maeve was always an entertaining interviewee - getting her to talk was never a problem! Unsurprisingly her books continue to sell.  

Magnus Magnusson died in 2007. He was  77. I spoke to Magnus when his history of Scotland was first published in 2000. Our conversation covered thoughts on Scottish independence, the film Braveheart, Shakespeare and whatever happened to the Picts. There was so much more to Magnus than being the chair .....I've started so I'll finish ..... of Mastermind!      

Her sister died of breast cancer and Justine just couldn't accept that her much loved sister had gone. This is conversation about grief and loss but it also about the lengths the bereaved will go to to re establish a link with the departed loved one. Despite being a journalist Justine tried everything and everybody. Mediums, spiritualists and people who really thought that there could be communication with the dead via a computer spell check. So what belief is Justine left with?

Although this account of the life lead by Henry VIII was first published at the turn of the century it is still selling well. Alison Weir thinks the key to understanding the famous Tudor King is to realise that he was never alone. Even a conjugal visit to his wife or a trip to the loo were attended by courtiers. Popular accessible history at it's entertaining best.

A brand new novel by first time author Clementine Taylor. It is the story of two young women Aisling and Maya and their love. Of course it isn't a simple story. The complications and obstacles are engagingly told. The book is a real page turner. Both women are charismatic characters and as a reader you are supporting both of them ...... so how does it end?    

Jilly Cooper has every reason to be very jolly. Her football novel is out for Christmas and Disney have made a movie of one of her stories. I met Jilly when her novel Pandora was first published. She was jolly then too!!

This is a brilliant novel set in Leningrad in September 1941. It tells of love in a time of unimaginable hardship. The horrific reality of a siege is being played out again in the Middle East  and Russian history is relevant to the war in Ukraine. Helen Dunmore was a major literary talent. Helen died of cancer in 2017.

'Revenge - God's gift to women!'  That's the message printed on the cover of this book. So does the author know what the desire for revenge feels like?

Sarah Waters burst onto the literary scene at the very end of the last century with her novel 'Tipping the Velvet' The story centered on the love between two women in Victorian England. Her next novel Affinity was again set in Victorian times and centres on the spiritualism beliefs of the time. In this interview Sarah talked to me about her novel Fingersmith. In Victorian slang what was a Fingersmith? And how did a collector of contempory pornography have a place in the story?

This novel was nominated for award when it was first published over 20 years ago. It has a message of acceptance and tolerance which, sadly, is still totally relevant. The novel was republished last year.  

Seems to some of us that the shadow of Brexit hangs over the Tory conference. Many of the leading players are only where they are because they are Brexiteers. Professor Grey has made it a personal mission to chronicle the drama and effects of Brexit. He writes a blog and now the latest edition of his book "Brexit Unfolded" is published bringing the story up to date. Does this mean that the Brexit story has reached a conclusion? Maybe not!!!      

Anita Shreve was a very successful writer mainly focussing on love and romance. She died in 2018 but her books still sell very well. She wrote the stories and lived the life marrying four times. She talked to me about her novel which is about a love that lasted through life even though the couple hadn't spent their lives together. I remember her as a very attractive and sparkly interviewee.

Lisa has lived life to the full. She is a very beguiling woman and many men have fallen for her charms and married her. On the day I interviewed her she was in the mood for remembering her life and loves in wonderful detail.

This conversation too place in the West End of London to mark the publication of the third in the shopaholic series of stories. As the interview progressed it wasn't clear whether we were talking about a real wedding or the fictional 'over the top' one. This title is alive and well. The audiobook was published on Sept 1st 2023 and the paperback is still on sale.

Emeritus Professor Sir Barry Cunliffe is an academic archaeologist who writes enthusiastically and engagingly about his passions. In this interview he talks to me about his book which tells the whole of African human history focussing on the Sahara. Sir Barry takes the story of us from our evolution through to the present day. Is he optimistic about our survival?

Gerald McCaughrean is a hugely successful author of books for children. The Kite Rider is recognised as a classic and in this conversation she tells me about the background to her story and man lifting kites!

Colin Dexter was a splendid writer. His creation Inspector Morse is superb on the page and just as gripping on television. I used to meet Colin in the pub on Banbury Road in Oxford, The Dew Drop. He was great company and almost completely unaware of his success and star quality. I recorded this conversation in his house after the publication of The Remorseful Day. He was relaxed and very happy to look back at his life in education and crime writing.

These  revelations about life at the Tudor Court are now well known , but when I talked to Philippa Gregory about 'The Other Boleyn Girl' it was all quite new. When the book was first published it won romantic novel of the year. For a book that starts and ends with an execution that seemed a bit odd.

Linda Grant grew up in Liverpool when it was a thriving port.  Her parents were friends of Brian Epstein's parents. Brian went on to manage The Beatles, and teenage Linda was entranced by the band who went on to conquer the world. Talking about the mechanics of writing her book Linda reveals how she felt composing her very first sex scene.

An author and English teacher, Peter Farquhar, was murdered by a much younger student, Ben Field. This happened in Maids Moreton in Buckinghamshire, the home of David Wilson. Peter Farquhar was a gay Christian who found it difficult to reconcile these two characteristics. This lead to his murder. The horrific event was the subject of a very well reviewed BBC drama series, The Sixth Commandment.   The Wilson book was written after a Channel 4 documentary and a Radio Five Live programme but before the BBC One drama. It is a shocking story told in gripping detail in David Wilson's book 'A Plot to Kill'. The destruction that a psychopath can reak is appalling.