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Send us a text! If you'd like a reply, please leave an email or numberIn today's episode, we talk with ex British Airways Cabin Crew member, Karen Mcleod. Karen has recently released a book called Lifting Off. Telling all about her life in the airline industry and the struggles she faced as a gay woman.Karen McLeod is a writer, comic performer, creative writing tutor and writer-in-residence at Bookseller Crow bookshop, London. Her debut novel, In Search of the Missing Eyelash, was published by Jonathan Cape and won the Betty Trask Award. Published in 2007 (and reissued this year) she wrote this during layovers in hotel rooms whilst travelling the globe as long-haul cabin crew for British Airways.Coming full circle, her recent memoir, Lifting Off, is about the years she worked as cabin crew and offers a fascinating insight into the profound impact of long-haul life. Spanning the late nineties into the 2000s, this memoir is brimming with vertiginous loops as Karen slowly unravels. This is the story of how Karen finally came into land and how she discovered her real self. For December there's 25% off both of her books, Lifting Off and In Search of the Missing Eyelash, through the publisher's website https://muswell-press.co.uk/ Use discount code PJRJ74WYFind Karen on Instagram @therealkarenmcleodAnd her website www.karenmcleod.co.uk We would really appreciate it if you take 1 minute to leave a quick review. It really helps our podcast become more visible on all the platforms so we can reach more people! Thank you. To find out more about how Not Just Crew can support you, visit www.notjustcrew.comSupport the showThe Red Eye Podcast is written by Kaylie Kay, and produced and narrated by Ally Murphy.To subscribe to the monthly newsletter and keep up to date with news, visit www.theredeyepod.com. Ot find us on Facebook, YouTube, TikTok & Instagram @theredeyepod, for behind the scenes stories and those funny short stories that only take a minute or less!If you'd like to support the podcast you can "buy us a beer" and subscribe at https://www.buzzsprout.com/2310053/support, we'd be happy to give you a shout out on our newsletter!Ally Murphy is a former flight attendant, and a British voice over artist based in the USA, visit www.allymurphy.co.ukKaylie Kay is a flight attendant and author based in the UK. You can find more of her work at www.kayliekaywrites.comTo preorder The Red Eye's first book click on the following links:Amazon KindleOther eBooksPaperback link to follow
Sonia Nasir er en middels vellykket skuespiller i London. Etter et opprivende brudd reiser hun for å besøke søsteren i Haifa i Israel, der farens familie kom fra, og der hun knapt har vært siden hun var tenåring. Snart blir hun dratt med i et lokalt teaterprosjekt, der en trupp skal sette opp Shakespeares Hamlet på Vestbredden. Det dukker opp gjenferd også utenfor teaterscenen, etter hvert som fortiden innhenter Sonia.Gjenferdet inn (til norsk ved Bjørn Alex Herrman) er en kompleks og velkomponert fortelling, en utforskning av identitet og tilhørighet, av kunstens rolle, av samhold og av den smertefulle historien til en familie og et folk.Isabella Hammad er en britisk-palestinsk forfatter. Debutromanen Pariseren vant en rekke priser, deriblant Betty Trask Award og Palestine Book Award, og i 2023 ble hun innlemmet på den prestisjetunge Granta-lista Best Young British Novelists. Gjenferdet inn er hennes andre roman.Priya Bains er poet, aktivist og redaktør for tidsskriftet Vinduet. Nå møter hun Hammad til samtale om gjenferd og søstre, Hamlet og okkupasjon. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Sonia Nasir is a somewhat successful actor in London. After a distressing end to a love affair, she travels to see her sister in Haifa, Israel, where their father's family is from, and where she's hardly been since she was a teenager. Soon, she is pulled into a local theatre production of Shakespeare's Hamlet on the West Bank. And as the past catches up with Sonia, ghosts appear off stage as well.Enter Ghost is a complex and skillfully composed novel, an exploration of identity and belonging, the role of art, community, and the painful story of a family and a people.Isabella Hammad is a British-Palestinian author. Her debut novel The Parisian won a number of awards, including the Betty Trask Award and the Palestine Book Award, and I 2023, she was included on Granta's prestigious list of Best young British Novelists. Enter Ghost is her second novel.Priya Bains is a poet, an activist and editor of the literary magazine Vinduet. She will join Hammad for a conversation about ghosts and sisters, Hamlet and the occupation. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Francesca Segal is an award-winning writer and journalist. She is the author of two critically acclaimed novels, The Innocents (2012) and The Awkward Age (2017), and a memoir of NICU motherhood, Mother Ship (2019). Her writing has won the 2012 Costa First Novel Award, a Betty Trask Award, and been longlisted for the Women's Prize. On today's episode of Little Atoms she talks to Neil Denny about her latest novel Welcome To Glorious Tuga. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Maya, the protagonist of Rohit Manchanda's novel The Enclave (Fourth Estate: 2024), should be happy with her life. She's newly single, her net worth steadily rising in the booming India of the 2000s. She has a cushy, if slightly unfulfilling, job in academia. But she struggles: She wants to write, but can't summon the energy to do so. She juggles several relationships, each one slowly imploding as the novel continues. And she butts heads with an oblivious and pompous bureaucrat, nicknamed “The Pontiff.” Rohit Manchanda is a professor at IIT Bombay where he teaches and researches computational neurophysiology. His first novel won a Betty Trask Award, was published with the title In the Light of the Black Sun and was republished in 2024 titled A Speck of Coal Dust. The Enclave is Rohit Manchanda's second novel, coming decades after his first published work. In this episode, Rohit and I talk about his writing career, the themes of The Enclave, and the very real struggle of wanting, but not having the energy, to write. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Enclave. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network
Maya, the protagonist of Rohit Manchanda's novel The Enclave (Fourth Estate: 2024), should be happy with her life. She's newly single, her net worth steadily rising in the booming India of the 2000s. She has a cushy, if slightly unfulfilling, job in academia. But she struggles: She wants to write, but can't summon the energy to do so. She juggles several relationships, each one slowly imploding as the novel continues. And she butts heads with an oblivious and pompous bureaucrat, nicknamed “The Pontiff.” Rohit Manchanda is a professor at IIT Bombay where he teaches and researches computational neurophysiology. His first novel won a Betty Trask Award, was published with the title In the Light of the Black Sun and was republished in 2024 titled A Speck of Coal Dust. The Enclave is Rohit Manchanda's second novel, coming decades after his first published work. In this episode, Rohit and I talk about his writing career, the themes of The Enclave, and the very real struggle of wanting, but not having the energy, to write. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Enclave. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies
Maya, the protagonist of Rohit Manchanda's novel The Enclave (Fourth Estate: 2024), should be happy with her life. She's newly single, her net worth steadily rising in the booming India of the 2000s. She has a cushy, if slightly unfulfilling, job in academia. But she struggles: She wants to write, but can't summon the energy to do so. She juggles several relationships, each one slowly imploding as the novel continues. And she butts heads with an oblivious and pompous bureaucrat, nicknamed “The Pontiff.” Rohit Manchanda is a professor at IIT Bombay where he teaches and researches computational neurophysiology. His first novel won a Betty Trask Award, was published with the title In the Light of the Black Sun and was republished in 2024 titled A Speck of Coal Dust. The Enclave is Rohit Manchanda's second novel, coming decades after his first published work. In this episode, Rohit and I talk about his writing career, the themes of The Enclave, and the very real struggle of wanting, but not having the energy, to write. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Enclave. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literature
Maya, the protagonist of Rohit Manchanda's novel The Enclave (Fourth Estate: 2024), should be happy with her life. She's newly single, her net worth steadily rising in the booming India of the 2000s. She has a cushy, if slightly unfulfilling, job in academia. But she struggles: She wants to write, but can't summon the energy to do so. She juggles several relationships, each one slowly imploding as the novel continues. And she butts heads with an oblivious and pompous bureaucrat, nicknamed “The Pontiff.” Rohit Manchanda is a professor at IIT Bombay where he teaches and researches computational neurophysiology. His first novel won a Betty Trask Award, was published with the title In the Light of the Black Sun and was republished in 2024 titled A Speck of Coal Dust. The Enclave is Rohit Manchanda's second novel, coming decades after his first published work. In this episode, Rohit and I talk about his writing career, the themes of The Enclave, and the very real struggle of wanting, but not having the energy, to write. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Enclave. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/south-asian-studies
Maya, the protagonist of Rohit Manchanda's novel The Enclave (Fourth Estate: 2024), should be happy with her life. She's newly single, her net worth steadily rising in the booming India of the 2000s. She has a cushy, if slightly unfulfilling, job in academia. But she struggles: She wants to write, but can't summon the energy to do so. She juggles several relationships, each one slowly imploding as the novel continues. And she butts heads with an oblivious and pompous bureaucrat, nicknamed “The Pontiff.” Rohit Manchanda is a professor at IIT Bombay where he teaches and researches computational neurophysiology. His first novel won a Betty Trask Award, was published with the title In the Light of the Black Sun and was republished in 2024 titled A Speck of Coal Dust. The Enclave is Rohit Manchanda's second novel, coming decades after his first published work. In this episode, Rohit and I talk about his writing career, the themes of The Enclave, and the very real struggle of wanting, but not having the energy, to write. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of The Enclave. Follow on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review
It's 1990 in London and Tom Hargreaves has it all: a burgeoning career as a reporter, fierce ambition and a brisk disregard for the "peasants" -- ordinary people, his readers, easy tabloid fodder. His star seems set to rise when he stumbles across a sensational scoop: a dead child on a London estate, grieving parents beloved across the neighborhood, and the finger of suspicion pointing at one reclusive family of Irish immigrants and "bad apples" the Greens. At their heart sits Carmel: beautiful, otherworldly, broken, and once destined for a future beyond her circumstances until life - and love - got in her way. Crushed by failure and surrounded by disappointment, there's nowhere for her to go and no chance of escape. Now, with the police closing in on a suspect and the tabloids hunting their monster, she must confront the secrets and silences that have trapped her family for so many generations. Today I talked to Megan Nolan, author of Ordinary Human Failings (Little, Brown, 2024). Nolan was born in Waterford, Ireland. Her essays and reviews have been published by the New York Times, the White Review, The Guardian, and Frieze, among others. Her debut novel, Acts of Desperation, was the recipient of a Betty Trask Award and was short-listed for the Sunday Times Charlotte Aitken Young Writer of the Year Award and long-listed for the Dylan Thomas Prize. Recommended Books: Tom Robbins, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues Ann Enright, Actress José Saramago, Blindness Chris Holmes is Chair of Literatures in English and Associate Professor at Ithaca College. He writes criticism on contemporary global literatures. His book, Kazuo Ishiguro Against World Literature, is forthcoming with Bloomsbury Publishing. He is the co-director of The New Voices Festival, a celebration of work in poetry, prose, and playwriting by up-and-coming young writers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
It's 1990 in London and Tom Hargreaves has it all: a burgeoning career as a reporter, fierce ambition and a brisk disregard for the "peasants" -- ordinary people, his readers, easy tabloid fodder. His star seems set to rise when he stumbles across a sensational scoop: a dead child on a London estate, grieving parents beloved across the neighborhood, and the finger of suspicion pointing at one reclusive family of Irish immigrants and "bad apples" the Greens. At their heart sits Carmel: beautiful, otherworldly, broken, and once destined for a future beyond her circumstances until life - and love - got in her way. Crushed by failure and surrounded by disappointment, there's nowhere for her to go and no chance of escape. Now, with the police closing in on a suspect and the tabloids hunting their monster, she must confront the secrets and silences that have trapped her family for so many generations. Today I talked to Megan Nolan, author of Ordinary Human Failings (Little, Brown, 2024). Nolan was born in Waterford, Ireland. Her essays and reviews have been published by the New York Times, the White Review, The Guardian, and Frieze, among others. Her debut novel, Acts of Desperation, was the recipient of a Betty Trask Award and was short-listed for the Sunday Times Charlotte Aitken Young Writer of the Year Award and long-listed for the Dylan Thomas Prize. Recommended Books: Tom Robbins, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues Ann Enright, Actress José Saramago, Blindness Chris Holmes is Chair of Literatures in English and Associate Professor at Ithaca College. He writes criticism on contemporary global literatures. His book, Kazuo Ishiguro Against World Literature, is forthcoming with Bloomsbury Publishing. He is the co-director of The New Voices Festival, a celebration of work in poetry, prose, and playwriting by up-and-coming young writers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network
It's 1990 in London and Tom Hargreaves has it all: a burgeoning career as a reporter, fierce ambition and a brisk disregard for the "peasants" -- ordinary people, his readers, easy tabloid fodder. His star seems set to rise when he stumbles across a sensational scoop: a dead child on a London estate, grieving parents beloved across the neighborhood, and the finger of suspicion pointing at one reclusive family of Irish immigrants and "bad apples" the Greens. At their heart sits Carmel: beautiful, otherworldly, broken, and once destined for a future beyond her circumstances until life - and love - got in her way. Crushed by failure and surrounded by disappointment, there's nowhere for her to go and no chance of escape. Now, with the police closing in on a suspect and the tabloids hunting their monster, she must confront the secrets and silences that have trapped her family for so many generations. Today I talked to Megan Nolan, author of Ordinary Human Failings (Little, Brown, 2024). Nolan was born in Waterford, Ireland. Her essays and reviews have been published by the New York Times, the White Review, The Guardian, and Frieze, among others. Her debut novel, Acts of Desperation, was the recipient of a Betty Trask Award and was short-listed for the Sunday Times Charlotte Aitken Young Writer of the Year Award and long-listed for the Dylan Thomas Prize. Recommended Books: Tom Robbins, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues Ann Enright, Actress José Saramago, Blindness Chris Holmes is Chair of Literatures in English and Associate Professor at Ithaca College. He writes criticism on contemporary global literatures. His book, Kazuo Ishiguro Against World Literature, is forthcoming with Bloomsbury Publishing. He is the co-director of The New Voices Festival, a celebration of work in poetry, prose, and playwriting by up-and-coming young writers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literature
Building parallels between technology and the human imagination, Masande Ntshanga's conversation with Magalí Armillas-Tiseyra explains how cities are like machines and how South African history resembles some of the most sinister versions of techno-futurism. Masande is the author of two novels: The Reactive, winner of a Betty Trask Award in 2018, and Triangulum, nominated for the 2020 Nommo Awards for Best Novel in 2020 by the African Speculative Fiction Society. His responses to Magalí's questions interweave autobiography and history, showing how when you venture into “underwritten spaces” in South Africa, realism starts to seem like speculation. Masande moves from playing bootleg Nintendo and hacking Lego sets in Ciskei, a “homeland” under the apartheid government's Bantustan system, to data mining and novel writing in the global cities of Cape Town and Johannesburg. All the while, technology is never something “we're resigned to experiencing” and “endorsing” in fiction—it can be a medium of contemplation as well as conquest. Masande and Magalí are also interested in the queer intimacies of young people busy forming their own “micro-tribes.” Especially young people who are reading the global phenomenon that is Stephen King by moonlight, when they might be just a little too young for it. Mentions: Masande Ntshanga, The Reactive, Triangulum, and the short story “Space” Samuel R. Delany, Equinox “Hauntology,” from Jacques Derrida in Spectres of Marx Ciskei Masande Ntshanga's essay “Technologies of Conquest” in The Creative Arts: On Practice, Making, and Meaning (Dryad Press, 2024) Stephen King, The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger Bonus mention: Lost Libraries, Burnt Archives, an edited volume of short stories, artworks, poems and essays that engage with the tragic destruction of the African Studies Library at the University of Cape Town in April 2021. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network
Building parallels between technology and the human imagination, Masande Ntshanga's conversation with Magalí Armillas-Tiseyra explains how cities are like machines and how South African history resembles some of the most sinister versions of techno-futurism. Masande is the author of two novels: The Reactive, winner of a Betty Trask Award in 2018, and Triangulum, nominated for the 2020 Nommo Awards for Best Novel in 2020 by the African Speculative Fiction Society. His responses to Magalí's questions interweave autobiography and history, showing how when you venture into “underwritten spaces” in South Africa, realism starts to seem like speculation. Masande moves from playing bootleg Nintendo and hacking Lego sets in Ciskei, a “homeland” under the apartheid government's Bantustan system, to data mining and novel writing in the global cities of Cape Town and Johannesburg. All the while, technology is never something “we're resigned to experiencing” and “endorsing” in fiction—it can be a medium of contemplation as well as conquest. Masande and Magalí are also interested in the queer intimacies of young people busy forming their own “micro-tribes.” Especially young people who are reading the global phenomenon that is Stephen King by moonlight, when they might be just a little too young for it. Mentions: Masande Ntshanga, The Reactive, Triangulum, and the short story “Space” Samuel R. Delany, Equinox “Hauntology,” from Jacques Derrida in Spectres of Marx Ciskei Masande Ntshanga's essay “Technologies of Conquest” in The Creative Arts: On Practice, Making, and Meaning (Dryad Press, 2024) Stephen King, The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger Bonus mention: Lost Libraries, Burnt Archives, an edited volume of short stories, artworks, poems and essays that engage with the tragic destruction of the African Studies Library at the University of Cape Town in April 2021. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literary-studies
Building parallels between technology and the human imagination, Masande Ntshanga's conversation with Magalí Armillas-Tiseyra explains how cities are like machines and how South African history resembles some of the most sinister versions of techno-futurism. Masande is the author of two novels: The Reactive, winner of a Betty Trask Award in 2018, and Triangulum, nominated for the 2020 Nommo Awards for Best Novel in 2020 by the African Speculative Fiction Society. His responses to Magalí's questions interweave autobiography and history, showing how when you venture into “underwritten spaces” in South Africa, realism starts to seem like speculation. Masande moves from playing bootleg Nintendo and hacking Lego sets in Ciskei, a “homeland” under the apartheid government's Bantustan system, to data mining and novel writing in the global cities of Cape Town and Johannesburg. All the while, technology is never something “we're resigned to experiencing” and “endorsing” in fiction—it can be a medium of contemplation as well as conquest. Masande and Magalí are also interested in the queer intimacies of young people busy forming their own “micro-tribes.” Especially young people who are reading the global phenomenon that is Stephen King by moonlight, when they might be just a little too young for it. Mentions: Masande Ntshanga, The Reactive, Triangulum, and the short story “Space” Samuel R. Delany, Equinox “Hauntology,” from Jacques Derrida in Spectres of Marx Ciskei Masande Ntshanga's essay “Technologies of Conquest” in The Creative Arts: On Practice, Making, and Meaning (Dryad Press, 2024) Stephen King, The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger Bonus mention: Lost Libraries, Burnt Archives, an edited volume of short stories, artworks, poems and essays that engage with the tragic destruction of the African Studies Library at the University of Cape Town in April 2021. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/literature
The May Art of Reading book club features Laureate for Irish Fiction Colm Tóibín in conversation with writer Megan Nolan about her novel 'Ordinary Human Failings'. "Megan Nolan's novel tells the story of the Green family who move from Ireland to London in the early 1990s. 'Where Nolan really excels is in the delineation of complex, sometimes contradictory interior states, the water we all swim in and call "reality",' writes The Financial Times." - Colm Tóibín Megan Nolan was born in 1990 in Waterford, Ireland and is currently based in London. Her essays and reviews have been published by The New York Times, White Review, The Guardian and Frieze amongst others. Her debut novel, Acts of Desperation, was published by Jonathan Cape in 2021 and was the recipient of a Betty Trask Award, shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award and longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. Her second novel, Ordinary Human Failings, was published in 2023 and is shortlisted for the inaugural Nero Book Awards, for fiction and longlisted for the Gordon Burn Prize. Learn more about the Art of Reading Book Club and the Laureate for Irish Fiction programme: https://www.artscouncil.ie/Arts-in-Ireland/Literature/Laureate-for-Irish-Fiction/The-Art-of-Reading-Book-Club/
Re-Up. Natasha Pulleys Debüt "The Watchmaker of Filigree Street" erschien bereits im Jahre 2015. Damit gewann die Autorin einen Betty Trask Award, der für Erstlingsromane von Autoren unter 35 Jahren vergeben wird, die in einem derzeitigen oder ehemaligen Commonwealth-Staat ansässig sind. Folge direkt herunterladen
This week's guest on the show is the hugely talented Isabella Hammad, author of The Parisian, and most recently, Enter Ghost. I love Isabella's work, which is always so thoughtful, beautifully written, multi-layered and hugely informative and insightful. As a British Palestinian, Isabella tells stories of Palestinian families, enabling us to understand better, Palestinian history, Colonial projects, and what we are witnessing unfold in Palestine right now.At the time of recording this episode, towards the end of 2023, the most recent war on Gaza has been taking place for over 75 days, and the official death toll has crossed 20,000 people. Thousands are still trapped under rubble, and millions are also at risk from starvation, disease and the cold. I'm so glad to be talking about Palestine, and Isabella's work today. Isabella Hammad was born in London. Her writing has appeared in Conjunctions, The Paris Review, The New York Times and elsewhere. She was awarded the 2018 Plimpton Prize for Fiction and a 2019 O. Henry Prize. Her first novel The Parisian (2019) won a Palestine Book Award, the Sue Kaufman Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and a Betty Trask Award from the Society of Authors in the UK. She was a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, and has received literary fellowships from MacDowell and the Lannan Foundation. She is currently a fellow at the Columbia University Institute for Ideas and Imagination in Paris.As always, I'd love to hear what you thought of this episode. Come connect with me on social media:www.instagram.com/readwithsamiawww.instagram.com/thediversebookshelfpodYou can now join me on Patreon, and join my community for £5 a month to support the show, so I can keep creating great episodes like these. Every subscriber will also get access to an exclusive, special bonus episode every month :)Join me here:http://patreon.com/TheDiverseBookshelfPodcastSupport the show
Life is too short for s*** books and Graeme Armstrong is a highly celebrated Scottish writer. His teenage years were spent within North Lanarkshire's gang culture. His bestselling debut novel, ‘THE YOUNG TEAM', is inspired by his experiences. We chat about his book and how it came to be. The books we discuss are: The Young TeamTrainspottingAlongside overcoming struggles with drug addiction, alcohol abuse and violence, he read English as an undergraduate at the University of Stirling; where he returned to study a Masters' in Creative Writing. He is currently undertaking a PhD at the University of Strathclyde.It won the Betty Trask Award, the Somerset Maugham Award, and was Scots Book of the Year 2021. It's being adapted for screen by Synchronicity Films. In 2021, Graeme presented ‘SCOTLAND THE RAVE', a BBC documentary exploring Scotland's rave and PCDJ culture, which was subsequently nominated for a BAFTA Scotland and RTS Scotland Award 2022. Most recently, he wrote and presented ‘STREET GANGS', a BBC factual series exploring modern Scottish gang culture, drill music and his own past. In 2023, Graeme was named as one of Granta's ‘Best of Young British Novelists', a once-in-a-decade literary honour.
In this episode Rachel and Simon speak with the novelist and journalist Megan Nolan. Her essays and reviews have been published by the Guardian and the New York Times, among other publications. Her debut novel, "Acts of Desperation", was published in 2021 and received a Betty Trask Award, was shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year award and longlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. Her second novel, "Ordinary Human Failings", was published in July. We spoke to Megan about getting started in journalism in her early twenties, balancing essay-writing with fiction-writing and about "Ordinary Human Failings". You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways and on Instagram @alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is patreon.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Simon Akam and Rachel Lloyd, and produced by Artemis Irvine. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.
NICOLA MONAGHAN chats to Paul Burke about her new thriller, WISH YOU WERE HERE, Dr. Sian Love, Nottingham, Alan Sillitoe, DNA.WISH YOU WERE HERE: DNA doesn't lie. But what if the truth is dangerous?Former police officer and DNA expert Dr Sian Love has settled into running her own detective agency and cohabiting with her partner, Kris. Her life is thrown into chaos once again when a teenage girl shows up at her office, claiming to be Courtney Johnson - a child who went missing in Nottingham over fifteen years ago - but refusing to allow Sian to test her DNA.Wary but intrigued, Sian reluctantly revives the undercover skills she learned in her days in the police force and begins investigating. But revisiting the past has consequences...NICOLA MONAGHAN Nicola Monaghan is the author of the Sian Love mystery series including the critically acclaimed Dead Flowers and, now, Wish You Were Here. Her debut novel The Killing Jar won a Betty Trask Award, the Authors' Club First Novel Prize and the Waverton Good Read. She taught creative writing for many years and is currently writing a thriller about that experience, as well as studying for her PhD at the University of Nottingham. www.nicolamonaghan.comRecommendationsChildren of Time - Adrian TchaikovskyLiz Nugent - Strange Sally Diamond & Our Little CrueltiesChuck Palahniuk, Irvine Welsh, Tana French & Kate AtkinsonPaul Burke writes for Crime Time, Crime Fiction Lover and the European Literature Network. He is also a CWA Historical Dagger Judge 2023.Produced by Junkyard DogMusic courtesy of Southgate and LeighCrime TimeCrime Time FM is the official podcast ofGwyl Crime Cymru Festival 2023CrimeFest 2023&CWA Daggers 2023
Masande Ntshanga is a writer and poet, an editor of New Contrast Magazine and a teacher of creative writing. For his debut novel The Reactive, he was awarded the Betty Trask Award, while his second novel, Triangulum, was nominated for the Nommo Prize for Best Speculative Fiction Novel written by an African. His latest book is the 2020 chapbook Native Life in the Third Millennium.This is Masande's reading list:Imraan Coovadia, Tales of the Metric System A Spy in TimeK. Sello Duiker, The Quiet Violence of DreamsNjabulo Ndebele, Fools and Other StoriesIn this podcastseries the House of Literature in Oslo, Norway invites writers and thinkers to talk about their work, what they read and present their readinglist from the African continent and diaspora. Host in this episode Åshild Lappegård LahnEditing and production by the House of LiteratureMusic by Ibou CissokhoThe House of Literature's project to promote African literature is supported by NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Masande Ntshanga er forfatter og poet, redaktør for New Contrast Magazine og underviser i kreativ skriving. Debutromanen hans The Reactive vant Betty Trask Award, og hans neste roman, Triangulum, ble nominert til Nommo Prize for beste spekulativ fiksjonsroman skrevet av en afrikaner. Hans seneste utgivelse er chapboka Native Life in the Third Millennium, utgitt i 2020.Dette er Masandes leseliste:Imraan Coovadia, Tales of the Metric System A Spy in TimeK. Sello Duiker, The Quiet Violence of DreamsNjabulo Ndebele, Fools and Other StoriesI denne podkastserien inviterer Stiftelsen Litteraturhuset forfattere og tenker til å snakke om sine forfatterskap, lesepraksis og sin leseliste fra det afrikanske kontinentet og diaspora. Intervjuer i denne episoden er Åshild Lappegård Lahn.Redigering og produksjon ved Stiftelsen Litteraturhuset. Musikk av Ibou Cissokho Litteraturhusets satsning på afrikansk litteratur er støttet av NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
«For meg har science fiction som sjanger alltid vært koblet til kritikk av maktstrukturer,» har forfatter Masande Ntshanga uttalt. Som ung leste han mye science fiction, og hans seneste roman, Triangulum, henter flere elementer fra sci-fi-sjangeren.Science fiction, spekulativ fiksjon og afrofuturisme er litterære sjangre som er på frammarsj i mange land, inkludert her i Norge og i Ntshangas hjemland, Sør-Afrika.Hva er det som gjør science fiction til en foretrukket form for å utforske mulige framtidsscenarier eller plukke fra hverandre dagens maktstrukturer?I dette personlige foredraget vil Ntshanga snakke om hva science fiction-bøker har betydd for ham som leser og forfatter, og om sjangerens betydning for forfattere som vil forestille seg en annen verden.Masande Ntshanga er en sør-afrikansk forfatter, poet og redaktør for tidsskriftet New Contrast Magazine. For debutromanen The Reactive vant han debutprisen Betty Trask Award, mens andreboka Triangulum ble nominert til Nommo-prisen for beste spekulativ fiksjonsroman skrevet av en afrikaner. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
On this month's episode, host Nicole Flattery is joined by writer Sophie Mackintosh to read and discuss David Hayden's short story, ‘Leckerdam of the Golden Hand', originally published in our Summer 2016 issue. Sophie Mackintosh is the author of three novels: The Water Cure, Blue Ticket and Cursed Bread. Her debut novel was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2018 and won a Betty Trask Award 2019, and Cursed Bread was longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2023. She has been published in Granta, The White Review and TANK magazine among others, and was named one of Granta's Best of Young British Novelists 2023. Sophie's short story ‘Revivalists' was published in our Summer 2018 issue. David Hayden was born in Ireland and lives in England. His writing has appeared in numerous magazines including The Stinging Fly, Granta online, Zoetrope All-Story, The Dublin Review, AGNI, The Georgia Review and A Public Space. His first book of stories, Darker With the Lights On, was published by Transit Books and Carcanet Press. Nicole Flattery is a writer and critic. Her story collection Show Them A Good Time, was published by The Stinging Fly and Bloomsbury in 2019. Her first novel, Nothing Special, was recently published by Bloomsbury. The Stinging Fly Podcast invites writers to choose a story from the Stinging Fly archive to read and discuss. Previous episodes of the podcast can be found here. The podcast's theme music is ‘Sale of Lakes', by Divan. All of the Stinging Fly archive is available to subscribers.
Året er 2043, og en astronom ved det sør-afrikanske romsenteret får tilsendt en pakke full av dokumenter, med en advarsel om at verden vil gå under om ti år.Dokumentene er dagboksnotater og lydfiler som skildrer oppveksten til en jente, først på 1990-tallet, mens hun lever ut ungdomstiden, utforsker egen seksualitet og forsøker å spore opp moren, som forsvant sporløst da hun var liten, og deretter når jenta har blitt voksen.Gjennom jentas historie ser vi hvordan Sør-Afrikas mørke fortid er med på å forme nåtiden, og hvordan den speiles i en dyster framtid, der miljøproblemene florerer og fattigdomsproblemer skal løses med å etablere arbeidsleire omkring i landet.I romanen Triangulum fletter Masande Ntshanga sammen ulike sjangre i en fortelling som på overbevisende vis illustrerer at Sør-Afrikas dystopiske fortid ikke er et tilbakelagt kapittel.Ntshanga er forfatter av to romaner. For debuten The Reactive vant han debutprisen Betty Trask Award, mens Triangulum ble nominert til Nommo-prisen for beste spekulativ fiksjonsroman skrevet av en afrikaner.På Litteraturhuset møter Ntshanga forlegger og oversetter Julia Wiedlocha til en samtale om oppvekst og teknologi, framtidsdystopier og kolonialismens mørke skygge.Arrangementet er støttet av NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
The year is 2043, and an astronomer at the South-African Space Agency receives a package filled with documents, which contain a warning that the earth will end in 10 years.The documents are diary entries and audio tapes by a girl, relaying first her adolescence in the 1990s, when she explores her sexuality and tries to find her mother, who disappeared without a trace when she was little, and then moving to her daily life as an adult.Through the history of the girl, we see how South-Africa's dark past is still shaping its present, and mirrored in a dystopian future, where environmental issues are rampant, and social issues is solved by creating work camps across the country.In his novel Triangulum, Masande Ntshanga combines different genres in a story which illustrates, convincingly, that South-Africa's dystopian past is far from a closed chapter.Ntshanga is the author of two novels and a chapbook. His debut The Reactive won him the debut prize the Betty Trask Award, while Triangulum was nominated for the Nommo Award for Best Speculative Fiction Novel by and African.At the House of Literature, Ntshanga is joined by editor and translator Julia Wiedlocha for a conversation about adolescence and technology, future dystopias, and the dark shadow of colonialism.The event is supported by NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
«I've always found Science Fiction to be a form that's irrevocably linked to critiques of power and societal structures,» writer Masande Ntshanga has said. During his adolescence, he read a lot of science fiction, and his latest novel, Triangulum, makes use of several elements from the genre.Science fiction, speculative fiction and afrofuturism are literary genres on the rise on many countries, including Norway and Ntshanga's home country, South Africa. What makes science fiction the preferred genre in which to explore possible future scenarios, or in which to pick apart contemporary power structures?In this personal lecture, Ntshanga will talk about what science fiction literature has meant to him as a reader and writer, and about the significance of the genre for writers who want to imagine another world.Masande Ntshanga is a South African writer, poet and editor of New Contrast Magazine. For his debut novel The Reactive, he was awarded the Betty Trask Award, while his second novel, Triangulum, was nominated for the Nommo Prize for Best Speculative Fiction Novel written by an African. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Isabella Hammad is the author of the novel Enter Ghost, available from Grove Press. Hammad was born in London. Her writing has appeared in Conjunctions, The Paris Review, The New York Times and elsewhere. She was awarded the 2018 Plimpton Prize for Fiction and a 2019 O. Henry Prize. Her first novel The Parisian (2019) won a Palestine Book Award, the Sue Kaufman Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and a Betty Trask Award from the Society of Authors in the UK. She was a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, and has received literary fellowships from MacDowell and the Lannan Foundation. She is currently a fellow at the Columbia University Institute for Ideas and Imagination in Paris. *** Otherppl with Brad Listi is a weekly literary podcast featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers. Available where podcasts are available: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeart Radio, etc. Subscribe to Brad Listi's email newsletter. Support the show on Patreon Merch @otherppl Instagram YouTube TikTok Email the show: letters [at] otherppl [dot] com The podcast is a proud affiliate partner of Bookshop, working to support local, independent bookstores. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Join Vick Hope as she sits down with writer Irenosen Okojie to discuss wild imaginations and magical realism in literature and if imposter syndrome comes into play when you're a judge for the Women's Prize for Fiction. Irenosen's intoxicating debut novel, Butterfly Fish, won the 2016 Betty Trask Award, and her highly acclaimed short story collections, Speak Gigantular and Nudibranch have both been nominated for countless awards and received praise from Bernardine Evaristo and Margaret Atwood to name just a couple. In 2021 she was awarded an MBE For Services To Literature. Irenosen is also a judge for this year's Women's Prize for Fiction, and has previously judged the Women's Prize Discoveries programme for new writers. Irenosen's book choices are: ** Jazz by Toni Morrison ** Black Vodka by Deborah Levy ** At the Bottom of The River by Jamaica Kincaid ** I Am, I Am, I Am by Maggie O'Farrell ** The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy Vick Hope, multi-award winning TV and BBC Radio 1 presenter, author and journalist, is the host of season six of the Women's Prize for Fiction Podcast. Every week, Vick will be joined by another inspirational woman to discuss the work of incredible female authors. The Women's Prize is one of the most prestigious literary awards in the world, and they continue to champion the very best books written by women. Don't want to miss the rest of Season Six? Listen and subscribe now! This podcast is sponsored by Baileys and produced by Bird Lime Media.
We speak to writer and teacher Okechukwu Nzelu. Why? To discuss that greatest pillar of creative writing - character. Gill and Okechukwu discuss many aspects of character development, including those in his latest novel Here Again Now. Based in Manchecter, Okechukwu Nzelu was the recipient of a Northern Writers' Award from New Writing North in 2015. His debut novel, The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney won a Betty Trask Award. It was also shortlisted for our very own Desmond Elliott Prize among others. In 2021, it was selected for the Kingston University Big Read. His second novel, Here Again Now was published by Dialogue Books in March 2022. He is also a Lecturer in Creative Writing at Lancaster University so he is perfectly positioned to help us understand how we can write compelling characters.
Simon and Rachel speak to the novelist Mohsin Hamid. Born in Lahore, he grew up mostly in Pakistan but spent part of his childhood in California and returned to America to attend Princeton University. He worked in New York and London as a management consultant before returning to Lahore to pursue writing full-time. Mohsin's first novel, "Moth Smoke" (2000), was published in 14 languages and won a Betty Trask Award. His second novel, "The Reluctant Fundamentalist" (2007), recounted a Pakistani man's abandonment of his life in New York in the aftermath of 9/11. Published in over 30 languages, it became a million-copy international bestseller and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. A film adaptation followed in 2013 starring Riz Ahmed and Kate Hudson. Mohsin's other novels include "How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia" in 2013, "Exit West" (2017) and most recently "The Last White Man." We spoke to Mohsin about the moving from Pakistan to America and from the corporate to the literary world, "The Reluctant Fundamentalist" and the shadow of 9/11, and his new book "The Last White Man". You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways and on Instagram @alwaystakenotes. Our crowdfunding page is patreon.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Simon Akam and Rachel Lloyd, and produced by Artemis Irvine. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.
Writer Helen Cross is remembering how clubbing in 90s Birmingham and an encounter with an oil painting in Birmingham's Museum and Art Gallery led her to feel at home in this city. Helen is the author of novels, stories, radio plays and screenplays. Her first novel, My Summer of Love, won a Betty Trask Award and became a BAFTA award-winning feature film. Her recent work includes a BBC Afternoon Play The Return of Rowena The Wonderful and a five-part audio drama series: English Rose. Helen teaches creative writing at various international venues, at UK universities and on many online and community courses. Helen lives in Kings Heath, Birmingham. Producers: Rosie Boulton and Melvin Rickarby A Must Try Softer Production A co-commission between BBC Radio 3 and the Space with funding from Arts Council England.
Nadifa Mohamed in conversation with Tommy Orange, celebrating the release of her new novel "The Fortune Men," published by Alfred Knopf. This event was originally broadcast via Zoom and hosted by Peter Maravelis. You can purchase copies of "The Fortune Men" directly from City Lights here: https://citylights.com/fortune-men/ Nadifa Mohamed was born in 1981 in Hargeisa, Somaliland. At the age of four she moved with her family to London. She is the author of "Black Mamba Boy" and "The Orchard of Lost Souls." She has received both The Betty Trask Award and the Somerset Maugham Award, and in 2013, she was named as one of Granta‘s Best of Young British Novelists. Her work appears regularly in The Guardian and the BBC. A fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, she lives in London. Tommy Orange is a novelist and writer from Oakland, California. His first book "There There" was one of the finalists for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize and received the 2019 American Book Award. Orange is a citizen of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma. He attended Institute of American Indian Arts and earned the Masters in Fine Arts. He was born and raised in Oakland, California, and makes his home in Angels Camp, California. This event was made possible by support from the City Lights Foundation: citylights.com/foundation
For all my multi passionate creatives out there, this one's for you! In today's episode, our guest helps us get to the core of what it takes to be successful with multiple passions. Chibundu Onuzo became a published author aged 19 and went on to publish several other books. She's also a singer-songwriter, screenplay producer and writer with a PhD in history. Chibundu grew up in Lagos, Nigeria and moved to the UK in 2005, where she then signed her first book deal at nineteen. Her first novel, The Spider King's Daughter, won the Betty Trask Award and was shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize and the Commonwealth Book Prize. Chibundu's second novel, Welcome to Lagos, was published by Faber in 2017 and in June 2018, Chibundu was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, as part of its "40 Under 40" initiative. In the same year, she was awarded a PhD in History from King's College London for her research on the West African Students' Union. In 2020, "Dolapo is Fine," a short film which Onuzo co-wrote, co-produced and composed the film score for, won the 2020 American Black Film Festival's HBO Short Film Competition and was long-listed for a BAFTA in 2021. Chibundu is also a singer songwriter and won the Drake Yolanda Music Award in 2021. Onuzo's most recent novel, Sankofa, has already been selected by Reese Witherspoon as her book club pick for October 2021. In February 2022, she will release her first EP titled “Coming Home” published in June 2021 by Virago. Snap, this girl packs a punch! How to connect with Chibundu: Connect with Chibundu on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chibundu.onuzo/ The Spider King's Daughter by Chibundu Onuzo Welcome to Lagos by Chibundu Onuzo Sankofa by Chibundu Onuzo Links to check out: Writers' and Artists' Yearbook by Peter James Frantz Fanon Goodreads Shaka Senghor Goodreads Maya Angelou Goodreads
NoViolet Bulawayo is the author of the novels Glory and We Need New Names, which was recognized with the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, the Pen/Hemingway Award, the LA Times Book Prize Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction, the Etisalat Prize for Literature, the Fred Brown Literary Award, the Betty Trask Award, the Barnes and Noble Discover Award (second place), and the National Book Foundation “5 Under 35” Fiction Selection. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Join Jewish Comedians Rachel Creeger & Philip Simon for their comedy podcast, a chat show about all things Jewish, produced by Russell Balkind. This week's guests are writer Francesca Segal and poet and Joshua Seigal.Follow them on social media, follow US on social media and don't forget to let us know what you think about the show.Facebook: @JewTalkinTwitter: @JewTalkinInstagram: @JewTalkinLots more fantastic episodes waiting to be released every Friday morning, so don't forget to subscribe and leave us a 5* review - it really helps other people find the show. Go on… it's what your mother would want!Plus you can now support the show and subscribe to our Patreon, where you can receive exclusive bonus footage and rewards. Check it out for as little as £3 per month here - Patreon.com/JewTalkin--------------------------------------------------------------------- Twitter: @JoshuaSeigalInstagram: @JoshuaSeigalWebsite: www.joshuaseigal.co.uk Joshua is a highly acclaimed, award-winning professional poet, performer and educator who uses poetry to develop literacy skills and inspire confidence and creativity in communication. He has worked in hundreds of schools, libraries, theatres and festivals around the world, had books published by Bloomsbury and other major publishers, and has written and performed for BBC television. "Very imaginative and wonderful"The Sunday Times"Your session was brilliant. Thank you so much" Mary Myatt - Ofsted Lead Inspector"Magic" Michael Rosen"A witty genius" ScholasticTwitter: @FrancescaSegalInstagram: @FrancescaSegalWebsite: www.francescasegal.comFrancesca Segal is an award-winning writer and journalist. Her first novel, The Innocents, won the Costa First Novel Award, the National Jewish Book Award for Fiction, the Sami Rohr Prize, and a Betty Trask Award, and was long-listed for the Women's Prize for Fiction (formerly the Orange Prize). Get bonus content on the Jew Talkin' To Me? Patreon See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Okechukwu Nzelu's debut novel, ‘The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney', won the Betty Trask Award, as well as a host of other accolades. His second book, ‘Here Again Now', is a compelling novel about lovers, fathers and sons, intimacy and generational trauma that asks how you can move forward when the past keeps pulling you back? Georgina Godwin meets the author in our studio in London.
NADIFA MOHAMED was born in 1981 in Hargeisa, Somaliland. At the age of four she moved with her family to London. She is the author of Black Mamba Boy and The Orchard of Lost Souls. She has received both The Betty Trask Award and the Somerset Maugham Award, and in 2013, she was named as one of Granta‘s Best of Young British Novelists. Her work appears regularly in The Guardian and the BBC. A fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, she lives in London. Her latest novel is called The Fortune Men. Mahmood Mattan is a fixture in Cardiff's Tiger Bay, 1952, which bustles with Somali and West Indian sailors, Maltese businessmen and Jewish families. He is a father, chancer, petty criminal. He is a smooth-talker with rakish charm and an eye for a good game. He is many things, but he is not a murderer.
Nigerian-British writer Irenosen Okojie and host Miriam Robinson discuss what would have happened if, in her early 20s, Irenosen had accepted a job as an editorial assistant at a magazine in New York. Along the way they discuss why mentors matter, the importance of embracing mess and why everything good starts with a fabulous lunch.Irenosen Okojie is a Nigerian-British author. In 2021 she was awarded an MBE For Services To Literature, and she is an RSL Fellow. Her debut novel Butterfly Fish won a 2016 Betty Trask Award. Her short story collection Speak Gigantular, was published was shortlisted for the inaugural Jhalak Prize and the 2017 Edge Hill Short Story Prize. Nudibranch, her collection of short stories, was longlisted for the Jhalak Prize 2020, and its story ‘Grace Jones' won the 2020 AKO Caine Prize for African Writing. Make sure to subscribe to hear the rest of Season 1 – in each episode, Miriam interviews a guest about a path their life might have taken and together, step by step, they write the stories of their unlived lives.Produced by Tess Davidson.#MyUnlivedLife Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Chibundu Onuzo was born in Lagos, Nigeria and lives in London. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and regular contributor to The Guardian, she is the winner of a Betty Trask Award. The author of Welcome to Lagos, Sankofa is her third novel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
CHIBUNDU ONUZO was born in Lagos, Nigeria and lives in London. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and regular contributor to The Guardian, she is the winner of a Betty Trask Award, has been shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize, the Commonwealth Book Prize, and the RSL Encore Award, and has been longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and Etisalat Literature Prize. Her first novel was The Spider King's Daughter. The author of Welcome to Lagos, Sankofa is her third novel.
For the seventeenth episode of The Literary Edit Podcast, I was joined by author Chibundu Onuzo, whose debut novel, The Spider King's Daughter, was the winner of a Betty Trask Award, shorted for the Dylan Thomas Prize and the Commonwealth Book Prize and longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and Etisalat Literature Prize. You can read about Chibundu's Desert Island Books here, and the ones we discuss in this episode are: Everything Good Will Come by Sefi Atta The Earth Sea Quartet by Ursula Le Guin The First Woman by Jennifer Makumbi Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison Ake by Wole Soyinka Outline Series by Rachel Cusk The Horse and His Boy by C.S Lewis Segu by Maryse Conde Other books we spoke about included Chibundu's books, Sankofa and The Spider King's Daughter, Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi and Elena Ferrante's My Brilliant Friend series. If you'd like to buy any of the books we discussed in the episode, please consider doing so from the list I created on Bookshop.org, an online bookstore with a mission to financially support local, independent bookstores. If you're based in Australia, please consider buying them from Gertrude & Alice, who deliver all over the country. To contact me, email lucy@thelitedit.com Facebook The Literary Edit Instagram: @the_litedit @chibundu.onuzo Twitter: @thelitedit @chibunduonuzo
Since Evie Wyld was first published, her writing has been celebrated for its fine observations, and way of pinning down emotional nuance. Her first novel, After the Fire, A Still Small Voice, won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and a Betty Trask Award and Evie was listed as one of Granta's Best Young British Novelists. Her second novel, All the Birds Singing, won the Miles Franklin Award, the Encore Award, the Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize, and was longlisted for the Stella Prize. Then with her third novel The Bass Rock she won the Stella Prize. It weaves together the lives of three women across different periods of time and explores male violence, in different guises. But Evie doesn't just explore male violence, she gets in deep, and leaves you reeling from the cumulative impact of this age-old misogyny. It's one of the most unsettling and artfully written novels of recent times. Evie's also written a graphic novel with illustrator Joe Sumner called Everything Is Teeth, and she co-runs Review, an indie bookshop in Peckham London.
In conversation with Nicole Galland, historical novelist and author of Master of the Revels and creator of Shakespeare for the Masses With a ''gift for combining intricate, engrossing plots with full-bodied characterizations'' (Washington Post), Irish–British novelist Maggie O'Farrell is the author of After You'd Gone, The Distance Between Us, The Hand That First Held Mine, and Instructions for a Heatwave, among several others. A former journalist in Hong Kong, deputy literary editor of the Independent on Sunday, and creative writing teacher, she is also a bestselling author. O'Farrell's work has won the Somerset Maugham Award, the Betty Trask Award, the Costa Award, and has been translated into more than 30 languages. Hamnet, winner of the 2020 Women's Prize for Fiction, tells the Elizabethan-era tale of William Shakespeare's family including his force–of–nature wife, Shakespeare's journey as a rising star, and the shared grief over the loss of their son Hamnet whose name Shakespeare would later use in his play Hamlet. Books available through the Joseph Fox Bookshop (recorded 6/3/2021)
Dismissal, in fact, is the default response to khayal (the preeminent genre of North Indian classical music), well before we get to know what khayal is, and vaguely term its strangeness 'classical music'. Those who later become acquainted with its extraordinary melodiousness forget that on the initial encounter it had sounded unmelodious. These words are part of the introduction to Amit Chaudhuri's newest book Finding the Raga: An Improvisation on Indian Music (New York Review Books / Faber and Faber, 2021). The book is part guide to Indian music, part memoir of Chaudhuri's life, part examination of modern culture. In this interview, I ask Amit to explain what makes Indian music so special, both in general and to his life. We explore how Indian music influenced the writing of this most recent book, and how his musical experiences in India and abroad have affected how he sees the world. Amit Chaudhuri is the author of seven novels, several collections of short stories, poetry and essays, one nonfiction work, and a critical study of D.H. Lawrence's poetry. He has received the Commonwealth Writers Prize, the Betty Trask Award, the Encore Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Sahitya Akademi Award, among other accolades. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and holds the titles of Professor of Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia in England and Professor of Creative Writing at Ashoka University in India. In addition to his writing, he is also a singer in the North Indian classical tradition and a composer and performer in a project that brings together the raga, blues, and jazz with a variety of other musical traditions. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Finding the Raga. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/asian-review
Dismissal, in fact, is the default response to khayal (the preeminent genre of North Indian classical music), well before we get to know what khayal is, and vaguely term its strangeness 'classical music'. Those who later become acquainted with its extraordinary melodiousness forget that on the initial encounter it had sounded unmelodious. These words are part of the introduction to Amit Chaudhuri’s newest book Finding the Raga: An Improvisation on Indian Music (New York Review Books / Faber and Faber, 2021). The book is part guide to Indian music, part memoir of Chaudhuri’s life, part examination of modern culture. In this interview, I ask Amit to explain what makes Indian music so special, both in general and to his life. We explore how Indian music influenced the writing of this most recent book, and how his musical experiences in India and abroad have affected how he sees the world. Amit Chaudhuri is the author of seven novels, several collections of short stories, poetry and essays, one nonfiction work, and a critical study of D.H. Lawrence’s poetry. He has received the Commonwealth Writers Prize, the Betty Trask Award, the Encore Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Sahitya Akademi Award, among other accolades. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and holds the titles of Professor of Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia in England and Professor of Creative Writing at Ashoka University in India. In addition to his writing, he is also a singer in the North Indian classical tradition and a composer and performer in a project that brings together the raga, blues, and jazz with a variety of other musical traditions. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Finding the Raga. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network
Dismissal, in fact, is the default response to khayal (the preeminent genre of North Indian classical music), well before we get to know what khayal is, and vaguely term its strangeness 'classical music'. Those who later become acquainted with its extraordinary melodiousness forget that on the initial encounter it had sounded unmelodious. These words are part of the introduction to Amit Chaudhuri’s newest book Finding the Raga: An Improvisation on Indian Music (New York Review Books / Faber and Faber, 2021). The book is part guide to Indian music, part memoir of Chaudhuri’s life, part examination of modern culture. In this interview, I ask Amit to explain what makes Indian music so special, both in general and to his life. We explore how Indian music influenced the writing of this most recent book, and how his musical experiences in India and abroad have affected how he sees the world. Amit Chaudhuri is the author of seven novels, several collections of short stories, poetry and essays, one nonfiction work, and a critical study of D.H. Lawrence’s poetry. He has received the Commonwealth Writers Prize, the Betty Trask Award, the Encore Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Sahitya Akademi Award, among other accolades. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and holds the titles of Professor of Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia in England and Professor of Creative Writing at Ashoka University in India. In addition to his writing, he is also a singer in the North Indian classical tradition and a composer and performer in a project that brings together the raga, blues, and jazz with a variety of other musical traditions. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Finding the Raga. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/performing-arts
Dismissal, in fact, is the default response to khayal (the preeminent genre of North Indian classical music), well before we get to know what khayal is, and vaguely term its strangeness 'classical music'. Those who later become acquainted with its extraordinary melodiousness forget that on the initial encounter it had sounded unmelodious. These words are part of the introduction to Amit Chaudhuri’s newest book Finding the Raga: An Improvisation on Indian Music (New York Review Books / Faber and Faber, 2021). The book is part guide to Indian music, part memoir of Chaudhuri’s life, part examination of modern culture. In this interview, I ask Amit to explain what makes Indian music so special, both in general and to his life. We explore how Indian music influenced the writing of this most recent book, and how his musical experiences in India and abroad have affected how he sees the world. Amit Chaudhuri is the author of seven novels, several collections of short stories, poetry and essays, one nonfiction work, and a critical study of D.H. Lawrence’s poetry. He has received the Commonwealth Writers Prize, the Betty Trask Award, the Encore Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Sahitya Akademi Award, among other accolades. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and holds the titles of Professor of Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia in England and Professor of Creative Writing at Ashoka University in India. In addition to his writing, he is also a singer in the North Indian classical tradition and a composer and performer in a project that brings together the raga, blues, and jazz with a variety of other musical traditions. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Finding the Raga. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/music
Dismissal, in fact, is the default response to khayal (the preeminent genre of North Indian classical music), well before we get to know what khayal is, and vaguely term its strangeness 'classical music'. Those who later become acquainted with its extraordinary melodiousness forget that on the initial encounter it had sounded unmelodious. These words are part of the introduction to Amit Chaudhuri’s newest book Finding the Raga: An Improvisation on Indian Music (New York Review Books / Faber and Faber, 2021). The book is part guide to Indian music, part memoir of Chaudhuri’s life, part examination of modern culture. In this interview, I ask Amit to explain what makes Indian music so special, both in general and to his life. We explore how Indian music influenced the writing of this most recent book, and how his musical experiences in India and abroad have affected how he sees the world. Amit Chaudhuri is the author of seven novels, several collections of short stories, poetry and essays, one nonfiction work, and a critical study of D.H. Lawrence’s poetry. He has received the Commonwealth Writers Prize, the Betty Trask Award, the Encore Prize, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and the Sahitya Akademi Award, among other accolades. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and holds the titles of Professor of Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia in England and Professor of Creative Writing at Ashoka University in India. In addition to his writing, he is also a singer in the North Indian classical tradition and a composer and performer in a project that brings together the raga, blues, and jazz with a variety of other musical traditions. You can find more reviews, excerpts, interviews, and essays at The Asian Review of Books, including its review of Finding the Raga. Follow on Facebook or on Twitter at @BookReviewsAsia. Nicholas Gordon is an associate editor for a global magazine, and a reviewer for the Asian Review of Books. He can be found on Twitter at @nickrigordon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/south-asian-studies
Rowan Hisayo Buchanan is the author of Harmless Like You and Starling Days. She has won The Authors’ Club First Novel Award and a Betty Trask Award and been shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award. Her work has been a New York Times Editors’ Choice, an NPR Great Read. Rowan's first novel Harmless Like You.
In 1995, the late author Nigel Watts published his highly acclaimed fictional book, Twenty Twenty, that foretold the events the world is experiencing today in the year 2020. Twenty Twenty was published in 1995 by Hodder and Stoughton and received rave reviews from The Times, Time Out, Sunday Times and more. After nearly 30 years, Twenty-Twenty was relaunched by Nigel’s widow, former BBC broadcaster, Sahera Chohan. Sahera said, “when COVID-19 was at its peak earlier this year, I reread Twenty Twenty and saw how Nigel had eeringly predicted the events of this year.” Sahera immediately knew she had to relaunch the powerful novel and bring it to a new audience. Twenty Twenty is a blueprint for today’s world because it eerily and accurately predicts a global pandemic that occurs in the year 2020. The futuristic novel predicts how the world will communicate largely through virtual technology, with people wearing masks, a drastic reduction of air travel leading to ‘virtual tourism’, and nature fighting back for its survival due to mankind’s destruction of our planet. Sahera Chohan joins World Footprints to share Nigel Watts’s words as he saw the year 2020 from the lens of 1995. Sahera shows us how her late husband secured Twenty Twenty as a futuristic treasure and a book that is relevant beyond our time. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Nigel Watts was born in Winchester in 1957. He spent two years in Japan, where he wrote his first novel, The Life Game, which won the Betty Trask Award for best first novel in 1989. His second novel, Billy Bayswater, was shortlisted for the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and broadcast on BBC Radio 4. We All Live In A House Called Innocence, his third novel, was followed by Twenty Twenty, written as part of his Ph.D. in Creative and Critical Writing from the University of East Anglia. In 1999, he received the British Library/Penguin Writers Fellowship grant to write his fifth and final novel, The Way of Love, the first novel to tell the story of the Sufi poet, Rumi. He also wrote the best-selling Write A Novel And Get It Published, part of the Teach Yourself Series.
Sophie Mackintosh is the author of The Water Cure, which was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2018 and won a Betty Trask Award 2019. Sophie talks to Neil about her "a bit speculative, a bit dystopian" new novel Blue Ticket. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Okechukwu Nzelu joins us on the pod to talk about his debut The Private Joys of Nnenna Maloney, writing in lockdown and balancing life as a full-time teacher and author. Okey was shortlisted for the Desmond Elliot Prize and Polari First Book Prize and won a 2020 Betty Trask Award. Turns out that award-winning debut author + experienced English teacher = a brilliant podcast full of tips and insight. Hosted by Steph McKenna and Simon Jones. Join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/3G39dRW All about our work: https://nationalcentreforwriting.org.uk/ Get Noirwich workshop tickets: http://noirwich.co.uk/ Photo of Okechukwu Nzelu (c) Martin Glacken Music by Bennet Maples.
The writing life of two authors who should have been sharing a stage at the Bare Lit Festival. Irenosen Okojie and Nadifa Mohammed talk to Shahidha Bari in a conversation organised with the Royal Society of Literature. And 2020 New Generation Thinker Seren Griffiths describes a project to use music by composer at an archaeological site to mark the summer solstice and the findings of her dig. The Somali-British novelist Nadifa Mohamed featured on Granta magazine's list "Best of Young British Novelists" in 2013, and in 2014 on the Africa39 list of writers under 40. Her first novel Black Mamba Boy won a Betty Trask Award. Her second novel The Orchard of Lost Souls won the Somerset Maugham Award and contributed poems to the collection edited by Margaret Busby in 2019 New Daughters of Africa. Irenosen Okojie's debut novel, Butterfly Fish, won a Betty Trask Award and was shortlisted for the Edinburgh First Book Award. Her short story collection, Speak Gigantular was shortlisted for the Edgehill Short Story Prize, the Jhalak Prize, the Saboteur Awards and nominated for a Shirley Jackson Award. Her most recent book is called Nudibranch. You can find more information about the Bare Lit Festival http://barelitfestival.com/ and about the Royal Society of Literature https://rsliterature.org/ Irenosen is one of the voices talking about Buchi Emecheta in this programme https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09r89gt Caine Prize 2019 winner Lesley Nneka Arimah is interviewed https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0006mtb Caine Prize 2018 winner Makena Onjerika https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b89ssp Billy Kahora a Caine nominee https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02tw6fg The music used by Seren Griffiths is by https://jonhughesmusic.com/ and you can find out about the dig https://bryncellidduarchaeology.wordpress.com/the-bryn-celli-ddu-rock-art-project/ and the minecraft https://mcphh.org/bryn-celli-ddu-minecraft-experience/ New Generation Thinkers is the scheme run by BBC Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to select ten academics each year to turn their research into radio. Producer: Robyn Read
Rowan Hisayo Buchanan is the guest. Her new novel, Starling Days, is available from The Overlook Press. It is the official April pick of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. Buchanan is also the author of Harmless Like You, winner of The Authors’ Club First Novel Award and a Betty Trask Award. It was a New York Times Editors’ Choice and an NPR 2017 Great Read. Her short work has appeared in several places including Granta, Guernica, The Guardian, The Harvard Review, and NPR’s Selected Shorts. She lives in London. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Michael Berkeley talks to author Chibundu Onuzo about the challenge of writing novels while studying for her A-levels, and the role of music and faith in her life. At the age of nineteen Chibundu became the youngest female writer ever to be signed by Faber and Faber. She started writing aged ten while growing up in Lagos, Nigeria and was working on her first novel, ‘The Spider King’s Daughter’, while doing her A levels at boarding school in England. It was published while she was still at university and was shortlisted for a host of prizes – winning a 2013 Betty Trask Award. Her second novel, ‘Welcome to Lagos’, was published in 2017 to great acclaim. Chibundu talks to Michael Berkeley about growing up in Lagos, and the challenge of adapting to life at boarding school in Britain. She chooses a carol, ‘I Wonder as I Wander’, that she sang with her school choir in Winchester Cathedral. The soundtrack to a Nigerian television advert from the 1990s speaks to her about the tensions between Western and traditional values in Nigeria. We hear a miniature by Christian Petzold that will be familiar to anyone who has ever learned the piano, alongside music from Handel and from Dvorak’s Symphony No. 9, ‘From the New World’. And, in a special moment for Private Passions, Chibundu is joined in the studio by members of her family to sing a setting of Psalm 23 by her uncle, Bishop Ken Okeke. Produced by Jane Greenwood. A Loftus production for BBC Radio 3.
My guest this week is Rowan Hisayo Buchanan, author of the acclaimed 2016 novel Harmless Like You as well as this year's Starling Days. One of the most exciting young voices in fiction today, she is the winner of The Authors' Club First Novel Award as well as a Betty Trask Award. I love her writing - it's poetic and lyrical but also incredibly readable, all while tackling big themes such as identity, and mental health. I found it totally fascinating talking to her and hearing about everything from writing with dyslexia to feeling like an outsider. Buy the book here: https://tinyurl.com/y6meusqr Twitter: @aliceazania @RowanHLB Instagram: @aliceazania @rowanhisa Edited by Chelsey Moore
Lucy Wood is the critically acclaimed author of Diving Belles, a collection of short stories based on Cornish folklore, and Weathering, a debut novel about mothers, daughters and ghosts. She has been longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award and the Dylan Thomas Prize, shortlisted for the Edge Hill Prize, and was runner-up in the BBC National Short Story Award. She has also received a Betty Trask Award, a Somerset Maugham Award and the Holyer an Gof Award. Weathering was named as one of The New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2016. Lucy’s latest collection of short stories is The Sing of the Shore. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Tronsmo bookshop and The Norwegian Council for Africa invites you to the launch of Chibundu Onuzo's new book, "Welcome to Lagos". Chibundu will be reading an extract from her book, and through conversation with Andreas Delset, program chief at Litteraturhuset. The event will be open for questions from the audience, and her book will be available in the bookshop. Born in 1991 in Lagos, Nigeria, Chibundu Onuzo started writing novels and short stories at the age of 10. Less than a decade later, she became the youngest woman ever to be signed by Faber and Faber, Her debut novel, "The Spiderking's Daughter" was longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and the Etisalat Prize, shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize and Commonwealth Book Prize and won a Betty Trask Award. Her second novel, "Welcome to LAgos", is out in January. She writes opinion pieces for the Guardian, with a special interest in Nigeria. Chibundu is a History graduate and she is currently pursuing a PhD in History at King's College. The book launch is an event in a series of seminars arranged by the the Norwegian Council for Africa, all of which have a focus on Lagos, Nigeria's megacity. Lagos is a city where urban development happens rapidly - the question is, development for whom? Is there a way of building and expanding the city that does not compromise the lives and communities of those living in the city?
Chibundu Onuzo was born in Lagos, Nigeria in 1991. Her first novel, The Spider King's Daughter, won a Betty Trask Award, was shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize and the Commonwealth Book Prize, and was longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and the Etisalat Prize for Literature. She is completing a PhD on the West African Student's Union at King's College London. Her latest novel is Welcome to Lagos. Alexandra Kleeman is a NYC-based writer of fiction and nonfiction, and a PhD candidate in Rhetoric at UC Berkeley. Her fiction has been published in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Zoetrope: All-Story, Conjunctions, Guernica, and Gulf Coast, among others. Nonfiction essays and reportage have appeared in Harpers, Tin House, n+1, and The Guardian. She is the author of the short story collection Intimations, and a debut novel You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Irenosen is the author of two books. Her novel 'Butterfly Fish' won a 2016 Betty Trask Award, and her short story collection 'Speak Gigantular' is Longlisted for the inaugural Jhalak prize. Both books are published by Jacaranda Books. IRENOSEN'S BOOK CHOICES: Geek Love - Katherine Dunn (Abacus) Glyph - Percival Everett (Graywolf Press) Revenge of the Mooncake Vixen - Marilyn Chin (Penguin) She tweets @IrenosekOkojie and you can visit her website for more information. SHOW NOTES: Mentioned: Ishmael Reed What Irenosen's reading at the moment: Kevin Barry's Beatlebone
Anne McElvoy talks to Nadeem Aslam and Chibundu Onuzo about their novels set in Pakistan and Nigeria which follow characters who have to find safe places to live following violent uprisings; Alex Evans joins them to explore myth-making plus we hear from Julius Bryant, the curator of an exhibition at the V&A about Lockwood Kipling art teacher and father of Rudyard. Nadeem Aslam is the author of books including Maps For Lost Lovers and The Blind Man's Garden which have won a series of awards. His new novel is called The Golden Legend. Chibundu Onuzo's first novel The Spider King's Daughter won a Betty Trask Award and her new novel is called Welcome to Lagos. Lockwood Kipling: Arts and Crafts in the Punjab and London is a free display at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London opening Saturday January 14th. The Myth Gap: What Happens When Evidence and Arguments Aren't Enough by Alex Evans is out now. Producer: Harry Parker
Emma Jane Unsworth is a journalist and won the Betty Trask Award for her novel Hungry, the Stars and Everything, and was shortlisted for the 2012 Portico Prize. Her short story ‘I Arrive First’ was included in The Best British Short Stories 2012. Emma’s latest novel Animals has won a 2015 Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize. After […] See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Continuing a series of podcasts featuring our Best of Young British Novelists, today we bring you an interview with Nadifa Mohamed. Mohamed was born in Somalia and moved to Britain in 1986. Here she spoke to online editor Ted Hodgkinson about how her first novel, Black Mamba Boy (which won the Betty Trask Award), was inspired by her father’s journey to the UK from Somalia, and how that process brought them closer together. They also spoke about her arrival from Somalia, growing up in Tooting and how she believed from a young age that cats were spies for the government. ‘Filsan’, in the issue, is an excerpt from her new novel, The Orchard of Lost Souls, forthcoming from Simon & Schuster in the UK and Farrar, Straus and Giroux in the US. You can also watch a specially commissioned short film in which Mohamed visits Shepherd’s Bush Market and explains why she wants to be the griot of London.
Ross Raisin’s first novel, God’s Own Country, about a disturbed adolescent living in the Yorkshire Dales, won him the 2009 Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award, the Guardian First Book Award, a Betty Trask Award and numerous other prizes. His second novel, Waterline, about a former shipbuilder grieving the death of his wife in Glasgow, was published to critical acclaim in 2011. His short stories have been published in Prospect, Esquire, Dazed & Confused, the Sunday Times, on BBC Radio 3 and in Granta. In this podcast, he spoke to Yuka Igarashi about how he evokes place and inhabits characters in his writing; the difference between his approaches to short stories and novels; and what it means to him to be part of the Best Young British Novelist list. He also discusses his work on a new novel, which began as a story published in Granta: Britain.
Continuing a series of podcasts on our Best of Young British Novelists 4, today we bring you an interview with Evie Wyld. Wyld’s first novel, After the Fire, A Still Small Voice, which follows the lives of two men, Frank and Leon, who live decades apart but on the same wild coastline in Queensland, Australia, and was shortlisted for numerous awards and won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and a Betty Trask Award. Her second novel All the Birds, Singing, is excerpted in the issue. Here Wyld talks to online editor Ted Hodgkinson about why living in Peckham makes it easier to write about rural Australia, how memory informs her stories and why she can’t write a novel without at least one shark in it.
Sarah Waters’ 2009 novel, The Little Stranger, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and has received much praise and critical acclaim since its release. Set in 1940s England, it is a chilling ghost story about the Ayres family. Since 2003, she has been awarded the Betty Trask Award, the Somerset Maugham Awards, and the CWA Ellis Peters Dagger Award for Historical Crime Fiction for Fingersmith. She has also been shortlisted twice for both the Orange Prize and the Man Booker Prize. Interview by Valerie Khoo, director of Sydney Writers' Centre. www.sydneywriterscentre.com.au www.valeriekhoo.com
Nino Ricci's first novel, the best-selling Lives of the Saints, won international acclaim and a host of awards, including, in Canada, the Governor General's Award for Fiction and the Books in Canada First Novel Award, and in England, the Betty Trask Award and the Winifred Holtby Prize. It was followed by In A Glass House and Where She Has Gone, which completed the trilogy that Lives of the Saints began, Testament, co-winner of the Trillium Award, and, The Origin of Species which won Ricci his second Governor General's Award. Born in Leamington, Ontario, to parents from the Molise region of Italy, he completed studies at York University in Toronto, at Concordia University in Montreal, and at the University of Florence, and has taught both in Canada and abroad. We met recently at the Blue Met Writers Festival in Montreal to talk about his most recent work: a brief biography of Pierre Trudeau for Penguin's Extraordinary Canadians series. Topics covered include the Italian Canadian attachment to Trudeau and the Liberals, immigration, gun slingers, alluring leadership qualities, fear of failure, media strategies, bilingualism's mixed legacy, the Charter, budget deficits, the pride of being Canadian, and philosopher-kings.
Glenn Patterson was born in Belfast in 1961 and studied Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia under Malcolm Bradbury. He is the author of seven novels. The first, Burning Your Own (1988), set in Northern Ireland in 1969, won a Betty Trask Award and the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature. We met at the Blue Met International Literary Festival in Montreal to talk about reassessing the past, the development and urban topography of his home town Belfast, cities versus nations, Disney, Tolstoy's theory of history, human complexity, his latest novel The Third Party, apathy, public houses, the minor impact of books, and how happy he is with his oeuvre.