Best Sandra Booker Podcasts (2024)

1
Rachel Kushner on Creation Lake (Booker Prize SHORTLIST 2024) 55:28

13d ago55:28

55:28

Rachel Kushner’s fourth novel Creation Lake is a spy novel stacked with ideas. As our fast-thinking, gun-packing protagonist wends her way down to the south of France, charged—by forces unknown—with infiltrating and sowing chaos at a commune of eco-warriors, her mission leads her into exhilarating reflections on activism, on charisma, on neandertha…

1
Ferdia Lennon on Glorious Exploits 42:04

8d ago42:04

42:04

Our guest in the writer’s studio this week is Ferdia Lennon, whose debut novel Glorious Exploits depicts the ancient world in a way readers will never have experienced it before. Set in Syracuse in 412 BC, after the catastrophic attempt by Athens to invade the city, Lampo and Gelon, two out-of-work potters, have the harebrained idea of staging a pr…

1
Roxy Dunn on As Young As This 37:35

26d ago37:35

37:35

Our guest this week is Roxy Dunn, whose debut novel As Young As This is a meticulous examination of the lives and loves of young women today. Told, strikingly, in the second person, it is structured by the the succession of first boys, then men in the protagonist Margot’s life, and populated by dysfunctional friends and a wisecracking, but deeply c…

1
Poetry: Ishion Hutchinson reads from and discusses School of Instructions 47:31

1M ago47:31

47:31

School of Instructions, the latest work by Ishion Hutchinson, draws from the time he spent in the archive of the Imperial War Museum, to foreground the experience—brutal, significant, but long overlooked—of West Indian volunteers in the First World War. This book length poem is a sensorial voyage into the convoys, garrisons and trenches of the Midd…

1
Michael Donkor on Grow Where They Fall 1:00:38

30d ago1:00:38

1:00:38

This week’s guest is Michael Donkor whose new novel Grow Where They Fall is a meticulous and tender exploration of two formative moments in the life of one Kwame Akromah, twenty years apart. Kwame is Black, Gay, British of Ghanian descent, a dedicated teacher, a dependable friend—character traits and conditions of life that weave around each other …

1
Writing Against Normality, with Samanta Schweblin 1:02:53

1M ago1:02:53

1:02:53

The seven stories in Samanta Schweblin’s Seven Empty Houses are not just about houses—how they contain us, how they constrain us—but are also about the families compressed in them, the objects stored in them, the neighbours that circle them…and the trauma that has soaked into their walls over years past, and that is now seeping slowly out, poisonin…

1
Parenting in the age of AI, with Helen Phillips 52:34

2M ago52:34

52:34

So much has been written about the imminent transformation that Artificial Intelligence will bring to our world. But it is often hard to get much of a sense of what that will mean on a personal level—for our work, for our leisure and, perhaps most importantly of all, for our families. What improvements will result? What new tensions will arise? Wha…

1
Creating Life from Art, with Catherine Lacey 58:12

2M ago58:12

58:12

We recently welcomed Catherine Lacey to the bookshop to discuss her vertiginous latest novel Biography of X. Ostensibly the quest of a journalist, C.M. Lucca, to discover more about the life of her late wife—an artist who went by many names, but who she knew only as X—it quickly becomes clear that, in Biography of X, it’s not just one life being ca…

1
Paul Murray on The Bee Sting 1:05:31

2M ago1:05:31

1:05:31

Set in small-town, post-crash Ireland, The Bee Sting follows the Barnes family—Dickie, Imelda, Cass and PJ—as the fabric of their lives first frays at the edges, then begins to unravel completely. The Barnes’ are endearing, and complex, and funny, and infuriating… In short, one of the most realistic and memorable portrayals of a family you’ll find …

1
Claire Kilroy on Parenting under the Patriarchy 54:57

2M ago54:57

54:57

A woman tells her son about his early life. About the months and years that he will by now have forgotten. When he was a baby, then a toddler, and when she was going into battle every day. For him first, and only then for herself. It’s a battle fought on many fronts. Against exhaustion, against time, against the loss of selfhood, against an increas…

1
Rachel Cusk on Art, Violence and Freedom through Destruction 1:00:16

3M ago1:00:16

1:00:16

The biographies of several artists, all named G, form a kind of exoskeleton to Rachel Cusk’s latest novel Parade, encasing the book’s other captivating strands—the story of an unprovoked attack on a Parisian street, the story of a couple on a remote island, the story of a suicide at a museum, the story of the death of a mother. Elements which thems…

1
When Radical Art meets Obscene Wealth, with Hari Kunzru 56:55

4M ago56:55

56:55

Last week we were joined in the bookshop by Hari Kunzru, whose new novel Blue Ruin is a deeply unsettling, and intensely thought provoking reflection on the impact capital has on people, but also on art, and those who create it. It is the perfect final instalment—alongside White Tears and Red Pill—in Hari Kunzru’s own trois couleurs —a loose trilog…

1
Sheila Heti on Alphabetical Diaries 50:07

4M ago50:07

50:07

Last week we were joined by the wonderful Sheila Heti to celebrate the launch of her Alphabetical Diaries. In taking a decade of her journals, sorting the sentences alphabetically, then paring them down to about a tenth of their original length, Sheila Heti has freed a slice of her life from the shackles of time and in doing so has extracted some o…

1
BONUS: Celebrating Dylan Thomas with Cerys Matthews…with exclusive live music from Flora Hibberd! 57:26

4M ago57:26

57:26

To celebrate Dylan Thomas Day 2024 we’re delighted to share this recording of our recent event with award-winning songwriter, author and broadcaster Cerys Matthews. The evening also featured live music from Flora Hibberd and her band, including a brand new song composed for this evening. Enjoy! More from Cerys Matthews: Out of Chaos Comes Bliss: ht…

1
Viet Thanh Nguyen on Memory, Migration and Model Minorities 1:03:03

4M ago1:03:03

1:03:03

A few weeks ago, we welcomed Pulitzer Prizewinner Viet Thanh Nguyen to Shakespeare and Company to discuss his engrossing new work A Man of Two Faces: A Memoir, A History, A Memorial, a book about family, and memory, and storytelling, and history, on all the levels that it impacts upon a life. Buy A Man of Two Faces here: https://www.shakespeareandc…

1
Ottessa Moshfegh on bringing Eileen to the screen 1:02:16

5M ago1:02:16

1:02:16

A few weeks ago we welcomed Ottessa Moshfegh to Shakespeare and Company. That night we’re headed almost back to where it all began by revisiting Moshfegh’s second book Eileen, the small town noir that propelled this experimental writer into the bestseller charts and onto the Booker shortlist. Eileen has just been adapted into a Hollywood film—direc…

1
Percival Everett on James, his subversive reimagining of Huckleberry Finn 34:56

5M ago34:56

34:56

James—the new novel by Percival Everett—retells, reframes, and reimagines Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of Jim, the black man whose flight from slavery quickly entangles with the journey of Huck, on the run after faking his own death to escape his violent father. James gives us the events of Twain’s picaresque…

Podcasts Worth a Listen

Sandra Booker Podcasts

Podcasts Worth a Listen

1
Sidekick COO

Sandra B

1
Artists Spotlight

Sandra Booker Music

1
The Launch Playbook

Sara Vartanian

1
The Shakespeare and Company Interview

Shakespeare and Company

1
Rachel Kushner on Creation Lake (Booker Prize SHORTLIST 2024) 55:28

1
Ferdia Lennon on Glorious Exploits 42:04

1
Roxy Dunn on As Young As This 37:35

1
Poetry: Ishion Hutchinson reads from and discusses School of Instructions 47:31

1
Michael Donkor on Grow Where They Fall 1:00:38

1
Writing Against Normality, with Samanta Schweblin 1:02:53

1
Parenting in the age of AI, with Helen Phillips 52:34

1
Creating Life from Art, with Catherine Lacey 58:12

1
Paul Murray on The Bee Sting 1:05:31

1
Claire Kilroy on Parenting under the Patriarchy 54:57

1
Rachel Cusk on Art, Violence and Freedom through Destruction 1:00:16

1
When Radical Art meets Obscene Wealth, with Hari Kunzru 56:55

1
Sheila Heti on Alphabetical Diaries 50:07

1
BONUS: Celebrating Dylan Thomas with Cerys Matthews…with exclusive live music from Flora Hibberd! 57:26

1
Viet Thanh Nguyen on Memory, Migration and Model Minorities 1:03:03

1
Ottessa Moshfegh on bringing Eileen to the screen 1:02:16

1
Percival Everett on James, his subversive reimagining of Huckleberry Finn 34:56

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