“…Dodgy dentists. The Dalai Llama. High-altitude polo players. Maoist rebels. Yak herders. Imran Khan. Just a few of the diverse personalities professional funnyman turned adventure traveller Michael Palin met on his epic 125-day journey across the world’s greatest mountain range…”
Ian Rankin – A Question of Blood interview
Tony Parsons – Stories We Could Tell interview
Chris Patten – Not Quite the Diplomat interview
Christopher Brookmyre – All Fun and Games Until Someone Loses an Eye
“…
Unlike most people, Jane Flemming, the protagonist of Scottish author Christopher Brookmyre’s novel All Fun and Games Until Someone Loses an Eye, can pinpoint the exact turn of events that transformed her life. A drunken, awkward, and most importantly unprotected bout of unsatisfying sex with her Catholic boyfriend Tom… ”
Iain Banks – Interview
“…A disturbed teenager slaughtering rabbits and torturing wasps; A futuristic religious leader decapitating his nemesis, keeping the head alive as he uses it daily as a punch bag; A serial killer intent on murdering those who represent the excesses of Thatcher’s Britain.
Just a few examples of the dark, warped and, often perversely funny themes that run through the works of Iain Banks….”
Jeffrey Archer – Interview
“… To say that disgraced politician cum author, Lord Jeffrey Archer, is a controversial character is an understatement. He has been imprisoned for perjury and perverting the court of justice; breached parole conditions; stolen coats in Canada; been accused of insider trading and ripping off charities; and was implicated in Simon Mann’s planned coup in Equatorial Guinea. The list goes on….”
Athol Fugard – Tsotsi
Shirley Hazzard – People in Glass Houses
“…If there’s one quality that defines Shirley Hazzard’s People in Glass Houses, it’s subtlety. This collection of eight short stories is a masterpiece of observation which clearly demonstrates the author’s perceptive wit… Set in the 1950s, amidst the corridors and offices of the newly-created monolithic and meandering bureaucracy of “the Organization” – an American-based concern intent on ‘inflicting improvement’ the world over…”