Bookclub

The Gunpowder Plot by Antonia Fraser.

Andrew Michael Hurley discusses his book The Loney which won the Costa First Novel Award in 2015. Recorded with an audience at the Liverpool Literary Festival and presented by James Naughtie. First published in a print run of just 300 copies by a small press, The Loney went on to win The Costa First Novel Award and Book of the Year at the British Book Industry Awards 2015. This gothic novel is set on a bleak stretch of the Lancashire coast near Morecambe Bay called The Loney, which is infamous for its dangerous waters. In 1976, The congregation of St Jude’s Catholic church in London head north, on pilgrimage to a holy shrine, near The Loney, hoping to cure Hanny, a boy who’s been mute since birth. His brother, who is unnamed throughout the novel, narrates the story in the present day.The retreat is led by the newly installed parish priest, Father Bernard McGill, who struggles to shake off the ghost of his predecessor, the hardline Father Wilfred. Meanwhile, the rain sweeps in off the sea and the tides come and go, shifting the sands, burying and obscuring.There's a mysterious death at the heart of the novel; complicated and destructive family relationships, and running through it all a story of faith and superstition, imagination and fear. To the author's delight it was described as 'an amazing piece of fiction' by the master of modern gothic himself, Stephen King.Presenter : James Naughtie Interviewed guest : Andrew Michael Hurley Producer : Dymphna FlynnDecember's Bookclub choice : The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer (2013)

A treat from the Bookclub archive celebrating our 20th anniversary

Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgaard discusses A Death in the Family, which is the first part of My Struggle, his series of memoirs which have a devoted following.Already a successful novelist in his native Norway, almost ten years ago Knausgaard embarked on a huge project: a first person narrative about his life. In A Death in the Family he writes with painful honesty about his childhood and teenage years, his infatuation with rock music, his relationship with his loving yet almost invisible mother and his distant and dangerously unpredictable father, and then his bewilderment and grief on his father's death. Becoming a father himself, he has to balance the demands of caring for a young family with his determination to write great literature. The series is an exploration of the author’s past from which emerges a universal story of the struggles, great and small, that we all face in our lives. Karl Ove Knausgaard writes with honesty about his upbringing, causing ructions in his family. He says he always knew that whatever he wrote, he would have to be able to look his family members in the eye. My Struggle finally ran to six volumes, and the last one The End, has just been published in the UK. The series became a literary sensation in his native Norway as well as around the world. Presented by James Naughtie and recorded with a group of invited readers.Presenter : James Naughtie Interviewed guest : Karl Ove Knausgaard Producer : Dymphna FlynnNovember's Bookclub choice : The Loney by Andrew Michael Hurley (2014)

A treat from the Bookclub archive celebrating our 20th anniversary

James Naughtie and Madeline Miller discuss her debut novel The Song of Achilles which won the Orange Prize for Fiction 2012. In The Song of Achilles, Madeline Miller presents a love story against the backdrop of the Trojan war - between Achilles, leading the Greek army, and his best friend Patroclus. Her imagined relationship between the two men explains the emotional support that Achilles gets from Patroclus, the strength of the bond between them and the depth of Achilles' grief at his friend's death.Recorded with a group of invited readers.October's Bookclub Choice : A Death in the Family by Karl Ove Knausgaard (2014)Presenter : James Naughtie Interviewed Guest : Madeline Miller Producer : Dymphna Flynn.

A treat from the Bookclub archive celebrating our 20th anniversary

Neel Mukherjee talks about his Man Booker Prize nominated book The Lives of Others, which explores the way an Indian family's history is disrupted when one member becomes involved in extremist political activism.The programme was recorded in the library at Styal Prison, Cheshire, with a reading group of women prisoners, and with the support of the National Literacy Trust and the Books Unlocked reading scheme.The Lives of Others is set in Calcutta and the ricefields on the edge of the jungle in the west of West Bengal. It takes place in the second half of the 1960s and centres on the large and relatively wealthy Ghosh family, led by a patriarch and matriarch who rule the family, from the top of a large shared house, with other relatives on lower floors depending on their social standing.The eldest grandson, Supratik, has left home and joined the Naxalite communist rebels and is working secretly in the countryside to mobilise the peasants against the landlords. Letters from him to an unnamed correspondent form one thread of narrative. The other is an intricate account of events and relationships on the various floors of the Ghosh house. There are tragedies and comedies, deaths and births, disasters and feasts and a mystery involving jewellery.The cast is huge and the reader spends time, at one point or another, with most of them. The reading group at Styal prison talk about the large cast of characters and how they drive the story, and also describe the importance of the prison library and reading in their daily lives.Presenter : James Naughtie Interviewed Guest : Neel Mukherjee Producer : Dymphna FlynnSeptember's Bookclub choice : The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller (2011).

A treat from the Bookclub archive celebrating our 20th anniversary.

Colm Tóibín discusses his best-selling novel Brooklyn with James Naughtie and a group of invited readers. Brooklyn follows the fortunes of a young Irish woman Eilis Lacey as she leaves home to make a new life in 1950s New York. Arriving in a crowded lodging house in Brooklyn, Eilis can only be reminded of what she has sacrificed and left behind. Just as her homesickness abates and she takes tentative steps towards friendship, and perhaps something more, Eilis receives news which sends her back to Ireland where she will be confronted by a terrible dilemma. In Bookclub Colm Tóibín talks about the ongoing emigration from Ireland, especially at times of economic downturn and how Irish emigrants view home; and he notes how the tides have turned with the country receiving new immigrants from the eastern countries of the European Union in recent years.Brooklyn was nominated for the Man Booker Prize and won the Costa Novel Prize in 2009. This edition continues a summer of editions celebrating Bookclub's 20th anniversary. Presenter : James Naughtie Interviewed guest : Colm Tóibín Producer : Dymphna FlynnAugust's Bookclub choice : The Lives of Others by Neel Mukherjee (2014).