Always Take Notes

BAFTA-winning screenwriter Peter Moffat discusses his transition from law to writing, the differences between British and American TV drama production, and the role of intensive research in his writing routine.

Kassia and Simon interview Helen Lewis, deputy editor of the New Statesman. She spoke to us about what her current role entails, the training she received as a sub-editor at the Daily Mail (and what it was like to work there). Helen candidly discussed the importance of networking, feminism, sub-editing and longform journalism. She also revealed a brilliant tip for powering through writers' block. https://www.newstatesman.com/2016/01/where-bodies-are-buried-0 https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/may/27/hot-feminist-by-polly-vernon-reducing-revolution-to-sloppy-self-help You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Elizabeth Davies edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Simon speaks to Max Hastings, the best-selling military historian and erstwhile foreign correspondent and newspaper editor. They discussed Max's early career - how 1960s and 70s Fleet Street really was, without the benefit of rose-tinted spectacles - his experiences in the Falklands in 1982, the development of his book writing, from early ventures to his doorstopper World War Two histories, and the evolution of military history as a genre. http://www.maxhastings.com/ You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Olivia Crellin edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Kassia and Simon speak to Hannah Westland, the publisher at Serpent's Tail, an independent imprint that published Lionel Shriver's We Need to Talk About Kevin and Sarah Perry's The Essex Serpent. She spoke to us about her early career — she started out as a literary agent — some of the projects she's currently working on and the role of independent firms in the publishing marketplace. https://serpentstail.com/ https://twitter.com/hannahwestland?lang=en You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook atfacebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Ed Kiernan edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Simon speaks to Laura Palmer, publishing director for fiction at Head of Zeus, an independent publishing house in London. Laura co-founded Head of Zeus in 2012, having started her career at Quercus Books, and she also worked at Corvus, the commercial fiction imprint of Atlantic Books. We spoke about what 'commercial fiction' precisely means, whether 'women's fiction' is still a useful label, best practice for aspirant writers and editors, and whether the Kindle has boosted public appetite for erotica. http://headofzeus.com/ Sophie Hannah - Why and How I Plan My Novels https://sophiehannah.com/why-and-how-i-plan-my-novels/ Save the Cat! - A step-by-step guide to telling the perfect story https://www.amazon.co.uk/Save-Cat-Only-Screenwriting-Youll/dp/1932907009 Head of Zeus - Submissions portal http://headofzeus.com/submissions-login Head of Zeus - Internship application http://headofzeus.com/about-us You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Liz Davies edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Kassia and Simon chat to Ben Judah, the journalist and author of This is London and Fragile Empire. He told us about how he got into writing, the influence on his work of Polish reportage styles and why he's decided to take a little break from Twitter. (We were on Skype, so please excuse the odd rough patch.) https://www.amazon.co.uk/This-London-Life-Death-World/dp/1447274792 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Fragile-Empire-Russia-Vladimir-Putin/dp/0300205228 http://standpointmag.co.uk/dispatches-jan-10-ben-judah-siberia-gulag-stalin http://www.standpointmag.co.uk/dispatches-january-february-2014-hunting-lynx-with-the-old-believers-ben-judah-tuva-siberia You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Ed Kiernan edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Kassia and Simon interview Patrick Kingsley, a correspondent with the New York Times. Patrick previously covered migration and the Middle East for The Guardian, based in Cairo and Istanbul. His first book, How To Be Danish (2012), was an exploration of contemporary Danish society. His second book, The New Odyssey (2016), chronicled the European refugee crisis, and was one of NPR's books of the year. Now based in London, Patrick is also a past winner of the annual foreign reporting award at the British Journalism Awards. We spoke about how foreign correspondency works — the intricacies of fixers, bureau chiefs and deadlines, Patrick's motivation to go abroad, some of his major pieces for the Guardian, his earlier experiences of student journalism and how he has combined his newspaper reporting and book writing. https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/sep/06/gap-year-thailand-full-moon-party https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/22/cairo-prison-abu-zabaal-deaths-37-prisoners https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/09/hashems-journey-a-lesson-in-humility-and-heroism https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/24/world/middleeast/the-jihadi-who-turned-to-jesus.html?_r=0 You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Ed Kiernan edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Kassia interviews Nikesh Shukla, a TV and fiction writer. We spoke about his novels Coconut Unlimited and Meatspace, and how he came to edit The Good Immigrant, the collection of essays about race and immigration and what it means to be a model "good immigrant" in the UK. You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Olivia Crellin edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Kassia and Simon interview Antony Beevor, the celebrated military historian. Best known as author of Stalingrad, the runaway success which on publication in 1998 transformed military history as a genre, Antony has also written on the Spanish Civil War, the battles of Crete and Berlin, and D-Day. His latest book Arnhem – The Last German Victory, will be published in May 2018. Antony, who is also a former chairman of the Society of Authors, has sold more than seven million books in 32 languages. They discussed Antony's early move from serving as an army officer to writing, the experience of an unexpected smash with Stalingrad, the techniques he uses to marshal vast quantities of material, and his creative collaboration with his wife Artemis Cooper, who is also a writer. http://www.antonybeevor.com/ https://www.penguin.co.uk/authors/antony-beevor/5016/ You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Olivia Crellin edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.

Simon interviews Sam Knight, a British writer who works mainly for the Guardian and the New Yorker and specialises in longform pieces on unusual topics, such as the UK sandwich industry and the psychology of a stalker. They discuss his entry into journalism, his love of classic American nonfiction and how he puts features together. https://harpers.org/archive/2014/02/a-god-more-powerful-than-i/ https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/nov/24/how-the-sandwich-consumed-britain https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/03/30/follow-the-white-ball You can find us online at alwaystakenotes.com, on Twitter @takenotesalways, and on Facebook at facebook.com/alwaystakenotes. Always Take Notes is presented by Kassia St Clair and Simon Akam, and produced by Olivia Crellin, Ed Kiernan and Elizabeth Davies. Ed Kiernan edited this episode. Zahra Hankir is our communities editor and deals with all things social media. Our music is by Jessica Dannheisser and our logo was designed by James Edgar.