Simon Mayo's Books Of The Year

Tom Bradby chats about some of his favourite authors including Len Deighton, Delia Owens, Thomas Harris and Simon Mayo Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Tom Bradby is a novelist, screenwriter and journalist. He has written nine previous novels, including top-ten bestselling Secret Service, and its two sequels, Double Agent and Triple Cross. As a broadcaster, he is best known as the current Anchor of ITV's News at Ten. He has been with ITN for thirty years and was successively Ireland Correspondent, Political Correspondent, Asia Correspondent (during which time he was shot and seriously injured whilst covering a riot in Jakarta), Royal Correspondent, UK Editor and Political Editor- a job he held for a decade - before being made the Anchor of News at Ten in 2015His latest novel is Yesterday's Spy. Set against the backdrop of one of the defining events of the Cold War.Nothing good ever comes from a midnight phone call. For washed-up spy Harry Tower, it is the worst news at the worst possible time. His son, Sean, has gone missing in troubled Iran after writing an exposé about government corruption. Their relationship has never recovered since Harry's wife's suicide, for which Sean holds his father responsible. And Harry, with his career on the verge of disintegration, needs to find him and put things right. When Harry arrives in Tehran, he finds a city on the cusp of revolution. Foreign powers are jockeying for influence, money and, most importantly, oil. The CIA are conspiring to undermine the government with an impending coup, and there are dark mutterings about opium smuggling. But the reasons for Sean's disappearance may be even more sinister than Harry first suspected. Before long, he is on the run - not only from a faceless enemy, but from his own past. Which will catch up with him first?, Yesterday’s Spy is a story that is rich in intrigue and history and will keep readers guessing until the final pages. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Claire Powell tackles our Q&A about the books she loved as a child, books that cheer her up and her favourite book shops. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

'At the Table is a hugely intelligent, emotionally astute novel about family dynamics, and Claire Powell is an incredible new talent' Marian Keyes'I hate the artwork on my kitchen wall' Matt WilliamsSet in 2018, Claire Powell's beautifully observed debut novel follows each member of the Maguire family over a tumultuous year of lunches, dinners and drinks, as old conflicts arise and relationships are re-evaluated. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The host of Radio 4's flagship Today programme chats about some of his favourite books which include Landslide, Stig of the Dump, Light Perpetual and Knights of the Cardboard Castle. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Simon and Matt chat to presenter and journalist Justin Webb. He has been a mainstay on BBC Radio 4's Today programme since 2009.His childhood was far from ordinary. Between his mother's un-diagnosed psychological problems, and his step-father's untreated ones, life at home was dysfunctional at best. But with gun-wielding school masters and sub-standard living conditions, Quaker boarding school wasn't much better.And the backdrop to this coming of age story? Britain in the 1970s. Led Zeppelin, Janis Joplin and Free. Strikes, inflation and IRA bombings. A time in which attitudes towards mental illness, parenting and masculinity were worlds apart from the attitudes we have today. A society that believed itself to be close to the edge of breakdown.Candid, unsparing and darkly funny, Justin Webb's memoir is a portrait of personal and national dysfunction. So was it the brutal experiences of his upbringing, or an innate ambition and drive that somehow survived them, that shaped the urbane and successful radio presenter we know and love now? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Simon and Matt chat to debut author Jo Browning Wroe about the books and authors she loves...including John Irving, Joanna Glen, Susanna Clarke and Maggie O'Farrell. Plus tips on how to squeeze extra reading time in to your day. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Simon and Matt chat to debut author Jo Browning Wroe. Her book, although beginning with a terrible real life tragedy, is an inspiring, uplifting read. Among other things, they chat about the embalming process, choral music and the cost of using famous lyrics in print.Tonight nineteen-year-old William Lavery is dressed for success, his first black-tie do. It's the Midlands Chapter of the Institute of Embalmers Ladies' Night Dinner Dance, and William is taking Gloria in her sequinned evening gown. He can barely believe his luck. But as the guests sip their drinks and smoke their post-dinner cigarettes a telegram delivers news of a tragedy. An event so terrible it will shake the nation.It is October 1966 and a landslide at a coal mine has buried a school: Aberfan. William decides he must act, so he stands and volunteers to attend. It will be his first job, and will be - although he's yet to know it - a choice that threatens to sacrifice his own happiness. His work that night will force him to think about the little boy he was, and the losses he has worked so hard to bury. But compassion can have surprising consequences, because - as William discovers - giving so much to others can sometimes help us heal ourselves. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ed recommends a variety of books including those by Hugh Ruttledge, Sam Knight, JB Priestley, Kingsley Amis and Cheeta! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ed tells the amazing story of Maurice Wilson, who planned to be the first person to scale Everest. His plan was to crash a plane in to it! What could possibly go wrong? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices