Little Atoms

Rachel DeLoache Williams is an ex-Vanity Fair photo editor and author of My Friend Anna: The True Story of a Fake Heiress. She tells Neil about her friendship with Anna Delvey, the 'Russian heiress' who deceived New York's art scene for a year, and how she became her mark. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's the 600th Little Atoms! and Neil welcomes Laura Cumming back to the show. Laura Cumming has been chief art critic of the Observer since 1999. Her book, The Vanishing Man: In Pursuit of Velázquez, was Book of the Week on Radio 4, Wall Street Journal Book of the Year and a New York Times bestseller. It won the 2017 James Tait Black Biography Prize and was published to critical acclaim (‘A riveting detective story: readers will be spellbound’ Colm Tóibín). Her first book, A Face to the World: On Self-Portraits, was described by Nick Hornby as ‘Brilliant, fizzing with ideas not just about art but human nature’ and by Julian Barnes as ‘that rare item: an art book where the text is so enthralling that the pictures almost seem like an interruption’. Laura’s latest book is On Chapel Sands: My Mother and Other Missing Persons. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Claire McGlasson is a journalist who works for ITV News and enjoys the variety of life on the road with a TV camera. She lives in Cambridgeshire. The Rapture is her debut novel. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Lee Jackson is a Victorian enthusiast, creator of the popular online resource on the social history of Victorian London, www.victorianlondon.org, and currently working on a PhD entitled 'Dickensland'. His book Dirty Old London was described by The Times as 'a tightly argued, meticulously researched history of sanitation that reads like a novel' and by the Lancet as 'a triumph of popular scholarship'. His latest book Palaces of Pleasure: How the Victorians Invented Mass Entertainment covers topics as diverse as the origins of modern public house, football, music hall, the Victorian seaside, dance halls and pleasure gardens. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Namwali Serpell is a Zambian writer who teaches at the University of California, Berkeley. She received a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award for women writers in 2011 and was selected for the Africa 39, a 2014 Hay Festival project to identify the best African writers under 40. Her first published story, 'Muzungu', was selected for The Best American Short Stories 2009 and shortlisted for the 2010 Caine Prize for African writing. She won the 2015 Caine Prize for her story 'The Sack'. The Old Drift is her first novel. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Caroline Crampton is a writer and editor who contributes regularly to the Guardian, the Mail on Sunday and the New Humanist. She has appeared as a broadcaster on Newsnight, Sky News and BBC Radio 4. Her first book is The Way to The Sea: The Forgotten Histories of The Thames Estuary. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Recorded live at the Idler Festival 2019 at Fenton House, Hampstead. Josh Cohen is a psychoanalyst in private practice, and Professor of Modern Literary Theory at Goldsmiths University of London. He is the author of numerous books and articles on modern literature, psychoanalysis and cultural theory. His books include How to Read Freud and The Private Life: Why We Remain in the Dark. He is a regular contributor to Guardian, New Statesman and TLS. His latest book is Not Working: Why We Have To Stop. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Carolina Setterwall was born in 1978 in Sala, Sweden. She studied Media and Communication in Uppsala, Stockholm and London and has worked within the music and publishing industries as an editor and writer. Setterwall lives in Stockholm with her son. Let's Hope for the Best is her first novel. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Angela Saini is an award-winning British science journalist and broadcaster. Her work has appeared in the Guardian, Observer, New Scientist, Wired, New Humanist among others, and she regularly presents science programmes on BBC radio. She has won awards from the Association of British Science Writers and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. And she was named European Science Journalist of the Year. She has a Masters degree in Engineering from Oxford University and was a fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Angela is the author of Geek Nation and Inferior, and her latest book is Superior: The Return of Race Science. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Keith Kahn-Harris is a sociologist and writer. He is a senior lecturer at Leo Baeck College, associate lecturer at Birkbeck College, and associate fellow of the Institute for Jewish Policy Research where he runs the European Jewish Research Archive. His previous books include Uncivil War: The Israel Conflict in the Jewish Community. His latest book is Strange Hate: Antisemitism, Racism and the Limits of Diversity. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.