Join the Two Marks in a Christmas special where they invited their listeners to share their favourite Christmas books and gifts. They dive into the most-loved books, annuals, games, bikes, cuddly toys, dolls and discover how these gifts have shaped us all.

Sunday Times bestselling author Mia Kuzniar brings some light to the bleak midwinter with her wonderful new novel Midnight in Everwood. She discusses how ballet and the Nutcracker Suite influenced her new book and how she moves between adventure stories for children and fairy tales for adults. She also tells us how an 18-month break between jobs allowed her to write and sell her debut novel.

GB Ralph, author of the Rise and Shine series, talks about his last-minute decision to try NanoWriMo this year. He takes us from the first idea for his new series — The Milverton Mysteries — to the various options he had, including: writing every day, writing “hermit style”, and waiting for the muse. And he tells us how he coped when he started missing his daily word count targets. This is as entertaining as it is educational for anyone thinking of taking on the NanoWriMo challenge, and it was recorded when the trauma of NanoWriMo was still fresh in Gavin’s mind!

Kindle Storyteller Award Winner Ian W Sainsbury returns the podcast to tell us what’s happened since we last spoke, not least how he started a new series and then decided to completely reinvent it by changing the protagonist’s name, series title and the cover designs. Ian also talks about working with dictation software, how his writing habits have evolved and how the limitations of genre, form and technology can make you more creative.

Bestselling author Lisa Hall tells us about her new novel The Woman in the Woods, which adds a dash of the supernatural to her page-turning thriller style. Lisa talks about setting a book in a real place, starting with the twist, how thinking the worst inspires her, the cruelty of rejection and how to cope with it, the importance of notebooks, and knowing when to let a book go.

JK Ellem writes cutting edge thrillers including the Ravenwood series, which was never supposed to be a series, but his readers wanted more. JK takes us through his career, how his writing process has developed over time, and how he’s benefitted from listening to his readers, going where the success is and following the muse.

We welcome Evan Gow back to the podcast to discuss StoryOrigin’s new feature to help manage feedback from your Beta Readers.   You can discover more about StoryOrigin here: https://storyoriginapp.com/    And here’s when Evan last came on the podcast: https://bestsellerexperiment.com/ep223-storyorigin-promotions-with-evan-gow/

We are delighted to welcome worldwide bestseller Michael Connelly back to the podcast to discuss his new novel The Dark Hours, which explores an LA scarred by fear and social unrest. Michael reflects on how the world of Harry Bosch has grown over an incredible thirty years, and he answers our listener questions of writing habits, outlining and much, much more.

Sasha Greene returns to the podcast with her new novel Trust, which explore ideas such as PTSD, sexual assault and coercive control. Sasha takes us through her process of research, how she writes just one day a week to a deadline, and why no writing is ever wasted.

Christine Pride is an editor with 15 years experience with the likes of Doubleday and Simon & Schuster, and Jo Piazza is the award-winning author of nine novels. Together they have written an extraordinary novel, We Are Not Like Them, which touches on themes of race and friendship. They tell us how the book came about, and how they worked together, and the challenges of writing two perspectives.