Watch the trailer forYou Are Not So Smart, by David McRaney

How many of your Facebook friends do you think you know? Would you help a stranger in need? Do you know why you re so in love with your new smartphone? The truth is: you re probably wrong. You are not so smart.

This Is Improbable: Cheese String Theory, Magnetic Chickens, and Other WTF Research

Marc Abrahams, founder of the infamous Ig Nobel prizes, and author of This Is Improbable, talks about his approach to science, and reveals his favourite improbable research.

Junot Díaz on how he writes…

On the publication of his collection This Is How You Lose Her, Junot Díaz, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, talks about how he writes novels and short stories and the inspiration behind them.

Kirsty Gunn on The Big Music

In this work of fiction, Kirsty Gunn has created something as real as music or as a dream. Not so much a novel as a place the reader comes to inhabit and to know, The Big Music is a literary work of undeniable originality and power.

Discover Delicacy

A new romantic comedy about Love, Fate and other Delicacies… Nathalie, a beautiful, happy, and successful Parisian business executive woman finds herself suddenly widowed… read an extract from the book by David Foenkinos, and watch the trailer for the film.

Walking Home, with Simon Armitage

In 2010 Simon Armitage walked the Pennine Way back to the place of his birth. As well as making notes for his book Walking Home writing poems and doing readings along the way, he took a video camera with him to record the journey. Here are some highlights from his walk.

Deborah Harkness talks about setting Shadow of Night in London, 1590

After the fantastic success of A Discovery of Witches, everyone is eagerly awaiting the second instalment of the All Souls trilogy.

Fall under the spell of Diana and Matthew once more in this stunning, richly imagined, epic tale.

An interview with Christopher Radmann, author of Held Up

Chris Radmann talks about his real life experiences in South Africa and the story behind a searingly powerful, heart-wrenching novel about a father whose daughter is abducted and his attempts to recover her in the face of police indifference.

An interview with Harriet Sergeant

Harriet Sergeant’s Among the Hoods is an extraordinary story of one woman’s friendship with a South London gang.

Watch an interview with the author.

Deborah Harkness talks about Shadow of Night

After the fantastic success of A Discovery of Witches, everyone is eagerly awaiting the second instalment of the All Souls trilogy.

Fall under the spell of Diana and Matthew once more in this stunning, richly imagined, epic tale.

Watch the trailer for The Big Music, by Kirsty Gunn

The hills only come back the same: I don’t mind… begins Kirsty Gunn’s The Big Music, a novel that takes us to a new understanding of how fiction can affect us. Watch a film inspired by the novel, narrated by Brian Cox and filmed by Gary M Gowans.

Lindsey Hilsum introduces Sandstorm: Libya in the Time of Revolution

The inside story of Gaddafi’s regime from the award-winning Channel 4 and CNN journalist.

Watch the trailer for The Age of Miracles, by Karen Thompson Walker

‘It is never what you worry over that comes to pass in the end. The real catastrophes are always different – unimagined, unprepared for, unknown…’

The 500 Trailer

Watch the explosive trailer for Matthew Quirk’s stunning novel The 500 – a fast-paced thriller that takes the reader on a journey through the corridors of power to the crack dens of Washington and the corrupt underbelly of American politics.

Kate Summerscale discusses her new book, Mrs Robinson’s Disgrace

A story of romance, fidelity, insanity, fantasy, and the boundaries of privacy in a society clinging to rigid ideas about marriage and female sexuality, Mrs Robinson’s Disgrace brings to life a complex, frustrated Victorian wife, longing for passion and learning, companionship and love.

The Wrong Man Trailer and Extract

Watch the trailer for the brilliant debut novel from Jason Dean featuring new series character James Bishop.

Then read the extract.

Open up The Book of Summers, by Emylia Hall

Beth Lowe has been sent a parcel…

Richard King on How Soon is Now?

Richard King’s How Soon Is Now? is a landmark survey of the record labels that make up the backbone of the independent music industry and the hugely inspirational, eccentric, impulsive and visionary figures who created them.

Elliot Perlman introduces The Street Sweeper

Elliot Perlman’s latest novel is written on an epic scale – spanning six decades and moving from Chicago to New York, Warsaw to Melbourne, and Auschwitz.

Double Cross

Ben Macintyre, author of Double Cross on The True Story of The D-Day Spies… their codenames were Bronx, Brutus, Treasure, Tricycle and Garbo….

This is The Coward’s Tale

‘My name is Laddy Merridew. I’m a cry-baby. I’m sorry.’ ‘And my name is Ianto Jenkins. I am a coward. And that’s worse.’

Watch author Vanessa Gebbie discuss The Coward’s Tale.

Justin Ruthven-Tyers talks about his book Phoenix from the Ashes

After a fire destroyed their house, Justin and his wife Linda irrationally decided to build a 15-ton classic yacht, as complete amateurs – starting with the trees.