Shows
Rippling Pages: Interviews with WritersAna Schnabl on using childhood locations and memories in stories about unpleasant peopleWe’re going to the Slovenian coast this week during the final years Yugoslavia with Ana Schnabl.
Dunja has finally launched her literary career, but the shadow and spectre of her brother’s death haunts both her and her family. What happens when she returns to investigate her brother’s death? And what happens when the truth becomes stranger than the fiction she writes?
Ana Schnabl’s novel is published by Divided Publishing. Ana is a Slovenian writer, and this is her second novel to be translated into English, by Rawley Grau. Her first novel to be tra...
2026-02-0537 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersEva Meijer live in Leeds and panoramic crisis fiction based on personal experienceWhat a lovely time I had speaking and sitting with Eva Meijer, the Dutch Author, in Leeds to discuss their novel SEA NOW.
A government who seems slow to respond to a rapidly encroaching crisis. Marketing executives exploiting ways to make quick cash. A missing Prime Minister. Leavers and remainers conflicted about the right course of action. It all sounds like a playbook for our recent political crises. But when the dams start bursting in the Netherlands and the country rapidly begins to flood and be subsumed, what happens when people are faced with the unthinkable in t...
2026-01-2237 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBonus - Madeleine Dunnigan and Farah Ali on their favourite books and writing beyond the surfaceHappy New Year!
I’m delighted to bring you some more unedited and bonus content from my Christmas and New Year special with Madeleine Dunnigan and Farah Ali. There was just so much good stuff in our craft and curation special, that I wanted to bring you a little more to start the year.
These books are going to be spoken about in literary circles in January.
In Pakistan, a young woman grapples with a strange, indefinable illness against a backdrop of political upheaval. In England, a teenager tries to make sense of his...
2026-01-0812 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersChristmas and NY special - exciting talents, Madeleine and Farah, discussing healing and books that inspired their craftI’m kicking off a 2026 preview with two of the most exciting emerging voices publishing books this January. I speak to them about how they wrote their novels, before asking which books inspired them along the way, and what their books and book selections say about the world today.
If you’re looking for your next great reads of 2026, look no further — Rippling Pages has you covered.
We’re going from Pakistan to a rural boarding school in 1970s London.
In Pakistan, a young woman grapples with a strange, indefinable illness against a backdrop...
2025-12-1849 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersEditor Rali Chorbadzyiyska talking about how writers can manage rejections and marketingI'm delighted to be talking to Rali Chorbadzhiyska about her work as freelance editor, and we're asking what the road to publication really looks like.
It must be another edition of Ask the Curator. In these episodes, we go behind the curtain of the literary industry to ask another literary curator, how they do what they do.
Over the years, Rali has worked at Penguin RandomHouse, Faber and Canongate, working with some of the biggest names in literature. But she recently went freelance to deliver on her aim of guiding writers refine and elevate their w...
2025-12-0622 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersLee Cole Bonus - how Lee found old books at his grandparents to build his characters and worldsWelcome to some bonus content with Lee Cole, and we’re talking about how he used an old book he found at his grandparents to help build the world and characters in his novels.
Plus, you’re going to hear some extra bits about writing heroes and villains.
Fulfillment, Lee Cole’s second novel, follows two half brothers whose clashing ambitions—Emmett’s longing to be a screenwriter and his brother’s academic ideals about “rural despair”—go beyond a simple difference in worldview. Something deeper threatens to pull them apart.
Lee is a graduate of the Io...
2025-11-2715 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersLee Cole on the ethics of writing about home, and the people who stay and leave small townsWelcome to the latest episode of the Rippling Pages. I’m having a coffee with Lee Cole, the American writer from Kentucky. And we’re talking about balancing the feelings and ethics of writing about home.
Now living a humdrum life in Kentucky, Emmett spends his days packing boxes in a warehouse. But what happens when he begins to dream of another life—and when those dreams start to fracture his family relationships?
These questions lie at the heart of Fulfilment, Lee Cole’s second novel. The book follows two half brothers whose clashing ambitions—Emmett’s l...
2025-11-1338 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBonus! Joanna Pocock on why your phone and notebook might be all you need to writeI’m talking with the essayist Joanna Pocock, and this is some bonus content from our original interview.
America is a place that has compelled countless writers to travel its vast and varied landscapes. Perhaps you’ve done it yourself. But what happens when you feel compelled to do it all again?
That’s the question at the heart of Joanna Pocock’s essay, Greyhound (Fitzcarraldo Editions). Named after the iconic bus company whose intercity network carries passengers from Detroit to Los Angeles — and which Joanna relies on for her own journey — Greyhound revisits familiar motels, cross...
2025-10-3013 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersLIVE! Agnes Lidbeck and how to write about major adjustments and characters that frustrate usI’m talking to the Swedish writer, Agnes Lidbeck, in this special edition live episode of the Rippling Pages! We really did have a coffee with one of the world’s, one of Sweden’s most interesting writers, because as we were live in person with a live audience in Leeds!
Life is full of adjustments - perhaps there isn’t a bigger adjustment than having children. But what happens when you start to question your role in this adjustment? Crucially, what happens when a mother starts to question her role in this adjustment.
These are the q...
2025-10-1651 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJoanna Pocock on writing about kindness and perspective on the American RoadAmerica is a place that has compelled countless writers to travel its vast and varied landscapes. Perhaps you’ve done it yourself. But what happens when you feel compelled to do it all again?
That’s the question at the heart of Joanna Pocock’s essay, Greyhound (Fitzcarraldo Editions). Named after the iconic bus company whose intercity network carries passengers from Detroit to Los Angeles — and which Joanna relies on for her own journey — Greyhound revisits familiar motels, crossings, and bus stations she first encountered years before.
Joanna’s writing has appeared in the LA Times, Guardi...
2025-10-0236 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersAsk the Host! Liam on Latest Reads, Favourite Bookshop, and Reality TVWelcome to the second edition of Rippling Pages: Ask the Host!
It's time to answer some more questions from you, the listeners!
So, that’s what I’ve done: I’ve picked out some questions from the Rippling Pages inbox, and answered them!
In this episode, I answer:
- What I have been reading lately?
- How are my French lessons going?
- How do I prepare for interviews?
- What is my favourite bookshop?
- What is my favourite season?
- Who's going to win the Premier...
2025-09-2816 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBONUS! Gurnaik Johal on Objects, Perfect Art and Buster Keaton“It’s almost a perfect work of art.”
This is some bonus content from the previous episode with Gurnaik Johal where we talk about objects of influence.
The return of a potentially holy river in the Indian mountains - is it a sign of a new age, a divine intervention, or simply the workings of nature? These are the questions at the heart of Gurnaik Johal’s novel, SARASWATI, published by Serpent’s Tail. Frauds, politicians, mystics, writers, and the family who own the farm in which the river exists, are caught up in trying to...
2025-09-1806 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersGurnaik Johal on Rivers, Family and Pub ChatsThe return of a potentially holy river in the Indian mountains - is it a sign of a new age, a divine intervention, or simply the workings of nature? These are the questions at the heart of Gurnaik Johal’s novel, SARASWATI, published by Serpent’s Tail. Frauds, politicians, mystics, writers, and the family who own the farm in which the river exists, are caught up in trying to determine what the return of the SARASWATI river means. It is a novel that is truly global in its scope, set in Canada, India, the Chagos Islands, and Wolverhampton. It was...
2025-09-0436 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersYan Ge Part 2 on Vulnerabilities, Younger Selves, Parents“I think when you’re young you really allow yourself to be stupid.”
Welcome to part 2 of my conversation with Yan Ge.
Yan Ge is here to discuss her life and writing. She was born in Chengdu, Sichuan Province People’s Republic of China. Emerging as a prodigious writer in Chinese and Sichuanese, she was named as one of China’s twenty future literary masters by People Magazine. In 2012, she was chosen as Best New Writer by the Prestigious Chinese Literature Media Prize. For English language readers, Nicky Harman first translated her novella, White Horse, for Hope R...
2025-08-2136 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersYan Ge Part 1 on Happiness, Elsewhere, and Striving”If I enter a project knowing what I’m going to do, confidently, I wouldn’t do it.”
It’s Women in Translation Month!
Yan Ge is here to discuss her life and writing. She was born in Chengdu, Sichuan Province People’s Republic of China. Emerging as a prodigious writer in Chinese and Sichuanese, she was named as one of China’s twenty future literary masters by People Magazine. In 2012, she was chosen as Best New Writer by the Prestigious Chinese Literature Media Prize. For English language readers, Nicky Harman first translated her novella, White Horse, f...
2025-08-0734 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersKimberly Campanello - Bonus Content with memory, flags and music“She starts having an experience to see her own life as a more shifting sands that isn’t to be fear but in fact to be enjoyed.”
Kimberly Campanello is here to talk about her novel, USE THE WORDS YOU HAVE (Somesuch Editions). It’s a sweltering summer in Bretagne, France. K, an American exchange student, is navigating more than just unfamiliar streets. She’s finding a new language. This is bonus content from the previous episode.
In this bonus content, I’ve asked Kimberly to provide me with some objects that Kimberly associated wit...
2025-07-2412 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersKimberly Campanello on Autofiction, the Midwest, and Notebooks“How do you sound like you know what you’re doing when you don’t have the words”
Kimberly Campanello is here to talk about her novel, USE THE WORDS YOU HAVE (Somesuch Editions). It’s a sweltering summer in Bretagne, France. K, an American exchange student, is navigating more than just unfamiliar streets. She’s finding a new language.
Kimberly’s work moves between forms, genres, and histories. She’s the author of MOTHERBABYHOME (zimZALLA), a harrowing and formally innovative response to Ireland’s Mother and Baby Homes, is held in the national poetr...
2025-07-1035 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersUttama Kirit Patel on Letters, Motherhood, and Mother-in-Laws“I found myself writing an apology letter…and I didn’t know what I was apologising for.”
In Uttama Kirit Patel’s novel, The Shape of an Apostrophe (Serpent’s Tail), Lina is pregnant, and she’s finding that this seemingly salubrious society is not congenial and accommodating to the difficult challenges of an unplanned pregnancy.
Uttama, born to Gujarati parents who then since found their way to the United Arab Emirates via Kampala, Surat, Pondicherry and Colchester. Her short fiction was nominated for the PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for emerging writers.
...
2025-06-2635 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersAsk the Bookshop- Bonus! On Leeds, Community and Safe Spaces“When I set out to plan the business, I wrote ten words - the world I always kept coming to was community.”
The Rippling Pages is all about curating the best writers to inspire you and your writing - today, we’re speaking to another curator. Eden Barnes is the owner of Next Chapter Books, an indie women-focussed bookshop in Leeds, and I had a quick chat with her in store.
There’s lots going on this week in Leeds. Leeds Lit Fest is starting, and it’s Indie Bookshop Week. Here someone who is at the cent...
2025-06-1411 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersRoisin Dunnett on Time Travel, Protest, and Littering"It is also difficult to imbue the people and the movements of the past with the complexities we offer ourselves."
If you were to meet a time traveller from the future, what would you ask them? This is the question Roisin Dunnett asks in her novel, A LINE YOU HAVE TRACED (Magpie Books/Oneworld Publications). Spanning over three centuries, three women are connected by forces they, at first, don’t understand. From post-WWI Britain, to East End London’s modern queer scene, to a portentous dystopian future, Roisin’s novel is coded with messages between the pas...
2025-06-1234 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersRippling Pages Live with Katharina Volckmer Part 2 - On Clowns, Mothers and Part Time Jobs“They got fired for that!”
Katharina Volckmer is here to discuss her second novel, Calls May Be Recorded for Training and Monitoring Purposes (Indigo Press) and it was live at the Hyde Park Book Club! Thank you to the Hyde Park Book Club for hosting us and Next Chapter Books for supporting the event. This is the second part of our conversation.
Katharina’s first novel, THE APPOINTMENT, was translated into over fifteen languages, it was adapted for the stage starring Camille Cottin and was nominated for several prizes. Katharina is in ribald mode in this...
2025-05-2926 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersRippling Pages Live with Katharina Volckmer - Part 1 - on Call Centres, Intimacy and Toilet HumourKatharina Volckmer is here to discuss her second novel, Calls May Be Recorded for Training and Monitoring Purposes (Indigo Press) and it was live at the Hyde Park Book Club! Thank you to the Hyde Park Book Club for hosting us and Next Chapter Books for supporting the event.
Katharina’s first novel, THE APPOINTMENT, was translated into over fifteen languages, it was adapted for the stage starring Camille Cottin and was nominated for several prizes. Katharina is in ribald mode in this funny, outlandish, and yet, very melancholic novel about a man called Jimmie who works in...
2025-05-1529 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersAsk the Host! Liam on Dream Guests, New Books, and Talking to AnimalsWelcome to the first edition of Rippling Pages: Ask the Host!
Over the years, I’ve been asking the questions, but it’s about time I answered some too.
So, that’s what I’ve done: I’ve picked out some questions from the Rippling Pages inbox, and answered them!
In this episode, I answer:
- Where am I from?
- Why did I start the podcast?
- Who would I like to interview?
- What books have I enjoyed recently?
- Would I rather speak every language o...
2025-05-0415 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersElaine Garvey on 2002, Wadrobe Departments, and Women Walking"She finds herself in London working in a theatre having to touch people!"
Elaine Garvey, to discuss her novel, THE WARDROBE DEPARTMENT, published by Canongate Books. It’s 2002. Mairéad Sweeney has moved from rural Ireland to work in London’s West End. While the prestige of working in theatre doesn’t exactly wear off, the long hours and spoiled actors make Mairéad’s transition from Ireland more difficult than it should be. Things get even more difficult when Mairéad has to return home for her grandmother’s funeral. It’s here she begins to reconc...
2025-04-1732 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBonus Content - Benjamin Markovits on Subtexts, Michael Jordan, and family favourites!“It’s my mum’s favourite book that I wrote!”
Benjamin Markovits is here to talk about his new and twelfth novel, THE REST OF OUR LIVES, published by Faber and Faber. Tom Layward has made a pact with himself. After his daughter moves out of college, he’s moving out too. His wife had an affair, and he feels like he owes himself a road trip across America. He takes in the sights, sounds and basketball games of the American heartland and beyond. But he’s deferring some health issues and it seems like it’s only a matter o...
2025-04-0309 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBenjamin Markovits on Basketball, Family, and Illness‘The people I like to write about are what I would describe as moderately successful failures.’
Benjamin Markovits is here to talk about his new and twelfth novel, THE REST OF OUR LIVES, published by Faber and Faber.
Tom Layward has made a pact with himself. After his daughter moves out of college, he’s moving out too. His wife had an affair, and he feels like he owes himself a road trip across America. He takes in the sights, sounds and basketball games of the American heartland and beyond. But he’s deferri...
2025-03-2033 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBonus Content with Marni Appleton - Taylor Swift, and Getting Up Early"Taylor Swift is somebody who has managed to keep reinventing herself to stay relevant."
Welcome to Rippling Points, more content and more insights and inspiration into the craft of literature:
Marni Appleton is here to talk about her short story collection, I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY, published by Indigo Press. We discuss:
- How Taylor Swift's ability to reinvent herself and stay relevant differs to that of the characters
- Ideas of productivity and how they shouldn't reflect your value in the world
The modern world Marni presents to...
2025-03-0607 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersMarni Appleton on Spotlights, Mirrors and the Art of the Title"It builds to women and girls choosing to hide their mouths because of the effect of this trend...things just morph and take on different meanings as they're shared in different contexts"
Marni Appleton is here to talk about her collection of short stories, I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY, published by The Indigo Press.
The modern world Marni presents to us in her stories is one that feels incredibly liberating, but then hinged by archaic attitudes from the past all at the same time. Women go viral on social media for seemingly innocent reasons; open and...
2025-02-2032 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersRippling Points - Bonus Content with Vincenzo Latronico - Berlin, Italian novels, and on being translated into English"Being published in English is a big milestone..."
Vincenzo Latronico is here to talk about his first novel translated into English - PERFECTION, published by Fitzcarraldo editions and translated from the Italian by Sophie Hughes.
Welcome to Rippling Points, more content insights and inspiration into the craft of literature:
- How and why he set his novel in Berlin, or why locations don't become so important for the novel
- The global market of translation and the pleasure of being translated into English
Vincenzo is one of the most...
2025-02-0608 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersVincenzo Latronico on Perfection, Authenticity, and Things“Love is a dangerous topic.”
Vincenzo Latronico is here to talk about his first novel translated into English - PERFECTION, published by Fitzcarraldo editions and translated from the Italian by Sophie Hughes.
Vincenzo is one of the most distinguished novelists writing in Italian today. He has also translated many books into Italian, by authors such as George Orwell, Oscar Wilde, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Hanif Kureishi.
In PERFECTION, there’s something missing from Anna and Tom’s life, and they can’t quite put their finger on what it is that is missing. It drives...
2025-01-2332 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersRippling Points - Bonus Content with Pola Oloixarac - Archives, Horoscopes, and Twisted Desire“They had one objective - to get rid of certain men”
Welcome to the first edition of Rippling Points - bonus content from last month’s episode!
A little bit more insight and a little bit more inspiration into the craft of writing!
Here, you can hear Pola talking about her delve into the archives to learn more about Argentina in 1970s.
You’ll then hear Pola talking about her next project, Bad Hombre - which features real life accounts collected from Pola of women who were wanting t...
2025-01-0809 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersPola Oloixarac and Unreliability, Energies, and Dopamine“I think it’s much more interesting to explore women through their powers.”
Pola Oloixarac, one of the most exciting voices in world literature today, is here to talk about her two novels that have been translated into English. Most recently SAVAGE THEORIES and then MONA (translated by Roy Kesey). Both are published by Serpent’s Tail. She was named by Granta as one of the Best Young Spanish novelists as well as this and has written for a wide range of publications and an Eccles Centre Fellow
SAVAGE THEORIES is a metaphysical, intertext...
2024-12-1237 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersIris Mwanza - Zambia, Human Rights, and Elections"I think it's a story few people have told before. And it's really about, what does a defender of human rights look like?"
Iris Mwanza is here to talk about her novel, THE LION'S DEN (Canongate Books). Iris's novel is about a human rights lawyer, Grace Zulu, whose client Willbess ‘Bessy’ Mulenga, has been arrested for offences ‘against nature. It launches Grace, and Iris, into the underbelly of the legal system.
Iris is deputy director of the Gender Equality Division of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, she leads strategy and investment for the Women in Leaders...
2024-11-2134 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersFriða Ísberg and THE MARK“The book is me trying to have a conversation with my father and reach a middle ground.”
Friða Ísberg is here to talk about THE MARK (Faber and Faber) translated by Larissa Kyzer. The book centres on a referendum in Iceland about whether mandatory tests should be imposed on its citizens. Friða talks about writing over the divide, arguments with her father, and Icelandic literary culture and how they have all shaped the book.
Rippling Points
02:05 - what is the mark?
04:12 - where are the divides?
06:30...
2024-10-2433 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersNaomi Wood and THIS IS WHY WE CANT HAVE NICE THINGS“Some people have been, oh these women are so grotesque. I don’t think they are! They’re quite relatable.”
Naomi Wood joins me to discuss THIS IS WHY WE CANT HAVE NICE THINGS (Published by Orion)
It’s a collection that features the BBC Short Story Prize winner, Comorbidities. We talk about different kinds of intimacy in the stories, and how or why Naomi often writes about mothers in the . Naomi also talks about the craft and how she clashed registers to dazzling effect.
Naomi Wood is the bestselling author of T...
2024-09-1932 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersSam Sax and YR DEAD"I think their experience in the bookstore is trying to think literary inheritance and spiritual and intellectual experience."
Sam sax is here to discuss YR DEAD, their debut novel about Ezra, a queer, non-binary 27-year-old of Jewish heritage, whose life we see in fragments and flashbacks when they self-immolate outside trump tower.
We talk about qualities of wandering, the multiplicities of Jewish identities, and what second hand bookstores can tell us about legacies and life.
Sam's PIG was named one of the best books of 2023 by New York Magazine and Electric Lit. They're...
2024-08-2233 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJennifer Lucy Allan and CLAY: A HUMAN HISTORY"I'd done a lot of clay-making...you can spend a lifetime and only get good at one technique!"
Jennifer Lucy Allan joins me to talk about her second book, CLAY: A HUMAN HISTORY (White Rabbit Books). After Jennifer's exploration and writing about sound in The Foghorn's Lament (White Rabbit Books), Jennifer has, quite literally, turned her hand to a more physical and enduring substance in clay. From Japanese Tea Ceremonies, to humans making their own image, to life on Mars, clay is seemingly everywhere. Jennifer is also a presenter on BBC Radio 3's Late Junction.
2024-07-2334 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBruce Omar Yates and The Muslim Cowboy"This book is begging to be written...It has this a frontier-ness to it..."
Bruce Omar Yates is here to discuss his upcoming novel published by Dead Ink Books, THE MUSLIM COWBOY .
In a contemporary and entertaining novel set in aftermath of the Iraq war, a man who is obsessed with old Western movies dresses in double denim and roams a lawless landscape in search of his own Western story.
Rippling Points
1.32 - Bruce's family and how these fed into ideas about a 'muslim cowboy'
4.30 - Nameless and speechless: playing wi...
2024-06-2032 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersClaire Carroll and The Unreliable Nature Writer"The smotheringly neutral voice"
Claire Carroll is here to talk about her new and debut collection of short stories THE UNRELIABLE NATURE WRITER. A truly candid insight into the workings of craft and being a writer from one of the most exciting and upcoming fiction writers today.
THE UNRELIABLE NATURE WRITER is published by Scratch Books - more here
Rippling Points
2.00 - Claire's dreams and reading.
4.55 - The different personal and impersonal voices in Claire's work
10:37 - Being a writer and knowing or not knowing answers
2024-05-2431 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersMarchelle Farrell and By the River"The garden is a co-author"
Marchelle Farrell is here to talk about her essay in a new anthology from Daunt Books, BY THE RIVER: ESSAYS FROM THE WATER'S EDGE. I've wanted to talk to Marchelle since the publication of UPROOTING: FROM THE CARIBBEAN TO THE COUNTRYSIDE - Canongate Books), so it was great to have her here when she's part of an anthology featuring the likes of Caleb Azumah Nelson and Tessa Hadley.
Marchelle, a consultant psychiatrist as well as a writer, often blends personal history with reflections on how colonial history has shaped the...
2024-04-2432 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersMarianne Brooker and Intervals"I wanted to be talking choice in a way that was routed in a social context, and that was true to the particularity and intimacy that I shared with my mum at the end of her life."
Marianne Brooker is here to talk about her Women's Prize for Non-Fiction shortlisted essay, INTERVALS, published by Fitzcarraldo Editions.
Marianne talks about her life and living with her mother who was diagnosed with primary progressive multiple sclerosis. The book is a blend of memoir, philosophy, literary criticism, and politics.
It's a tough but incredibly beautiful read.
2024-03-1333 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersDawn Garisch and Breaking Milk"That whole question of the invisible life...that there's something going on we cannot see that determines our health and the future of the planet."
Dawn Garisch, one of South Africa's most pre-eminent writers, joins the Rippling Pages to talk about Breaking Milk, published in the UK by Heloise Press. Shortlisted for the prestigious Sunday Times South Africa/CNA Literary Awards '21, it finally lands on our shores.
Dawn is also a doctor and a CEO of the Life Righting Collective, a non-profit organisation aiming to provide creative practice as a low-cost resource for humane...
2024-02-2132 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersRachel Mann and Eleanor Among the Saints"Wounds, whilst they open us to the world...they can be points of infection."
Welcome to 2024 and a new episode of the Rippling Pages. Rachel Mann is a poet, scholar, novelist and Anglican priest. She is Rachel Mann is here to talk about her new collection, Eleanor Among the Saints (Carcanet), which takes inspiration from the life of Eleanor 'John' Rykener. A trans woman, seamstress, embroider, and sex worker who lived in medieval England.
More info about the book here
This is Rachel's second collection after Kingdom of Love (also Carcanet - a...
2024-01-2532 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJo Scott-Coe on the Life and Death of Kathy Leissner Whitman"Kathy had a documentary impulse that is teaching us now."
Jo Scott-Coe returns to the Rippling Pages to talk about her latest book, UNHEARD WITNESS: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF KATHY LEISSNER WHITMAN (University of Texas Press)
Jo is a previous guest of the podcast, joining us in Series 2 to discuss MASS (Pelekinesis), an account of Charles Whitman, the Texas Tower Shooter.
Listen to that episode here: https://ripplingpages.podbean.com/e/jo-scott-coe-on-mass/
Now she returns to discuss a follow-up to that book, the story of Whitman's wife, Kathy Leissner Whitman.
2023-12-0631 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersCharlotte Eichler and Swimming Between Islands"It's not confessional...but it's absolutely full of concrete details of things that I've observed or really happened."
Charlotte Eichler joins the Rippling Pages to discuss her new collection, SWIMMING BETWEEN ISLANDS, published by Carcanet
Tickets to Tom Branfoot launch that I'm hosting here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/boar-book-launch-tickets-733576425837
Rippling Points
Fruit bats: the mystery of the mystery, and how we write it
Unnatural world: how even poets find it difficult to connect with nature
Reference Points
Anthony Vahni Capildeo
2023-11-0331 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBaron Wormser on Silence, Solitude and Shakespeare"There was a lot of solitude quiet and silence, and I believe poetry exists in relation to silence."
Baron Wormser, a former National Endowment for the Arts and Guggenheim Fellow, is here to talk about his eleventh collection of poetry, THE HISTORY HOTEL, and THE ROAD WASHES OUT IN SPRING , an account of a poet living life off the grid.
Tickets to Tom Branfoot launch that I'm hosting here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/boar-book-launch-tickets-733576425837
Rippling Points
The rhythm of poetry, the poetry of jobs: how the different rhythms of t...
2023-10-2033 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersLeslie Smolan and the Life and Work of Rodney Smith"it took a lot of courage to keep going and channel that sadness and melancholy into pictures of such joy and exuberance "
Leslie Smolan, widow and creative partner of the photographer Rodney Smith is here to talk about a new book celebrating his life and work.
A LEAP OF FAITH, with essays from Paul Martineau, Rebecca Senf, and Graydon Carter, is also packed full of Rodney's iconic images. It's published by Getty Publications (available here )
Leslie is a founder and director of the Carbone-Smolan agency. She met Rodney in the 90s and w...
2023-09-2537 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersNii Ayikwei Parkes and Azúcar"We live in a world where we increasingly want to control everything...I hope that in fictional spaces, the effort of trying to keep up becomes so much you eventually say, hey, let's go."
Nii Ayikwei Parkes is here to discuss his second novel, Azúcar, published by Peepal Tree Press.
How do we grow in...
Fictional spaces: understanding when we're not in control
Real spaces: understanding control and conditioning
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https://ko...
2023-08-1734 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJames Clarke and Sanderson’s Isle"I hate judging characters - you have to have respect for people's origins."
James Clarke is here to talk about his new novel, Sanderson's Isle, published by Serpent's Tail (buy here)
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Rippling Points
Ebullient characters: stepping into the sixties and using real-life figures as reference points and inspiration
Lost and looking: writing characters that are lost and looking for someone, or maybe anyone.
R...
2023-07-2029 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersBloomsday special with Helen Palmer!'I wanted to write a queer love story, Blackpool is crying out for literary renditions and I'm obsessed by Ulysses.'
Helen Palmer is here to talk about her Ulysses inspired queer love story, Pleasure Beach which is published by Prototype (more info here!)
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Rippling Points
Corrie and the Tower: setting a novel in Blackpool.
Time please: The enduring appeal of a novel set in a day
Reference Points
James Joyce
Julia Kristeva
Coronation S...
2023-06-1634 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersDuncan Wiese and TITYRUS: A PASTORAL"There is a genuine search for something - much of the time it turns out to be distraction."
Duncan Wiese joins me from Denmark to discuss his new collection of poetry based on Virgil's Eclogues, Tityrus: A Pastoral. Published by Lolli Editions (more info here!), the poems were translated by Max Minden Ribeiro (Pelle Hvenegaard’s Dear Zoe Ukhona and Finn Juhl: Life, Work, World by Christian Bundegaarand) and Sam Riviere (81 Austerities, Kim Kardashian's Marriage)
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https://ko-fi.c...
2023-06-0631 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersSoraya Palmer and The Human Origins of Beatrice Porter and Other Essential Ghosts"I was interested in stories with stories and how the family used folklore to approach conflict"
Soraya Palmer joins me from Brooklyn to discuss her debut novel, recently released in the UK, The Human Origins of Beatrice Porter and Other Essential Ghosts, published by Serpent's Tail (more info here!).
We speak about hauntings, family narratives, and Anansi the animal trickster!
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Rippling Points:
Tales from the...
2023-05-1030 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersCatalan Literature in Translation Special!It's a Catalan Literature in Translation Special!
I'm delighted to welcome Mara Faye Lethem and Tiago Miller to discuss two recently released books from Catalonia
Irene Solà's When I Sing, Mountains Dance has has been re-released in paperback translated by Mara for Granta
Josep Maria Argemí's The Angel of Santa Sofia has been newly released and translated by Tiago for Fum d'Estampa
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Rippling Po...
2023-04-2045 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersSeraphina Madsen and Aurora"I was fascinated by the idea of what is real and what isn't real what people perceive to be real and not real"
Welcome back to Series 4 of the Rippling Pages. And Seraphina Madsen is here to talk witches, the occult and different realities!
Aurora is Seraphina's second novel and is published by Dodo Ink
Read an extract here
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Rippling Points:
Witchhunts and witchcraft...
2023-03-2429 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersCaitlin Stobie and THIN SLICES"I don't think poetry should be giving a lesson to anyone"
Caitlin Stobie is here to talk about THIN SLICES, her new collection from Verve Press (Pre-order here )
Caitlin examines culture's need for 'origin' myths, as well as asking what is a language for the pre-lingual?
We recorded this episode in the run-up to Caitlin's appearance at Ilkley Literature Festival - more of which you can find out here: https://www.ilkleyliteraturefestival.org.uk/whats-on
And find out more about the University of Leeds Poetry Centre here - https://poetry.leeds...
2022-10-1733 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersCristina Bendek and Robin Myers - Salt CrystalsBoth writer and translator of SALT CRYSTALS, Cristina Bendek and Robin Myers, are here to discuss this shape-shifting and history-searching novel. A book about a woman, Victoria, who explores her own and the island she's from, San Andrés's, history.
Find out more about the book here
Rippling Points:
A momentaneous piece or peace? How can we write about the transient, the changing, in a form which preaches endurability and timelessness?
Disease as a symptom: why Cristina chose to write about diabetes
Enjoyed this episode - wh...
2022-09-2942 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersNicholas Royle and White Spines:"It's a quest to try to collect all of the Picadors..."
Nicholas Royle is here to talk about White Spines: Confessions of a Book Collector, and his journey to find Picador books. You can buy the book here
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Rippling Points
The Second Life of Books: the second-hand bookshop as a home for new, undiscovered and forgotten writers
Got to Catch Them All: Is y...
2022-08-2537 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersCaroline Clark and Own Sweet Time"All this wouldn't have happened without that experience of cancer..."
Caroline Clark is here with one of the most tender and moving books due to be released this year: Own Sweet Time.
Caroline's book is about the "hardest thing she's been through physically" and the "hardest things she's found mentally.
Find out more book here:
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Rippling Points
In the moment: how do we...
2022-07-2132 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersSarah Schofield and Safely Gathered In"As humans, we're really scared of forgetting..."
Welcome back for another episode of the Rippling Pages – I’m delighted to speaking to Sarah Schofield, author of the short story collection, SAFELY GATHERED IN (Comma Press - you can find here)
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Rippling Points:
Safely Gathered In? Containment as a literary, psychological and physical idea
Shopping lists and short stories: when fiction crosses over with the everyday.
Refer...
2022-06-1641 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersRichard Price - the Owner of the Sea"Song is very powerful...it's not a truth teller, it's a state-changer."
Richard Price joins today's show to discuss his collection of 'Three Inuit Stories Retold.' Published by Carcanet, the book was a Scotsman Book of the Year in 2021, and Richard joined me to discuss the challenges of retelling these tales.
You can buy the book here: https://www.carcanet.co.uk/cgi-bin/indexer?product=9781800171176
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R...
2022-05-2041 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersErica Mou and Clarissa Botsford on THIRSTY SEA"The first thing that came to me? A woman, alone with the sea, and in charge of her own destiny?"
Welcome back to the Rippling Pages and Series Three: Beneath the Surface.
We have Erica Mou and Clarissa Botsford here to discuss Thirsty Sea. Erica is a successful musician with six albums to her name. Her novel is translated by Clarissa and published by exciting new press, Héloïse Press, who are championing world-wide female talent.
You can buy the book here:
https://www.heloisepress.com/b...
2022-04-2136 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersEmilio Fraia and Zoë Perry on Sevastopol"It's nice to see my imagination dressed with my words...It's very interesting to see a universe in other words."
What a pleasure have both Emilio Fraia and Zoë Perry to discuss with me the writing and translating of Emilio's novel Sevastopol (Lolli Editions - buy here)
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Ripping Points:
A common tone: how the creation of a certain atmosphere leads to individual variations
How Sevastopol was translated in...
2021-10-1451 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersCharlie Baylis and Santa Lucía'You can't just have a greatest hits collection, there has to be a flow of ideas.'
Charlie Baylis, poet, critic, and editor joined me to talk about his latest collection, Santa Lucía, published by Invisible Hand Press - available here
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https://ko-fi.com/liambishop
Rippling Points:
Day and Night: structuring around the rhythms of the day
The conscious art of repeating
Reference Points
Poets
John A...
2021-10-0141 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJo Scott-Coe on MASS"It seemed to be a flashpoint moment, it was saying more than we thought it was saying."
Jo Scott-Coe joins me to talk about Charles Whitman, the man known as the 'Texas Tower Sniper'. In this discussion which touches on some challenging subjects, Jo discusses her book and the journey behind the writing of the book MASS: A Sniper, a Father, and a Priest (published by Pelekinesis Press)
Please be advised we recorded this conversation earlier this year and discuss issues of a sensitive nature
Rippling Points:
'Senseless Acts': the troubling...
2021-09-1648 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJessie Greengrass on the High House'All the way through the book, it should feel like there's going to be some kind of ending which will enable a potential future'
What a pleasure to welcome Jessie Greengrass to talk about the High House! (Buy here). We talk about the climate crisis and writing about the end times.
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Rippling Points:
Is this the end for me, you, all of us? What's it...
2021-09-0254 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJeff Chon and Hashtag Good Guy with a Gun"The thing I learned last year is that the product is sometimes the problem"
Jeff Chon joins me to discuss his novel, Hashtag Good Guy with a Gun, published by the exciting Sagging Meniscus press (buy here)
Please be advised we recorded this conversation earlier this year and discuss issues of a sensitive nature with some instances of strong language
Rippling Pages:
Good guys and bad guys: a troubling distinction
What's it like writing about people we really do not like?
Reference Points
Books
...
2021-08-2037 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersKhalisa Rae and Ghost in a Black Girl’s Throat'The south is a living breathing thing in this book. it's a personality.'
Really excited to have American poet, Khalisa Rae, join me for series two, episode two!
Khalisa is here to talk about Ghost in a Black Girl's Throat, published by Red Hen Press (buy here)
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Rippling Points:
Title collection: the story of a title
Surrounded by the best: environments of poetic creativity and su...
2021-08-0542 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersPolly Barton and Fifty SoundsWelcome Back! Series Two: Horizons is here with Polly Barton.
"I wanted to give people tools they could then forget about for the rest of the book."
Polly Barton is here to talk about Fifty Sounds, winner of the Fitzcarraldo Essay Prize 2019. (BUY HERE!)
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https://ko-fi.com/liambishop
Rippling Points:
Loving others and loving language: is there one without the other?
Wittgenstein: even he got it wrong at times
...
2021-07-2141 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJacqueline Bishop on Jamaican Women Writers"The sense we don't have to trample on each other, to amplify each other, we can heal and nurture each other."
Jacqueline Bishop is here to talk about her collection of interviews, The Gift of Music and Song: Interviews with Jamaican Women Writers
(Buy here!)
It's a perfect way to conclude the 'Finding Room' series - promoting the voices of some fantastic Jamaican women writers.
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https://ko-fi.com/liambishop
2021-05-1441 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersSamatar Elmi and A Portrait of Colossus"I knew from the age of 13, 14, I needed to write poetry, I just didn't fully understand why."
It's part two of our Flipped Eye 20th birthday special, and I'm joined by Samatar Elmi talking about his debut collection, Portrait of Colossus.
Thank you Katherine and Samatar for joining me. Two exciting, upcoming poets.
Buy Portrait of Colossus here.
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Rippling Points:
The power of the poe...
2021-04-3037 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersKatherine Lockton on Paper Doll - Flipped Eye Anniversary Part 1'[Poetry] is the beginning to accepting, the beginning to processing emotion.'
It's a Flipped Eye anniversary special as I'm joined buy two of their poets. First up - Katherine Lockton talking about Paper Doll.
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https://ko-fi.com/liambishop
Buy Paper Doll here
Rippling Points:
Like a Rubix cube: life and poetry
Notes from a childhood in Bolivia.
Reference Points
T.S Eliot
Follow Liam o...
2021-04-1631 min2021-04-0100 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersNeil Griffiths on TRAUMA: Writing About Art and Mental Health"I was wrestling with what certain states of being feel like as negatives."
Novelist and publisher, Neil Griffiths, joined me to discuss his essay, 'Madness as Such', which is featured
in Trauma: Writing About Art and Mental Health (Dodo Ink).
Neil talks candidly about his essay which reflects on his experiences of depression. Indeed, if you are affected by any
of the themes discussed in today's episode, I've reserved this episode's Rippling Points for a couple of links to charities.
The Samaritans
Mind
Reference Points:
B...
2021-03-3140 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersOlja Knežević and Catherine the Great and the Small'Where there is conflict, there is always a path to literature...Freedom is an important topic for me.'
What a pleasure to talk to the Montenegrin writer, Olja Knežević about her trans-generational novel, Catherine the Great and the Small (Istros Books). The novel is translated by Paula Gordon and Ellen Elias-Bursać
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Rippling Points:
Lessons from writing in and about a civil war
Why don't we write about gran...
2021-03-1937 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersJen Calleja on Time and Goblins'I want the story the story to be as disorientating for the reader as it is for me...I'm not trying to offer an answer or a safe and complete world...'
The incredibly talented Jen Calleja joins the RP Pod to talk about her short story collection, I'm Afraid That's All We've Got Time For (Prototype Publishing), and Goblins (Rough Trade Books), a personal exploration of 'goblinery.'
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https://ko-fi.com/liambishop
Rip...
2021-03-0541 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersKatharina Volckmer and The Appointment'It felt liberating to find that voice and put it on paper...Some restrictions can be creative.'
Hello! Katharina Volckmer talks about her debut novel, The Appointment (Fitzcarraldo Editions), a TLS 'Book of the Year 2020', and one critics have called 'a darkly funny untangling of national and sexual identity' (The Guardian).
And what a great way to kick off our 'Finding Room' series with a novel set entirely in one room...
Enjoyed this episode - why not send a small donation to support with the running costs! Thank you! - https...
2021-02-1936 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersKatherine Horrex and the Growlery‘I do believe that we’re all travellers of a fashion. For the poetic process I personally need a sense of freedom in order to write, and I like to feel free.’
These are some Rippling Pages Pilot episodes published in Summer 2020
Katherine Horrex talks about her debut collection of poetry, GROWLERY (Carcanet).
Rippling Points:
How 'Growlery', a term from another era, can come to represent the space you write in.
The challenges of writing or not writing about big contemporary topics like Brexit.
Buy GROWLERY here.
Referen...
2021-02-1634 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersGaia Holmes and 'RESIST' 'I did feel like I wasn't living my own life. I was in the world of Newbury and trees.'
These are some Rippling Pages Pilot episodes published in Summer 2020.
Gaia Holmes talks about her story, '198 Methods of NVDA', which features in Comma Press's Resist Anthology.
Rippling Points:
Researching the environment to create your story's environment.
'Thisness' and how some elements of the story might refuse to be resolved.
Buy RESIST: STORIES OF UPRISING from Comma Press here.
Reference Points
Books
9 Miles b...
2021-02-1635 minRippling Pages: Interviews with WritersThomas Chadwick and 'Above the Fat'‘Things don’t always turn out how you intended them to, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.’
These are some Rippling Pages Pilot episodes published in Summer 2020.
Thomas Chadwick on his short story collection ABOVE THE FAT (Splice).
Rippling Points:
Using the ‘byproducts’ of our lives and writing in writing
How a concept like 'haunting' can be a less than spooky idea
Buy ABOVE THE FAT here.
Reference Points
Books
Ghosts of My Life: Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost Futures by Mark Fish...
2021-02-1634 min