The Book Club

• Irvine Welsh: Men In Love – Trainspotting Sequel

  My guest this week is Irvine Welsh – who, three decades after his era-defining hit Trainspotting, returns with a direct sequel, Men In Love. Irvine tells me what Sick Boy, Renton, Spud and Begbie mean to him, why his new book hopes to encourage a new generation to discover Romantic verse and shagging, and why MDMA deserves more credit for the Good Friday Agreement than Tony Blair.Become a Spectator subscriber today to access this podcast without adverts. Go to spectator.co.uk/adfree to find out more.For more Spectator podcasts, go to spectator.co.uk/podcastsContact us: [email protected]

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• M. John Harrison: The Course of the Heart

  My guest this week is the writer M. John Harrison, who joins me to talk about the rerelease of his 1992 novel The Course of the Heart – a deeply strange and riddling story of grief, friendship, memory and occult magic. We talk about why this book is so personal to him, what he learned from Charles Williams and Arthur Machen, turning his back on science fiction/fantasy and returning to it – as well as how probably the most acclaimed of all his novels, Light, came about after Iain Banks told him he wasn't having enough fun.Become a Spectator subscriber today to access this podcast without adverts. Go to spectator.co.uk/adfree to find out more.For more Spectator podcasts, go to spectator.co.uk/podcastsContact us: [email protected]

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• Karin Slaughter: We Are All Guilty Here

  Sam Leith's guest in this week’s Book Club podcast is one of the most popular living thriller writers. Karin Slaughter has made her native Georgia her fictional territory, and she joins Sam as she launches a new series set in a whole new county, with the book We Are All Guilty Here. They talk 'planning versus pantsing', what it means to write violence against women as a woman and how becoming the showrunner for television compares to the sovereignty of the novelist.Become a Spectator subscriber today to access this podcast without adverts. Go to spectator.co.uk/adfree to find out more.For more Spectator podcasts, go to spectator.co.uk/podcastsContact us: [email protected]

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• Carl Zimmer: The Hidden History of the Life We Breathe

  My guest on this week’s Book Club podcast is science writer Carl Zimmer, whose new book Air-Borne: The Hidden History of the Life We Breathe explores the invisible world of the aerobiome – the trillions of microbes and particles we inhale every day. He tells me how Louis Pasteur's glacier experiments kicked off a forgotten scientific journey; how Cold War fears turned airborne research into a bioweapons race; and why the COVID-19 pandemic exposed a century-long misunderstanding about how diseases spread through the air.Become a Spectator subscriber today to access this podcast without adverts. Go to spectator.co.uk/adfree to find out more.For more Spectator podcasts, go to spectator.co.uk/podcastsContact us: [email protected]

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• William Dalrymple: The Golden Road

  My guest on this week’s Book Club podcast is the historian William Dalrymple, whose bestselling account of ancient India’s cultural and economic influence, The Golden Road, is newly out in paperback. He tells me why the ‘Silk Road’ is a myth, how Arabic numerals are really Indian – and how he responds to being Narendra Modi’s new favourite author.Become a Spectator subscriber today to access this podcast without adverts. Go to spectator.co.uk/adfree to find out more.For more Spectator podcasts, go to spectator.co.uk/podcastsContact us: [email protected]

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