Our pick of BBC Books on air now - May 2017

The BBC Books team picks a juicy highlights selection from the many literary programmes on offer each week - from BBC Radio 4, and around the BBC...

Online First from BBC Radio 4
Listen to these programmes before they are broadcast on the radio.

18 May 2017

From BBC Radio 4. This edition features the follow up to Paula Hawkins' best seller The Girl on The Train, a glimpse behind the scenes at the National Theatre with Nicholas Hytner, and a chat with one of Ireland's freshest new talents.

Plus we've got links to a wealth of delights available across the BBC, from Open Book revealing the last remaining unpublished short stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald to writers' memoirs from Bella Pollen and Richard Beard - and even the history of the libraries of Timbuktu! You can also keep up to date with what's available and coming up from Radio 4's Book Cluband World Book Clubon BBC World Service...

Book at Bedtime / Into The Water

Our pick from Book at Bedtime is a psychological suspense story by Paula Hawkins, author of global phenomenon The Girl on the Train.

In Into The Water a single mother turns up dead at the bottom of the river that runs through town. Earlier in the summer, a vulnerable teenage girl met the same fate...

Listen to all ten episodes

Open Book - Paula Hawkins
Paula Hawkins' thriller The Girl On The Train smashed all kinds of literary records. She talks to Mariella Frostrup about following up such incredible success.

Book of the Week / Balancing Acts: Behind the Scenes at the National Theatre

Nicholas Hytner, former Artistic Director of London’s National Theatre

“We want to make art, but we know we’re in Show Business. It’s one of the balancing acts that the National Theatre and this book are about”

Start rehearsing as soon as he arrives, or we’ll be here all morning with “Traffic jams I have known"
Alan Bennett - on the actor Richard Griffiths

So explains Nicholas Hytner, renowned theatre director and former Artistic Director of London’s National Theatre. His intimate, candid and insightful book, Balancing Acts, is a passionate exploration of the art and alchemy of making theatre, and is read over five episodes by its author.

The inside story of twelve years at the helm of Britain's greatest theatre. It's a story of lunatic failures and spectacular successes such as The History Boys, War Horse and One Man, Two Guvnors; of opening the doors of the National Theatre to a broader audience than ever before, and changing the public's perception of what theatre is for.

Listen to all 5 episodes

Open Book / Lisa McInerney

Lisa McInerney - author

Everything I try to write these days comes out in a Cork accent
Lisa McInerney

McInerney is considered one of the freshest new voices in Irish writing. In our Open Book pick, Lisa chats with Mariella about the second instalment of her Cork Trilogy, describing the setting of Cork as a “seething hotbed of pill popping, rave music and violent drug wars” - and a central character who (much to Mariella's concern) never seems to sleep.

Books and Authors - Available to Download
Podcasts available now from Open Book and A Good Read

Recommended on BBC iPlayer / B is for Book

Another chance to see this documentary following a group of primary schoolchildren over the course of a year as they learn to read. Some of them make a flying start, but others struggle even with the alphabet.

As the children master the basics, they discover the magical world of stories and look with fresh eyes at the world around them.

Originally shown during Awesome Authors, part of the #LovetoRead season.