Val McDermid on Truth and Fiction

Is fiction the best way to access the truth? Award-winning Scottish crime writer, Val McDermid, explores the relationship between fiction, video games and real-life crime documentary. She talks to Ken McLeod and Richard K Morgan, whose science fiction novels offer a commentary on current political events. She meets Malath Abbas, the designer of Killbox, a new game about the ethics of drone warfare, and Lucas Pope whose BAFTA-winning Papers Please examines the moral and political decisions faced by an immigration officer. McDermid discusses the importance and the pitfalls of covering real-life crime with the veteran documentary maker and criminologist Roger Graef.