Top 5 books and their authors coming to 2012 Edinburgh International Book Festival

Michael Palin, Simon Callow, Paddy Ashdown, Gordon Brown and Lucinda Dickens Hawksley

This article is from 2012.

Michael Palin

It’s a whole quarter of a century since the former Python took his place at the Book Festival, but you have to say he’s seen quite a lot of the world in the interim period. His next book and TV travel show is about Brazil, but he’s here to tell The Truth about his new novel.
13 Aug, 6.30pm, £10 (£8)

Simon Callow

To some, he’s the foremost proponent of Charles Dickens in the public eye. To others, he was in Four Weddings and a Funeral. And to others still, he’s Tom Chance alongside Brenda Blethyn’s Alison Little. To all, he’s a beloved British actor and raconteur.
11 Aug, 4.30pm, £10 (£8)

Paddy Ashdown

The warm and likeable former Royal Marine and leader of the Liberal Democrats gets stuck into two events, one about our ever-changing world and the second on an incident in WW2.
14 Aug, 8pm 15 Aug, 10am, £10 (£8)

Gordon Brown

The only former PM in the Book Festival village is in town to deliver this year’s NLS Donald Dewar Lecture discussing his hopes for the future of Scotland and the UK.
13 Aug, 4.30pm, £10 (£8)

Lucinda Dickens Hawksley

Literary household names don’t come any bigger than the guy who would have been 200 this year. Thankfully his great-great-great-granddaughter is around to keep the flame burning as she talks about her own illustrated guide to the man and his works.
16 Aug, 12.30pm, £10 (£8)