Edinburgh Festival
RBS Talks - Vicky Featherstone

Fiction

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lengthy literary works

EIBF 2011: five lengthy literary works

featuring Adam Levin, Thomas Pynchon, David Foster Wallace, Stephen King and Tolstoy

24 Aug 2011

The Instructions The story of a megalomaniac 10-year-old boy who may or may not be the messiah takes place over the course of just four frenetic days, but Levin’s massive book takes in Israel’s battle for existence and an entire religion’s search for…

Jane Harris

Jane Harris

The author of The Observations and Gillespie and I on making Glasgow an evocative character

24 Aug 2011

‘The secret was what I began with,’ says Jane Harris about her most recent work, Gillespie and I. And what a mystery we unravel, as narrator Harriet Baxter reflects on her time in 1880s Glasgow and the consequences of a chance meeting with ‘soulmate…

Rebecca Hunt

Rebecca Hunt

The author of Mr Chartwell creates a credible and empathetic vision of illness

24 Aug 2011

One of the most intriguing and delectably-crafted debut novels of the past year is Mr Chartwell by Rebecca Hunt. The black dog of Winston Churchill’s legendary deep depression is brought vividly to life through the eponymous mutt (also known as Black…

EIBF 2011: Christopher Brookmyre adopts subtle pseudonym for latest work - interview

EIBF 2011: Christopher Brookmyre adopts subtle pseudonym for latest work - interview

Chris, not Christopher, for Where the Bodies are Buried

23 Aug 2011

When Christopher Brookmyre has three syllables thrown at him, he knows he’s done something wrong. Despite his full first-name appearing on every book jacket since his debut novel in 1997, those around Brookmyre have called him Chris for years. ‘I tend…

Sunjeev Sahota

First Writes: Sunjeev Sahota, author of Ours are the Streets

The debut author discusses his first novel, Edinburgh and some of his favourite novels

17 Aug 2011

Give us five words to describe Ours are the Streets? Fathers. Sons. Responsibilities. Belonging. Home. Which author should be more famous than they are now and why? I don’t know how famous or not she is, but I don’t think I hear that much in the UK…

Jo Nesbø

Jo Nesbø

Crafty Oslo crime scribe brings us his fiendish ’tec

17 Aug 2011

There are many ways to cause a fatality, and crime writers are renowned for finding the most imaginative route to the grave possible. But Norwegian author Jo Nesbø has really outdone himself in his latest novel The Leopard. His serial killer’s…

Darren Shan

Darren Shan, Barry Hutchison and Alexander Gordon Smith talk horror

Creating terrifying tales for teenage readers at the EIBF

16 Aug 2011

As far as groundings in the horror business go, young adult writer Barry Hutchison knew exactly what fear was from an early age. ‘I lived in a perpetual state of terror when I was a kid,’ says the Fort William-based creator of the Invisible Fiends…

Interview: Joe Dunthorne, author of Submarine and Wild Abandon

Interview: Joe Dunthorne - author of Submarine and Wild Abandon

Edinburgh shows with Unbound, Aisle16, Luke Wright and Tim Clare

21 Jul 2011

The day before our phone interview, Joe Dunthorne was on Radio 4, bantering with Tim Key about the perfect opening line. Chatting to him the next day, it appears the Welsh-born poet, short story writer and novelist has worked out a potential strategy.

Robin Robertson

Robin Robertson

Poet with an impressive range talks about his newest batch

17 Aug 2010

Though widely known as one of British publishing’s finest editors, Robin Robertson is also a highly acclaimed poet. Since his 1997 debut collection A Painted Field, he has been the recipient of numerous prizes, both for books and individual poems. Most…

Lauren St John at the Book Festival

Lauren St John at the Book Festival

Writing for a more honest and passionate reader

17 Aug 2010

Remember those series of books you would read as a child? Remember how, when you discovered a new one, you’d just have to devour it as quickly as possible, gobbling up boarding-school tales of lacrosse and midnight feasts and adventure after adventure…

Louise Welsh's Naming the Bones

Louise Welsh's Naming the Bones

The author's newest novel meanders between boozers and burial grounds

17 Aug 2010

Louise Welsh’s latest novel was inspired during a trip to Germany, but set in her beloved Scotland, though it’s not the reverie of an expat looking through tartan-tinted glasses. Naming the Bones meanders between Edinburgh boozers and Highland burial…

Alice Thompson

Alice Thompson

The Edinburgh novelist gets used to the spotlight

12 Aug 2010

‘It’s a great honour to be asked to appear at the Edinburgh Book Festival,’ says Alice Thompson. ‘It’s like being knighted.’ And no one deserves it more than this Edinburgh-based author. Her fifth and most recent work, The Existential Detective, finds…

Amy Sackville

Amy Sackville

Retreating into imagined worlds of the past

12 Aug 2010

Amy Sackville’s debut novel, The Still Point, is an Arctic love story which has already drawn comparisons with Virginia Woolf. Set in modern England, Julia is the great-grand-niece of an explorer whose story fascinates her and she often dreams about the…

David Mitchell

David Mitchell

Dreaming up the non-existent

12 Aug 2010

David Mitchell isn’t known for his simple approach to storytelling. His most recognisable work, the Booker-shortlisted Cloud Atlas, was described as having a ‘Rubik’s cube structure’. Ambitious and unconventional, it melted genres of airport…

Simon Rich

Simon Rich

Taking inspiration from the comedy greats

12 Aug 2010

Simon Rich makes his first appearance as a fully fledged novelist at this year’s Edinburgh International Book Festival. Although the 24-year-old Harvard graduate has written two anecdotal non-fiction comedy books in the past three years – Ant Farm: And…

Owen Sheers

Owen Sheers

Covering the poetic landscape of Britain

12 Aug 2010

One of those infuriating people whose expansive CV (poet, novelist, playwright, actor, television presenter) is matched only by their down to earth charm, Wales’ Owen Sheers will be presenting two very different projects at the Book Festival. The first…

Lars Husum and his novel My Friend Jesus Christ

Lars Husum and his novel My Friend Jesus Christ

A wild and bizarre slapstick farce

6 Aug 2010

Given that My Friend Jesus Christ reads like a Dogme movie, you can’t help but feel Lars Husum’s time working as a dramaturge at Lars von Trier’s Copenhagen film production company Zentropa fed into his debut novel. ‘It’s not conscious, but I see your…

Emily Woof at the Writer's Retreat

Emily Woof at the Writer's Retreat

The ex-actress conducts a deep involvement with language

6 Aug 2010

Emily Woof first graced Edinburgh nude and on a trapeze for a trilogy of one-woman Fringe plays, under the Sex umbrella. And throughout The Whole Wide Beauty (the debut novel by The Full Monty and Wondrous Oblivion star), the loss of physical expression…

Garth Nix kicks off this year's Book Festival

Garth Nix kicks off this year's Book Festival

What he has in store and why fantasy is making a comeback

6 Aug 2010

Garth Nix, the bestselling Australian author of young people’s fantasy fiction, is both honoured and alarmed that he’ll be kicking off this year’s Book Festival with its very first session. ‘I’m not entirely sure what I’ll be talking about yet!’ Nix…

Philip Pullman - The Good Man Jesus and The Scoundrel Christ

Philip Pullman - The Good Man Jesus and The Scoundrel Christ

'The Most Dangerous Author in Britain' comes to the Book Festival

6 Aug 2010

You will know him by the horns, of course, and the casual air of unholy sin. For Philip Pullman is the anti-God and ‘The Most Dangerous Author in Britain’, according to the modern gospel of The Mail on Sunday. To most of us, however, he is the avuncular…

Laura Barton talks about Twenty-One Locks

Laura Barton talks about Twenty-One Locks

The author describes why and how she wanted to write her novel

6 Aug 2010

Born and raised in Lancashire, Laura Barton migrated south a decade ago, and found gainful employment with The Guardian. ‘I started writing a music column [Hail, Hail, Rock ‘n’ Roll] in a style that was quite different to most journalism at the time,…

Alberto Manguel will discuss All Men Are Liars

Alberto Manguel will discuss All Men Are Liars

And why we should step back from the over-reliable narrator

6 Aug 2010

Alberto Manguel’s latest book, All Men Are Liars, is ‘a tribute to falsehood’ in which no one is a reliable source; not the enigmatic figure whose death is being investigated, not those who knew him, nor Manguel himself. It’s a concept that challenges…

Top five Scottish crime writers to catch at the EIBF

Top five Scottish crime writers to catch at the EIBF

The city that embodies vice and virtue welcomes the authors

6 Aug 2010

With its Jekyll and Hyde nature, Edinburgh is the perfect spot for the portraiturists of good and evil to congregate. Here’s a quintet of Scottish scribes to catch this week Tony Black. Gus Drury is Black’s flawed bobby and in Long Time Dead, he’s…

Christos Tsiolkas' The Slap touched a few raw nerves

Christos Tsiolkas' The Slap touched a few raw nerves

He tells us how he tackled this multi-story tale.

5 Aug 2010

Judge me once you’ve walked a mile in my shoes, the old saying goes. Well in his latest book, The Slap, Christos Tsiolkas hands us the literary equivalent of eight pairs of walking boots. Set in suburban Melbourne, the novel opens with a chapter devoted…

James Robertson answers five questions

James Robertson - And the Land Lay Still

One of Scotland's most vital authors tackles our Q&A

5 Aug 2010

James Robertson has been long-listed for the Man Booker Prize of 2006 for The Testament of Gideon Mack and has just published And The Land Lay Still.

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