Papertrail Podcast

May-Lan Tan is a British Chinese writer based in Berlin. Having studied fine art at Goldsmiths, she now works as a ghostwriter. Her collection, Things To Make and Break, was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award, and is one of Alex's favourite reads of 2018.

For further discussion about Things to Make and Break, check out episode 24 with Sharlene Teo.

MAY-LAN'S BOOK CHOICES:

• Why the Tree Loves the Axe by Jim Lewis
• Coin Locker Babies by Ryū Murakami
• The Notebook by Ágota Kristóf

You can follow May-Lan Tan on twitter @amanlyant

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Hannah is a poet, memoirist and creative writing tutor. Her books include 'Chick', 'Long Time No See', and most recently, 'Chan'.

HANNAH'S'S BOOK CHOICES:

• As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
• Small Island by Andrea Levy
• Staying Alive: Real Poems for Unreal Times, Edited by Neil Astley

You can follow Hannah on twitter @HannaLowePoet

If you haven't already, please consider leaving the podcast a review on iTunes.It makes a massive difference and helps new people discover the show.

Samantha Harvey is the author of four novels, the most recent of which is The Western Wind.

Her novels have been shortlisted many prizes, including the Orange Prize for Fiction, the Guardian First Book Award and the James Tait Black Prize. She won the AMI Literature Award and the Betty Trask Prize.

She lives in Bath, UK, and is a Reader in creative writing at Bath Spa University.

Sam's Book Choices:
Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
All The Names by Jose Saramago
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace
You can find out more about Sam on her website.

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Jules is an author interested how individuals and organisations use therapeutic practices from ancient philosophies and wisdom traditions today.

His first book, Philosophy for Life and Other Dangerous Situations, explored how people are rediscovering ancient Greek and Roman philosophies and was a Times book of the year. His second book, The Art of Losing Control, was published in the UK in May 2017

JULES'S BOOK CHOICES:

• The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
• Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
• Moksha by Aldous Huxley

You can find out more about Jules on his website.

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Sharlene Teo was born in Singapore in 1987and has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia, where she received the Booker Prize Foundation Scholarship and the David TK Wong Creative Writing award.

In 2016, she won the inaugural Deborah Rogers Writer's Award for Ponti, her first novel, which is coming out on the 19th of April.

Sharlene's Book Choices:
Things To Make And Break by May-Lan Tan
Nowhere To Be Found by Bae Suah
Dear Friend, From My Life I Write To You In Your Life – Yiyun Li

You can follow Sharlene on twitter @treebirds

Support The Show!

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Johnny Harris is a writer, actor, and producer. His latest film, Jawbone,came out in 2017 and has been nominated for a BAFTA. Johnny has also starred in This is England '86,Welcome to the Punch, London to Brighton, and more. He was BAFTA nominated for his performance in This is England '86.

Johnny's Book Choices:

• The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
• The Grass Arena by John Healy
• The Dumb Waiter by Harold Pinter

You can follow Jawbone on twitter @Jawbonethemovie

If you haven't already, please consider leaving the podcast a review on iTunes.It makes a massive difference and helps new people discover the show.

Dr Preti Taneja is the author of 'We That Are Young', published by Galley Beggar Press. We that are young was listed as one of the Sunday Times' 'Books of 2017'. She is also the author of a novella 'Kumkum Malhotra' which was published in 2015 and won the Gatehouse Press New Fictions Prize.

As well as being a writer, Preti isa Leverhulme Early Career Reseach Fellow at Warwick University working in the department of English and Comparative Literary Studies, and the Centre for Human Rights in Practice. She is also the co-founder and editor of Visual Verse, an anthology of art and words.

Preti's Book Choices:

• A Spy In The House of Love by Anaïs Nin
• Everybody Loves a Good Drought by P. Sainath
• Citizen by Claudia Rankine

You can find out more about Preti by visiting her website. And you can follow her on Twitter @PretiTaneja.

Niven is the author of four books. Including All the Days And Nights, and Black Bread White Beer. He has also been featured in Best British Short Stories 2017. He is currently working on his next novel.

NIVEN'S BOOK CHOICES:

• Shadows On The Hudson by Isaac Bashevis Singer
• The Door by Magda Szabo
• There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyonce by Morgan Parker

Niven tweets @Niven_Govinden. You should also check out the Tumblr for Black Bread White Beer

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Dan is the author of 'Climbing Days' in which he retraces the steps of his great-great-aunt and uncle, the mountaineers Dorothy Pilley and I.A. Richards . He is also the author of 'The Beechwood Airship Interviews', and co-authored 'Holloway' with RobertMacfarlane and Stanley Donwood. He is currently working on his next book, Outpost.

DAN'S BOOK CHOICES:

But Beautiful by Geoff Dyer
The Book of Fame by Lloyd Jones
Bluets by Maggie Nelson

Dan tweets @Dan_Zep

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Darran is the author of 'Imaginary Cities', an exploration of metropolis, imagination, and the symbiosis within. It was published by Influx Press.His second book, Tidewrack will be released on the 8th of March 2018 from Chatto & Windus. It is the second in a trilogy of books about cities. He is a Contributing Editor for White NoiseMagazine.

DARRAN'S BOOK CHOICES:

• The Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard
• Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
• Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov

Darran tweets prolifically @Oniropolisand you can visit his website for more information about what he's up to.

If you haven't already, please consider leaving the podcast areview on iTunes.It makes a massive difference and helps new people discover the show.