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Philippe Sands is a practicing barrister, a professor of law at University College London and visiting professor of law at Harvard. He is an acclaimed author with his body of work including The Ratline, East West Street, The Last Colony , among others. His latest work, 38 Londres Street: On Impunity, Pinochet in England and a Nazi in Patagonia , has been released in India by Hachette.  In this epi...

Phil Craig is a bestselling author and multiple award-winning filmmaker. The former RAF cadet pilot built his career working for the iconic British TV series ‘World in Action’ and ‘Panorama’. In this conversation, he discusses his latest book, 1945: The Reckoning. 

Dr. Victoria Bateman is an economic historian, author and historical consultant who has published books on economic history, feminist economics and gender inequality. She holds a Masters degree in Economic and Social History and a DPhil in Economics from the University of Oxford, and is well-known for her public speeches covering topics such as economic growth, capitalism, gender inequality, and B...

Jason Roberts is the author of A Sense of the World , which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and named a best book of the year in 2006 by multiple outlets such as the Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Kirkus Reviews, etc. In this conversation, he discusses his recent book, ‘Every Living Thing’, which has won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Biography and the PEN/EO Wils...

Ken Follett is one of the world’s best-loved authors, having sold more than 198 million copies of his 38 books, in over 80 countries and across 40 languages. His first major success came with the publication of ‘Eye of the Needle’ in 1978. In this conversation, he discusses his latest novel, ‘Circle of Days’. 

Sanjoy K Roy is an entrepreneur of the arts and managingdirector of Teamwork Arts, which produces over 30 highly acclaimed performing arts, visual arts and literary festivals across 40 cities in countries such as Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Egypt, Singapore, UK and USA, including theworld's largest literary gathering, the annual Jaipur Literature Festival. In this episode of TOI Bookma...

Namita Devidayal is a journalist based in Mumbai, a trained Indian classical singer, and author of ‘The Music Room’, ‘Aftertaste’ and ‘The Sixth String of Vilayat Khan’. In this conversation, she discusses her most recent book, ‘Tangerine: How to Read the Upanishads Without Giving Up Coffee’, published by Westland Books.

Manish Gaekwad is a journalist who has contributed to several publications, including Scroll and The Hindu . He co-wrote the Netflix series  She  with Imtiaz Ali, consulted on the script for Badhaai Do, and served as a senior script creative at Red Chillies Entertainment. Gaekwad made his fictional debut with his novel Lean Days, which was followed-up by his book The Last Courtesan: Writing My Mot...

Zahid Rafiq is a writer living in Srinagar. He did his BA at Kashmir University, then went on to study journalism as a Fulbright scholar at University of California, Berkeley. As a journalist, he has written for Indian and international publications, including The New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, BBC, Vice, Al Jazeera, Foreign Policy, etc. Rafiq completed his MFA in Fiction at Cornell Un...

Gautam Bhatia is a speculative fiction writer, reviewer andeditor. He is the author of The Wall and The Horizon , a science fiction duology published by Harper Collins India. His latest novel The Sentence was a Locust magazine recommended read and is a finalist for the 2025 Ignite Award. Bhatia is also a constitutional lawyer who has published commentaries on the Constitution. In this episode of T...

Amitav Ghosh reveals in this 2023 interview how opium trade shaped modern capitalism and created vast fortunes across continents. From American railways to prestigious universities and global banking institutions, Ghosh uncovers how drug money built the foundations of today's economic world order

Amitav Ghosh reveals in this 2023 interview how opium trade shaped modern capitalism and created vast fortunes across continents. From American railways to prestigious universities and global banking institutions, Ghosh uncovers how drug money built the foundations of today's economic world order

Born in Delhi and raised in Bengaluru, Keshava Guha studied history and politics at Harvard and writing at Goldsmiths, University of London. In this conversation, the author of Accidental Magic discusses his latest novel, The Tiger’s Share , published by John Murray, an imprint of Hachette India.

Kunzang Choden is a Bhutanese author and the first Bhutanese woman writer to be published in English. Her debut novel Circle of Karma is a critically acclaimed bestseller. She started her career collecting vanishing Bhutanese folktales and moved on to novels, a study of food and culture, and children's books. In this episode of TOI Bookmark, Choden discusses her recent book, Telling Me My Stor...

Kiran Desai is the author of Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard and The Inheritance of Loss , which won both the Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. Born in India, she went to the US at 16 and now lives in New York. In this conversation, she discusses her latest novel, The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny , which has been shortlisted for the Booker.

Nayanima Basu is an award-winning journalist and Delhi-based author with extensive experience in international relations, strategic affairs, geopolitics, and geoeconomics. Over the past two decades, she has held senior editorial positions in leading Indian and international media organisations, while also contributing to several independent global publications. As a senior journalist, she continue...

Charlie English is a London-based journalist and non-fictionwriter who has authored several internationally acclaimed books – The Gallery of Miracles and Madness (2021), The Book Smugglers of Timbuktu (2018) and The Snow Tourist (2009). In this episode of TOI Bookmark, Charlie English discusses hismost recent work The CIA Book Club (2025), which captures the history of the CIA’s use of forbidden l...

Weena Pun is the debut author of Kanchhi , a novel that brings to life the political and social tremors stirring Nepal’s valleys at the turn of the millennium, as well as the tenacious, tragedy-marked women of the time. Her writings have appeared in Himal Southasian , The Kathmandu Post , The Record , House of Snow: An Anthology of the Greatest Writing About Nepal , and several other publications....

Dr. Rachel Clarke is an NHS palliative care doctor and an award-winning author who writes regularly for The Guardian, Sunday Times, New Statesman and Lancet, among others.  Her books include Your Life in My Hands , which documents life as a junior doctor, and Dear Life , which depicts her work at an NHS hospice and was shortlisted for the 2020 Costa Biography Award and longlisted for the 2020 Bail...

Kavitha Rao is a London-based journalist and author. Spies, Lies and Allies is her fourth book. Her third book, Lady Doctors: The Untold Story of India’s First Women in Medicine , was a nationwide bestseller. Her articles have appeared in The Guardian, The New York Times, The South China Morning Post, Mint, The Hindu , and many others. In her spare time, she enjoys exploring London, reading crime...

Andrew Miller is a Bristol-born novelist who published hisfirst novel, Ingenious Pain , in 1997. Miller bagged several awards for his debut work, including the InternationalImpact Dublin Literary Award. Miller, who currently lives in Somerset, has had his work published and translated in 20 countries. In today’s conversation, Miller discusses his latest book Land in Winter , which has won the Walt...

Patrick McGee is a reporter at the Financial Times , where he has won a San Francisco Press Club award for his coverage. He joined the newspaper in 2013, starting in Hong Kong before going on to report from Germany and California. Prior to that, he was a reporter at The Wall Street Journal . Patrick holds a master’s degree in global diplomacy from SOAS University of London and a degree in religiou...

Kaliane Bradley is a British-Cambodian and editor based in London. Her short stories have appeared in Electric Literature, Catapult, Some Such Stories, and the Willow Herb Review, among others. Her debut novel, The Ministry of Time , was a Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller and a global sensation, and has since been published in India by Hachette India. In this episode, Bradley discusses t...

Dr Jagdish Shukla is a professor of climate dynamics at George Mason University and an internationally recognised figure in weather and climate science. He has received the International Meteorological Prize from the UN, and NASA’s Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal—the agency’s highest civilian honour—for his role as a lead author of the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment. In 2007, his team, along wi...

Sam Dalrymple is a Delhi-raised Scottish historian and award-winning filmmaker. A graduate in Persian and Sanskrit from Oxford University, he has also studied at the University of Isfahan and Ferdowsi University of Mashhad in Iran. His work spans South and Central Asia, including roles with Turquoise Mountain in Kabul and the Aga Khan Trust for Culture in Hunza and Lahore. In 2018, he co-founded P...