Bestsellers

This is a very special Episode of Bestsellers. Firstly - It was recorded very late at night because our guest Robinne Lee is in California. Secondly - A drink may have been taken. Thirdly - It contains what is, to date, the best reading from a book we've ever had on the show. This is in part due to the fact that Robinne is an actor, you may've seen in Hitch or the Fifty Shades franchise. The Idea...

In Episode 7, we meet the brilliant Steve Cavanagh: Former civil rights lawyer turned million selling crime writer. The Devil's Advocate is the latest in his Eddie Flynn Series, in which Eddie has the seemingly impossible task of acquitting a young black boy of murder, in a deeply racist town where the district attorney delights in sending people to the death chamber, regardless of their innocence...

The art of the crime thriller is something Clare Mackintosh knows well, having written a bunch of brilliant page-turners. As well as sharing what she learned from her time in the police force, where unexpectedly Clare and Natalie crossed paths in Oxford - all above aboard, honest - she also details how to keep readers guessing and why it can be so good to ask for help when researching. When it com...

What's not to love about the writing of Taylor Jenkins Reid? She had us long before Daisy Jones & The Six with her dreamy depictions of the drama of life and we both happily settled in for the 80s surfer celebrity vibe she created for her latest, Malibu Rising. So much to unpick with Taylor, from how much real life gets blended into her stories, the TV adaptations that are imminent, how confid...

The Other Black Girl is a searing account of the publishing world, as told by, well, there's a clue in the title... Actually there are a number of Black women telling their stories in this thriller of a read, which happens to be Zakiya's debut as a fiction author. She joins Phil and Natalie from her home in Brooklyn, NYC to explain how her novel has comparable themes to movies such as Get Out, The...

What a complete balm it is to spend an hour in the company of thriller writer Erin Kelly. Recorded in April 2021, Erin drew us in with her tales of why book titles matter so much, the joy she gets from reading and writing, and how she identified and then worked her way through depression that hit at the height of the 2020 global pandemic. And of course we chat about the captivating world of top-le...

Episode 2 is all about the very funny and humble Andy Weir. Why do you know that name..? Because he wrote and brought you The Martian, which was turned into a Hollywood blockbuster starring Matt Damon, directed by Ridley Scott and he's now back with a new story called Project Hail Mary, where one astronaut has to save planet earth. Find out how Andy makes the science fit the fiction and how he got...

Episode 1 of Season 2 is the magnificent Dawnie Walton. The final revival of Opal & Nev is a brilliant novel about two superstar musicians who combine on and off stage. It's written like an oral history you might encounter in Rolling Stone or Q magazine. It's SO good, Phil had to google Opal Jewel because he thought she must've been a real singer he hadn't heard of. High Quality fiction at it'...

Phil Williams & Natalie Jamieson are back. With more top writers. More great reads. Most importantly, these are big commercial fiction books that we're proud to say we've loved. Join Nat and Phil as they break through snobbery in reading and champion books that will be bestsellers. In this trailer you'll hear some sneak preview clips of the authors we'll be featuring in season two. Then tell y...

Iiiiiiiiiiits Christmas. 2020. One of the shittest years on record. But throughout this difficult year there have been some amazing books. In this seasonal special, Phil & Natalie offer you their five books of the year each. With enough time to still go and buy one of them for you or for a loved one, we hope this will inspire you in some way to find solace and peace in a book. Thank you for li...

SEASON FINALE: Robert Harris In the last episode of Season 1, Phil & Natalie talk to international bestseller Robert Harris. V2 tells the story of the rockets the Nazis built at the very end of the second world war, through the eyes of one of the rocket scientists who really only wanted to send rockets to space and a woman photo analyst for the WAAF. Hear Robert talk about writing this in lock...

Lee Lawrence was an eleven year old boy in 1985, when armed police burst into the family home looking for his brother. He wasn't there. They shot his mum, Cherry Groce, and that shooting sparked the Brixton riots, or as Lee prefers to call them, the Brixton Uprising. She survived the shooting but died from her injuries many years later. In this episode of Bestsellers, Lee tells Phil & Natalie...

This. Is. Special. Lee Child and his official biographer Heather Martin join Phil & Natalie to discuss Heather's new book of Lee's life: The Reacher Guy. It's an extraordinarily candid interview, so much so, we felt compelled to split it into two parts. Listen out for Lee's view of the Booker Prize and how he's set his bullshit detector on it; the truth about Tom Cruise and those Reacher films...

This. Is. Special. Lee Child and his official biographer Heather Martin join Phil & Natalie to discuss Heather's new book of Lee's life: The Reacher Guy. It's an extraordinarily candid interview, so much so, we felt compelled to split it into two parts. Listen out for Lee's view of the Booker Prize and how he's set his bullshit detector on it; the truth about Tom Cruise and those Reacher films...

For Episode 18, Phil & Natalie speak with former Anti-Social Behaviour Officer, Stand Up Comic turned writer, Nick Pettigrew. His new memoir tells the story of a calendar year in his old job with the council, whilst his stress levels and medication rise per chapter. He encounters a naked Nazi Paedophile, human excrement and someone who consistently smells dope in their block of flats, when non...

Episode 17 is a BestSellers CookBook special in which Natalie finally proves to Phil that she's not the only person in the world who reads cook books cover to cover, in the same way she reads fiction/non-fiction. The brilliant Rukmini Iyer has perfected one roasting tin recipes: Minimal input for maximum taste return and much less washing up! Rukmini tells Phil & Natalie how she plots her reci...

The brilliant Lisa Jewell joins us on this week's Bestsellers. Lisa is an incredible thriller writer. Her latest is set in London and is about misfits, mystery and a missing girl. Lisa tells Phil and Natalie about writing in lockdown; about her high propensity for violence and how she knows where to draw the line in her books and how she's still typing away on two fingers! You can buy Invisible Gi...

Episode 15: It's only Anthony Horowitz. One of Phil & Natalie's favourite writers. He's written authorised original stories for the Sherlock Holmes and James Bond estates; He brought Alex Rider back earlier in the year in NightShade, and has now produced another book within a book story for Moonflower Murders, the magnificent follow up to Magpie Murders. Here Anthony talks about how he crafts...

Despite this being Episode 14, it was recorded at the very beginning of lockdown just as Tony was recovering from Covid 19. Power Play is his third novel and utilises Tony's professional background as a working Barrister. He tells Phil & Natalie about recovering from Coronavirus, writing in lockdown and about his background as a Boxer...'He could've been a contender.' Tony was the first ever e...

Kevin Kwan is a sheer delight. Phil & Natalie recorded this episode quite late at night because Kevin is in LA, and his energy and enthusiasm is infectious. Sex and Vanity is his new novel and first since Crazy Rich Asians lit up cinema screens across the world. He talks about that success; breaking the glass ceiling for asian actors; his new book and how he made books for Elizabeth Taylor. Yo...

Mike Gayle cheers up the nation! He writes feel good fiction on contemporary issues and his new book is no exception. In this week's BestSellers he talks to Phil & Natalie about his 84 year old hero in this book, Hubert, and loneliness, racism and why he thinks women make friends easier than men. All The Lonely People is both heart wrenching and warm & fuzzy and will also make you laugh, a...

In Episode 11, Phil & Natalie welcome the incredible Jojo Moyes. With over 40 million books sold, the creator of Lou Clark and the Me Before You series returns with a brand new stand alone story based on the women librarians who used to deliver books in the late 20's early 30s to rural homes in Kentucky. The female librarians on horseback were the idea of Eleanor Roosevelt, who was keen that d...

Dorothy Koomson is Britain's Biggest Selling Black Female Writer - A title she's proud of. All My Lies are True is a long awaited sequel to The Ice Cream Girls and in this week's episode, Phil & Natalie talk to Dorothy about why now for a sequel; the importance of paying for books and why she's adamant there won't be an Ice Cream Girls 3....For now! You can buy All My Lies are True here: https...

Phil & Natalie talk to the best selling writer of the Flat Share, Beth O'Leary about her new comedy drama, The Switch. Beth reveals a big Hollywood star signed on to work on a major adaptation of her debut; how The Switch was her 'difficult second album,' and how it took adulthood before she realised she was funny and could write comedy. If you want to buy The Switch you can do it here: https:...

Lara Prescott was told by a literary agent nobody was interested in a story about Russia. Yet her debut novel - The Secrets We Kept - sold for a $2 million dollar advance. In Episode 8 of BestSellers, she tells Phil & Natalie how she quit life in Washington and politics, to fulfil her dream to become a writer and discusses this fictional imagining of what it was like for Boris Pasternak to wri...