FaberBooks

Do people change their behaviour just because other people do? In his new book 'Positive Linking' (http://www.faber.co.uk/work/positive-linking/9780571279203/) economist Paul Ormerod explores how networks - models for human society's interactions - impact on economic policy and behavioural trends, explaining along the way the '50 Shades of Grey' phenomenon, and why Manchester United has become glo...

The 'Big Music' of the title of Kirsty Gunn's new novel is the pibroch, the formal music of the Highland bagpipes, the most intricate and demanding bagpipe music for both player and listener, far removed from the so-called 'little music' of dance tunes and marches. Kirsty Gunn weaves the pibroch's elaborate structure into a remarkable work of fiction, which is constantly evolving and reshaping. It...

Read here by Dan Stevens, 'Winged Back' is Dannie Abse's contribution to 'Jubilee Lines', a new anthology of sixty poems published to mark the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, the way we chronicle, the wa...

Read here by Alex Lanipekun, 'Events & Happenings' is Roger McGough's contribution to 'Jubilee Lines', a new anthology of sixty poems published to mark the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, the way we chro...

Read here by Lyndsey Marshal, '1977 (I am quite sure of this)' is Imtiaz Dharker's contribution to 'Jubilee Lines', a new anthology of sixty poems published to mark the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, th...

Read by Lyndsey Marshal, 'The Royal Visit' is Fleur Adcock's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, the...

Read by Samantha Bond, 'On not dying young' is Elaine Feinstein's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak...

Read by Samantha Bond, 'World Events' is Ruth Fainlight's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, the wa...

Read by Lyndsey Marshal, '1974' is Vicki Feaver's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, the way we chr...

Read by Samantha Bond, 'To a Ladybird' is Sarah Maguire's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, the wa...

Read by Lyndsey Marshal, 'Margaret Kirk née Baxter' is Jackie Kay's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we spe...

Read by Lyndsey Marshal, 'In the space of that year' is Clare Shaw's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we sp...

Read by Samantha Bond, 'Home Birth' is Sinead Morrissey's contribution to Jubilee Lines, a new poetry anthology edited by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, marking the Diamond Jubilee. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poems celebrate the way we speak, the wa...

Read here by Samantha Bond, 'Chunnel / Le Tunnel sous la Manche' is Patience Agbabi's contribution to 'Jubilee Lines' for the year 1994, when a particular feat of engineering changed travel for escaping Brits forever. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an essential portrait of today. The poem...

Read here by Lyndsey Marshal, this is Liz Lochhead's contribution to 'Jubilee Lines', Carol Ann Duffy's anthology of poems marking 60 years of the Queen's reign. It's a poem about 1966, capturing the age of Vidal Sasson, Mary Quant and emerging feminism. With a poem for each of the years of the Queen's reign, Jubilee Lines offers both a unique portrayal of the times in which we have lived, and an...

As a Foreign Correspondent, Channel 4 News' International Editor Lindsey Hilsum has covered many of the major conflicts of the past two decades: the genocide in Rwanda, war in Iraq, Afghanistan and Kosovo, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In 'Sandstorm', her first book, she turns her journalist's eye on the Libyan revolution. It's a remarkable documentary of Gaddafi's 42-year-long reign, fill...

'One day in May the rubbish began to sing ...' Lindsey Hilsum's 'Sandstorm' is a brilliant work of reportage that recounts the history of the Gaddafi regime from its beginning to its bloody end. Here's the author - Channel 4 News' International Editor - reading the third of three exclusive extracts from the book.

'The suburb of Abu Salim that surrounded the prison was always a stronghold of Gaddafi supporters ...' Lindsey Hilsum's 'Sandstorm' is a brilliant work of reportage that recounts the history of the Gaddafi regime from its beginning to its bloody end. Here's the author - Channel 4 News' International Editor - reading the second of three exclusive extracts from the book.

'The first images of the Libyan revolution were blurred and shaky ...' Lindsey Hilsum's 'Sandstorm' is a brilliant work of reportage that recounts the history of the Gaddafi regime from its beginning to its bloody end. Here's the author - Channel 4 News' International Editor - reading the first of three exclusive extracts from the book.

Practising barrister and acclaimed Australian author Elliot Perlman's latest novel is written on an epic scale - spanning six decades and moving from Chicago to New York, Warsaw to Melbourne, and Auschwitz. It's a book about Memory, 'but memory is a wilful dog ... it won't be summoned or dismissed, but it cannot survive without you'. Find out more in this half-hour long interview.

From the frontline of cutting-edge scientific research, Professor Robin Dunbar's new book 'The Science of Love and Betrayal' is a brilliant and sparkling exploration of the extraordinary nature of romantic love. The book tackles some of the most fundamental questions of human behaviour, including - why do we as a species pairbond when few other mammals do? What are the evolutionary advantages of m...

Tobias Jones's latest book, 'Blood on the Altar', tells in forensic detail the gripping true story the disappearance of a sixteen-year-old girl in an Italian town in 1993. As you’ll hear, nearly a decade after Elisa Claps’ disappearance, the case took a bizarre twist which no novelist would have dared invent.

In our second interview this month George Miller speaks to Philip Oltermann about 'Keeping Up with the Germans: A History of Anglo-German Encounters'. Philip came to the UK from his native Germany in his mid-teens and in the book turns his wry gaze on both countries and their history of mutual misunderstandings.

In the first of 2012's author podcasts George Miller talks to James Palmer about the momentous year 1976, which saw the death of Chairman Mao and inevitable machinations to be his successor, as well as one of the worst natural disasters in human history, the Tangshan earthquake.

Stewart Lee's previous book How I Escaped My Certain Fate drew on three live shows to deconstruct the nature of stand-up comedy. With its heavy use of footnotes there was a nod in structure to T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land. For his new book, the slimmer volume Stewart Lee! The 'If You Prefer a Milder Comedian Please Ask for One!' EP, Lee draws inspiration from The Specials' 1980 five-track EP The S...