The Hobcast Book Show

Fear. There's a lot of it about currently. That's the currency of thriller and suspense authors of course, and our guest this week, British journalist and author Jo Furniss is brilliant at mining reader's inherent fears. Her most recent novel, Guilt Trip , poses a scenario all parents will dread: a minibus carrying the school swimming team never arrives back from a gala. The police don't know wher...

The Hobcast Book Show brings you an unmissable one-hour interview with U.S. author and former CIA officer I.S. Berry . Ilana's multi award-winning debut novel The Peacock and the Sparrow has been hailed as a modern spy classic, blending real-world intrigue with gripping fiction. Ilana's inspiration came from her intelligence work during the Arab Spring, and we explore her journey from intelligence...

We're back! Our summer hiatus was a little longer than we planned, but we're delighted to bring you The Hobcast Book Show again. Our guest this week is Rhoda Baxter , queen of witty, heartfelt romcoms. She also writes as Jeevani Charika , exploring multicultural women’s fiction with depth and warmth. We talk about smart heroines, nice‑guy heroes, and the craft of writing under two names.  A f...

This week we're joined from Italy by the brilliant Katherine Mezzacappa . Born in Ireland, Katherine is now based Tuscany, a country which has inspired her work as a historical and contemporary novelist. Her most recent novel, The Ballad of Mary Kearne y was published earlier this year, sees Katherine return to her Irish roots, telling the tragic tale of an 18th century nobleman who secretly marri...

If you're beginning to think we're obsessed with Icelandic crime fiction here on The Hobcast Bookshow - you may be right. We're delighted to be joined this week by our third great Icelandic crime fiction writer in recent months, Sólveig Pálsdóttir , the author of the popular Ice and Crime series . As we explore in this wide-ranging interview, Sólveig enjoyed a varied career prior to becoming an au...

In many ways, British crime authors are lucky. They stand on the shoulders of giants from the so-called 'Golden Age' of the genre: Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Margery Allingham, G.K. Chesterton and Ronald Knox were just a few of the greats who established both the rules of the genre, and laid the foundations for crime fiction's enduring popularity with UK and international readers. Our gue...

It sometimes feels as if this podcast feeds our "must visit pile". Whether it's Iceland, Seattle, Barcelona, Romania or Maine, our guests fuel our wanderlust with their passion for their home areas. That's the case again this week with our enthralling conversation with Dr. Nicholas Louis Baham III as we discuss his debut crime novel, The People's Detective . Set in present day Oakland, California,...

Some guests are so good we have to give them two shows. So we're delighted to welcome back Antony Johnston again this week to discuss the methods and techniques he uses to cope with writing multiple projects in multiple formats at the same time. His advice is based on years or trial and error during his career as a writer for video games, films, graphic novels and fiction, as well as extensive res...

Antony Johnston 's list of achievements as a writer take the breath away. His work has been made into a star-studded Hollywood film . He's a legend in the video games industry with some of the biggest franchises amongst his credits. He's worked in the Marvel Comic universe with superheroes such as Daredevil and Wolverine. Antony is also an accomplished novelist working across a number of genres, i...

We had one of those moments this week. In fact we had a few. Those moments when you are given an insight or information that challenges your perception of the world or the work you do. One of those came during our interview with author Jodie Robins , whose debut novella The Off-Season was published earlier this month. Jodie adopted the Eastern Story Structure or Kishōtenketsu, which is traditional...

The rise and rise of Icelandic crime fiction continues, and we at The Hobcast Bookshow are here for it! We're delighted to be joined this week by internationally acclaimed playwright, screenwriter and author Jón Atli Jónasson , whose brilliant novel Broken was published in translation this month by Corylus Books . His plays have been performed in major cities including London, Paris, Ber...

Every so often, when Rebecca and I put down our microphones after an interview, we turn to each other and say: "That was great." Our interview with New York Times bestseller J.D. Barker is a classic example of that feeling. His journey to the top of the bestseller lists is remarkable. Encouraged by his wife, J.D. sold up everything and they moved to a small duplex in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania while...

You'll know by now that we're obsessed with good storytelling here at The Hobcast Bookshow . Our guest this week, author Anne Booth , has a passion for engaging readers, whatever their age. Anne waited until she was 49 before her first book was published, but she's certainly making up for lost time. Her publisher credits include Puffin, Nosy Crow, OUP, Walker Books, Templar, Tiny Owl, Egmont and L...

Anyone embarking on writing a book will know how tough a journey that can be, and how many unexpected bumps and hurdles can be encountered. Our guest this week, Rachel Grosvenor , has combined her knowledge as a writer and editor with her training as a certified life coach to become a writing coach. She aims to help her clients through the creative writing process from idea to completion, and help...

We're thrilled to be speaking to author Alison Stockham again on The Hobcast Book Show . Alison joins us for a third time, to celebrate the recent release of her latest psychological thriller, The Man She Married published by Boldwood Books. Regular listeners will know that Alison has a background in TV and film production, worked with the Cambridge Literary Festival, and is now a full-time author...

Can crime fiction rebuild a national identity? Our guest this week, award-winning author Teresa Solana , believes it can certainly help. Teresa has won admirers world-wide for her crime fiction centered on her native Catalonia and Barcelona, which has been translated into eight languages. But she's most proud of her contribution to rekindling the Catalan language, so long repressed under the regim...

Our guest this week, Scottish crime author Douglas Skelton probably won't mind us saying that he's had an eclectic career, so juggling writing several book series in parallel might be easier for him than it would be for other authors. As we discuss in this wide-ranging interview, Douglas wrote several true crime non-fiction books before switching to crime fiction in 2013. Nominated multiple times...

We love speaking to true storytellers on The Hobcast Book Show . Our guest this week, Jayne Chard , fits that description perfectly, even though she published her debut novel, More Than Murder this week. It's the first in a series of cosy crime novels Jayne plans to publish. But Jayne is no stranger to telling crime stories. She is a hugely successful and award-winning TV and film drama producer,...

It's fair to say that 2025 has been an unusual and surprising year so, driven largely by events in the United States. Almost as soon as we record our news section for The Hobcast Book Show , it fast becomes out of date as President Trump signs a new executive order or publishes his latest social media post. Upheaval in America is nothing new of course, but for our guest this week, author and film...

We're really excited to be bringing you something different in this week's show. We're joined by six students from Toorop Mavo in Rotterdam in the Netherlands, all of whom are taking the Cambridge English course as an additional option to their usual studies. All our guests are around 15 years old, and each read one of our Hobeck books before we interviewed them - choosing between Echo Rock by Rob...

A few weeks ago we had the pleasure of speaking to veteran entertainment and celebrity public relations expert and author, Peter Berry . He gave us an insight into how difficult it is to mediate between his celebrity clients and the demands of journalists. It's time to hear from the other side of things. Debut author Caroline Westbrook is an entertainment journalist who has faced the challenge of...

In the second part of our interview with award-winning historical author Chris Lloyd , we discover how unexpected historical research details impact his storytelling and novels. Chris spends three months digging into the minutiae of life in wartime Paris for each of his Occupation Series novels , and is often surprised by what he finds. As he explains, his plans can change dramatically as a result...

Some interviews are so fascinating we decide to run them over two episodes. That was certainly the case with our guest this week, Chris Lloyd , winner of the Historical Writers' Association Gold Crown for the best historical novel of the year. The winning title, The Unwanted Dead was the opening novel in his Occupation Series, set in wartime Paris, in which Detective Eddie Giral tries to ensure ju...

We'd like to introduce you to two words, if you haven't already discovered them, that will change your life. One is stramash , a Scottish noun for "uproar, brawl or tumult." The other, which also features in the back cover blurb of our guest Callum McSorley 's second novel, is the brilliant shitemire, which we think succinctly sums up the world at present. As you'll hear, both words feature fairly...

Finding time to write can be one of the biggest challenges for any author. That's certainly the experience of our guest this week, Jenny O'Brien , who for years had to find pockets of time in her busy career as a nurse to jot down ideas or write scenes. She tells us she always had a notebook handy, and sometimes used dictation during her breaks on the ward to add to her work in progress. Now the s...