‘I exposed the dirty laundry of gay life’: The Lure, the thriller that shocked America

Felice Picano’s controversial story of a serial killer in New York was a huge hit in 1979 – but may also have provoked an armed attack on his home. Forty years on, he talks about his novel

Liz Hyder: ‘I feel like I’m in a weird cheese dream’

The author of acclaimed YA book Bearmouth on striking gold in a slate mine – and what you can’t learn from other writers

Neal Katyal: ‘A second term for Donald Trump could destabilise our democracy’

He was acting solicitor general under Barack Obama and drew up regulations used in the Mueller investigation. Now Neal Katyal is arguing for impeachment

Hate baby showers and dinner parties? Sarah Knight wants you to say no

The sweary self-help guru behind a string of bestsellers explains her evangelical faith in turning down everything from lunch to love

Lucy Ellmann: ‘We need to raise the level of discourse’

The author of the prize-winning Ducks, Newburyport on why she prefers books written before Hiroshima

Michael Lewis: ‘Don’t bet against the US. It has an incredible capacity for self-reinvention’

The author of The Big Short on Trump’s war on experts and why it would take a pandemic to remind Americans of the importance of good governance

Lisa Taddeo on her bestseller Three Women: ‘I thought I was writing a quiet little book’

Lisa Taddeo spent eight years talking to three women about sex and desire – and had no idea the result would be a publishing sensation. She tells Hadley Freeman what happened next

Barbara Taylor Bradford on love, tragedy and ambition: ‘I’ve always had a backbone of steel’

The novelist writes about strong, independent women. But her own resilience was tested when her husband died earlier this year

Fairview: the Pulitzer winner whose creator hopes it has a short shelf life

Jackie Sibblies Drury thinks her acclaimed play, and the stereotypes it presents, will soon go out of date. As it comes to the Young Vic, she and director Nadia Latif explain why

Eat rats and throw poo at the horizon: can Bear Grylls help me survive any disaster?

What could you kill and eat in Hyde Park? How do you fight off an angry dog? And how do you put a nosy journalist in his place? The SAS man turned TV star shows off his survival skills

Clive James: the last interview

Two months before his death, the broadcaster, poet and critic spoke about his own mortality

Meena Kandasamy: ‘If I was going to write my life story, I would condense that marriage to a footnote’

The author of Women’s prize shortlisted novel When I Hit You talks about the troubling line between memoir and fiction and how Brexit politics shaped her new book

Caroline Moorehead: ‘Simone de Beauvoir asked me for $200…’

The biographer and historian on the unsung heroines of the Italian resistance, favourite reading – and an encounter with feminist royalty

Oncologist Azra Raza: ‘Don’t give up hope. Don’t give in to despair’

The Columbia professor on taking healthcare out of the stone age, her ideas for cancer prevention – and why getting too close to patients is an occupational hazard

Christos Tsiolkas on Jesus, sex and the power of doubt: ‘I get shivers when I think about it’

Tsiolkas left the church when he was 15, unable to reconcile it with his sexuality. His novel Damascus asks where God dwells if not in the heavens