Girl A: Abigail Dean on her shocking debut novel that’s taking the book world by storm

Has this Google lawyer written the book of the year? The part-time author talks about the inspiration for her thriller about siblings who flee abusive parents and their ‘house of horror’

Rachel Clarke: ‘NHS staff are burning with frustration and grief at this second wave’

The palliative care doctor and author on a year of Covid in UK hospitals and her hopes for the vaccine

Sunday with Tom Watson: ‘Since I left politics, I’ve been given Sundays back’

The former MP on jazz, crime novels and living with the seasons

Lee Lawrence: ‘I loved revisiting the parts of my childhood before the shooting’

The award-winning author on the memoir he has written about his mother, who was left paralysed after being shot by London police in front of her family

‘People in their 80s and 90s are bloody brilliant!’ Kate Mosse on writing – and being a carer

The bestselling historical novelist has had a productive lockdown - reading 250 books and writing two, all while caring for her elderly mother-in-law

Joan Bakewell: ‘The world is full of such interesting people’

Joan Bakewell had been a broadcasting pioneer for more than half a century. And she’s still as forthright as ever. Here, she talks to Sophie Heawood about the empowerment of women, her newly streamlined life and why Boris has got it all wrong about the virus

Megha Majumdar: ‘Books do nothing for a lot of people’

The author of acclaimed debut novel A Burning on how being an editor informs her writing, and why children’s books sparked her interest in English

Mick Herron: ‘I look at Jackson Lamb and think: My God, did I write that? My mother reads this stuff!’

As the first book in his spy series, Slow Horses, is made into a TV drama, Herron talks about his slow-burn success – and the resemblance of a certain blustering villain to our PM

Playwright Mark Ravenhill: why I took up ballet after my mum died

He tried dance to cope with grief – and found himself in a class with ‘25 mostly retired ladies’. It all fed into a new play, about his mother, his childhood and his obsession with Jemima Puddle-Duck

Bridgerton author Julia Quinn: ‘I’ve been dinged by the accuracy police – but it’s fantasy!’

Her ‘hot and crazy’ novels about feisty women bedding rakish aristocrats have become a Netflix sensation. The writer talks about literary snobs, colour-conscious casting and the curse of Jane Austen

Tom Templeton: ‘I suspect doctors have realised how therapeutic it can be to write books’

The former Observer writer and now GP talks about his new book, 34 Patients, and the challenges he has faced during the pandemic

Jenny Offill: ‘I don’t miss the world as much as, perhaps, I should’

The US novelist on getting through the pandemic, Trump’s legacy of fear, and why a slow apocalypse could be the threat we didn’t see coming

Nick Kent: ‘I was in the right place at the right time, on the wrong drugs’

The rock critic who revived British music writing at the NME in the 70s is back with his first novel – a caustic tale of rock megalomania

Jenni Fagan: ‘I understand crisis. I grew up in a very, very extreme way’

From a childhood in care to dazzling readers with her debut The Panopticon, Fagan talks about writing her third novel, channelling rage, and why now is a pivotal moment for us all

Stuart MacBride: ‘I love writing fictional serial killers. But I cannot stand reading about real ones’

The bestselling novelist stresses that his relish for the kind of bloodshed that features in new novel The Coffinmaker’s Garden is strictly confined to stories