Maggie O’Farrell
Stroud Book Festival is thrilled and proud to present an in-conversation event with renowned novelist and screenwriter, Maggie O’Farrell. Maggie joins us to discuss her tenth novel, “Land”, her most ambitious to date. Inspired by her own Irish family history and the landscape of the Wild Atlantic Way, it is a spellbinding, multi-generational epic which…
Read MoreReds: A Global History of Communism
Understanding what communism was, why millions of people embraced it, and why it failed…is our best guarantee that it does not return. Reds, the latest book by the former economics editor of Channel 4 News and BBC Newsnight Paul Mason, is an impressively global history of Communism as ‘an impulse, an idea, a political movement…
Read MoreFiring Earth
Did you know a potter’s wheel was invented before any other kind of wheel? And that in the 17th century, people believed eating clay was good for you? And that Royal Doulton started off as a sewage company? All this and much more about the history of ceramics is contained in Firing Earth, the latest…
Read MoreChurch Crawling
Churches carry the genes and culture of our past in a vivid and enduring way. Rachel Morley is a building conservator and Director of the Friends of Friendless Churches. With its title taken from the words of John Betjeman, her debut book Church Crawling is an enchanting, impassioned love letter to our parish churches which,…
Read MoreArthur: A New Life
We are delighted to welcome back author, illustrator and historian of stories Amy Jeffs as she mines the roots of another story we think we know: the legend of King Arthur. Her latest book Arthur: A New Life is a beautifully crafted, richly illustrated retelling of the Arthurian legend, which takes us back beyond the…
Read MoreDNA and Beyond
How do we know what we know about the past? How can we give voice and identity back to those who came before us, especially those who have been misrepresented? We bring together two authors and renowned experts in reconstructing past lives; one through history, the other through science. Professor Turi King – co-presenter of…
Read MoreFor the Love of Stroud
What’s so great about Stroud? And what makes it such an inspiring and creatively stimulating place in which to live? We invite two Gloucestershire legends to discuss! Celebrated novelist Katie Fforde has lived in Stroud since the early 1980s and many of her bestselling books have been inspired by Stroud people and Stroud places. Her…
Read More