Showing results by author "Holly Newson" in All Categories

Joining us at Audible Studios is Esme Young, English fashion designer and judge on the BBC's The Great British Sewing Bee. Beginning her career in the 1970s, Young established her brand 'Swanky Modes', opening a shop in Camden Town. Her designs were sought after, and appeared in ID and Nova. She has also designed costumes for films such as Bridget Jones's Diary and Trainspotting, including the iconic bunny outfit for Renée Zellweger. Esme Young has now written Behind the Seams, her memoir looking back over her life and time in fashion.

Author of the best-selling Inspector McLean series and the Ballad of Sir Benfro series, James Oswald is back with a brand-new book, No Time to Cry, published in July 2018. James Oswald talks to us about what inspired his new lead character, playing detective while he’s writing and how eye-opening it was to write a female protagonist.

Colfer, born and raised in Wexford, Ireland, alongside his four brothers, earned a degree from Dublin University before returning to Wexford to work as a teacher. After releasing some children's books that went down well in Ireland, he wrote the first draft of Artemis Fowl, and, on reading it, his family demanded he get himself an agent. Artemis Fowl allowed Colfer to leave his teaching job to write full time, and he has never looked back, gaining international recognition and regularly appearing in best seller lists.

Joining us at Audible Studios is Dan Abnett, British comic book writer and novelist, who has contributed to series for Marvel, DC Comics and Games Workshop's Black Library. Abnett is one of the Black Library's main authors, and certainly one of their best sellers. Writing within the Warhammer 40,000 universe, Abnett has authored infamous series such as Horus Heresy, Gaunt's Ghosts and Eisenhorn. Abnett has also written prolifically for Marvel and DC, as well as 2000 AD.

Joining us at Audible Studios is James Acaster, one of the UK's finest stand-up comedians, who has his own Netflix special, a podcast with Ed Gamble and a TV show with Josh Widdicombe. Acaster has written and recently released his second book, Perfect Sound Whatever. We spoke to James about his iPod guy, whether or not therapy was useful to him and the sheer joy he gets from recommending music.

After beginning a career in psychiatric nursing, Jo Brand moved to the alternative comedy stand-up scene with early performances on Saturday Live and later appearing in the likes of The Brain Drain and Jo Brand Through the Cakehole. Brand is the author of four novels and is currently the presenter of The Great British Bake Off: An Extra Slice, and her latest book, Born Lippy, was published in October 2018.

Celebrated for being the ‘Nora Ephron’ of the millennial generation, Dolly Alderton joined us for a chat about female friendships, recording her audiobook, and revealed who she’d like to play her in a film.

Dolly Alderton is an award-winning journalist, writer and director, known for her podcast The High Low, as well as her honest and relatable writing. She brings us her debut audiobook, Everything I Know about Love, a spot-on, wildly funny and sometimes heartbreaking book about growing up, growing older and navigating all kinds of love along the way.

Bob Roth, meditation teacher and CEO of the David Lynch Foundation, joins us to discuss his latest audiobook, Strength in Stillness: The Power of Transcendental Meditation. Roth’s audiobook examines what we might do to combat the growing stress epidemic which has gripped the world and why he believes that transcendental meditation is a key tool. In this interview we discuss what transcendental meditation is, how he first came across the technique and how the view of meditation has changed over the years.

George Monbiot is renowned for his passionate and impactful writing on political, social and environmental issues. A fearless investigative journalist, he’s travelled the world in search of stories and has written about subjects as varied as mahogany extraction from Indian reserves in Brazil to the effect of the loneliness epidemic on the health of the British population.

Neurologist Ash Ranpura and Buddhist monk Gelong Thubten have recently collaborated with Ruby Wax - comedian, mental health advocate and best-selling author of Frazzled - to produce a new book called How to Be Human: The Manual. In this interview they reveal what they learnt from each other, where they found common ground and where, perhaps, they might disagree. We hear about mindfulness and what science can really tell us about who we are.

Joining us in the studio to talk about his latest book, Rebel Ideas, is British table tennis Olympian, author, journalist and broadcaster Matthew Syed. Known for being the ping-pong guy from popular sports podcast Flintoff, Savage and the Ping Pong Guy, Matthew Syed started his career as a table tennis player, competing in two Olympic games, and was ranked as a top player in England for 10 years. Since then, Matthew moved on to a career in journalism, writing a column in The Times and broadcasting on the BBC and Eurosport.

Since beginning The Everyday Sexism project as a website in 2012, Bates has begun what some are calling 'the fourth-wave feminism'. By gathering instances of sexism experienced on a day-to-day basis, Bates has proved to the world that, not only does sexism exist, but that it is a problem faced by women every day. Bates has authored best-selling books, and now works closely with politicians, schools, police forces and organisations to tackle gender inequality. Bates was awarded a British Empire Medal for services to gender equality in 2015.

Best known for her magical role as Luna Lovegood in the Harry Potter series, Lynch has since branched into a stage career, including a role as Bess Houdini in Houdini, which toured the UK, and short films, such as 'My Name Is Emily'. Alongside her acting career, Lynch's activism has led her to campaign for animal rights and veganism. She has starred in short films to this end, launched a podcast titled Chickpeeps with the aim of educating others on being a vegan, and founded a cruelty-free cosmetics brand, Kinder Box.

Joining us at Audible Studios is ex-Special Forces soldier, and member of the director staff for SAS: Who Dares Wins, Ollie Ollerton. He has penned a novel, Break Point, to share his life story and secrets for achievement. Break Point travels through Ollerton's life to depict his most challenging moments, from a freak childhood accident, through his time in Iraq and Baghdad, including high-speed shoot-outs, counter-terrorism and humanitarian heroics.

Joining us at Audible Studios is Christopher Paolini, author of the Inhertiance Cycle series and the youngest author of a best-selling series for The New York Times, USA Today and Publishers Weekly. Paolini's newest book has been released: The Fork, the Witch, and the Worm, from Tales of Alagaësia. Eragon has departed the world of Alagaësia in order to create a new home to train the next generation of dragon riders, to construct a dragonhold and protect dragon eggs; through these three original stories, we also see more of Eragon's personal journey.

Joining us in the Audible Studios to talk about his narration of Tony Lee’s audio drama Dodge and Twist is British actor Stephen Mangan. Known for his roles as Guy Secretan in Green Wing, Sean Lincoln in Episodes and Dan Moody in I’m Alan Partridge, Stephen Mangan has had a respected career across both stage and screen. The Tony-nominated actor now plays the part of Charles Dickens in the audio drama Dodge and Twist. In this interview, Stephen Mangan talks to us about what it’s like to voice a Victorian, why he didn’t get to sing in Postman Pat: The Movie and what got him into acting.

Author and business mogul Rolf Dobelli brings Audible the release of his latest audiobook, The Art of the Good Life: Clear Thinking for Business and a Better Life. Split into 52 sections with advice on how to live better, The Art of the Good Life offers guidance on how to approach the many issues we're faced with in our daily lives. We talk to Rolf about his audiobook and about what a 'good life' really looks like and ask him for some of his top tips to get there.

Joining us at Audible Studios is high profile human rights and civil liberties barrister Leslie Thomas QC. Thomas was called to the bar in 1988 and has represented some very high-profile cases, including families of the Hillsborough disaster, the family of Mark Duggan, whose death sparked the 2011 London riots, and more recently, the families of the victims of Grenfell Tower. It's clear that Thomas has a passion for supporting the voiceless and vulnerable, and is an expert in claims against the police and other public authorities.

Born and bred in Virginia, David Baldacci is the author of acclaimed novels such as Absolute Power and Wish You Well as well as the critically hailed Amos Decker and Will Robie series. David has sold over 130 million copies of his work in 45 languages and in over 80 countries. His latest series introduces new female protagonist, Atlee Pine. David Baldacci talks to us about his brand-new thriller series, how he manages to consistently create addictive plot lines and how his writing has changed since he began.

When Covid struck and the country entered lockdown, Widdicombe and Beckett were stuck at home and the reality of parenting young children without the escape of work hit hard. They decided to start a podcast, Lockdown Parenting Hell, which meant they could go upstairs, leave the children for a while, and moan about the difficulties of being a dad, which over 2 million people a month started listening to! With the success of the podcast, Beckett and Widdicombe decided there was plenty they hadn’t covered that would make a great audiobook.