4.2 • 824 Ratings
🗓️ 8 October 2013
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
In the first of a new series, Alex Polizzi, presenter of TV's The Hotel Inspector and The Fixer, and Peter Robinson, author of the DCI Banks crime novels, talk to Harriett Gilbert about the books they love. Alex has chosen Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem. Peter's choice is A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr. And Harriett flies the flag for I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith. Produced Beth O'Dea
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0:00.0 | In Northern Ireland, from the late 70s to the early 90s, the IRA killed over 40 alleged informers. |
0:07.9 | But the man who often found, tortured and sometimes killed these people on behalf of the IRA |
0:12.0 | was himself an informer, a secret British army agent with the codename Stakeknife. |
0:18.0 | Who gets to play God? And why me? Why my family? |
0:21.3 | When lies are still being told to this day, who do you believe? |
0:25.0 | I wouldn't even know where to start, and I'm with the IRA. |
0:28.4 | Steakknife. |
0:29.7 | Listen first on BBC Sounds. |
0:32.6 | Thanks for downloading a good read. |
0:34.4 | You can find more information on all the BBC downloads at BBC.co.com.uk slash radio four. |
0:42.3 | Hello, welcome to a new season of a good read and how better to kick things off than with three very different tales of thwarted love. |
0:50.3 | Well, thwarted love and murder and God and even a kitchen sink. |
0:55.2 | With me to introduce their choice of book are first the Hotelia, |
0:59.0 | Alessandra Maria Luigia Olga Polizzi di Sorrentino, |
1:03.7 | or as she's more succinctly known on British television, Alex Polizzi, |
1:07.6 | the enormously popular hosts of Channel 5's The Hotel Inspector and and as of last year of the BBC's The Fixer. |
1:14.5 | With her husband, she also runs Miller's wholesale bakery. Alex, welcome. Thank you. And welcome to crime writer Peter Robinson, |
1:22.7 | best known and loved for his novels featuring Inspector Banks, played on TV by Stephen Tompkinson. |
1:28.7 | Peter's books are widely translated. They've won awards everywhere from Canada to Denmark to France to the UK, |
1:35.2 | and the latest Inspector Banks novel, Children of the Revolution, came out just this August. |
1:41.8 | But, Alex, let's start, first of all, with your choice of a good read. What is it and why have you chosen it? |
1:48.0 | I have chosen Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Letham. I think the writing, the way he puts his sentences together is absolutely extraordinary. I was captivated by it the first time I read it, |
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