Sebastian Faulks

Simon Mayo's Books of the Year

Bauer Media

Arts, Books

4.9 • 994 Ratings

🗓️ 29 August 2023

⏱️ 40 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Bestselling author, Sebastian Faulks, joins Simon and Matt for a chinwag about his latest novel, 'The Seventh Son'. The book is set in a not-too-distant future, which is a departure for Sebastian who we know mainly for his historical fiction. In this episode we discuss this brilliant new novel (without spoilers, we think) and where his inspiration for it came from. We learn about the incredible amount of research he had to undertake to be able to write the book, and see if we can guess who some of his characters are based on! Here comes the science bit: A child will be born who will change everything. When a young woman named Talissa answers an advert to carry a child, she cannot begin to imagine the consequences. Behind the doors of the Parn Institute, a billionaire entrepreneur plans to stretch the boundaries of ethics as never before. Through a series of IVF treatments, one they hope no one ever discovers, they set in motion an experiment that is set to upend the human race as we know it. Seth, a baby, is delivered to hopeful parents Mary and Alaric, but when his differences start to mark him out from his peers, he begins to attract unwanted attention. The Seventh Son is a spectacular examination of what it is to be human. Sweeping between New York, London, and the Scottish Highlands, this is an extraordinary novel about unrequited love and unearned power. It asks the question: just because you can do something, does it mean you should?

Transcript

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0:00.0	All right, Matt.
0:01.3	Hello, Simon.
0:02.0	Did you know that if you need to hire, you need Indeed?
0:06.6	Now, I think you've mentioned this before, but tell me more.
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0:18.5	Yes, that sounds pretty good to me.
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0:27.9	But is it a quick process?
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0:46.2	to help get your jobs more visibility. Just go to indeed.com slash BOTY. That's indeed.com
0:53.7	slash BOTY. Terms and conditions apply.
0:57.3	Need to hire. You need Indies.
1:19.0	Hello and welcome to another Books of the Year podcast from your friends at Books of the Year, your favourite book-based podcast.
1:28.1	We are, although we are also the reason why you're spending so much money on books and filling up your bookshelves because there are so many great books we feature on this podcast. Unless you're going to the library. Yeah, that's true. Because I mentioned that because
1:34.3	I think Tracy and Haywood's Heath has been on. Headline, Where is the Summer in Caps? For context, I'm
1:42.1	writing this email on a miserable day in July, in which there have been several in a row where I live in Haywood's Heath. I'd be really looking forward to cracking out some beach reads, but this weather is making me want to read Shirley Jackson and Charlotte Bronte. I find myself in the mood for Gothic fiction, rather than page-turning thrillers or summer romances. I just wondered if anyone else's reading habits were affected by the weather. That's interesting. I never thought about that. I suppose... No, I mean, you're going to read... You have a beach read. You're going to have a beach read, aren't you? Yeah, yeah. I've already decided on what I'm going to take on my little holiday. And it's going to be something nice
2:18.5	and straightforward, I think. I might take the Ben McIntyre book about your man, Philby.
	...

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