Little Atoms - podcast cover

Little Atoms

Neil Dennylittleatoms.com
Little Atoms is a weekly show about books, with authors in conversation. Produced and presented by Neil Denny.

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Episodes

Little Atoms 431 - Dan Richards and Cal Flyn

Cal Flyn is a freelance journalist from the Highlands of Scotland. She has been a reporter for the Sunday Times and the Daily Telegraph, and a contributing editor at The Week magazine. She has been published in the New Statesman, The Observer, The Independent, Telegraph Magazine and FT Weekend, and won the 2013 Brandt/Independent on Sunday travel writing prize. Her first book is Thicker Than Water. Dan Richards studied at UEA and Norwich Arts School. He is co-author of Holloway with Robert Macfa...

Aug 03, 20161 hr 19 min

Little Atoms 430 - Alex Marshall’s Republic or Death

Alex Marshall is a journalist who writes about music and politics. He has written previously for the BBC, Guardian and New York Times. Alex is the author of Republic or Death! Travels in Search of National Anthems. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jul 27, 20161 hr

Little Atoms 429 - Miranda Sawyer's Out Of Time

Miranda Sawyer is a journalist and broadcaster. Formerly of Smash Hits and Select, she currently writes features and radio criticism for the Observer, and her writing has also appeared in GQ, Vogue and the Guardian. She is a regular arts critic in print, on television and on radio. The author of Park and Ride, a book about suburbia, her latest is Out of Time: Midlife, If You Still Think You’re Young. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....

Jul 20, 201659 min

Little Atoms 428 - Marcus Du Sautoy's What We Cannot Know

Marcus Du Sautoy is Professor of Mathematics at the University of Oxford. In 2008 he was appointed to Oxford University’s prestigious professorship as the Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science, a post previously held by Richard Dawkins. In 2009 the Royal Society awarded him the Faraday Prize for excellence in communicating science to the public, and in 2010 he received an OBE from the Queen for his services to science. He’s also recently been made a fellow of the Royal Society. M...

Jul 13, 201659 min

Little Atoms 427 - Louise Dougty's Black Water

Louise Doughty is the author of seven novels, most recently the top 5 bestseller Apple Tree Yard, which was chosen for the Richard & Judy Book Club, shortlisted for the Specsavers National Book Awards Crime & Thriller of the Year and the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger, longlisted for the Guardian's Not the Booker Prize, and translated into over twenty languages. Her other novels include Whatever You Love, which was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and longlisted for the Orange Prize f...

Jul 06, 201643 min

Little Atoms 426 - Francis Spufford's Golden Hill

Francis Spufford was born in 1964. He is the author of five highly-praised books of non-fiction, most frequently described by reviewers as either 'bizarre' or 'brilliant', and usually as both. Unapologetic, has been translated into three languages; the one before, Red Plenty, into nine. He has been longlisted or shortlisted for prizes in science writing, historical writing, political writing, theological writing, and writing 'evoking the spirit of place'. In 2007 he was elected a Fellow of the R...

Jun 29, 201657 min

Little Atoms 425 - Kate Moore's Radium Girls

Kate Moore is a Sunday Times bestselling writer with more than a decade's experience in writing across varying genres, including memoir and biography and history. She is the author of The Radium Girls, and previously she was the director of the critically acclaimed play about The Radium Girls called 'These Shining Lives'. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jun 22, 201651 min

Little Atoms 424 - John Wray's Lost Time Accidents

John Wray is the author of The Right Hand of Sleep, which won a Whiting Writers' Award, Canaan's Tongue and the critically-acclaimed Lowboy. He was chosen as one of Granta's Best Young American Novelists in 2007. His latest novel is The Lost Time Accidents. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jun 14, 201659 min

Little Atoms 423 - Eagles of podcasting!

Recorded live at the Stoke Newington Literary festival, we gathered together the crème of UK literary podcasting and put them on the same stage, and inevitably they talked about books; With Andy Miller (Backlisted), Carrie Plitt & Octavia Bright (Literary Friction), our own Neil Denny, and occasional remote interjections from Robin Ince (Book Shambles). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jun 08, 201659 min

Little Atoms 422 - Lucy Jones and Foxes Unearthed

Lucy Jones is a nature writer and journalist based in London. She was Deputy Editor at NME.com and previously worked at the Daily Telegraph. Her writing on culture, science and nature has been published in BBC Earth, BBC Wildlife, the Guardian, TIME and the New Statesman, and she has contributed to programmes on BBC Radio 4, 6 Music and Radio 1, the BBC World Service, VICE, Channel 5 and Channel 4. She runs the Wildlife Daily blog, featuring wildlife, nature and environment news from around the ...

Jun 01, 201649 min

Little Atoms 421 - Sean Carroll and the Big Picture

Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist at Caltech in Pasadena, California, where he researches the foundations of quantum mechanics, the arrow of time, and the emergence of complexity. He received his PhD in 1983 from Harvard University, and has been awarded prizes and fellowships by the National Science Foundation, NASA, the Sloan Foundation and the Royal Society. He is the author of From Eternity to Here, and The Particle at the End of the Universe among other books, his latest being The Big ...

May 25, 201657 min

Little Atoms 420 - Katie Roiphe's Violet Hour

Katie Roiphe is the author of several books, including The Morning After: Sex, Fear and Feminism, Uncommon Arrangements, and In Praise of Messy Lives. Her articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Harper’s, Vogue, Esquire, Slate, and Tin House, among many other places. She has a Ph.D. in literature from Princeton University, and is currently the director of the Cultural Reporting and Criticism program at New York University. Her latest book is The ...

May 18, 201656 min

Little Atoms 419 - Duncan Campbell's We’ll All Be Murdered in Our Beds!

Duncan Campbell is a former crime correspondent of the Guardian, former chairman of the Crime Reporters’ Association and winner of the Bar Council’s newspaper journalist of the year. He has also written for the Observer, New Statesman, London Review of Books, Oldie, Esquire, Los Angeles Weekly and British Journalism Review. He was the original presenter of Crime Desk on BBC Radio 5 Live, presented the Radio 4 documentary Bandits of the Blitz, has appeared on the Today programme, LBC radio and nu...

May 11, 201657 min

Little Atoms 418 - Rowan Moore's Slow Burn City

Rowan Moore is the architecture critic for the Observer and previously for the Evening Standard. He is also a trained architect, and between 2002 and 2008 was the Director of the Architecture Foundation. His award winning book Why We Build was published by Picador in 2012. In 2014 he was named Critic of the Year by the UK Press Awards. His latest book is Slow Burn City: London in the Twenty-First Century. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information....

May 04, 201649 min

London election special #3 - housing

Josh Neicho speaks to Ben Judah, Heather Kennedy and Martin Skinner about housing, the hottest issue of the London mayoral campaign.Ben Judah is a journalist and author of This Is London, about the migrant experience of LondonHeather Kennedy is an organiser of Digs, a private renters' campaign group in Hackney which is part of the Radical Housing NetworkMartin Skinner is a micro-apartment developer who is CEO of Inspired Asset Management and Inspired Homes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy ...

May 03, 201640 min

London election special #2 - Youth, diversity and equality

In our second London mayoral election special, Josh Niecho and his panel discuss the issues affecting London's young and diverse community.Featuring:Kenny Imafidon is author of the award-winning Kenny Reports and Partnerships & Programmes Co-ordinator of Bite The Ballot. He lives in south London - kennyimafidon.com, @KennyImafidonShelly Asquith is Vice President (Welfare) of the National Union of Students, and former SU President of the University of the Arts - @ShellyAsquithAmina Gichinga i...

Apr 28, 201639 min

Little Atoms 417 - Stephen Trombley's Wise Words

Stephen Trombley's most recent books are Fifty Thinkers Who Shaped the Modern World (2012) and A Short History of Western Thought (2011). For 15 years he co-edited The Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought with Alan Bullock. His latest book is Wise Words: The Philosophy of Everyday Life. This show also features a catch up with Johann Hari on the paperback release of his book Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of The War on Drugs. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more informatio...

Apr 27, 201659 min

London election special part 1 - transport infrastructure and environment

Alexander Jan leads the City Economics team at engineering and consultancy firm Arup and is a columnist for City AMAlex Ingram is a cycling campaigner with groups in Lewisham and Islington and with national campaigns. He blogs at Alex in the Cities(alexinthecities.co.uk)Kate Arnell is a TV presenter who currently presents BBC America's Anglophenia. She has a blog oneco-living at EcoBoost (eco-boost.co)Jonn Elledge is a journalist and edits New Statesman's urbanism magazine site (citymetric.com)....

Apr 26, 201649 min

Little Atoms 416 - Steve Silberman and Sarah Moss

The last of our three shows for the 2016 Wellcome Book Prize, with shortlisted authors Steve Silberman & Sarah Moss. The Wellcome Book Prize 2016 winner will be announced on Monday 25th April. Thanks again to Chris, Alice and Fiona at FMcM Associates for arranging these interviews.Steve Silberman is an award-winning investigative reporter and has covered science and cultural affairs for Wired and other national magazines for more than twenty years. His writing has appeared in The New Yorker,...

Apr 22, 201645 min

Little Atoms 415 - Suzanne O'Sullivan and Amy Liptrot

Dr Suzanne O’Sullivan has been a consultant in neurology since 2004, first working at The Royal London Hospital and now as a consultant in clinical neurophysiology and neurology at The National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, and for a specialist unit based at the Epilepsy Society. In that role she has developed an expertise in working with patients with psychogenic disorders alongside her work with those suffering with physical diseases such as epilepsy. Suzanne’s first book It's All i...

Apr 20, 201648 min

Little Atoms 414 - Cathy Rentzenbrink & Alex Pheby

The first of three shows for the 2016 Wellcome Book Prize, with shortlisted authors Cathy Rentzenbrink & Alex Pheby.Cathy Rentzenbrink was born in Cornwall, Grew up in Yorkshire and now lives in London. A former bookseller at Waterstones, she was until recently Project Director of the charity Quick Reads, and is currently books editor at the Bookseller magazine. Her first book, The Last Act of Love, has been shortlisted for the 2016 Wellcome Book Prize.Alex Pheby is a writer and academic. He...

Apr 13, 20161 hr

Little Atoms 413 - Molly Crabapple and Paul Mason

A recording of the first Little Atoms live event at Waterstones Piccadilly in which we host the launch of Mollly Crabapple’s book Drawing Blood. An acclaimed artist and journalist whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Vanity Fair, and The Paris Review, and in her regular column in Vice (among many other venues), Molly Crabapple has swiftly become one of the most provocative – and most-watched – voices at work today.Now, in her memoir, DRAWING BLOOD, Crabapple weaves together her fresh v...

Apr 06, 201659 min

Little Atoms 412 - The Penderyn Music Book Prize special

The Penderyn Music Book Prize is organised by Richard Thomas, founder of the Laugharne Weekend Festival, and is the only UK-based book prize specifically for music titles including history, theory, biography and autobiography. The winner will be announced at the Laugharne Weekend Festival on 3rd April 2016. In this special edition of Little Atoms, Neil Denny talks with shortlisted authors Stuart Cosgrove and Peter Doggett, and prize judge Jude Rogers. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for m...

Mar 30, 201659 min

Littlle Atoms 411 - Ioan Grillo and Gangster Warlords

Ioan Grillo has reported on Latin America since 2001 for international media including Time magazine, Reuters, CNN, the Associated Press, the Houston Chronicle, the BBC World Service and the Sunday Telegraph.His first book, El Narco: Inside Mexico’s Criminal Insurgency, was translated into five languages and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Orwell Prize.A native of Britain, Grillo lives in Mexico City. His latest book is Gangster Warlords: Drug Dollars, Killing Fields,...

Mar 23, 201656 min

Little Atoms 410 - DJ Taylor and The Prose Factory

DJ Taylor is the author of two acclaimed biographies, Thackerary (1999), and Orwell: The Life, which won the Whitbread Biography Prize in 2003. He has written eleven novels, the most recent being The Windsor Faction. He’s also well known as a critic and reviewer, and his other books include A Vain Conceit: British Fiction in the 1980s and After the War: the Novel and England since 1945. His journalism appears in the Independent and the Independent on Sunday, the Guardian, The Tablet, the Spectat...

Mar 16, 201651 min

Little Atoms special: Andrew Solomon and Marion Coutts

For the last two years Little Atoms has partnered with the Wellcome Book Prize, broadcasting interviews with the shortlisted authors. We’ll be doing the same this year, and to mark the announcement of the 2016 shortlist on Monday 14th March, here’s a bonus episode. This is a recording of a conversation between previous winners Andrew Solomon and Marion Coutts, which took place at Libreria bookshop on 2nd March. Libreria director Sally Davies is the host. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy fo...

Mar 11, 20161 hr 11 min

Little Atoms 409 Harry Parker Andrew Hankinson

Harry Parker grew up in Wiltshire. He was educated at Falmouth College of Art and University College London. He joined the British Army when he was 23 and served in Iraq in 2007 and Afghanistan in 2009 as a Captain. He is now a writer and artist and lives in London. Harry’s first novel is Anatomy of a Soldier. Andrew Hankinson is a journalist who was born, raised, and lives in Newcastle upon Tyne. He started his career as a staff writer at Arena magazine and in 2012 won a Northern Writers Award....

Mar 09, 201656 min

Little Atoms 408 - Jo Marchant and the science of mind over body

Jo Marchant is an award-winning science journalist based in London. She has a PhD in genetics and medical microbiology from St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College in London, and an MSc in Science Communication from Imperial College London. She has worked as an editor at New Scientist and at Nature and her articles have appeared in publications including The Guardian, Wired, and The Observer Review. She’s the author of Decoding the Heavens, which was shortlisted for the 2009 Royal Society Priz...

Mar 02, 20161 hr

Little Atoms 407: Maria Konnikova and The Confidence Game

Maria Konnikova was born in Moscow, Russia and came to the United States when she was four years old. She is a contributing writer for The New Yorker, where she writes a regular column with a focus on psychology and culture, and has written for The Atlantic, The New York Times, Slate, The Wall Street Journal, The Observer, and Scientific American, among numerous other publications. She is the author of Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes and her latest book is The Confidence Game: The ...

Feb 24, 201658 min

Little Atoms 406 - Kathryn Harkup and A is for Arsenic

Kathryn Harkup is a chemist and author. Kathryn completed a PhD then a postdoc at the University of York before realising that talking, writing and demonstrating science appealed far more than spending hours slaving over a hot fume-hood. She went on to run outreach in engineering, computing, physics and maths at the University of Surrey, and is now a freelance science communicator delivering talks and workshops on the quirky side of science. Kathryn is the author of A is for Arsenic: The Poisons...

Feb 17, 20161 hr
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