The new Blackwell podcast is available to download today!

The Blackwell Online podcasts bring a fantastic selection of in-depth author interviews straight to your PC. Packed full with over 30 minutes of insight into some of the most fascinating titles available, you'll find a brand new podcast available on our website every two weeks. Listen to the show as you browse the internet or work at your PC, or download the file to transfer to your iPod/MP3 player and take it with you wherever you go!

Listen to the content that interests you!

While we believe that we will bring you some of the best author interviews around, we appreciate that not all titles are to everybody's taste. Therefore, if you don't want to listen to the full show, you can listen to or download the segments that interest you the most. And if you do find a title that is really up your street, you'll find easy links to buy not only the featured title, but a series of related books that provide further insight into the featured subject.

Scroll down to view our most recent podcasts, visit the archive page for the complete backlist, or browse by category via the left-hand menu.

Atul Gawande, Philip Ball and Timothy Ryback are the featured guests for this week's podcast, all speaking with our host George Miller.

Dr Atul Gawande is an American surgeon, author and journalist. Following his bestelling publications Better, which looked at improving doctors' performance, and Complications, an account of the life of a surgeon, Gawande has now released The Checklist Manifesto. The book looks at the use of aviation-style checklists in the operating theatre and the significant benefits that they bring to the complicated world of surgery. The NHS has recently agreed to implement the checklists based on Dr Gawande's research.

Philip Ball is a freelance science writer and author. He he written numerous bestsellers including Critical Mass and Elegant Solutions. With The Music Instinct, Ball turns his attention to the psychology of music, providing a comprehensive, accessible account of humans' obsession with music; piecing together the puzzle of how our minds understand and respond to it.

Timothy Ryback is a historian of the Holocaust. His new paperback, entitled Hitler's Private Library, investigates Hitler's collection of books, estimated to be 16,000 volumes at the time of his death in 1945. Ryback explores this remarkable collection, as well as several other caches which he subsequently discovered in Europe and elsewhere.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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As we return with our first Blackwell Podcast for 2010, we are delighted to welcome Thomas Asbridge, Tim Bale and David Peace.

We start our first show of the year with Thomas Asbridge, Senior Lecturer in Medieval History at Queen Mary, London and author of The Crusades. The book is a major new account of the wars for the Holy Land, unique in its vivid representation of events from both Christian and Muslim perspectives. The book draws upon painstaking original research to reveal how these wars reshaped the medieval world and why they continue to echo in human memory to this day.

Our second guest this week is Tim Bale, Senior Lecturer in Politics at the University of Sussex. In his new book entitled The Conservative Party, Bale presents a new assessement of the Tories from the fall of Margaret Thatcher to the rise of David Cameron answering along the way such questions as "Why did the party dump Margaret Thatcher only to commit electoral suicide under John Major?", "What stopped the Tories getting their act together until Cameron came along?" and "Has the Tory leader changed his party as much as he claims?".

We complete this week's show with David Peace, author of The Red Riding Quartet, The Damned Utd and new in paperback, Occupied City; the second book in his Tokyo Trilogy. The book dramatises the notorious real-life case of Japan's Teikoku Bank Massacre that took place in 1948, exploring the man who was convicted of the crime, the victims, survivors and more.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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Graham Farmelo's The Strangest Man looks at the extraordinary life of the theoretical physicist, Paul Dirac. Little-known beyond the scientific community, Dirac was one of the leading pioneers in quantum mechanics, arguably the greatest scientific discovery of all time.

Yet outside of his professional work Dirac was a curious character: pathologically reticent, strangely literal-minded and legendarily unable to communicate or empathize.

With The Strangest Man shortlisted for this year's Costa Book Awards, our regular podcast host George Miller spent some time with Graham Farmelo to discuss the quantum genius.

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Audio recordings produced by George Miller of podularity.com

For the final Blackwell podcast of the year, we take a look back at some of the hightlights from our shows of 2009 in a two-part Christmas special.

Listen to our regular host George Miller as he revisits some of the best interviews of the year including his discussions with Hilary Mantel, Philip Hoare, Alain de Botton, Mary Beard, Micheal Slater and more.

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Audio recordings produced by George Miller of podularity.com

In this fortnight's Blackwell Online podcast we welcome authors John Gray and John Sutherland.

John Gray's 2002 book Straw Dogs offers a profound assessment of what it means to be human, challenging our long-held assumptions about our place as humans in the hierarchy of life. The book was named among the top 100 Blackwell Books of the Decade so we invited John to come and discuss his bestselling book and the titles that he has most enjoyed from the last 10 years.

We are also delighted to welcome John Sutherland, author of Curiosities of Literature. In the book, Sutherland presents a series of essays in which he looks to answer a range of literary curiosities including: 'When did cigarettes start making an appearance in English literature?', 'Who wrote the first Western?', 'Is there any link between asthma and literary genius?' and more.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In this fortnight's Blackwell Online Podcast, we are pleased to welcome Marcus du Sautoy and Michael Slater.

We begin the show with Marcus du Sautoy, Professor of both Mathematics and the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford. Du Sautoy's 2003 publication, The Music of the Primes, is a critically acclaimed popular science book that delves into the mysterious world of prime numbers. The paperback release features in the Blackwell Books of the Decade list and with that in mind, our regular host George Miller spent some time with Marcus to discuss not only his bestselling title, but also the three books that he has most enjoyed over the past 10 years.

Our second guest for this programme is Michael Slater, Emeritus Professor of Victorian Literature at Birkbeck College, University of London. In his new book, titled simply Charles Dickens, Slater draws on a lifetime of research to present a masterful biography of the great Victorian novelist. The book provides a comprehensive account of Dickens' personal and emotional life with the core focus on his career as a writer and professional author, covering not only his big novels but also his phenomenal output of other writing.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In the latest edition of Blackwell Podcasts, our regular host George Miller speaks with three authors about their latest books.

Starting the show this week is Robert Ferguson. In his new book The Hammer and the Cross, Ferguson provides a fresh approach to the Viking Age utilising his long familiarity with the literary culture of Scandinavia with the latest archaeological discoveries and the evidence to make the most convincing modern portrait of the Viking Age to date.

Our second guest is Marcus Chown, former radio astronomer at CALTEC and current cosmology consultant of New Scientist magazine. Chown's latest book, We Need to Talk About Kelvin, shows how familiar, everyday occurrences can teach us profound truths about the fundamental nature of reality. From the bizarre particle/wave duality of photons in the light of your reflection from a window, to the traces of cosmic background radiation left from the Big Bang found on an untuned television set, We Need to Talk About Kelvin will change the way you look at the world forever.

Our final guest this week is Canadian author Graeme Gibson. With his 2005 bestseller, The Bedside Book of Birds, Gibson gave readers a beautifully illustrated miscellany of the avian world. With The Bedside Book of Beasts, Gibson extends his reach to other wildlife combining beautiful illustrations, scientific extracts, poems, fables and stunning photography to present a captivating celebration of wild animals.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In the last podcast for October, we are delighted to welcome Hilary Mantel, David Kynaston and John Grindrod.

With her Man Booker Prize victory still fresh in the memory, Hilary Mantel takes some time out of her very busy schedule to discuss the book that won her the prestigious prize, Wolf Hall. The book is set in the 1520s and tells the story of Thomas Cromwell's rise to prominence in the Tudor court. Listen as Mantel discusses the book.

Praised as "the most entertaining historian alive" by The Spectator magazine, David Kynaston is an English historian who has written numerous books on British history. In his latest offering, Family Britain, 1951-1957, Kynaston presents a collection of diaries and memoirs to paint a picture of yesteryear's Britain which is as fascinating as it is moving.

Our last guest this week is John Grindrod, editor of the hilarious new book Shouting at the Telly. The book features funny and heartfelt rants and raves from a host of comedians, writers and viewers on everything the box has to offer: from soaps to sitcoms, sci-fi to reality shows, HBO to QVC.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In the latest Blackwell Podcast we are joined by Ian Mortimer, Jenny Uglow and Dan Cruickshank for a British History special.

We begin this week with historian and historical biographer Ian Mortimer. In his groundbreaking new book 1415, Mortimer looks at Henry V's 'year of glory', a period of religious persecution, personal suffering and the Battle of Agincourt, and asks whether the King deserves to be remembered as the greatest man who ever ruled England.

Our second guest is Jenny Uglow, author, historian and critic who discusses her latest book A Gambling Man. The book presents a study of Charles II, exploring his elusive nature through the tumultuous first decade of the restoration, a period which saw the plague, the Fire of London and the Dutch war.

Our final guest for this British History special is Dan Cruickshank. His new book The Secret History of Georgian London looks at the darker side of the Georgian capital, where prostitution was rife, houses of ill repute were widespread, and many tens of thousands of people were dependent in some way on the wages of sin.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In the new Blackwell Online podcast, we are delighted to host Mary Beard, Mark Vernon, Amanda Vickery and Mark Hudson.

Mary Beard joins our podcasts programme for the second time, with her forthcoming title It's a Don's Life the topic of today's discussion. The book is a selection of entries from her now famous blog on the Times Literary Supplement website, covering themes such as the classics, universities and teaching - and much else besides.

Writer, broadcaster and journalist Mark Vernon takes a sideways glance at modern living in his new book Plato's Podcasts, presenting the would-be thoughts of Ancient Philosophers on various topics central to our 21st century existence.

Amanda Vickery is Professor of Modern British History at Royal Holloway. Her new book Behind Closed Doors unlocks the homes of Georgian England to examine the lives of the people who lived there, revealing what these abodes meant to the inhabitants both physically and psychologically.

Mark Hudson, journalist and prize-winning author, discusses his new book, Titian: The Last Days. The book is an exploratory journey through the life and work of the 16th-century Venetian painter, detailing the artist's struggles with his work, clients and family while celebrating his largely unfinished, final paintings.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In this fortnight's podcast, we are pleased to welcome Philipp Blom, Christian Wolmar and Michael Frayn.

The Vertigo Years is the latest book from German historian, novelist and journalist Philipp Blom. In the book, subtitled 'Change and Culture in the West, 1900-1914', Blom looks at the pre-First World War era and argues that the emergence of the new European world dominated by globalisation, consumerism and other dramatic social shifts thought to have been triggered by the conflict, were already well established...

Christian Wolmar's Blood, Iron and Gold tells the story of the people and events that shaped the world's railways. From the vision and determination of the pioneers who designed the railways, to the workers who endured horrific conditions to build them, Wolmar's book shows how the rise of the train paved the way not only for engineering and architectural innovation, but for the rapid movement of people and goods around the world.

Michael Frayn, author, critic and playwright, discusses his new title Travels with a Typewriter. The book is a collection of travel articles written by Frayn for The Observer during the 1960s and 70s. Documenting his travels to numerous locations worldwide including Israel, Berlin, Japan, America and Cuba, Frayn turns his attention not to the extraordinary, but to the ordinary, typical happenings of everyday life.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In the first podcast for September, we are pleased to host authors Roland Chambers, Julian Baggini, Tom Vanderbilt and Rodge Glass.

We start this week with Roland Chambers, author of The Last Englishman. The book is a biography of English author and journalist Arthur Ransome who is best remembered for his series of children's books Swallows and Amazons. Chambers shows however that Ransome was much more than a writer, leading an astonishing 'double life' in the early part of the century when he was a foreign correspondent based in revolutionary Russia, and possibly much else besides.

Our second guest is British philosopher and author Julian Baggini. In his latest book Should You Judge This Book by Its Cover?, Baggini offers philosophical opinions to 100 familiar saying and quotations such as 'is the grass always greener on the other side?' 'Is there ever smoke without fire?' And 'is it better to be safe than sorry?'

Next up we have Tom Vanderbilt, author of Traffic. The book looks at how our behaviour changes when we get behind the wheel and what that says about us as drivers and people. The book also covers other curiostities of the road such as the driving habits of nations and road rage.

Our final guest this week is Rodge Glass who has written a fascinating biography on the Scottish writer and artist Alasdair Gray. The book documents the journey of the Glaswegian looking at the people, events, books, paintings, plays, poems and circumstances that conspired to make the man as he is today.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In the latest Blackwell Online podcast, authors Ziauddin Sardar and Christopher Potter take some time to discuss their books Balti Britain and You are Here. Ziauddin Sardar is a Muslim intellectual, cultural-critic and author. In his new book Balti Britain, Sardar travels to Asian communities throughout the UK to tell the history of Asians in Britain. From the arrival of the first Indian in 1614 through to present day, Sardar also looks back at his own past and that of his family following their emigration to Britain in the 1950s. Christopher Potter is a publisher-turned-author who has written the hugely successful popular science book You are Here. The book takes the reader on a fascinating journey through the life of the cosmos - from the birth of the universe some 13.7 billion years ago to the strange world of quantum mechanics, the ground-breaking theory of general relativity and much, much more, this is the ultimate story of the universe and our place in it.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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In the latest Blackwell Online podcast, our regular host George Miller speaks with three authors. We begin this week with Lisa Hilton, author of Queens Consort. The books follows the lives of the twenty women who were crowned queen consort of England between 1066 and 1503 from the well-known to the forgotten. Hilton looks at the evolution of the role through the centuries while presenting intimate portraits of the individual women who ultimately helped shape the modern state. Our second guest is Jane Robinson. Her book Bluestockings tells the story of how women in the 19th and early 20th century determinedly fought for their right to a university education against staunch opposition, paving the way for generations of women to follow in their footsteps. Our final guest this week is Catharine Arnold who discusses her new book Bedlam. The book is an informative and entertaining account of how London has treated its mentally ill. From the foundation of Bethlehem hospital in 1247, the establishment which later gave rise to the term 'bedlam'; through the 18th century mad houses and on to present day.

To download the full-length podcast click HERE or select the individual segments below.

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