The Boundless Podcast

Faiqa Mansab on the tradition of Sufi storytelling

Wed, 04 Jun 2025 10:48:37 GMT

Author of The Sufi Storyteller Faiqa joined Boundless Junior Editor Sadia Nowshin to discuss the beauty of Sufi stories, how classic Western literature might have been inspired by the tradition, and the love and pain of mother-child relationships.

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Building the Brooklyn Bridge with Erica Wagner

Fri, 30 May 2025 09:40:49 GMT

Erica Wagner talks to Patrick Galbraith about her book Chief Engineer, which was published by Bloomsbury in 2017.

They discuss Washington Roebling, the man who built the bridge, and his extraordinarily prescient understanding of engineering. It isn't just a story about metal and rock but it's a story about fathers and sons and it captures, in tremendous detail, a time of great change. There was, for instance, a ferry company that tried to sue when the bridge was built.

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Alison Bechdel on capitalism, representation, and her comic novel Spent

Fri, 23 May 2025 15:24:04 GMT

Alison Bechdel joins Erica Wagner to chat about her new comic novel Spent, writing a new kind of autobiography, and learning new things.

Spent by Alison Bechdel was published by Jonathan Cape on 22nd May 2025 (£22) and is available for preorder now

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Hedgelayer and writer Richard Negus on the disconnect between the urban and rural

Fri, 16 May 2025 15:01:15 GMT

Patrick Galbraith talks to Richard Negus about hedgelaying, nature writing, and the disconnect between the urban and rural sphere.

Richard’s debut book, Words From the Hedge: A hedge layer’s view of the English Countryside, was published by Unbound on May Day.

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Shelley Fisher Fishkin on what Mark Twain would say of politics today

Fri, 09 May 2025 10:45:39 GMT

Shelley Fisher Fishkin speaks to Boundless Editor-at-Large Erica Wagner about the enduring relevance and influence of Mark Twain — and how his words can still be used to apply to American politics today over a century since his death.

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Patrick Galbraith on what the land actually means

Wed, 30 Apr 2025 15:27:42 GMT

Patrick Galbraith and Erica Wagner talk about Patrick’s unexpectedly controversial new book, Uncommon Ground, which explores land access throughout Britain. From naturism to fox hunting to magic mushroom picking and farming, Uncommon Ground has been called “a raking survey of England”

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Elizabeth Garner on folk tales and liminal spaces

Wed, 23 Apr 2025 15:50:44 GMT

Erica Wagner talks to Elizabeth Garner about folklore, and Erica and Patrick Galbraith discuss Elizabeth’s piece for Boundless on a well that sits in the garden at her childhood home.

Erica and Patrick also discuss Patrick’s new book Uncommon Ground.

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Lamorna Ash on the rise of young people turning to religion

Wed, 16 Apr 2025 14:16:19 GMT

Patrick Galbraith talks to Lamorna Ash, the author of Don't Forget We're Here Forever which will be published shortly by Bloomsbury, about the rise of interest in religion among young people in Britain. That's the topic of her book, which also looks at conversion and Lamorna's own relationship with Christianity.

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Manya Wilkinson on Yiddish, and misplacing what was lost

Wed, 09 Apr 2025 14:26:14 GMT

Erica Wagner talks to the novelist Manya Wilkinson, the winner of the 2025 Wingate Prize, about the influence of Yiddish in writing today.

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Sadia Nowshin on how teen girl literature has changed

Fri, 04 Apr 2025 14:44:26 GMT

Like many now-20-something women who grew up in the UK, Angus Thongs and Full Frontal Snogging was an iconic staple of Sadia Nowshin's early teenhood — the awkwardness of girlhood thrown into sharp relief and a protagonist whose imperfections brought girls on the cusp of young adulthood some comfort.

What teens are reading now looks very different, and you only have to look at a 'TikTok Recommends' table at a bookshop to notice a pattern of romances with questionable themes — but should there be more guidance in place to stop impressionable young women from accessing stories beyond their years, or will teens simply always want to feel older than they are? She and Erica Wagner discuss how books targeting this demographic has changed, from Judy Bloom to toxic tropes.

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Erica Wagner on increasingly long podcasts and shorter books

Wed, 26 Mar 2025 17:15:08 GMT

Erica Wagner and Patrick Galbraith talk about Erica’s trip to Easter Island. From the high sea, she talks about her piece on novels getting shorter while podcasts are getting longer. What they both give us, in different ways, is intensity of experience. They also discuss Francisco Garcia’s piece on how crime writers land big stories.

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Arvind Ethan David on the thin line between science fiction and reality

Wed, 19 Mar 2025 13:44:49 GMT

In recent history, apocalyptic science fiction was fun. It was hard for most of us to imagine, while reading things like Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, that the bleak deadzone the novel is set in could become a reality but for many people round the world, it now is.

Erica Wagner talks to Arvind Ethan David, an author and screenwriter, about the purpose of science fiction now. In times of plenty, it is strangely gratifying to imagine times of disaster — and in times of disaster, it pays, Arvind thinks, to imagine more positive possibilities. The role of the artist, he feels, is to consider how a better future might work.

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Sarah Dunant on furry friends through history

Wed, 12 Mar 2025 16:11:18 GMT

When Sarah Dunant was writing her most recent historical novel, she had a character who was tough to crack. Isabella D’Este, a 16th century Italian noblewoman, had no obvious softness or humanity, and then Sarah – a bestselling novelist and cultural commentator – discovered her fondness for little dogs.

Erica talks to Sarah about the ways in which understanding relationships that people had with dogs historically gives an incredibly rich window into the past. From horse culture to pig rearing, the history of humankind is almost all there.

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Mario Theodorou on the differences between writing for screen and shelf

Wed, 05 Mar 2025 16:02:43 GMT

It’s all just storytelling, right? Whether you’re a dramatist, a writer for telly, or a novelist. Well, no. It turns out that writing for the screen and writing for the bookshelf are markedly different.

Mario Theodorou, a Londoner of Greek heritage who ordinarily writes screen plays, has just written Felix Grey and the Descendant, a pacey thriller set in Edwardian society. He tells Patrick Galbraith about how the novel form set him free. Characters, he explains, are usually far more developed in books than they are on the screen and their interior world can be revealed to a far greater extent. They can also afford to be more experimental.

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Francesca Reece on the ascendancy of young Welsh writers

Wed, 26 Feb 2025 14:22:51 GMT

Why is it that young Irish writers are everywhere, while the Welsh dragon of literary fiction is sitting quietly in a corner? Francesca Reece thinks that the Scottish and Irish simply have better PR — but she also says that the profile of Welsh writing is in ascendancy.

Francesca’s latest book, Glass Houses, is a plot-driven tale about sex, magic mushrooms, and nationalism. She talks to Patrick Galbraith about forestry, second homes, and the Gavin and Stacey effect.

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Hannah Hayden on the world of erotic fantasy fiction

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 15:36:51 GMT

Last summer, outside a pub in Soho, Patrick Galbraith met Hannah Hayden, a librettist who also writes erotic novels about men who fall into fantasy worlds and end up having a wild time with dinosaurs and elves. Hannah has never met the people she works for and she has no idea really who the readership is.

What is clear, though, is that the novels sell remarkably well; Hannah often writes a novel a month. Can she tell Patrick exactly what it is that male readers really want?

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Philippe Petit on being more than the 'man on wire,' and Nathan Hill on the uncanniness of Fort Myers Beach

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 16:17:15 GMT

In 1974, the artist Philippe Petit embarked on an illegal high-wire walk across the Twin Towers, which resulted in a great degree of notoriety that has followed him ever since.

Philippe talks to Erica Wagner about his struggle to break free of that fame and his desire to be recognised for his many creative endeavours, rather than just being the ‘man on wire’.

Erica also talks to bestselling novelist Nathan Hill about living in face of extreme weather, and the uncanny commodification of relaxation.

Philippe's To Reach the Clouds was published by Orion in 2022

Nathan Hill’s Wellness, was published by Picador in September 2024

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Author Kaliane Bradley on the pains of piecing together lost stories

Wed, 05 Feb 2025 17:21:23 GMT

While researching her bestselling novel The Ministry of Time, Kaliane Bradley became obsessed with the life of Robert McClure. She has spent the past few years trying to piece together the details of his existence from fragments in the archives — though he died well over a century before Kaliane began to write, she tells Erica Wagner that she knows him well.

She also discusses her novel and the enduring appeal of great failures.

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The Fence magazine’s Founding Editor, Charlie Baker, on launching a print magazine in a very digital age

Wed, 29 Jan 2025 15:37:20 GMT

In 2019, having almost no experience of journalism whatsoever, Charlie Baker decided to launch a print magazine. In a world where print readership is in dire decline, people thought he was completely nuts — but over five years on, The Fence is flying.

Marina Hyde and Richard Osman recently toasted the magazine on their podcast The Rest is Entertainment, and Patrick Radden Keefe says it is the only place he gets his news. Keefe probably wasn’t being entirely serious when he said that but he has written for The Fence, along with people like John Banville, Roísín Lanigan, Fergus Butler-Gallie, and our own Patrick Galbraith. Charlie talks to Patrick about why he thinks that reading print is preferable to reading digitally, what makes a great story, and the future of magazines in a rapidly-changing media landscape.

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Katrina Porteous on the last fishing boat in the harbour, and Tice Cin on the madness of your second novel

Mon, 20 Jan 2025 14:39:48 GMT

When she was in her 20s, Katrina Porteous moved to a cottage on the Northumberland Coast. It was immensely beautiful but it was a place that was changing fast – every year the number of fishing boats in the harbour declined and many of the fishermen themselves were getting on. Katrina has spent the past few decades, as a poet, documenting the loss of their way of life and the inshore sea fishing culture. Katrina talks to Erica Wagner about capturing a sense of place in her writing and about the importance of spending a time simply listening and watching.

Erica also talks to the young London-based Turkish Cypriot writer, Tice Cin, about her piece for Boundless on the challenge of writing a second novel, in the wake of the first, and the importance of finding other artists to run with as a pack.

Tice Cin's Keeping the House

Katrina Porteous' Rhizodont

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Patrick McCabe on the pain of watching your book adapted for the silver screen

Fri, 10 Jan 2025 11:56:37 GMT

In 1992, Pat McCabe was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for his haunting novel, The Butcher Boy. Shortly afterwards, Hollywood came calling and his dark and bleakly funny yarn about small town Ireland was turned into a big film. Pat talks to the Editor of Boundless, Patrick Galbraith, about what it was like to see his words realised on the screen. Most of the team at Warner Bros., Pat explains, couldn't understand half of the dialogue he'd written or 'the everyday talk of rural Ireland'. A novelist might write the words but when big directors, producers, and money men come to town, that doesn't count for much.

Read Pat's Boundless feature: https://boundlesslit.substack.com/

Pre-order Goldengrove, publishing with Unbound in 2025

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