Clapham’s distinctive Book Festival was inaugurated in 2016 and took place on 5th October 2019. The 2019 Programme may be viewed below. The 2020 Programme has not yet been announced.

2.00 – 3.00pm       Rival Queens

Award-winning TV historian and New York Times bestselling novelist Kate Williams vividly explores the rivalry between Mary Queen of Scots and Elizabeth I and shares her experience of writing historical fiction.

3.30 – 4.30pm     Beyond The Thirty Nine Steps

Drawing on new family archive material, award-winning journalist Ursula Buchan discusses the ‘magnificent biography’ of her grandfather John Buchan with Clapham novelist Elizabeth Buchan, revealing the author of The Thirty-Nine Steps in a completely new light.

5.00 – 5.30pm    Our Man in New York

New York Times best-selling local writer Henry Hemming introduces and reads from his latest work Our Man in New York.   The extraordinary story of how a covert British operation used fake news to manipulate US public opinion and bring America into WWII.

6.00 – 7.00pm     An Extraordinary Life

Guardian journalist and Ondaatje prize-winner Aida Edemariam talks to novelist Michèle Roberts about The Wife’s Tale, her “outstanding and highly unusual memoir” of her Ethiopian grandmother, sharing how she came to write this lyrical biography.

7.30 – 8.30pm    In Conversation with Frank Gardner 

Drawing on his exciting broadcasting career, BBC journalist and author Frank Gardner delves into the tense mix of fact and fiction in his novels Crisis and Ultimatum with fellow thriller writer Simon Berthon.