The Book Café - 07/06/2010

Yann Martel will be with us to explain why with his new book he's risking the acclaim that came from winning the Man Booker prize with Life of Pi. He's done something very few authors would: he's used the Holocaust as a base for a novel. Eighteen years ago The Shadow of the Wind author Carlos Ruiz Zafon was known only in Spain for writing novels for young adults. Now those books are about to be published in the UK for the first time. He'll be telling us why he feels that the seeds of the international best-sellers he's written since were there right from the beginning, with The Prince of Mist. Gavin Pretor-Pinney, the bestselling author of 'The Cloudspotter's Guide', stood on the shore in Cornwall on a clear blue-skied day. Without clouds to occupy his gaze, his attention turned to the waves rolling towards him. Where did they come from? Why do waves exist? In his inimitable fashion he plunged into researching waves- and found out that our lives depend on them. Join Clare and Gavin as they surf the ocean that is his new book, The Wave-Watcher's Companion.