The Penguin Podcast: Episode 8 – Christmas Gifting

As the Christmas season approaches, we’ve assembled an expert panel to help you navigate your gifting dilemmas and find the ideal presents for everyone on your list. Plus, how do you politely decline a festive party? And is bending the spine of a book the approved way to read it? We find out with etiquette expert, and Help I've S*xted my Boss podcaster, William Hanson as we discuss his new book Just Good Manners.

As a special thank you to our podcast listeners we are offering a special discount code for the Penguin Shop. Use PENGUINPODCAST at Checkout and click here for T&Cs

Click the button below to listen to this episode or continue scrolling to explore the books discussed.

Click here to read the transcript of this episode

Episode 8: Transcript

Rihanna Dhillon:

The Penguin Shop is your destination for all things Quintessentially Penguin. From sets of beloved classics to merchandise and home goods, highlighting our iconic design history this week from today through to Thursday the 28th of November. Enjoy 20% off a selection of books and merch with the Discount Code Penguin podcast. Some exclusions apply, see terms and conditions in the show notes for full details.

Hello, I'm Rihanna Dhillon. Welcome to the Penguin Podcast and another episode of Ask Penguin, the show that's packed full of book recommendations and conversations with penguin authors and the people who make the books. Now, I know that we're still a few weeks away from Christmas, but purely in the interest of helping you sort out your Christmas presents early so you can enjoy the run up to Christmas. We're talking all about the perfect books that will make the perfect gift, whether you are looking to buy for a secret Santa or you're tackling the whole list of family, extended family, friends and more, we will have your shopping sorted.

We're always surrounded by beautiful books in the studio, but for our Christmas special, we have all sorts of treasures from gorgeous children's books, quizzes, classics, page, turning romances. I mean there are just so many books here that I'm going to be stealing as soon as we finish recording. And to answer all of your Christmas shopping dilemmas, we've got not one but three experts from Penguin who are going to be recommending the perfect book related gifts. But first, the Christmas season can be an absolute minefield of potential faux pas. What is the etiquette for giving and receiving gifts? How do you get out of that Christmas party that you desperately want to avoid so you can just stay home, curl up with a book, or is that just me? Fear not? I happen to have the perfect guest with me today to guide us through the Christmas season.

Joining me down the line is author, podcaster and etiquette expert William Hanson. William is widely regarded as one of Britain's most trusted authorities on etiquette. His day job is as director of the English manner, a training institute where he advises individuals, organisations and films on correct form and good manners. And according to his book, the Correct Sandwich Size, he's co-host of the smash hit podcast Help. I've sexted my boss. He holds not one but two Guinness World records for etiquette. And somehow in amongst all of that, he's found the time to write four books. His latest is Just Good Manners, a quintessential guide to courtesy, charm, grace, and decorum. And it's a comprehensive guide to all things good and proper. I'm suitably nervous. William, thank you so much for joining us.

William Hanson:

Well, thank you for having me.

Rihanna Dhillon:

So tell us, how did you come to be an etiquette expert and was that something that was just always going to be your destiny?

William Hanson:

Well, probably looking back, yes, it probably was going to be my destiny because I have no other talent. So I think I probably would've ended up doing the job I'm doing really by accident. I did not really. And this becomes no shock to anyone grow up thinking I'd like to be an etiquette coach because I didn't really think that was a job. And it has been a job for hundreds of years before me. It is a job. I as a child wanted to be archbishop of Canterbury or a spy quite eclectic. And then when my grandmother gave me a book of etiquette when I was 12 for Christmas, that's sort of really when my love for etiquette started. And then when I was 16, my school said, we need someone to teach the young years how to set a table. Do you think you could do it? I said, well, does that mean I don't need to play rugby anymore? And they said, yes, that's fine, and I don't need to be asked twice. So really my entire career, almost 18 years later is just one great big get out of playing sport move. It's just gone a bit too far.

Rihanna Dhillon:

You said that you got a book when you were younger, but who makes the rules on what makes good etiquette and why those people listened to?

William Hanson:

I think it is changed over time. I mean, historically etiquette is a word. Is French an old French word? It goes back to the quarter Louis 14th. And there of course in France had an absolute monarchy where what the monarch said went, he was both monarch and government. And there quite a lot of etiquette was codified and some of it we still use today. Whereas now I would say etiquette is quite democratic in that we don't have, well obviously France doesn't have a royal family anymore, but even our own royal family, Charles and Camila are not sitting there going, right, this is now the etiquette. This is what we will do with royal protocol they do decide that, but that's fair enough. But for things like mobile phone use, think how irritating it is when, and phones seem to be a particular touch point with manners because when the telephone was first invented by Graham Bell, people would shout down it because they didn't really understand how it worked.

And then sort of etiquette guides were put at the back of telephone directories at the start of the 20th century to tell people how to use this. And as a society, we finessed that out and then the mobile phone was invented and people shouted down that on trains. And again, we sort of quite quickly worked out, we don't do that. And now you have people doing speakerphone calls in public, so you've got the same sort of thing. And I think it's us, we the people now that make these rules for the newer things. So contrary to what a lot of people think, I think etiquette is quite universal. It's not this elitist thing. It might have elitist origins, but actually it's just about consideration for others and there's nothing elitist about that.

Rihanna Dhillon:

I love that my dad still shouts down the phone and clearly needs one of your etiquette guides. You mentioned in the book that your granny gave you that there is a lot of barbed humour throughout it, which I think the same can be said absolutely for yours. And it's so kind of easy to hear your voice throughout it because you give little asides and it's a very witty book. So how important was it for you that this was a little bit sort of tongue in cheek as well as being a guide to.

William Hanson:

Yeah, again, and it is probably a result of being British and doing the job I do in Britain. And there are etiquette coaches all over the world. Obviously in Britain we have Eyelight. I mean we are probably quite biassed. We have quite a good sense of humour. I like to think so. And we don't do, or indeed ourselves q quite as seriously as maybe other countries. But I think also in Britain, as I said, I've done my job for nearly 18 years and Brits I noticed when I'm teach, they sort of don't like with etiquette, they don't like to be taught at because there's this slight arrogance sadly with Britain in that, well, we're British we're meant to know this or we sort of intrinsically know this. And of course nobody knows everything. And so that's I think probably a result of why I've sort of added the humour layer in. But also the history is like, okay, you might know the rule, but do you know why we do it? You can learn the backstory. And I find things funny. I mean, I learn better if things are funny. I might remember the joke more than whatever is being taught. And I had an English teacher at school who was incredibly funny. And I think that sort of influenced my style of teaching when I leave my classes and obviously write in the book.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Is there an etiquette or a rule from the past which we don't do anymore that you think we should bring back?

William Hanson:

Gosh. Well, I mean I always love an old fashioned push revolving door. I mean, lots of revolving doors now are automatic, so you don't need to push at all. But the Victorians had this lovely thing, and again, sort of attitudes to gender in the Victorian times were different from how they are now, but let's say a husband and wife were going out for dinner at the Ritz Hotel, which still has an old fashioned pushed door. The man would go in first, but he would go round twice so that the lady did not have to push at any point, which is really nice. And I've tried doing that and you just get funny looks from concierge and they wonder what you're up to. But I think it's so ridiculous. I mean it's ridiculous. It's ridiculous by today's standard, but actually you can sort of see a logic because obviously conventionally you would let ladies go through doors first in a more old fashioned era, but actually on a revolving door, even if the man went in first to push for them, they've still got to sort of finish off the job. Or if they go in first, they've got to start the job and these doors can be terribly heavy. And also again, there was a practicality to it in the Victorian era because ladies were wearing slightly cumbersome dresses and actually they might've had to ho them up with both hands so they couldn't push anything. So there was a bit of a practicality. It wasn't just sexism, but I quite like that rule and I think it's a losing battle to bring it back.

Rihanna Dhillon:

I think you might be right, there's a really great Paddington Bear story where he just goes around a revolving door and maybe he was trying to bring that back.

William Hanson:

Exactly. Yes. Actually there's a lovely, I always think of Paddington. There's a thing where he's on the London underground and there's a sign that says Dogs must be carried. And he takes that literally thinking that he needs to steal a little dog, find a dog, bless him.

Rihanna Dhillon:

As I'm sure we're all about books and reading on the Penguin Podcast, so we have to quiz you if you're okay with this, on whether there are any etiquette rules that we should be following as bookworms. I think one of the biggest debates amongst readers is whether you should keep your books just completely pristine or dog ear pages, whether you crack the spine or not. So are there definitive rules?

William Hanson:

I would say this is personal preference, but maybe I also think there's a difference between a fiction book and a nonfiction book because certain, particularly if it is a nonfiction book and it's almost a reference book now, just Good Maners is a reference book but is in prose and there's sort a vague narrative throughout it. So it's not a dip in quickly find out how to eat peas and then put it down. You can do that if you wish. And there's a lovely index that the cover suggests. But I would say for reference books that actually sort of marking pages, I would suggest some sort of little post-it note type thing rather than folding it down. But I can see why you might doggy certain pages that you go to, whereas a fiction book, unless you're sort of studying it for a book club or something, I think probably you wouldn't turn down pages because if you then were lending that book to your partner and you had dogeared a certain page, I mean it's sort of almost like flagging in advance that something is coming up on that page and it's almost a bit of a spoiler. So I probably wouldn't suggest doing it on a fiction. And obviously it is not your book in the first place and you have borrowed it from someone. You cannot dog ear pages. And actually I would ask in advance, do you mind if I break the spine if the spine has not already been broken?

Rihanna Dhillon:

Oh, you'd ask. But you would break it?

William Hanson:

Well, if you are the sort of person that wants to break a spine, of a book, then yes, I would ask in advance before you do it. Because if the person who's donated you that book temporarily is not a spine breaker, they're going to be pretty peeved when they get their book back and the spine's broken.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Do you sniff your books like old books? Do you sniff them?

William Hanson:

No, I don't sniff old books because often, I mean I've got some very old books and they don't smell brilliant. And I dunno where they've been before I've acquired them. But I like new books. When my first copy of Just Good Manners arrived, that was a heavy sniff on that and it smells gorgeous everybody, by the way. It was lovely.

Rihanna Dhillon:

You have a chapter in your little subsection in your book called Cancel Culture. So it is kind of relevant here. So aside from gifting, I guess Christmas etiquette is a bit of a minefield, and if you'd actually rather be at home with a book rather than at a cocktail party, what is the correct way to decline a party invite to cancel your plans?

William Hanson:

Really you want to do it within 24 hours of being invited. And that's whether the invitation comes on text, it comes through the post, it comes on email. I think most of us, if something comes through you sort of vaguely know if you want to go or not, there might be a hesitation because you're waiting for something else to confirm or to drop out before you can commit. But actually if something comes through and you just think, I don't want to go to that, then you need to say sooner rather than later. And I think younger generations probably struggle with this more than older generations, probably through no fault of their own lack of experience because they're not as old as older generations obviously. But you can't go to everything and people don't expect you to be at absolutely every party or every dinner that they throw.

Obviously if you are constantly declining invitations of one particular friend, they might begin to think, what's going on here? But if I had a big birthday earlier on this year and certain really good friends couldn't come for various reasons, it doesn't really matter because the part is not about them. And we still had lots of other people, but I could tell that certain friends were getting really anxious and actually, no, no, I'd rather you told me you couldn't come. And I can sort of finalise numbers with the venue and know how many olivan to order rather than sort of try and guess at how many people are coming. But it's all Facebook's fault, as I think I put in the book with all this may be attending. And you're not maybe attending anything, you're either going or you're not.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Do you have any reading traditions over the Christmas holidays or any Christmas books that you go back to again and again each year?

William Hanson:

Well, do you know what? It is probably coming up for some sort of anniversary of when granny gave me that book. So I mean, I read, I dip into that book all the time, but maybe I should reread that from cover to cover. Well, I can't do it in the same room. My parents have moved, so I can't recreate where I first read it, which is a shame. But yes, I get lots of books for Christmas fiction and nonfiction. I've discovered fiction. I mean, I say I've discovered fiction, like I've just struck gold. I'm aware fiction's been a thing quite a lot of people have enjoyed, but I went through it years.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Do you have any reading traditions over the Christmas holidays or any Christmas books that you go back to again and again each year?

William Hanson:

Well, do you know what? It is probably coming up for some sort of anniversary of when Granny gave me that book. So I mean, I read, I dip into that book all the time. Maybe I should reread that from cover to cover. Well, I can't do it in the same room. My parents have moved, so I can't recreate where I first read it, which is a shame. But yes, I get lots of books for Christmas fiction and nonfiction I've discovered. I mean, I say I've discovered fiction, like I've just struck gold. I'm aware fiction's been a thing a lot of people have enjoyed. But I went through it years of nonfiction and just pouring over books, biographies, self-help guides and loving I think to read around my subject. But I've got back into fiction. Anthony Horowitz and the Tom Hindel books particular have sort of got me into that. So this Christmas I'm going to probably have more fiction, but I have to have absolute glacial silence to read.

William Hanson:

And I'm with my husband's family this year and there are two young children who, my niece and nephew who are gorgeous and lovely, but glacial silence is not happening. So I suspect I won't be doing a lot of reading other than just before bed this Christmas. But some people can read. How about you? Can you read with noise going on?

Rihanna Dhillon:

I can read it with absolutely anything going on. Do it, I just dive in, just block everything out. It's great. It's such an escapism.

William Hanson:

Yeah, no, I'd love to do it. I know, but I'd get quite irritating. What are they doing that for? Shut up, be quiet. I'd get very laser focused on it.

Rihanna Dhillon:

And what is your favourite etiquette rule to break?

William Hanson:

Oh, I think the elbows on the table one is interesting because I mean you don't really put elbows on table, but that's when you're eating during the meal. It is also incredibly difficult to eat and hold it and use a knife. And with your elbows on the table, it just sort of doesn't work. The angles are completely wrong. Unless you've got incredibly long hands, it's not going to work. But at the end of a meal when food has been cleared, often at my own sort of candlelight sups, I will put my elbows on the table almost to show other guests. It is fine. This is okay. And the elbows on the table all goes back to an era where tables were not secure. They were in the Middle Ages, they were sort of sheets of word on benches. And so if you put your elbows on the table, the table would tip and the food would go everywhere. So that's why you didn't put your elbows on the table. Obviously it looks bad as well, so I will sometimes break that, but I'm breaking it consciously to sort of let people know. It's okay, you can do that. We've finished eating, we've just got a cup of coffee and a mint. It's fine. It's fine to do it at this point.

Rihanna Dhillon:

William, it has been delightful to chat to you. Thank you so much. Just good manners is available now in bookstores and online and dare we say is an excellent gift for anyone with an interest in polishing up their manners. Thank you so much for joining us.

William Hanson:

Thank you for having me, Rihanna.

Rihanna Dhillon:

You are listening to the Penguin podcast and it's time for some of your brilliant Ask Penguin questions. And in this episode, they are all requests for ideas for books to gift to particular people. Now we've assembled a bit of a crack team of experts from across penguin's, imprints, all with expertise in different genres. And I am sure that between all of us, we can solve even the trickiest of present dilemmas, including wands. For your dad in the studio with me today, I am delighted to introduce Olivia Mead, head of campaigns for Penguin General. We have Louise Jones, creative and communications director at Ebury and Joel Richardson, publisher at Michael Joseph, welcome to all of you. Thank you so much for coming. We're feeling incredibly festive in the studio today, so we have loads of brilliant gifting questions for you. So Joel, perhaps you could start us off.

Joel Richardson:

Yeah.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Somebody has written in and says, my dad loves a good spine novel. What would you recommend? And I love this that we're getting the dads out of the way early because they're the worst advisor. I

Joel Richardson:

Feel like the dad is the key Christmas recommendation. So me and Olivia have had long conversations about spy fiction going back a long time. The one book I would recommend, it's called The Scarlet Papers, it's by Matthew Richardson. It's out in paperback now. It was on stacks of Book of the Year lists last year. It's kind of the way I would describe it. It's somewhere halfway between John La Carrie and James Bond. It's got that kind of old fashioned stylish cold war espionage thing, but it's got a more modern action take on it too. It's about a male academic in the present day who gets the chance to help an ageing female spy with her memoir. But predictably, there are some twists in the tale, although when we were talking about this earlier, the other book that if you haven't read already, I would definitely recommend is there is a new John Le Carrie from Nick Haraway. That is, John Le Carrie's son has revived Le Carrie's most famous character, arguably apart from Bond, the most famous character in espionage fiction, which is George Smiley. So Carla's Choice published a few weeks ago, and it's always a big thing bringing someone else's work back to life. But the reviews have been incredible sort of saying it's like having the Carrie back. So we're thrilled.

Olivia Mead:

And actually I'm going to add one more in which is that William Boyd has returned to the sort of espionage themes of some of his earlier work with Gabriel's Moon, which is about an unwitting, well, an unwitting man who gets caught up in the espionage world in 1960s London. So it's kind of Cold War vintage vibes.

Louise Jones:

I have read that. And I mean, I'm a huge William Boyd fan. And it's just such a William Boyd book. It's like returning to an old friend the way he writes. And I really love this one. I really loved it. So second that as a recommendation.

Rihanna Dhillon:

That's perfect. Thanks guys. Okay, next up my 20-year-old son who is studying English lit at uni. Are there any good books that he might enjoy over Christmas? That's quite hard, isn't it? Because as an English Lit student myself, you do get inundated throughout the term. So I guess you want something that you just wouldn't ever have to study, I guess.

Olivia Mead:

Yeah, I might take this one and say that the Waterstone's debut book of the year this year is a book called Glorious Exploits by FIA Lennon, who he's quite a young guy himself, brilliant Irish guy. And he has written this absolutely brilliant, bold, original kind of madcap book set in ancient Sicily where two sort of potters who have nothing else to do their best mates decide to stage a play with prisoners of war in a quarry. And on the surface, this book shouldn't work. It's the most bizarre kind of theme. But the dialogue is all written in kind of current Irish vernacular and it's sort of being described as like Roddy Doyle meets Pat Barker in a quarry and it's completely mad. Well, it's not mad actually because you feel so much for these two characters who are in their early twenties themselves. It's really voice driven. It's really quick and pacey because there's so much dialogue in it, but it is kind of about deeper themes that an English lit student might enjoy. It's sort about the power of stories to connect us, how art gives us purpose. So there's kind of beyond all of the banter and the brilliance of F's writing, there's this kind of amazing theme running underneath as well. So it's a bit out there, which I feel like a 20-year-old English student that's like their right, absolutely. That's where they want to be. I

Joel Richardson:

Love that. And it's a book where when I first heard about it, I didn't know if it would've been for me and I've just had so many people over and over and over again recommending it. I think it is so distinctive and original and everyone who reads it presses it into your hands afterwards and it sounds amazing.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Olivia, one for you, my partner loves magical realism. I really love the term Magical realism covers all manner of sins. Are there any topics picks from this year?

Olivia Mead:

I'm so thrilled to get this question. I am a huge magical Realism fan as well. And a highlight of my year this year was working on the lost novel from the master of the genre, Gabrielle Garcia Marquez. So his final novel was published posthumously in March this year called Until August. And it is a very slim novela. So you kind of think of him with these huge sweeping epic like hundred years of solitude, which we did reissue in a very lovely new cover. So if there's any avid collectors, I think I've read that cover

Rihanna Dhillon:

Along with that cover

Olivia Mead:

On it, it's great. But until August is much slimmer and it's kind of a meditation on love and longing and passion and desire, and it follows one woman who every summer says she's married, she's got a happy family, and she goes to visit the island where her mother is buried and every year takes a new lover. And it's about her kind of journey through those lovers and sort through herself in a way. So that's brilliant. But the other ones, I would say LF Shaak had got a new novel out, which has kind of a magical realism tone, particularly in the beginning called there are rivers in the sky, which starts out being narrated by a drop, a single drop of water, and tells you that it's going to tell the story of water through four different time periods and people. And then of course Murakami, he has a new novel out called The City and it's on certain walls, which is coming out I think at the end of this month. And he always has some kind of tonal similarity to that in his work as well.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Amazing. Three perfect recommendations. Joel, over to you next, my colleague who loves crime fiction, this is what this person wants to buy. What have been some of the bestsellers this year?

Joel Richardson:

So there have been a lot of the kind of big bestselling authors in the genre have had new books out. So Richard Osmond has a new book, we Solve Murders. If you have read the Thursday Murder Club series, it's definitely got some similarities. I think it would really appeal to anyone who has, but if you haven't, it would be the perfect entry point. It's a completely new thing. It's not the same characters. It's got a big, it's like a old fashioned airport thriller really, isn't it? It's got that jet setting scale to it. It's really fun. And that's by far the bestselling thriller book of the year.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Is that going to be turned into a series or is it a stone load?

Joel Richardson:

I think it's going to be turned into a, it's going to be a series.

Olivia Mead:

It's be a TV series of Thursday

Joel Richardson:

Of film

Olivia Mead:

Are going to be a film next year, but this one's going to be like a series

Joel Richardson:

And he's just so good. I think that's the reason why he's become so popular is he has that gift for characters and dialogue. It's another kind of classic from him. Also, we've published a new novel from Alex Michael Ledes who wrote The Silent Patient, which many people will have read called The Fury, which is a brilliant kind of clever, whenever you think you've worked out, what's happening at Twists Around On You again, thriller. Our star, star bestselling author at Michael Joseph is Claire Douglas, who's booked the Wrong Sister, has been one of the biggest books of this year. But if you're looking for something new and a name that you maybe haven't read before, the bestselling debut crime novel of the years by an article called Ruth Mancini.

It's called The Woman on the Ledge. It's a really clever, twisty thriller. It starts off with someone dying, going off the edge of a building, and our main character is sort of the prime suspect, and it's that clever kind of unreliable narrator thing where you know that she's hiding something but takes till the end to figure out what, or we've published an author called Kale Slater who's written a book called Message Deleted, which just has the cleverest concept of anything I've worked on in forever. The main character is about to go into a job interview and she gets a text message from her best friend to say, please come right now, I need you. And even as she's looking at her phone, the message gets deleted that way it can on WhatsApp suddenly it's blank. So she raises to her friend's house, but her friend denies having sent it. She doesn't know what's happening. She says, why are you here? So eventually she gives up, there's nothing really to do, and she goes home and then six hours later the police knock on our main character's front door and they found a body in the house. She was the last one there. She's the prime suspect and she's got to work out

Rihanna Dhillon:

What's happened. I've got actual goosebumps there.

Joel Richardson:

So good.

Rihanna Dhillon:

It's so good. You sold that very well. You do this every time I speak to you, Jo, like this is happened last time.

Joel Richardson:

Yeah, that's message deleted by a calculator and yeah, I love it. It's really

Louise Jones:

Brilliant. I'll say if you're looking for, so if you've got a colleague who's into crime fiction, I will say the Death in Paradise puzzle book, you can't come far wrong for a bit of fun if you're into your crime fiction in Death in Paradise, obviously one of the most popular TV series, mystery TV series lovable character's been going forever. Still kind of like a top rating series. And this is a puzzle book that kind of takes you into the series and unlocks the series. And there's a narrative that runs all the way it through all of the puzzles. And they're just really fun puzzles. They're kind of unlocking different mysteries involving some of the characters.

Rihanna Dhillon:

So what sort of logic? Puzzles? Logic,

Louise Jones:

Logic puzzles, word searches, kind of riddles, word play number play, so all involving some of the characters and then kind of following a nice narrative arc if they're really into crime. And it's kind of a fun gift for colleagues then,

Rihanna Dhillon:

Or maybe if you're going away.

Louise Jones:

Yes, exactly. Yeah. And it's handy. You can just take it in your bag if you're on any flights or anything like that. No, it's

Joel Richardson:

Puzzles such a good gift as well because there's always that awkward silence at some point on Christmas Day and you can bring that out,

Rihanna Dhillon:

Have a go. Everyone desperately says yes. Yeah, exactly. So this person really needs some help. My family's had a hard year, so I'm looking for something lighthearted and funny all round. That's a really nice one because I think everyone's had a bit of a tough one this year. Anyone want to kick us off?

Olivia Mead:

I was going to say we solve Matters in which by Richard Osmond, a new one purely because there's this one, well, there's a lot of funniness in that. There's this one character who is the best friend of the protagonist who just describes to you how he gets from A to B all the time. And there's something about it that makes me laugh so much like every single Christmas day morning, like, oh, did you get the M three? Yeah, yeah. Apparently Junction six was a nightmare. It's that family chat all the time. But the other one for me and for the more lighthearted kind of escapist side is we just published the new book by Stanley Tucci, the kind of most amazingly gorgeous man in the world, which is someone's got a crush. Honestly, it's, and it's called What I Ate in a year, and it is just filled with delicious food and delicious name dropping and delicious anecdotes. And so that might not be the bomb for some people, but I think for other people, for just pure delight, and it's because it's his diary. It's short, it's digestible, sort of pick it up and put it down. But those are the ones that I sort of thought if I was feeling really miserable and I just needed to curl on the sofa and down and forget everything, being in Stanley Tui's world is not a bad thing, not a bad place to be. I love that. Thank you.

Louise Jones:

I have a different world. I can take you into quite the leap, quite the leap. If anyone's a fan of Gone Fishing, the Bob Mortimer and Paul White House series. We have a porter biography by Ted the dog who is ultimately the star of the show, the dog that is in the series, and this is the story of his life, the pornography, and if you just, everybody loves dogs, everybody loves him, particularly he a real character of a dog. And this is just a really light-hearted tale told from his own doggy voice that yeah, voice. That's adorable. Yeah, that's a great shout. He's seen some great, great TV appearances. He's a real star, charming, all the TV presenters signing with a poor print of the cue. He's read

Joel Richardson:

The audio book.

Louise Jones:

I can imagine absolutely signing books left, right and centre, but a real kind of lovely, lovely read and perfect. Joel,

Joel Richardson:

The author who comes immediately to mind for me, who a lot of people will have read but is an absolute rely on with every bit of your being. Classic is Marion Keys. And anything she's written would I think be such a good gift in that kind of situation. Her new book is called My Favourite Mistake, which always makes me think of Olivia Rodrigo whenever I hear

Speaker 4:

It.

Joel Richardson:

And it's about a woman who is Irish. She's been living in America, and she comes back home to start a wellness retreat, which predictably is quite unpopular with the locals, but as she's doing that and getting into all sorts of shenanigans, she bumps into an old flame. There were very good reasons why that was a bad idea, but maybe now it might be a little bit different. And she's just so funny. She's so warm. I think she's got such a gift for her books are like a warm hug. And I think if you are looking for something you can completely rely on. I couldn't recommend her enough.

Rihanna Dhillon:

I listened to that audio book I think earlier, really early this year.

Joel Richardson:

She reads it herself. She does.

Rihanna Dhillon:

And I think that works so well because

Joel Richardson:

You get, every

Rihanna Dhillon:

Cadence is right as like Philip Pullman's, you know that it's written, it's read exactly as it

Louise Jones:

Reading one of her books. It's just meeting up with an old friend just

Rihanna Dhillon:

And also you always fall in love with the guys that she writes. I know she writes men really well. She does

Olivia Mead:

The way that we want. Yeah, the ideal lies, women, men, yeah, no, but she should be prescribed on the NHS for people. You know what I mean? For sage wise advice and mood boosting and escapism and all of it. She's one of a kind. There's no one like her.

Rihanna Dhillon:

I agreed. This person has written in asking for a book for their daughter who needs some hope about the future.

Louise Jones:

Yes. Well, I know we all, it's that time, isn't it? It's that time. And I think books can give you hope. And there are so many books out there that give you that kind of feeling of comfort. And there are books that give you practical hope. How can we do things that improve the environment? How can we be kinder to other people? But actually the two books I wanted to talk about are one, which is this amazing book, which is now five years old, unbelievably, which is The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse, which is just a fantastic illustrative, beautiful illustrated book by Charlie McKee, which is about these four central characters, the Boy, the Mole, the Fox, and the Horse. And they take you on this wonderful journey where together they are discovering kindness and discovering how to look after each other and how to find solace in really dark times and how to find comfort in times where you feel troubled.

And I think it has brought a lot of comfort to people over the last five years and will continue to do so. And this is also a gift you can give to people to treasure and hold onto. So this is my first recommendation, but my second one, it's actually this really lovely book by Tim Min. I love Tim with Tim Minch. He's a wonderful comic and of course has brought so many fantastic creative projects. But this book is actually a combination of a few of his speeches that he's given. And what it really does is it gives you hope, it teaches you how to fall in love with art again, how to fall in love with yourself again, to think about others, to think about actually it's okay to not have a dream. It's called you don't have to have a dream. And it's okay to just put one foot in front of the other and to walk forwards and to look upon each other and to use each other as comfort. So I think they're both really great books for thinking about solace and comfort in a different way.

Joel Richardson:

He's done graduation speeches. I've seen them, I've seen clips of them. They're so funny and wise and insightful. That's

Louise Jones:

Completely right. Brilliant. It's got some brilliant illustrations and little vignettes of kind of sentences that just kind of are real kind of moments for you. So yeah, they're both very helpful.

Olivia Mead:

They both look so beautiful. I mean, people on the podcast might not be able to see them, but they're gorgeous, hard back illustrated books, great on Christmas Day. They're a real treat to probably give and receive as well. It's

Louise Jones:

Always, yeah, this Tim mentioned book has a fantastic illustration on the front that I think will become quite iconic because it's just a really lovely standalone image.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Well, you've sort of piggybacked onto another question actually really nicely, because somebody's asking for gorgeous looking books that are going to feel like extra special to open on Christmas Day.

Joel Richardson:

I have a few,

Olivia Mead:

I got that. That's so many beauty.

Joel Richardson:

Well, it's another one where I guess it feels like it depends what type of book they like, because I think depending on what genre you read in there are so many different ones. The one that comes immediately to mind is we've got a book called The Book of Gifts by Lucy Claire Dunbar. You might not know her name, but you will definitely know her most famous illustration, which is she did the picture of the Queen with Paddington Bear. That was absolutely everywhere, obviously after the Queen passed away. And this is her first book. It's a collection of different illustrations from her, but it's a little bit like the Charlie McAfee. It's got a fable like quality. It's got a really hopeful of heart to it. So I think for either of those questionnaires, it would be the perfect thing. And they're just gorgeous illustrations. They're just really simple and timeless. And yeah, I think it would be something really special.

Olivia Mead:

Love that mine is actually, I'm going to give a fiction one because I think our designers and production staff do the most amazing job on things and fiction these days just looks, it's just getting better and better. And one author who always works incredibly closely with the design and production team that we publish is the very special Allie Smith. And if you haven't

Read Allie or looked up a video of her speaking or anything, she is this mesmeric sort of otherworldly writer and person and her newest book, glyph we published a few weeks ago actually. But the production value of the hardback is amazing. So I think it's hard to describe on a podcast, but trust me, go and look it up. And if you were wanting to give someone a book that they could enjoy with their eyes and their heart, it would be an ally Smith. And even better, if they've never discovered her and are drawn in by this sort of beautiful package, frankly be giving them a gift and giving them just the discovery of Ally Smith and the ideas and the kind of plane that she inhabits. She's a really singular writer, critically acclaimed, but sort of with her feet on the ground and sort of earthiness to her that I adore. Perfect Louise.

Louise Jones:

And again, I wish people could see this beautiful book I've brought with me the latest yogi, which is Comfort, which has got the most stunning cover

Rihanna Dhillon:

Bright.

Louise Jones:

It's really eye catching, it's beautiful, it's eye catching. And the recipes inside just calm to life. As soon as you look through the mind for looking through them now, and they are classic yacht recipes. You just want to eat all of them immediately. It's a beautiful ribbon, which really adds to the look and feel of the book, but it's the sentiment in the book that's also beautiful. It's a book about home. It's a book about travel. It's a book that gives you comfort. It's thinking about those foods that really centre you and really make you feel at home. And generational food that's passed down from families to family. Food is at the heart of every home, and this book just brings that to life like no other. And it just is genuinely just stunning. And every time I look at it, I just want to go home and cook all the food and eat it all immediately. So I think, I don't want to say it's his best yet because all of his books are just so amazing. But this one is definitely a book of a time. It's definitely needed. It's, it fits the mood of, I'd say the world right now. The

Speaker 4:

Colour. Amazing. I just

Rihanna Dhillon:

Looking at it there. Pop food circles, pinks, greens, oranges, very, very eye catching on a shelf if you are looking. Excellent. Thank you so much. Here's somebody who wants to buy some new Christmasy Reeds for their nieces and nephews. What should they look out for? They haven't specified an age, so perhaps a range.

Joel Richardson:

A range. The one that I massively recommend, if anyone hasn't seen the You two series, they're so perfect, probably for a, I guess three to five-ish kind of child. Each page has a huge picture and it will be 25 different pictures of these amazing different beds. And it's which bed would you sleep in? And then the next page, 50 different little figures and who's going to be your best friend? They've got a new Christmas one, I think is just out now. So that would be a perfect gift for someone of that age. And there's a whole back list of different ones as well.

Louise Jones:

Well, you can't go wrong with the dinosaur that pooped Christmas. That is a big favourite of Christmas time in our house. The Tom pointed, I'll admit I've not read it well, you're missing out. It really is. A Christmas classic

Olivia Mead:

Comes out. I have some anatomical questions. The dinosaurs pooped a lot of things I think as well. Did Christmas just being one of the many? Yeah. Oh wait, no, there's

Louise Jones:

Different involved. It gets messy anyway. There's a big poo at the end.

Rihanna Dhillon:

There's a big

Louise Jones:

Spoiler. But yeah, happy Christmas. I mean, love it. They love it. The kids do really love it. I mean, they really have got a magic touch with writing with all of their books. But the Christmas one in particular,

Olivia Mead:

And I think the other thing is if you've got little nieces and nephews that are really obsessed with a TV show or a cartoon or a toy property or anything, they'll always be a kind of gorgeous new, often really beautifully produced version of Christmas story for them. So be it. Hey, Dougie or Bluey or Peter Rabbit or Spot Spot, exactly. They'll always be something that is just bang up their street, silly, naughty, funny, created by the best minds who understand children and children's entertainment in these amazing ways. So it's always a really safe bet. And there's a chapter book series for girls called Lottie Brooks that is taking off to the point that I was sort of looked up and down by a child for not knowing what this was a few weeks ago. And I believe she's getting a Christmas one this year as well. So if they haven't discovered Lottie Brooks, get them into them with the Christmas one.

Rihanna Dhillon:

That's a great shout. And if they're a bit older, I will bang on about this until the day I die. You can't go wrong with a bit of just William.

Olivia Mead:

Oh yes, especially. And the audio books with Martin Jarvis on Martin

Rihanna Dhillon:

Jarvis is, yeah. Yeah.

Olivia Mead:

There's one more. He has to tell the truth. And so he tells everyone how much he hates his presents and it's, it's brilliant. He never wanted to

Rihanna Dhillon:

Do, that's a Christmas one as well. That is a Christmas. Yeah, there are some really great little Christmas stories within the William book. So yes, this one is a really useful one I think for everybody. This person's looking for a book that they can gift all of their book club friends so they can all read it in the new year and discuss at the next meet.

Joel Richardson:

So I have so many different ideas for this, but thinking about it practically, I feel like it depends a little bit if they want to gift a lot of hardbacks or a lot of paperbacks, very budget conscious.

Speaker 4:

Oh, that's true.

Joel Richardson:

If they want to splash out and get a hardback, I can't recommend the new JD pco enough. It's called by any other name, anyone who's read her before. It does everything that she's brilliant at really well. And that is the heart, I think, of book club fiction. Her books are so thoughtful and thought provoking, but this is quite a different story. So it's actually about Shakespeare or rather it's about Shakespeare's plays. And Jody has been deep diving into the research on this and she has a theory about the actual author of those. She

Rihanna Dhillon:

Certainly does.

Joel Richardson:

And it's so interesting and meaty and it's a great read. People will love it. But also I think for a book club, it would be the perfect kind of discussion point and jumping off point. And so

Speaker 4:

It

Joel Richardson:

Weaves in, there are these Easter eggs where it must have hundreds of quotes from Shakespeare plays just in the dialogue in the book. And you're sort of looking at it. And I think that's huge. Is it? Maybe it'll be good for that person earlier who is an English literature student, but could be an interesting one for them to read.

Rihanna Dhillon:

And actually, I got to speak to Jody Pico about her new book, and if you want to hear that interview, you can listen to last week's episode. She was fabulous and she dressed like her book cover, which I was a big fan of,

Joel Richardson:

But if they're looking understandably for a paperback, just for practicality, the book that I love is by an author called Claire Daley. It's called Talking At Night. If you read or watched one day and loved it, it would be the perfect thing to pick up. It's a love story. It's told over quite a long time span. It begins with these two people who meet when they're teenagers. It's called Talking at Night because she is his best friend's little sister, and they're a sleepover just in the kitchen at night. Having cereal at midnight and kind of chatting is how they get to know each other. That's so cute. I won't give too much away about the story. There are lots of kind of twists and turns. It's a real will they, won't they?

Rihanna Dhillon:

Is it going to make me cry?

Joel Richardson:

It will. It'll absolutely make cry now. I cry very easily, but I think it would make even a stronger soul than me cry, I would say. But yeah, it's beautiful and really brilliant.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Thank you. Somebody's written in asking, my brother loves Stephen King, so can you recommend another author that he can get stuck into?

Joel Richardson:

So the author who he should 100% read. In fact, he may even have come across already as an author called CJ Tudor

Who's now written, is it four? Is it five books? I would recommend going and starting with her first one, which was The Chalk Man, which if you're a Stephen King fan, which Caz CJ herself is you'll absolutely love. It's got a kind of backstory where the main characters are all teenagers. They're hanging out together, they're playing these games, they're drawing these chalk figures on the ground for each other to sort of send messages. And then suddenly these chalk figures start appearing. They're not drawing, and they get more and more kind of sinister as it goes. We know that's going to end somewhere very dark, and then in the present day it starts happening again and they start figuring it out. She's so brilliant. The Chalk Man had an amazing quote from Stephen King saying how much he loved it. And yeah, she'd be the perfect person. I think

Louise Jones:

I'd agree with that. I've also read that and grew up reading and loving Stephen King, and actually this book did remind me very much of his writing in terms of how you feel. You feel a bit like, oh, on the edge and you're not sure what's going to happen. And it's not so gruesome and gory all the way through. It just gives you that kind of feeling of suspense all the way. So I would recommend that one also.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Perfect. And finally, I feel like this is such a vital one. It's been in the news recently. It's a really concerning, personally, I think for anybody who loves books, I think it feels like a real worry. But this person has written in saying, my teenager needs to find their love of reading again. So what would you recommend for that? And I feel like this is possibly one of the most important questions that we're asking today.

Joel Richardson:

So I actually had this exact same conversation with a colleague a couple of years ago now. It was over the pandemic, and her son was a slightly older teenager at the time. I think he was 16 or 17. And the thing that I said, which is what I was reading when I was a teenager, the James Patterson books, if you like a thriller or if you just like a kind of gripping read, they're so easy to read. He's brilliant at those short chapters. Every single one has a cliffhanger. They pull you through, they've got these big clever plots, and then you get to the next book and it's got its own standalone thriller story. But actually there are bigger things happening in the background. I think you could start reading one Alex Cross book, having not read a book for years, and by two weeks later you'd have read six of them. They're so addictive.

Speaker 4:

That's really nice.

Joel Richardson:

And so yeah, if they're interested in that kind of thing, that worked. And I can say it worked for my colleague's son. It was a completely successful answer to this question, really. So there's a tried and tested teenager rejuvenation project.

Louise Jones:

Thanks. I don't have a specific, I think it's more that just reminding ourselves that actually any reading's, reading, so if it's bits of poetry, if it's the journals, if it's anything that's getting somebody in the idea of picking up a book and nonfiction can be a great way of getting people back into books because you can just dip in and out of different sections.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Yeah, I agree about the sort of diary entries as well. That is so easy. I mean, even like Adrian Mo,

Louise Jones:

There is a fantastic book called You Need to Exist by Youngblood. Youngblood is a musician, if anyone's familiar with him. Heard of him, yeah, A global superstar. And he's created this wonderful journal that is part journal, part Nest this book up, write your feelings down, just really get everything out there and really put it all into this book and just get in touch with yourself again. And I think that's a really good entry point as well, because it's reminding people the power of a book that it can have over you.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Yeah, that's a lovely idea. Thank you. I think that's everything. Okay. I was really dreading doing this because I knew that my reading pile would just get bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. And you have absolutely just fed into that, so thank you. It feels like a double-edged sword. I'm never going to be able to do anything else but read. Thank you, of course. So much to our wonderful guest, Olivia Mead, Louise Jones, and Joel Richardson. Thank you so much for joining us today.

Joel Richardson:

Thank you for having us.

Rihanna Dhillon:

Those were brilliant recommendations. If you were thinking of buying any of the titles that we've mentioned across the series or in this episode, all of the books are linked in our show notes. If you're looking for penguin merch or maybe special editions are at the top of your list, then we've got an extra special thank you for our podcast listeners between now and the 28th of November. You can use the Discount Code Penguin podcast or one word and enjoy 20% off in the Penguin shop. Just go to shop penguin.co.uk. There are plenty of temptations there for you. And if you'd like to submit and ask Penguin question for a future episode, please get in touch by emailing Penguin podcast@penguinrandomhouse.co.uk, or click the link in the show notes to go straight to the podcast page. We really love hearing from listeners, so please do get in touch. I'll be back next week with a special episode on a subject that we get a lot of questions about. I'll be sitting down with writers and editors to find out all about how to get your book published. Perhaps it's your ambition for 2025, so make sure you click the follow button so you don't miss an episode. In the meantime, happy reading and good luck with your Christmas shopping.

Penguin Podcast Discount offer

Get 20% off your order at Penguin Shop (the ‘Offer’): The Offer is valid for one-time use and cannot be used in conjunction with any other discounts. The Offer will open at 23.30 GMT on Wednesday 20th November 2024 and close at 23.59 GMT on Thursday 28th November 2024. The Offer is subject to availability and applies to items on the Penguin Shop, except for the following products: Gift Cards, Isokon Penguin Donkey bookcases, Penguin Cushions, Penguin Throws, Wooden Bookends, Signed Editions, Special Editions, Writing Workshops, Roasting Tin bundles, NLT (National Literacy Trust) products, and Art Prints. In order to participate in the Offer add your products to your basket and enter the promotional code PENGUINPODCAST when prompted during the checkout process. There is no cash alternative to the Offer. The Offer can only be used once in any order. Events may occur which render the continuance of the Offer impossible due to reasons beyond the control of Penguin Shop and Penguin Shop may, at its absolute discretion, vary, amend, suspend or withdraw the Offer with or without notice. The Offer is subject to these terms and conditions and Penguin Shop terms of sale which can be found here.