I'm taking a little break from recording podcasts over Easter, and I'm really excited that I'm actually going away for a few days. I've got a lot on my to-read pile, which I'm going to be taking with me. Some electronically to avoid filling up my suitcase too full, and some fabulous hard copies of some novels that I am absolutely desperate to read.

So what's coming up in season 12? There's an eclectic selection so far. I've had some amazing emails from publishers and agents about books which are coming out over the next few months. And I am looking forward to reading a book called Six and a Half Days in the City by Isaac Grijalva. This looks to be a really exciting novel written by somebody who is a paramedic in the the USA based in the world of emergency care and I really love the idea and of thinking about a bisexual burnt out EMT called Cameron preparing for a much needed New York City trip, staying with his two best friends whilst exploring the city. His vacation is shadowed by unresolved trauma... N

I was also approached by a fabulous publicist and who often puts me in touch with some really, really cool authors. A big thank you to Ana for recommending to me a novel which comes out in May, which is called Waiting on a Friend by Natalie Adler. This is 1980s historical fiction looking at the AIDS crisis in 1980s New York and particularly thinking about the role that lesbians played in the crisis and that sort of unsung role of friends and carers. The final new book and author that I'm really, really excited about and is a work of nonfiction, which is called Born at the Gates of Hell by obstetrician Maria Milland, who spent nine months working in the Al-Hol refugee camp in Syria. Born at the Gates of Hell, is her book detailing that experience. It's just been published. and And I am really, really looking forward to reading it and talking to Maria.

Of course, I've got lots of non-author guests coming on. I'm really delighted to be welcoming back some old friends and as well as some new people. So I really love Malcolm Gladwell and I was really excited when Sarah Marwick got in touch and asked me if I'd like to talk about The Revenge of the Tipping Point. So that's definitely coming up.

There are a couple of fabulous novels that people want to talk about. Most particularly, I'm really looking forward to talking to Alice Deasy about Cutting for Stone by Abraham Vergese which I think must be one of the novels that's really stayed with me and one of the ones that I just assumed when I started the podcast that someone would want to come on and talk about. . I know i have talked about his amazing second novel, Covenant of Water, but it's really exciting to be able to be talking about Cutting for Stone with Alice.

We've got some nonfiction and the really fascinating book Sociopath by Patrick Gagne, which I very much enjoyed reading. And I'm really excited and to have psychiatrist Claudia Camden-Smith coming on to talk about that.

I'm also welcoming a couple of people who I feel that know through some online education work, much less through podcasting, and who are going to come on and talk about some books which I think sound fabulous. So I'm really looking forward to talking to Lee David about a book called Defy, which I think is really going to be something that is going to have a lot of themes in it and that are really going to work for us. And Lee has got her own podcast, which is called The Choice Space, which I have thoroughly enjoyed exploring. And so I'm really excited to get her to guest with me. I'm also really looking forward to talking to Michael Killshaw about Radical Candor. I know that Kim Scott'd book has really changed a lot of people's lives, particularly those working in education or in leadership roles where they are m