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Ryan Gattis on All Involved

Ryan Gattis talks to Mariella Frostrup about his new novel All Involved, and Dr Sarah Dillon dissects Ian McEwan's Enduring Love, plus news from Kuwait and hen night novels.

Ryan Gattis talks to Mariella Frostrup about his new novel All Involved, a fictional account of the 1992 Los Angeles riots told from the perspective of 17 different characters caught up in the violence from gang members to fire fighters.

Also on the programme, resident close reading expert Sarah Dillon scrutinizes a passage of Ian McEwan's prose; we offer advice to someone in search of the perfect novel for a hen night and Saud Alsanousi, winner of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, sends us a literary postcard from Kuwait.

Available now

28 minutes

Last on

Thu 28 May 2015 15:30

Chapters

  • Ryan Gattis on All Involved

    Duration: 09:00

  • Close Reading of Ian McEwan's Enduring Love

    Duration: 05:50

  • Reading Clinic

    Duration: 07:45

  • Postcard from Kuwait

    Duration: 05:05

Read the first chapter of All Involved by Ryan Gatiss

 by Ryan Gatiss

Close Reading of Ian McEwan's Enduring Love

I’m holding back, delaying the information. I’m lingering in the prior moment because it was a time when other outcomes were still possible; the convergence of six figures in a flat green space has a comforting geometry from the buzzard’s perspective, the knowable, limited plane of the snooker table.  The initial conditions, the force and the direction of the force, define all the consequent pathways, all the angles of collision and return, and the glow of the overhead light bathes the field, the baize and all its moving bodies, in reassuring clarity.  I think that while we were still converging, before we made contact, we were in a state of mathematical grace.  I linger on our dispositions, the relative distances and the compass point – because as far as these occurrences were concerned, this was the last time I understood anything clearly at all.

Credits

Role Contributor
Presenter Mariella Frostrup
Interviewed Guest Ryan Gattis
Interviewed Guest Sarah Dillon
Interviewed Guest Viv Groskop

Broadcasts

  • Sun 24 May 2015 16:00
  • Thu 28 May 2015 15:30

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