The Greek politician Yanis Varoufakis chooses Margaret Atwood's treatise on debt - Payback: Debt & The Shadow Side of Wealth as his go to book for students of economics. It examines money lending throughout the ages and how it has been portrayed in classic literature. Patrick McGrath's choice is a novel by Nigel Balchin set during the London Blitz: Darkness Falls From The Air which he loves for its humour and for its stoic main character Bill Sarratt, a civil servant whose attempts to get anything done are thwarted by bureaucracy. Yanis describes Bill as a 'Sir Humphrey' from Yes Minister character and was unexpectedly delighted to discover the novel. Harriett's choice is by Kiley Reid: a smart look at race politics in the USA through the story of a young black nanny and her white employer, white boyfriend and black friends. Such A Fun Age was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2020.
Producer: Maggie Ayre