EPISODE 1: Garrett Reisman
NASA veteran. SpaceX Director of Space Operations, and now a Senior Advisor. Professor of Astronautical Engineering at USC. Consultant, Producer, and sometimes actor on For All Mankind.

Garrett's Books:

• Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
•  Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad
•  Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs
•  Vacationland: True Stories from Painful Beaches by John Hodgman
•  Welcome to Hard Times by E.L. Doctorow

Other Books Discussed:

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

EPISODE 2: Marion Turner
Professor of English Literature at Oxford and a Fellow of Jesus College. Author of Chaucer: A European Life. Book of the Year in 2019 in The Times, The Sunday Times, and the TLS. Awarded the Rose Mary Crawshay Prize. Shortlisted for the Wolfson History prize.

Marion's Books:

•  The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, C. S. Lewis
•  A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf
•  Emma, Jane Austen
•  The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer
•  The Buried Giant, Kazuo Ishiguro

Other (Kids) Books Discussed:
Violet and the Pearl of the Orient, Harriet Whitehorn | Pugs of the Frozen North, Philip Reeve and Sarah McIntyre | Ottoline and the Yellow Cat, Chris Riddell | Goth Girl, Chris Riddell | Rooftoppers, Katherine Rundell | The Explorer, Katherine Rundell | The Good Thief, Katherine Rundell | Mortal Engines, Philip Reeve | Murder Most Unladylike, Robin Stevens | Wizards of Once, Cressida Cowell | Roman Mysteries and Roman Quests, Caroline Lawrence | Ruby Redfort, Lauren Child

Episode 3: Darin Strauss

Best selling author of Half a Life. Recipient of the National Book Critics Circle award for memoir. Recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in fiction writing and numerous other awards. Associate Professor of writing at NYU.

Darin's Books:

•  Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
•  Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov
•  Like Life by Lorrie Moore
•  Collected Stories by VS Pritchett
•  Eye of the Needle by Ken Follett

Episode 4: Rory Stewart

British academic, diplomat, explorer, author, soldier, and politician. Senior Fellow at Yale University's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs. Served as a Minister in four different departments of the UK government, including Secretary of State for International Development. Former Member of Parliament. Best selling author of The Places In Between, a book about his experiences walking across Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, India, and Nepal.

Rory's Books:

•  Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne
•  Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
•  The Civilisation of the Renaissance in Italy by Jacob Burckhardt
•  The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene
•  The Master and his Emissary by Ian McGilchrist

Other Books Discussed:
The Places in Between by Rory Stewart | A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy by Laurence Sterne | Virtue Politics: Soulcraft and Statecraft in Renaissance Italy by James Hankins | Second Place by Rachel Cusk | A Life's Work by Rachel Cusk | An African in Greenland by Tété-Michel Kpomassie | Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev | Silence by Shūsaku Endō

Episode 5: Carol Dysinger

Director of the short documentary, Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone if You're a Girl. Winner of the Academy Award for best short documentary, the BAFTA for best short, and best documentary short from the IDA and the Tribeca Film Festival. Recipient of the David Payne Carter award for excellence in teaching and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Associate Professor at NYU Film School.

Carol’s Books:

•  Under My Skin: Volume One of My autobiography, to 1949, by Doris Lessing
•  The Golden Notebook, by Doris Lessing
•  Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë
•  Middlemarch, by George Eliot
•  The Giving Tree, by Shel Silverstein

Episode 6: Isha Sesay

British journalist of Sierra Leonean descent. Led a CNN team to a Peabody award for her coverage of the kidnapping of 276 school girls in Nigeria in 2014. Authored of Beneath the Tamarind Tree: A Story of Courage, Family, and the Lost Schoolgirls of Boko Haram. Founder of W.E. Can Lead, an educational humanitarian nonprofit organisation which helps African girls receive educational support so that they can become future leaders.

Isha's Books:

•  Beloved by Toni Morrison
•  To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
•  The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
•  When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
•  The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

Episode 7: Chris Anderson

British American businessman. Head of TED, a non-profit organisation that provides idea-based talks and hosts an annual conference in Canada. Founder of Future Publishing. Published New York Times best seller, TED Talks: The Official TED Guide to Public Speaking. Host of “The Ted Interview” podcast.

Chris’ Books:

•  The Last Battle by C.S. Lewis
•  How the Mind Works by Steven Pinker
•  The Happiness Hypothesis by Jonathan Haidt
•  The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch
•  The Blue Sweater by Jacqueline Novogratz

Episode 8: Douglas Stuart

Scottish writer. 2020 Booker Prize winner for his debut novel, Shuggie Bain. Finalist for the National Book Award, the Pen/Hemingway Award, and the National Book Critics Circle. Named a notable book of the year by The New York Times and The Washington Post.

Douglas' Books:

•  Jude The Obscure by Thomas Hardy
•  A Kestrel for a Knave by Barry Hines
•  The Swimming Pool Library by Alan Hollinghurst
•  Young Adam by Alexander Trocchi
•  The Trick is to Keep Breathing by Janice Galloway

Episode 9: William H. Macy

American writer, actor, and director. Written films, tv series, and screenplays. Recipient of two Emmy awards, and nominee for 15. Winner of four Screen Actor’s Guild Awards. Nominee for an Academy Award for best supporting actor for his performance in Fargo.

William’s Books:

•  The Kid Who Batted a Thousand by Bob Allison and Frank Ernest Hill
•  Call of the Wild by Jack London
•  Electric Universe by David Bodanis
•  American Buffalo by David Mamet
•  Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlasky

Episode 10: Krista Tippett

Creator and host of the spiritual nourishment podcast, On Being. Interviewed everyone of spiritual consequence from Mary Oliver to the Dalai Lama. Recipient of the National Humanities Medal at the White House, given by Barack Obama. Winner of a Peabody award.

Krista's Books:

•  Let your Life Speak by Parker Palmer
•  My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakem
•  When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron
•  Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
•  The Invention of Nature by Andrea Wulf

Episode 11: Aimee Mullins

American athlete, actress, model, and public speaker. Born with a medical condition that resulted in the amputation of both of her lower legs when she was one year old. First amputee to compete against able bodied athletes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association events (despite being told as a child that she would never walk). Competed in the Paralympics. Motivational speaker and has given multiple TED talks. Modelled on the catwalk for Alexander McQueen. Starred as an actress in many TV shows and movies.

Aimee's Books:

•  The Wicked Pigeon Ladies in the Garden by Mary Chase
•  Le Morte d’Arthur by Sir Thomas Mallory
•  The Second Circle by Patsy Rodenburg
•  CivilWarLand in Bad Decline by George Saunders
•  Liar’s Club by Mary Karr

Episode 12: Dan Houser

Dear friend from Oxford and Godfather to my daughter. Gaming icon. Former lead writer and creative director of Rockstar Games. Head writer and creative director of Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption. (GTA5 is the most successful entertainment product in history. It has sold over 150 million copies. Red Dead Redemption 2 made a billion dollars in three days.)

Dan's Books:

• Winter Holiday by Arthur Ransome
•  Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
•  Tender is the Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
•  The Thin Red Line by James Jones
•  Middlemarch by George Eliot

Surprise New Year’s Day episode: John Simm

English actor, director, and musician. Best known for playing Sam Tyler in Life on Mars, the master in Doctor Who, and DS Roy Grace in Grace. Other television credits include: State of Play, The Lakes, Crime and Punishment, Exile, Prey and Cracker. Nominee for a BAFTA for best actor and the Lawrence Olivier Award for best actor.

John's Books:

• Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger
•  Salem's Lot by Stephen King
•  Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
•  Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
•  East of Eden by John Steinbeck

Surprise bonus episode: Huma Abedin

Huma Abedin has spent her entire career in public service and national politics, beginning as an intern in First Lady Hillary Clinton’s office in 1996. After four years in the White House, she worked in the U.S. Senate as Senior Advisor to Senator Clinton and was Traveling Chief of Staff for Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign. In 2009, she was appointed Deputy Chief of Staff at the U.S. Department of State. Huma served as Vice Chair of Hillary for America in 2016, resulting in the first woman elected nominee of a major political party. She currently serves as Hillary Clinton’s Chief of Staff. Born in the United States and raised in Saudi Arabia, Huma moved back to the U.S. in 1993. She lives in New York City with her son, Jordan. She is the New York Times best-selling author of BOTH/AND: A Life in Many Worlds.

Huma’s Books:

• The Qu'ran

• Beyond the Veil - Fatima Mernissi

• Little Women - L.M. Alcott

• The Scarlet Letter- Nathaniel Hawthorne

• Silas Marner - George Eliot