Tom's Book Club

Elif Shafak on Writing, Memory and the Power of Fiction

Tom's Book Club

Show Notes

Bestselling novelist and President of the Royal Society of Literature Elif Shafak discusses literature, storytelling and the writing life. In this wide-ranging conversation, Elif reflects on the books that have guided her through difficult times, growing up between cultures, writing in both English and Turkish, and why stories can cross borders more easily than people can. She discusses her acclaimed novel There Are Rivers in the Sky, the experience of being put on trial following The Bastard of Istanbul, and the challenge of inhabiting voices as varied as sex workers, archaeologists and even a fig tree. Elif also opens up about her unusual writing process, why she writes amid a "hullabaloo" of noise, her thoughts on artificial intelligence and literature, and her forthcoming novel, In One Brief Moment All Eternity, which she describes as "the novel I always wanted to write." 📚 Buy books discussed on the podcast through the Tom’s Book Club Bookshop.org page: https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/TomsBookClub

Tom’s Book Club may earn a small commission from purchases made through our Bookshop.org link, at no extra cost to you. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

More from Tom's Book Club

Oct 20, 2026

Luke Kennard joins Tom’s Book Club to discuss Black Bag, his offbeat novel shortlisted for the 2026 Booker Prize. A penniless actor takes a job wearing an oversized black bag as part of a university experiment, with unexpected consequences for love, friendship and the possibility of turning the whole thing into a business.

Oct 13, 2026

Roddy Doyle joins Tom’s Book Club to talk about A Ghostly Little Book, a new collection of contemporary ghost stories from five acclaimed writers.

Oct 6, 2026

Hernan Diaz joins Tom’s Book Club to talk about Ply, his new novel set centuries in the future. Diaz is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Trust, which won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Sep 29, 2026

John Boyne joins Tom’s Book Club to talk about his new novel, The Weight of Angels, an imaginative reworking of the life of Oscar Wilde that asks what might have happened if Wilde had made a different decision at a crucial moment in his life.

Sep 24, 2026

Louise Kennedy joins Tom’s Book Club to talk about her new novel, Stations, a powerful story of friendship, love, family and the long shadows cast by the choices we make when we are young.

See all episodes →