Pas a pas, se va luenh. Step by step, one goes far.

An ancient Occitan proverb. Eight centuries old. Spoken in Kate Mosse's Labyrinth by two women who never meet — and yet walk the same path, face the same danger and carry the same secret.

Carcassonne. 1209 and today. Two timelines. One city that has been holding its secrets for eight hundred years.

Alais in 1209 is entrusted by her father with the protection of something ancient and sacred — something that must not fall into the wrong hands. Alice in the present day enters a cave and finds herself somewhere between worlds. From that moment she is in danger.

What Kate Mosse does that very few authors manage is give you two complete worlds and make you care equally about both.

I also share something personal in this episode — I stood inside the walls of Carcassonne three years ago. And what I felt there confirmed every word of this book.

For anyone who has ever stood somewhere ancient and felt the resonance of footsteps that came long before theirs.

Get your copy of Labyrinth on Bookshop.org — https://uk.bookshop.org/a/17227/9781474625906

This episode contains affiliate links. If you purchase through these links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

No barges. No lavender fields. No slow journey south.

This is Occupied Dijon. 1940s. And the tension is underneath everything.

The French Affair by Theresa Howes is the second episode of the France Trilogy — and it asks a question that will stay with you long after you finish listening.

What would you do if someone you loved completely suddenly believed the worst about you? Not because they wanted to. But because everything they could see told them it was true.

This is a story about what a place looks like on the surface and what it carries underneath. About two women whose courage runs through every page even when only one of them is visible. And about the kind of truth that belongs only to you — because there is nobody you can share it with.

If Dijon is on your travel list — listen to this first. You will see it differently when you arrive.

Get your copy of The French Affair on Bookshop.org — https://uk.bookshop.org/a/17227/9780008547912 or Amazon —https://amzn.to/4dDxK25

This episode contains affiliate links. If you purchase through these links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George is part love story, part road trip, part soul searching — wrapped in the most beautiful French landscapes you'll ever read about.

Jean Perdu runs a floating literary apothecary. He can read exactly what every customer needs. The one person he cannot fix is himself.

This is Episode 1 of the France Trilogy — three episodes covering three books set in three corners of France.

If you have ever had something sitting unopened — a letter, a conversation, a truth you kept putting off — this book is for you.

Get your copy on Bookshop.org —https://uk.bookshop.org/a/17227/9780349140377

This episode contains affiliate links. If you purchase through these links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

In this pilot episode I open up a quote that stopped me in my tracks:

"To read a book is to take a journey, to travel into a vast unknown, to hear the voices of angels both living and dead."

When you read — where do you go? Whose voice do you hear?

I share what reading means to me, why historical fiction is my world and what Wilbur Smith's Africa taught me about what great descriptive writing can do.

This is a show for people who love books the way I love them. The kind that pull you somewhere you didn't expect. New episodes every fortnight.

Get your copy of the books we discuss on  Bookshelf Review Bookshop UK

This episode contains affiliate links. If you purchase through these links I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.