The Booker Prize Podcast to launch on July 6 with hosts Jo Hamya and James Walton

• Episodes will be available on all podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify 
• Find out more about The Booker Prize Podcast and listen to the trailer here 
• Download the logo and images of the hosts here  

The Booker Prize Foundation today announces The Booker Prize Podcast, launching on July 6, 2023. The new weekly podcast will cast a fresh eye over some of the 500+ novels previously nominated, as well as peering behind the curtain of the latest prizes. It will feature lively discussion and comment, and interviews with authors and many others who take a keen interest in modern fiction.  

Hosted by novelist and critic Jo Hamya and critic and broadcaster James Walton, the podcast will delve into the fascinating history of the Booker Prizes, looking at the shortlists and ceremonies from years gone by – and some of the Booker’s more controversial moments. The conversations will be wide-ranging, covering the novels’ historical context, as well as how they relate to other books and writers – and to current events and other art forms. Jo and James will also provide insight and opinion around the current prize seasons. 

Each 45-minute episode will focus on a single topic, divided between ‘deep dives’ into individual books from the Booker Library, and discussions – with a Booker spin – about popular book genres and topical issues. Listeners will get an insight into the decisions and legacy of the Booker and International Booker Prizes.  

As well as featuring special guests, episodes will include a recurring Booker Clinic segment, where listeners will be invited to send in their personal dilemmas, with Jo and James then prescribing Booker books as remedies. Listeners will be invited to contribute to help shape future by suggesting books that could be discussed and submitting their comments. 

Jo Hamya said:  

‘In these early stages, it’s been great fun to disagree with roughly half of everything James says and an even greater joy to discover our common ground, or else bring each other round to a new point of view. The Booker Prizes have given us wonderful scope to approach their history and library: my hope is that our podcast is a nuanced, candid, and an easy place to spend time. I can’t wait for listeners to think and gossip with us.’ 

James Walton said:  

‘There’s no denying that Jo and I were thrown together by Booker in a strange kind of blind date. But even after the first recording it felt surprisingly clear that they must have known what they were doing, because working together is proving a joy: informative, stimulating and, most of all, fun. I much look forward to being joined by our listeners who will no doubt keep us on our toes. Here’s hoping they’ll enjoy the podcast – and side with me in any disputes (good-natured ones, obviously).’                       

The Booker Prize Podcast is produced by British Podcast Award-winning company Daddy’s SuperYacht Productions, with music exclusively composed by renowned UK composer Ty Unwin, who has created the scores to over a hundred TV and film projects over the last 25 years for the BBC, Discovery, Nat Geo, Sky and Netflix, amongst others. Projects of note include Power of the Planet, Last Man Standing, Dinosaurs - The Final Day, Ancient Rome and Atlantis.  

Listen to the trailer for the podcast here ahead of the official launch, with the first two episodes released on July 6, 2023. Find future episodes every Thursday on all podcast platforms.  

Jo Hamya is the author of Three Rooms (Jonathan Cape, 2021) and The Hypocrite (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2024). Her writing has been praised by the Times, the New York Times, the Guardian and the TLS, among others. She is currently completing a doctorate on the impact of social media on 21st century notions of literary value. In her spare time, she works as a freelance book reviewer.  

James Walton has written and hosted 17 series of the Radio 4 literary quiz show The Write Stuff and has appeared on Pick of the Week, Woman’s Hour, A Good Read and Saturday Review. His book reviews have appeared in the New York Review of Books, the Spectator, the Times and several other publications. He writes a weekly quiz in the FT Magazine, is a television critic for the Spectator and is the author of the anthology The Faber Book of Smoking (2000) and the Penguin Book Quiz (2019). 

Daddy’s SuperYacht Productions is a British Podcast Award winning production company specialising in digital content. Past credits include Human Error for BBC Sounds, Sunil Patel: an Idiot’s Guide to Cryptocurrency for Radio 4 and BBC Audio Drama award nominated SeanceCast for HatTrick Podcasts. Benjamin Sutton is the lead producer.