Reading Up - It’s literally, a panel show with Jane Corry, Damien Lewis, Fiona Waters and Darren Wells

Local actor and writer of the Blackadder Radio Stage shows Sam James hosts this light-hearted and lively literary-based panel show, in which four respected authors introduce themselves and their work, they will then enter a battle to be crowned the inaugural Reading Up champion in a humorous interactive literature-based quiz! Then it’s your turn as the mic makes its way around the audience for the closing: Quiz the Panel. 

Jane Corry, No.3 in the Sunday Times July 2019, is a former magazine journalist who spent three years working as the writer-in-residence of a high security prison for men. This often hair-raising experience helped inspire her Sunday Times-bestselling psychological thrillers My Husband’s Wife, Blood Sisters, The Dead Ex and I Looked Away, which have been published in more than 35 countries. Jane was a tutor in creative writing at Oxford University and is a regular contributor to the Daily Telegraph and My Weekly magazine. 

Damien Lewis is a No.1 Sunday Times bestselling author whose books have been translated into forty languages worldwide. For decades he worked as a war and conflict reporter for the world’s major broadcasters, reporting across Africa, South America, the Middle East and Far East, winning numerous awards. His books include the Word War Two Classics SAS Ghost Patrol, SAS Shadow Raiders, Churchill’s Secret Warriors, The Nazi Hunters and Hunting the Nazi Bomb. Over a dozen of his books have been made or are being made into movies or TV drama series and several have been adapted as plays for the stage. 

Fiona Waters has over 100 book titles to her name, published in many different languages all over the world. Her love of poetry has been her guiding light; she was hooked from the moment she heard Gabriel Woolf reading The Lady of Shalott on the radio when she was seven years old. Most notably, Fiona compiled the poetry anthology I am the Seed that Grew the Tree, magnificently produced by Nosy Crow with glorious illustrations by Frann PrestonGannon. Winner of the 2018 Waterstones Children’s Gift Book of the Year, the book has been hailed as a classic in the making. Fiona is currently working with Nosy Crow on a successor to I am the Seed that Grew the Tree. 

Darren Wells author of Blue as The Sky. A life-changing event inspired Darren Wells to write a book under the pen name Ethan Willis. Darren was determined to write a screenplay version of his book and it is now pencilled in for filming next year. Darren Wells runs screenwriting workshops, talking about the creative side of the art. He firmly believes a great story is more important than a great structure as an idea has to be felt and a structure can be learnt.