There are an infinite number of questions one might ask an author in the hopes of better understanding their work, but few yield as enlightening and revealing an answer as: What book made you the writer you are today and why?
And so this is the query we put to eight of the brilliant authors on the line-up at this year’s Hay Literature Festival, including the recent recipient of its medal for prose, Elif Shafak, whose latest novel, the century-spanning There Are Rivers in the Sky, wears the influence of her telling selection on its sleeve.
