Women and food, and Helen Dunmore's posthumous Costa prize – books podcast

This week’s show is bursting with food for thought: poetry for the mind and gastronomy for the belly. Claire and Sian start with a discussion of the late Helen Dunmore’s triumph at the 2017 Costa book awards, which saw her become the second posthumous winner of the book of the year award. Her poetry collection Inside the Wave was crowned the best book of last year – was it the right decision?

Then Laura Shapiro sits down with Sian to discuss her book What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories. Exploring the diets of women as varied as Dorothy Wordsworth and Eva Braun, Shapiro sets out to tell their life stories through what they did – and didn’t – eat.