Fiction Uncovered has been called “the Mercury Prize for books, because it celebrates writers whom keen readers (and literary editors) might know about, and introduces some whom we probably don’t.” (The Independent on Sunday). Each year it selects eight British fiction titles to go through to a UK-wide promotion.
For the annual literary promotion we decided to play at the intersection of analogue and digital by creating a pop-up FM radio station broadcasting from Foyles bookshop, Charing Cross Road from 20 – 23 June 2012. The four day radio station broadcast live from 87.9FM and was also streamed live online. Guests included the writers Geoff Dyer, Philip Hensher, David Baddiel, Stella Duffy, Courttia Newland and Jake Arnott, as well as a specially commissioned play set in Foyles Bookshop called The Foil by the award-winning writer and director Gabriel Bisset-Smith and a host of panel discussions on reading and writing. The radio station also featured content around the eight selected titles as well as a range of recordings supplied via partnerships with the Royal Society of Literature, Granta and the Bloomsbury Institute.
Fiction Uncovered FM strengthened the relationship with Foyles, and supported Fiction Uncovered’s broader remit to promote UK fiction. In addition, podcasts from the radio shows featured in New and Noteworthy on iTunes, and supplied a huge range of podcast content for dissemination online via social media, and via author and publisher websites.
Podcasts of each of the shows are available for download on iTunes.
In 2014 and 2015 we partnered with Resonance FM to bring the Fiction Uncovered radio station to its a vast range of cultural programming, which also includes in-depth series on literature, fine art, and an amazing variety of music, along with radiophonic experimentation and special broadcast projects throughout the year.