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Chris Power speaks to William Boyd about The Romantic, his inventive new novel about a 19th century globetrotter. The author of Any Human Heart and Restless talks about full life narratives, using fiction to explore fact and literary legacies.

Also, equally playful and profound, Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities is 50 years old this year. Lauren Elkin and Darran Anderson take us on a tour of the imagined cities in the novel, a majestic prose-poem in which a fictional Marco Polo recalls his own intrepid travels.

Book List – Sunday 16 October and Thursday 20 October

The Romantic by William Boyd
Sketches by Boz by Charles Dickens
Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
The Hermit in Paris by Italo Calvino
Imaginary Cities by Darran Anderson
Flaneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice
and London by Lauren Elkin
Floating Cities by Lauren Elkin
Venice Observed by Mary McCarthy