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The prize-winning writer Hilary Mantel joins Harriett Gilbert on The Strand to discuss how the supernatural permeates her work in mysterious ways.

From her own childhood visions of malevolent spirits and her adult experience of witchcraft in Botswana, to her 16th Century English protagonist Thomas Cromwell’s beliefs in an afterlife and a judgement day – Hilary Mantel ponders the existence of ghosts and whether or not she is haunted by the characters in her historical fiction.

Having already won the Man Booker prize for Wolf Hall (in 2009) and Bring Up the Bodies (in 2012), we’re just days away from finding out if the second book in her epic Cromwell trilogy will be selected as the Costa Book of the Year (to be announced on 29th Jan).

(Photo: Writer Hilary Mantel. Credit: John Haynes)