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Malorie Blackman is one of the UK’s most influential children’s authors. Along the way she’s become an OBE, served as children’s laureate and been described by the Times as a national treasure. Now she is publishing her seventieth novel – Crossfire, the latest in her Noughts and Crosses series for young adults.

The true story of a young Scots-Italian during the Second World War, brought to life by his daughter, writer Hilda De Felice. Actor Lorenzo Novani, also Scots-Italian, plays all the characters in the one-man show, ‘Loving The Enemy’.

Raja Shehadeh and Penny Johnson live in Ramallah in the occupied West Bank. They’re both writers and campaign for Palestinian civil and political rights. They talk to Sally about their writing and their life together.

The Ghost Shirt is a Native American shirt believed to have been worn during a Ghost Dancer ritual at the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890. The story had a profound effect on a budding film-maker from Aberdeen, Steven Lewis Simpson, who went on to make a number of films about Native Americans. His latest film is Neither Wolf Nor Dog.

In our occasional series on the things that inspire and touch us deeply, we’re taking a trip to the coast with Edinburgh-based poet Lynn Davidson. She grew up near Pukerua Bay in New Zealand, and it still holds a powerful place in her heart.

Dunfermline-born entrepreneur Andrew Carnegie made hundreds of billions of dollars in today’s money in the booming American steel industry. His philanthropic philosophy that ‘the man who dies rich, dies in disgrace’ is explored in a new Radio 4 programme this week. Sally is joined by philosopher and writer Julian Baggini, and Sharron McColl, from the Dunfermline Carnegie Library.