19:00 Nicci French Two for the Price of One ScottishPower Studio Theatre, £10 [£8] Nicci Gerrard and Sean French first started writing together under the name Nicci French in 1995 and together they crafted a collection of bestselling psychological thrillers including The Memory Game. Now, the husband and wife team join us to launch Tuesday's Gone, the second in a new series of crime thrillers featuring a new heroine - a psychotherapist named Frieda Klein.THE STATE OF BRITAIN19:00- Debate: Rethinking 20:15 the Union (part 2) Would an Independent Scotland Lose Its International Influence? The Guardian Spiegeltent, £10 [£8] David Cameron may not be popular among Scottish voters but he raised an intriguing argument in February. Scotland would, he claimed, lose its influence on the international stage and be marginalised by organisations such as the UN and NATO. Worse, Scotland's entry into the European Union may be vetoed by a Spanish government anxious not to spark its own regional independence issues. Does Cameron's argument add up, or is he just scaremongering? Join us to debate this political hot potato.In association with the Saltire Society.ANOBII FIRST BOOK AWARD NOMINEE19:00 Jon Gower & Wayne Price Blowing Hot and Cold RBS Corner Theatre, £7 [£5] Admired by Alan Warner and Alan Spence and receiving comparisons to Raymond Carver, Wayne Price is clearly one to watch. Furnace is a scintillating series of short stories featuring a hapless backpacker and a summer worker drawn into a dangerous tryst. Jon Gower's Too Cold for Snow is an equally thrilling collection including a paid assassin, a prison ship governor and an avalanche survivor.20:00 THE EDINBURGH GIN EVENT Ian Rankin Desert Island Rebus RBS Main Theatre, £10 [£8] It's 25 years since Knots and Crosses introduced us to John Rebus - and changed the face of crime writing in the process. To celebrate, Ian Rankin shares some of his favourite Rebus moments from the 17 novels featuring this flawed and deliciously puzzling character. A journey across Edinburgh's topography as much as it is a voyage through Ian Rankin's mind, this literary Desert Island Discs promises to be a highlight of the Festival.LITERARY LEGENDS20:30 Kim Newman The Greatest Vampire Novel Since Dracula? ScottishPower Studio Theatre, £10 [£8] Kim Newman's Anno Dracula was first published in 1992 and is now recognised as one of the greatest vampire novels of the century. Re-released in a new edition, the book reinvents Stoker's original Dracula myth, taking it on a spine-tingling and often very funny journey. Today Newman discusses his classic alongside its equally brilliant sequel The Bloody Red Baron and the forthcoming Dracula Cha Cha Cha. DRAWING ON OUR RESOURCES20:30 THE SCOTTISH MORTGAGE INVESTMENT TRUST EVENT Donovan Hohn & Kate Rawles Quirky Adventures into Uncharted Territories Peppers Theatre, £10 [£8] When Donovan Hohn heard how 28,902 bath toys spilled into the Pacific en route to the US from China and have been washing up along beaches throughout the world, he decided to find out more. Moby-Duck is the curious result. Kate Rawles' The Carbon Cycle zeroes in on her 4,553 mile cycle ride from Texas to Alaska, encountering bears, wolves and a lynx.ANOBII FIRST BOOK AWARD NOMINEE20:30 Kenneth Macleod & Louisa Young Life During a Series of Wartimes RBS Corner Theatre, £7 [£5] Louisa Young's My Dear I Wanted to Tell You is a moving tale of love, class and sex during the First World War, featuring soldiers Purefoy and Locke and the women left behind. It's a novel that is racing up the bestseller lists. Kenneth Macleod's debut The Incident charts a story of history, guilt and fate from the Second World War through to the present day, with events reverberating across the generations.21:00- Unbound 23:00 Stories, Music and Literary High Jinks The Guardian Spiegeltent, Free & Drop-In A literary experience like no other. Anything goes: storytelling, music, performance, poetry, stand-up - it's a raw, surprising, sometimes emotional ride. Come with an open mind! The line-up will be announced in July in The Skinny magazine and on our website at www.edbookfest.co.uk.Passionate about politics? Love.Gerry Hassan & Eric Shaw (25 Aug, p50)Tue 21 August (continued) 40Bridegroom... what has a man about to be married got to do with someone who looks after horses? People have come up with some crazy explanations.David Crystal, The Story of English in 100 Words, 16:00

Like crime fiction? Love. Yrsa Sigurdardottir (16 Aug, p25)10:00- Paterson Arran 10:10 Ten at Ten Writers' Retreat, Free: Book in Advance A delicious morning reading from one of our Festival authors to set you up for the day. Check the screen in the Entrance Tent to see who's reading each day.10:15 Claire Kilroy & Adam Thorpe Defying Market Forces The Guardian Spiegeltent, £10 [£8] We welcome two writers whose novels take them in exciting new directions. Claire Kilroy's Devil I Know is her much-anticipated follow-up to All Names Have Been Changed, and it takes the form of the testimony of a man who realises he's trapped in a world of greed and hubris. Adam Thorpe's thrilling Flight follows a middle-aged pilot, who runs from his past to a new life in the Outer Hebrides. But can he really escape? Free coffee, courtesy of Heritage Portfolio.11:00 Dennis O'Donnell Warding Off Some Dark Memories Peppers Theatre, £10 [£8] In 2000 Dennis O'Donnell was approached to work as an orderly in the intensive psychiatric care unit of a large hospital in central Scotland. The Locked Ward sets out to reveal the true story of a life divided by fear and care, and by violence and compassion, recounting the stories of the patients, and those of the friends he made in the unit over seven years.11:00- Writing Workshop 12:30 The Art Of Performance Writers' Retreat, £15 [£12] The relationship between the written and spoken word is changing for authors, with performance and public reading becoming an integral part of a writer's career. In this workshop, performance poet Tim Turnbull explores how performance and public reading can inform and improve your writing. Using your own work, the workshop will look at voice, structure, rhythm and timing. In association with the Society of Authors. 11:30 Stef Penney Why Don't They Want to Find Rose Janko? RBS Main Theatre, £10 [£8] The novels of Edinburgh-born Stef Penney have now been translated into 30 languages, with new legions of global fans drawn in by The Invisible Ones. It has been seven years since Rose Janko went missing without a huge amount of fuss. Now her father has hired PI Ray Lovell to uncover the truth, but his task is hampered by the very people he thought he was helping.14:00 William Brodrick & James Runcie A Former Monk and an Archbishop's Son ScottishPower Studio Theatre, £10 [£8] The authors featured here may share a religious background, but it is the quality of their writing that brings them together today. James Runcie discusses his new Grantchester Mysteries (to be screened as a BBC1 drama), while the former Augustinian monk William Brodrick talks about his newly-published The Day of the Lie. Both have written page-turning novels with moral dilemmas at their heart. ANOBII FIRST BOOK AWARD NOMINEE14:00 Tom Benn & Elaine Proctor Disunited Britain RBS Corner Theatre, £7 [£5] Elaine Proctor's debut Rhumba is set in London, featuring a 10 year old boy waiting for his young mother to arrive from the Congo, along the same dangerous route that the human traffickers smuggled him. Tom Benn's crime novel The Doll Princess is set in mid-90s Manchester, with the body of an Egyptian heiress discovered in the basement of a block of flats.14:30 Selina O'Grady & Francis Spufford An Informed Discussion About God Peppers Theatre, £10 [£8] This event is not a reductive debate about whether God exists, but a look at the meaning of belief today. Francis Spufford discusses Unapologetic, which he describes as 'for anyone who feels there is something...anti-imaginative and intolerant about the way the atheist case is now being made', while Selina O'Grady's book And Man Created God looks at how Christian belief arose in its earliest days. 15:00 Quintin Jardine Is This the End for Britain's Toughest Cop? RBS Main Theatre, £10 [£8] DCI Bob Skinner arrived on the scene in 1993 after Quintin Jardine read a crime novel and exclaimed he could do better. Now, nearly two decades later, Jardine presents the 22nd novel to feature Skinner, and every year the Motherwell-born author continues to build his fan-base. In Funeral Note, Skinner's marriage is on the rocks and corruption within his own force could finish him for good. A current of pure joy passed between us as I tried out the title: '"The Hounds of the Baskervilles".' 'Yes!' Doyle rose suddenly and began to pace the room. 'Yes, yes, yes! Although,' he jabbed at the air, 'the singular would sound better. "The Hound of the Baskervilles". Don't you agree?'John O'Connell, Baskerville: The Mysterious Tale of Sherlock's Return, 15:00William Brodrick, 14:00Tom Benn, 14:00Latecomers will not be admitted after the start of events and no refunds will be given.Events are 1 hour long unless otherwise stated and take place in Charlotte Square Gardens.41Wed 22 August