Reading and conversation with the author of Restoration and Evangelista's Fan, whose new novel Music and Silence about the experiences of an English musician in the Danish court of King Christiannin 1630 is a masterpiece. Tremain is joined by the new Welsh novelist, Trezza Azzopardi, whose debut The Hiding Place is set in the Maltese community of Tiger Bay. Both writers feature in the new edition of the British Council anthology of New Writing.