Time for a new TV books show?
Robert McCrum in his column on book in The Observer, Sunday 17 May 2009

The much-expected announcement, following the demise of The South Bank Show, that Richard and Judy are to abandon their sofa on daytime TV and give up their sponsorship of new fiction looks like bad news for publishers but good news for Sky Arts's excellent Books Show, which will now enjoy a clear run of the airwaves.

Though not for long, I fancy. Nature abhors a vacuum and I predict that some reckless broadcaster will soon throw caution to the wind and invest the exceedingly modest sums required to launch a new books programme - and discover to their surprise that it's actually quite popular.

Better still, with a good producer and an experienced presenter, it can be both cheap and effective. The BBC, for example, could do a lot worse than revive its 70s paperback programme Read All About It, hosted by... Melvyn Bragg.