Ten minutes with... is a special series presented by Coode Street that sees readers and booklovers from around the world talk about what they're reading right now and what's getting them through these difficult times.

Today Jonathan fires up Skype to talk to Chaz Brenchley about the strange challenges of these times, the comfort to be found reading crime and mystery novels, living and working a short walk from SETI and NASA in Silicon Valley, combining girls school novels and steampunk (and the accompanying Mrs Bailey's Recipes for Medium), taking control of his own publishing, his new short story collection and more.

Crater School

Chaz has been working on a series of English girls' boarding-school stories set on Mars. You can sample the Charter School on his website and read more on his Patreon.

Books mentioned include:

Everything in all the Wrong Order: The Best of Chaz Brenchley by Chaz Brenchley (forthcoming 2021)

Ancestral Night by Elizabeth Bear

Velocity Weapon by Megan E. O'Keefe

Dr. Siri Paiboun Series by Colin Cotterill

Bangkok 8 by John Burdett

The Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes Series by Laurie R. King

Slough House Series by Mick Herron