Famed for novels such as An Ice-Cream War (1982), Brazzaville Beach (1990), The Blue Afternoon (1993), Armadillo (1998), and Bamboo (2005), among many others. (Notably, his 1998 book, Nat Tate: An American Artist 1928-1960, the 'biography' of a neglected genius, reportedly fooled a number of prominent art critics who claimed to have heard of the wholly fictional painter. )

Born in Ghana in 1952, Boyd had his first novel, A Good Man in Africa, published while he was a lecturer in English at St Hilda's College, Oxford, and was delighted when it went on to win the Whitbread First Novel Award and a Somerset Maugham Award. Subsequently selected in 1983 as one of Granta's %u0F50 Best of Young British Novelists', Boyd has gone on to enjoy a long and fruitful career, as a screenwriter as well as an author.

His latest book, Restless, is set during World War II. William Boyd says that he was inspired to write the book as an exploration of his fascination with the psychology of spying: "I'm very intrigued by loss of identity and change of identity…those parallel universes in which you imagine you're someone else".

Based loosely on a Kim Philby-esque figure, the book examines the murky world of wartime intelligence and counter-intelligence both in the UK and America, and explores the theory that America was forced by British intelligence to reluctantly join the war. According to Boyd, "the special relationship was a Churchill myth".

On the show, Boyd also goes discusses his role as a screen writer. He believes that, as a writers adapting his own work for the screen, he is much more ruthless than anyone else would be, although he admits that an author's ego can suffer in the democratic movie-writing process: "It keeps you humble".

Restless is priced £17.99, as is available from all good bookshops now.