Christian Sprenger is a journalist who has been in the game for over 40 years. He started out as a sports journalist at the “Kölner Express” and switched to television in the mid-1990s. He has presented on RTL and premiere, among others, and is still active in soccer and television as a reporter and coach – not only for young TV talents.
Since 2021, the Düsseldorf native, who lives in Cologne and has loved reading since childhood, has been hosting the somewhat different book podcast, “sprengerspricht autorinsights”.
I am involved with Climate Fiction Writers Europe because I believe that we in Europe are also called upon to stand up for our climate, our continent and our children.
The world is upside down – and not just since 2025, even if it feels that way.
But it has really gone crazy, especially since Donald Trump took office. Since then, one topic has increasingly taken a back seat, as it did in the most recent general election: climate change.
One person who has experienced this first-hand is Uwe Laub. The author of environmental thrillers often spends time in Florida. He is also connected from there in this episode, which is dedicated to our climate. Timeless, but deliberately online at a time when the fifth Climate Book Fair is taking place in Leipzig, Germany, in addition to the regular Leipzig Book Fair (more about this in the special by the late literary agent Lars Schulze Kossack, among others).
In the first part of this issue, Julia Hauck, one of the honorary co-organizers, explains in detail what’s on the programme until 31 March 2025. Among others, Mary Stormhouse will be a guest in Leipzig, because the fantasy author “thinks the Climate Book Fair is a super cool project, where I myself noticed in 2024 by reading my award-winning solar punk novel that people are realizing that climate change can also be addressed in an entertaining way.”
And not just in purely fictional thrillers or crime novels, but as Uwe Laub shows in his bestseller “Sturm”, which has even been translated into English, and his current novel “Blaues Gold” (more on this in episode #168), enriched with scientific facts. Just like Andreas Koebe’s debut thriller, who tells of a reader “who was quite surprised that what I described actually exists.”
Very important for everyone: “It must not be too dystopian”, as Mary Stormhouse says, because: “Then people will be even less interested in the topic and dealing with it.” Which, according to Uwe Laub, “must be prevented at all costs, despite all the current social trends”.
That’s why Julia Hauck, in relation to books, thinking and the Climate Book Fair 2025, is “working towards a worthwhile future and showing perspectives!” Preferably all together or at least in a network.
At sprengerspricht, Uwe Laub talks exclusively about the Climate Fiction Writers Europe for the first time: “It’s been around in the USA for a long time. Associations that deal with Climate Fiction. I realized that there was nothing like this for authors/artists or other media professionals in Europe. That’s why I founded the association. So that we can join forces together.”
It’s a long way from idea to realization, to say it with the fantasy title of Mary Stormhouse’s book: an almost Olympic task. How does that sound in Hawaiian? Find out in the third part of this issue.
Episode amongst others at Spotify»