The week of Valentine's day is traditionally seen as the start of spring, the season when "a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love", so this week's podcast is devoted to the pursuit of love. We talk to the author of a new book on the history of the lonely hearts advert and consider whether there is any literary merit in the personal columns of your local paper. We buttonhole some passers-by to find out what they make of lonely hearts ads from the 17th century to the present day.
And, as school half-term is looming, we also take a trip down to London's Imperial War Museum to check out a new exhibition devoted to the stories of war in children's literature.
Reading list
A Shapely Ankle Preferr'd: A History of the Lonely Hearts Ad 1695-2010; by Francesca Beauman (Chatto & Windus)
Buy it at the Guardian bookshop
Sexually I'm More of a Switzerland, by David Rose (Picador)
Buy it at the Guardian bookshop
Exhibition: Once Upon a Wartime, Imperial War Museum
