In the early years the topics for the programme were arranged well in advance and printed in the "Radio Times" but by the 1980s there was a change to greater topicality. Clare Selerie-Gray became the producer in 1987 and steered the programme away from its tendency to include merely whimsical topics and ensured that the books read in the last section were more relevant to women's lives rather than ordinary novels. She responded to criticism that the programme was too feminist by asserting that it avoided ""Spare Rib" didactics" but that a feminist influence on the people who made it had occurred.