Disasters are by their very nature hard to predict. Pandemics, like earthquakes, wildfires, financial crises and wars, are not normally distributed; there is no cycle of history to help us anticipate
From the international bestselling authors of WillpowerWhy does a bad impression last longer than a good one? Why does losing money affect us more than gaining it? What makes phobias so hard to shake?
In 402 AD, the young Emperor Honorius made the momentous decision to move his capital to a small, easily defendable city on the Po estuary - Ravenna. Until 751 AD, Ravenna served as the capital of the
The 'Viking Age' is traditionally held to begin in June 793 when Scandinavian raiders attacked the monastery of Lindisfarne in Northumbria, and to end in September 1066, when King Harald Hardrada of N
The definitive biography of one of the most famous and influential artists the world has ever seenA GUARDIAN, OBSERVER, AND DAZED MAGAZINE 'BOOK TO LOOK FORWARD TO' IN 2020'Art and art history jumped
'If you're a progressive, in Britain or elsewhere, and if you think the movement needs fresh ideas, read this book, it's full of them. Then get to work.' Oliver Bullough, The Guardian'It ought to be r
One of our most scintillating public intellectuals explores the political paradoxes of the pandemic and helps us think our way through it'We are able to imagine anything because we are being besieged
We know our world's unequal. But, says Owen Jones, it doesn't have to stay that way. No status quo simply dissolves of its own accord: it must be replaced with something else. Without a real alternati
When Henry IV seized the throne from his cousin Richard II, some commentators saw it as a hopeful new beginning for England. The first monarch to have English as his mother tongue since the Norman con
An icon of the last fifty years, Stephen Hawking seems to encapsulate genius: not since Albert Einstein has a scientific figure held such a position in popular consciousness. In this enthralling memoi
In this unflinching intervention, philosopher Kate Manne offers a radical new framework for understanding misogyny. Ranging widely across the culture, from the Kavanaugh hearings and "Cat Person" to H
'Endlessly fascinating and full of surprises. Easily one of my books of the year' BILL BRYSONThe myth-busting science behind our modern attitudes to exercise: what our bodies really need, why it matte
'Tell them. Tell them what is happening on the land. Someone has to tell them... When I was young there was cowslips and ragged robin everywhere, and butterflies on the thyme in the rocky crags on t
A gripping narrative of the intertwined lives of the four philosophers whose ideas reshaped the twentieth centuryThe year is 1919. Walter Benjamin flees his overbearing father to scrape a living as a
Other species adapt to their environment; we create ours. Our remaking of the world has not only liberated much of the planet from plague and famine: it has reshaped the human phenotype - the interact
We think we know bullshit when we hear it, but do we? A spotter's guide to bullshit in the wild from two brilliantly contrarian scientistsThe world is awash in bullshit, and we're drowning in it. Poli
You're going to die. The Earth will, one day, be toast. So too, our Sun will eventually shine its last. But what's next?The End of Everything is a unique exploration of the destruction of the cosmos.
In The Habsburgs, Martyn Rady tells the epic story of a dynasty and the world it built - and then lost - over nearly a millennium. From modest origins, the Habsburgs grew in power to gain control of
An intimate portrait of Stephen Hawking -- the man, the friend, the physicistAn icon of the last fifty years, Stephen Hawking seems to encapsulate genius: not since Albert Einstein has a scientific fi
Wagner's last music-drama tells the story of Parsifal, the 'pure fool, knowing through compassion', who has been called to rescue the Kingdom of the Grail from the sins that have polluted it. The Grai
An award-winning medic and scientist makes the game-changing case that genetic females are stronger than males at every stage of life'A powerful antidote to the myth of a "weaker sex"' Gina Rippon, au
This is the story of a family led to confront a crisis they had never foreseen. Aged eleven, their eldest daughter has stopped eating and speaking. Alongside diagnoses of autism and selective mutism,
'This is one of those rare books that have something really important to say. Anatol Lieven, one of the most original and independent-minded foreign policy thinkers, is telling his fellow realists tha
'This acutely argued book will engender a thousand conversations' Cynthia OzickThe prescient New York Times writer delivers an urgent wake-up call exposing the alarming rise of anti-semitism -- and ex
Humanity's greatest feat is our incredible ability to learn. Even in their first year, infants acquire language, visual and social knowledge at a rate that surpasses the best supercomputers. But how
