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SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 'If you want to write a novel or a script, read this book' Sunday Times 'The best book on the craft of storytelling I've ever read' Matt Haig 'Rarely has a book engrossed me more, and forced me to question everything I've ever read, seen or written. A masterpiece' Adam Rutherford Who would we be without stories? Stories mould who we are, from our character to our cultural identity. They drive us to act out our dreams and ambitions, and shape our politics and beliefs.We use them to construct our relationships, to keep order in our law courts, to interpret events in our newspapers and social media. Storytelling is an essential part of what makes us human. There have been many attempts to understand what makes a good story - from Joseph Campbell's well-worn theories about myth and archetype to recent attempts to crack the 'Bestseller Code'.But few have used a scientific approach. This is curious, for if we are to truly understand storytelling in its grandest sense,

We are living in an age of heightened individualism. Success is a personal responsibility. Our culture tells us that to succeed is to be slim, rich, happy, extroverted, popular—flawless. We have becom

`Fascinating' Guardian`Brilliant' Evening Standard`Electrifying' Financial Times`So interesting I literally couldn't put it down' Sunday TimesWe live in the age of the individual. We are supposed to b

We live in the age of the individual. Every day, we’re bombarded with depictions of the beautiful, successful, slim, socially conscious, and extroverted individual that our culture has decided is the

Roald Dahl meets American Psycho in a gripping tale about the filth behind fine diningThere are no ghosts, there are only stories too stubborn to dieThere was a time when everyone in the country knew

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The compelling, groundbreaking guide to creative writing that reveals how the brain responds to storytelling, based on the wildly popular creative writing classStories shape who we are. They drive us

What drives our political and moral beliefs? What makes us like some things and dislike others? What shapes how we behave, and misbehave, in groups? What makes you, you? For centuries, philosophers and scholars have described human behaviour in terms of sex, power and money. In The Status Game, bestselling author Will Storr radically turns this thinking on its head by arguing that it is our irrepressible craving for status that ultimately defines who we are.From the era of the hunter-gatherer to today, when we exist as workers in the globalised economy and citizens of online worlds, the need for status has always been wired into us. A wealth of research shows that how much of it we possess dramatically affects not only our happiness and wellbeing but also our physical health – and without sufficient status, we become more ill, and live shorter lives. It’s an unconscious obsession that drives the best and worst of us: our innovation, arts and civilisation as well as our murders, wa

Killian Lone comes from a long line of gifted cooks, stretching back to the seven-teenth century, and yearns to become a famous chef himself. When he starts an apprenticeship under Max Mann, the most

Will Storr has done some seriously bizarre and otherworldly things over the course of his career as a journalist. But even spending an entire day with Ozzy Osbourne wasn't as frightening as when he