Bestsellers on Five Books

“It’s certainly a thriller. It’s tense, tense, tense. But the big thing in this novel is not just the tension, it’s the voices. Joseph O’Connor gives a masterclass in the different voices of the people gathered around the priest Hugh O’Flaherty to help him organise and run the Escape Line—the escape routes out of Italy for POWs and others being pursued by the Nazis. If you feel you know Rome, you’ll find much to enjoy in the twists and turns of the streets, the hidden alleys, the sudden expanses and that ever-present ‘seethe of black water’, the Tiber. It’s full Rome immersion.” Read more...

The Best Historical Fiction of 2024

Katharine Grant, Historical Novelist

“The novel is really about the unsettling of the West, and it revisits that classic hero of the Western novel: the ‘American Adam.’ This is the figure who tries to throw off history, tries to sever his family ties, and tries to break free from the past in order to experience rebirth and renewal in the so-called Edenic spaces of the West. But what Håkan finds instead is a devastating lack of connection and belonging. He experiences a kind of soul-crushing loneliness and a very limited and truncated life.” Read more...

Landmark Western Novels

Susan Kollin, Literary Scholar

“I think this book is a watershed in the writing of human history. It is an exploration of the history of emotions, and the way that they relate to everyday life today. Zeldin helps us to understand the big picture that who we are – the way we think about love, fear, death and so on – is partly inherited from the past. The way we think about love is inherited from medieval ideas of courtly love, for instance. We’re products of the past. This was a revolutionary idea, to personalise history and make it relevant… Zeldin connects the past with the present, for me like no other historical writer…He’s chosen what he thinks are the 24 most important aspects of emotional life – like love, fear, hate or curiosity – and has dedicated a chapter to each one. He starts each chapter by interviewing someone (in the case of this book a French woman) and then traces how that person’s quandaries in life are reflected in the past. What he leads up to is a core conclusion that conversation, and nurturing the art of conversation, is one of the ways to transform our lives in a mental way.” Read more...

The best books on The Art of Living

Roman Krznaric, Philosopher

“Epictetus was mainly a teacher. We think of him as a philosopher, but he was mainly a teacher of Stoic philosophy around the first century AD. He was born a slave in what is now Turkey, was eventually liberated, moved to Rome, taught there for a while and was banished to a city in Greece called Nicopolis…It’s no coincidence that Stoicism is enjoying a revival today and Epictetus’s thought in particular, because it’s helpful in life. It’s the philosophy of hard knocks, the philosophy for people who have lived for a while and suffered for a while. It’s largely about coping with difficult situations.” Read more...

Life-Changing Philosophy Books

Eric Weiner, Journalist

“This book is a non-technical introduction to machine learning that is aimed at a general audience. It explains the different types of machine learning algorithms and their relative strengths and weaknesses, and it discusses the implications of machine learning for society.” Read more...

The best books on Artificial Intelligence

ChatGPT, AI Chatbot

“Kahneman developed research with Amos Tversky, who unfortunately died young—I think it would have been a co-written book otherwise. It’s a brilliant book that summarizes their psychological research on cognitive biases, or is patterns of thinking, which all of us are prone to, which aren’t reliable.” Read more...

The best books on Critical Thinking

Nigel Warburton, Philosopher

“It’s just such a fantastic book for learning chess. I think sometimes adult improvers don’t pick this book up because of the title, and they should. It’s one of the best chess books I’ve ever read…The author is definitely a very experienced chess teacher…he’s a master player who clearly started focusing on teaching…Unlike other books which are just puzzles, it explains concepts and ideas really well, the examples are picked really nicely, he’s got a good mix. In chess, we divide it into three parts, you’ve got the opening, you’ve got the middle game and the end game. This book covers all of them, there are lots of bite-sized lessons. Within the book there are also puzzles, which are more interactive, more doable…My book is so tattered and dog-eared because I look at it all the time.” Read more...

Best Chess Books for Beginners

Andrew Green, Sportspersons & Sportswriter

“This book is a collection of very clever puzzles. The author is mysterious and goes by the pseudonym M. Some are pictures, some are codes, and some are wordplay. One thing I love about them is that you have to use different types of thinking and solving techniques.” Read more...

The Best Puzzle Books

A. J. Jacobs, Journalist

“The genius of what Alan did is to make Roosevelt’s story accessible by getting it down to a hundred pages.” Read more...

The best books on Franklin D. Roosevelt

Cynthia Koch, Historian

“I picked this one because I’m into feminism and I really like female empowerment. I feel like a lot of books just have males, white males. But this one has a lot of feminist philosophy. This book covers pretty much everything, it has Eastern, Western… different philosophies from all over the world. And it’s really easy to understand because there’s a ton of colours and pictures.” Read more...

The Best Philosophy Books for 8-13 Year Olds

Zara, Children