In the English-speaking world the art form is in a perennial battle for hearts and minds. Two contrasting books from either side of the Atlantic ask why
Sam Larner studies the metrics to reveal the sport’s secrets — and explains why the game is now more thrilling than ever
Sergio Luzzatto on the perniciously charismatic French aristocrat whose violent antisemitism and populist swagger were the foundations for 20th-century fascism
The lauded author’s Helsinki Trilogy vanishes the boundaries of form and genre — and it’s finally available to anglophone readers
A deeply personal survey of the judgments women have faced in divorce courts for centuries
Eswar Prasad brings academic and policy expertise to this engaging analysis of the disintegrating postwar order
Daniel Neep’s excellent account corrects the traditional narrative to show a nation surviving and resisting the powers that have vied to dominate it
A powerful family memoir sounds a warning from history about antisemitism and threats to democracy
A classical composer and celebrity saxophonist find their lives altered after they team up
Titles include Alex Preston, Paul Warner and James Wolff on the perils of being an MI6 spy and two tales from Scotland of women on the hunt for answers
Jacqueline Riding’s meticulously researched history paints a vivid picture of working-class London in the Victorian and Edwardian eras
In a companion piece to 2024’s ‘Gliff’, the novelist touches on the horrors of war, AI, siblings and childhood memories
The best historic houses let our imaginations wander, says novelist Rebecca Perry
Opera’s perennial battle for hearts and minds; metrics and the golden age of rugby; why the global economic order is spiralling out of control; a history of Syria tackles the nation’s complexities; working-class life in Charlie Chaplin’s London; masterly autofiction from Pirkko Saisio; a Jeremy Cooper novel set among classical musicians; the sinister legacy of the Marquis de Morès; a deeply personal survey of the judgments women face in divorce courts — plus Adam LeBor’s pick of the best new thrillers
Goal-setting with intention, corporate scandals with impact, and companies with tentacles
Catch up on the most-read pieces of the week
Young readers are switching off — it’s time to change the subject
As a new film brings a fresh generation of fans to Emily Brontë’s classic novel, Maria Crawford heads for the wild moors that inspired it
A masterful new thriller from the former CIA analyst is informed by a profound understanding of the Middle East and the forces that seek to reshape it
Elisa Shua Dusapin’s story of two estranged sisters’ struggle to bridge their differences is quietly powerful in its emotions
In his first collection in 11 years, the writer conjures his youth and family, elegises old friends, and hints at sensual memories
Minxin Pei charts the country’s journey from Deng to today — and the creation of a new form of totalitarian rule
Oliver Bullough takes a brave dive into the seedy underground network of money laundering — and the governments failing to tackle it
Makenna Goodman repurposes campus novel tropes in surreal fashion, as a disgraced professor seeks rural salvation
Alwyn Turner charts the new values, entertainments and anxieties that transformed the country in the 1920s and ’30s
Titles explore unheeded lessons from a 1950s climate disaster, the carbon blame game, a guide for environmental optimists, and the rapidly changing face of the Arctic
Focusing on Novo Nordisk, Aimee Donnellan’s book ranges across R&D, patents, medical effects and the stigma attached to obesity
Nadia Davids skilfully hints at deeper forces in a tense, claustrophobic stand-off between a housemaid and her mistress
The choreographer invites us to cultivate our ‘physical intelligence’ — the body’s capacity to sense, decide and learn independently of conscious thought
The Booker-winning ‘Lincoln in the Bardo’ author paints a weird and funny relationship between an ‘angel’ and an egotistical oil tycoon
Economic activity rises in most districts over past three months
William Rankin’s ‘Radical Cartography’ makes a powerful case against mainstream mapmaking’s creation of an orderly, objective reality
The Irish author’s playful satire conjures up a canon of fictional novels by a fictional novelist, all to dizzying effect
The gay author shocked France with stories of working-class poverty and homophobia. He talks to Simon Kuper about the misogyny his mother endured and why escape is his defining theme
From Piltdown Man to the Stanford prison experiment, many famous scientific discoveries have been exposed as hoaxes or distortions
Mark Smith’s impressive history surveys life in the Soviet Union, and its advances and failures from Khrushchev to Gorbachev
The best business books selected by our judges
