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The Address Book longlisted for the Jhalak Prize

We’re thrilled that Deirdre Mask’s fascinating and acclaimed The Address Book has been longlisted for the prestigious Jhalak Prize!

First awarded in March 2017, the Jhalak Prize and its new sister award Jhalak Children’s & YA Prize founded in 2020, seek to celebrate books by British/British resident BAME writers.

The prizes are unique in that they accept entries published in the UK by writers of colour. These include (and not limited to) fiction, non-fiction, short stories, graphic novels, poetry and all other genres. The Jhalak Children’s and YA Prize accepts books for children and teens and young adults including picture books, chapter books, graphic novels, poetry, non-fiction, and all other genres by writers of colour and aimed at young readers. The prizes are also open to self-published writers.

The Jhalak Prize was started in 2016 by authors Sunny Singh, Nikesh Shukla and Media Diversified, with support from The Authors’ Club and funds donated by an anonymous benefactor, the prize of £1000. The Jhalak Children’s & YA Prize was founded in 2020 with a matching amount of £1,000 for the winner. The two prizes exist to support and celebrate writers of colour in Britain.

See the full longlist

ABOUT THE BOOK

A TIME Magazine Must-Read Book of 2020

‘Deirdre Mask’s book was just up my Strasse, alley, avenue and boulevard.’ -Simon Garfield, author of Just My Type

‘Fascinating … intelligent but thoroughly accessible … full of surprises’ – Sunday Times

When most people think about street addresses they think of parcel deliveries, or visitors finding their way. But who numbered the first house, and where, and why? What can addresses tell us about who we are and how we live together?
Deirdre Mask looks at the fate of streets named after Martin Luther King, Jr., how ancient Romans found their way, and why Bobby Sands is memorialised in Tehran. She explores why it matters if, like millions of people today, you don’t have an address.
From cholera epidemics to tax hungry monarchs, Mask discovers the different ways street names are created, celebrated, and in some cases, banned. Full of eye-opening facts, fascinating people and hidden history, this book shows how addresses are about identity, class and race. But most of all they are about power: the power to name, to hide, to decide who counts, who doesn’t, and why.

‘A must read for urbanists and all those interested in cities and modern economic and social life.’ – Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class

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Happy 80th Richard Mabey, bestselling nature writer

Richard Mabey is one of our greatest nature writers. He is the author of some thirty books including the bestselling plant bible Flora Britannica, Food for Free, Turned Out Nice Again, Weeds: the Story of Outlaw Plants and Nature Cure which was shortlisted for the Whitbread, Ondaatje and Ackerley Awards. His biography, Gilbert White won the Whitbread Biography Award.

To celebrate Richard turning 80, we’ve collected his books below. Which will you pick up first?

 

GILBERT WHITE

Richard Mabey tells the enthralling story of Britain’s first ecologist.

When the pioneering naturalist Gilbert White (1720-93) wrote The Natural History of Selborne (1789), he created one of the greatest and most influential natural history works of all time, his detailed observations about birds and animals providing the cornerstones of modern ecology. In this award-winning biography, Richard Mabey tells the wonderful story of the clergyman – England’s first ecologist – whose inspirational naturalist’s handbook has become an English classic.

Buy your copy

 

 

WEEDS

A lively and lyrical cultural history of plants in the wrong place by one of Britain’s best and most admired writers

Ever since the first human settlements 10,000 years ago, weeds have dogged our footsteps. They are there as the punishment of ‘thorns and thistles’ in Genesis and , two millennia later, as a symbol of Flanders Field. They are civilisations’ familiars, invading farmland and building-sites, war-zones and flower-beds across the globe. Yet living so intimately with us, they have been a blessing too. Weeds were the first crops, the first medicines. Burdock was the inspiration for Velcro. Cow parsley has become the fashionable adornment of Spring weddings.

Weaving together the insights of botanists, gardeners, artists and poets with his own life-long fascination, Richard Mabey examines how we have tried to define them, explain their persistence, and draw moral lessons from them.

One persons weed is another’s wild beauty.

 

THE PERFUMIER AND THE STINKHORN

Inspiring meditations through the author’s rich store of memories

In these elegant, short essays, revered nature writer Richard Mabey attempts to marry a Romantic’s view of the natural world with that of the meticulous observations of the scientist. By Romanticism, he refers to the view that nature isn’t a machine to be dissected, but a community of which we, the observers, are inextricably part. And that our feelings about that community are a perfectly proper subject for reflection, because they shape our relationship with it. Scientists eschew such a subjective response, wanting to witness the natural world exactly, whatever feelings subsequently follow.

Our feelings are an extension of our senses – sight, taste, smell, touch and sound – and here, in a sextet of inspiring meditations, Mabey explores each sensory response in what it means to interact with nature. From birdsong to poetry, from Petri-dish to microscope, this is a joyful union of meandering thoughts and intimate memories.

Buy your copy

 

TURNED OUT NICE AGAIN

An exploration of our preoccupation with the weather, as heard on BBC Radio 3: Changing Climates.

In his trademark style, Richard Mabey weaves together science, art and memoirs (including his own) to show the weather’s impact on our culture and national psyche. He rambles through the myths of Golden Summers and our persistent state of denial about the winter; the Impressionists’ love affair with London smog, seasonal affective disorder (SAD – do we all get it?) and the mysteries of storm migraines; herrings falling like hail in Norfolk and Saharan dust reddening south-coast cars; moonbows, dog-suns, fog-mirages and Constable’s clouds; the fact that English has more words for rain than Inuit has for snow; the curious eccentricity of country clothing and the mathematical behaviour of umbrella sales.

We should never apologise for our obsession with the weather. It is one of the most profound influences on the way we live, and something we all experience in common. No wonder it’s the natural subject for a greeting between total strangers: ‘Turned out nice again.’

Buy your copy

 

THE CABARET OF PLANTS

A Mabey magnum opus: ‘Mabey’s finest, an eclectic world-roaming collection of stories … lacing colour, intimacy and emotional texture around the scaffold of hard facts.’ (Spectator)

In The Cabaret of Plants, Mabey explores the plant species which have challenged our imaginations, awoken our wonder, and upturned our ideas about history, science, beauty and belief.

Picked from every walk of life, they encompass crops, weeds, medicines, religious gathering-places and a water lily named after a queen. Beginning with pagan cults and creation myths, the cultural significance of plants has burst upwards, sprouting into forms as diverse as the panacea (the cure-all plant ginseng, a single root of which can cost up to $10,000), Newton’s apple, the African ‘vegetable elephant’ or boabab – and the mystical, night-flowering Amazonian cactus, the moonflower.

Ranging widely across science, art and cultural history, poetry and personal experience, Mabey puts plants centre stage, and reveals a true botanical cabaret, a world of tricksters, shape-shifters and inspired problem-solvers, as well as an enthralled audience of romantics, eccentric amateur scientists and transgressive artists. The Cabaret of Plants celebrates the idea that plants are not simply ‘the furniture of the planet’, but vital, inventive, individual beings worthy of respect – and that to understand this may be the best way of preserving life together on Earth.

Buy your copy

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11 Remarkable things about Elizabeth Barrett Browning

‘How do I love thee? Let me count the ways,’ Elizabeth Barrett Browning famously wrote, shortly before defying her family by running away to Italy with Robert Browning. But behind the romance of her extraordinary life stands a thoroughly modern figure, who remains an electrifying study in self-invention.

Elizabeth was born in 1806, a time when women could neither attend university nor vote, and yet she achieved lasting literary fame. She remains Britain’s greatest woman poet, whose work has inspired writers from Emily Dickinson to George Eliot and Virginia Woolf.

This vividly written biography, the first full study for over thirty years, incorporates recent archival discoveries to reveal the woman herself: a literary giant and a high-profile activist for the abolition of slavery who believed herself to be of mixed heritage; and a writer who defied chronic illness and long-term disability to change the course of cultural history. It holds up a mirror to the woman, her art – and the art of biography itself.

Read on for some unusual facts about Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

Buy your copy

11 Remarkable things about Elizabeth Barrett Browning

1. She was the first woman to be nominated for Poet Laureate, 159 years before a woman was actually appointed.

2. For most of her adult life she lived with life-threatening respiratory disease. As a result she spent years at a time living in lockdown.

3. World famous in her lifetime, she wrote Aurora Leigh, the first woman’s künstlerroman, or portrait of how an artist develops.

4. For her poetry advocating the reunification of Italy, she was seen as a heroine of the Italian struggle and given a public funeral in Florence.

5. She also wrote verse excoriating child labour, slavery, and forced prostitution.

6. She married Robert Browning secretly at 40.

7. She believed herself to be BAME, though Robert called her ‘my little Portuguese’.

8. Her son Pen, who grew up to be an artist, was born when she was 43.

9. She loved ice-cream, coffee and chianti.

10. For a few years she dabbled in spiritualism, even though she felt it was so wrong she kept it hidden from her son.

11. She only lived at Wimpole Street for a little over five years. She actually lived longest at Hope End, near Ledbury in Herefordshire, her home for twenty-two years until she was twenty six, and Casa Guidi in Florence, her base on and off for the last fourteen years of her life.

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A Q&A with Mark Solms, author of The Hidden Spring

‘Required reading’ – Susie Orbach
‘Truly pioneering’ – Eric Kandel
‘It changes everything’ – Brian Eno

How does the mind connect to the body? Why does it feel like something to be us? Solving the question of consciousness has been an eternal quest for science. Now at last, the man who discovered the brain mechanism for dreaming appears to have made a breakthrough.

The very idea that a solution is at hand may seem outrageous. Isn’t consciousness intangible, beyond the reach of science? Yet Mark Solms shows how previous failures of science have concealed its true nature. Stick to the medical facts, listen to the eerie testimony of hundreds of neurosurgery patients, and with the author, you’ll begin to understand the truth – and it might just lie in the most ancient part of the brain – or The Hidden Spring.

Through a combination of neuroscience, philosophy, psychology and the real, lived experiences of people, The Hidden Spring will forever alter how you understand your own experience. There is a secret buried in the brain’s ancient foundations. This book shows how, if we bring it into the light, we can finally fathom ourselves.

Pre-order your copy

A Q&A with Mark Solms and his editor, Ed Lake

Ed Lake: How did you decide to start researching the nature of consciousness?

Mark Solms: When I was a small child, my brother suffered a serious brain injury. Watching him struggle, I felt panicky and despairing about my own mortality and eventually I became nihilistic: what’s the point of doing anything if, in the end, I am going die and disappear forever, no matter what I do? As I matured intellectually, this led me to conclude that the only thing worth doing is to try to understand what ‘being’ is. In other words, it drove me to try to explain subjectivity, objectively.

EL: Was there a moment when you realised that you were on a track that was leading you somewhere really new? What was it?

MS: I knew I was on a promising new track when I realised that visual perception was the wrong model example of consciousness, since vision is not an inherently conscious process, and that affect (feeling) is a far better model, since feelings are inherently conscious. But when I knew I was going somewhere really, really new was when I realised that, since affect is a form of homeostasis, and homeostasis has a rather simple mechanism, consciousness must be explicable mechanistically. In retrospect this seems obvious; since consciousness evolved long after the birth of the universe, it must be explicable in terms of some physical process that preceded the dawn of consciousness.

EL: What are the main things that experts have been getting wrong about consciousness?

MS: (1) That visual perception is a good model example of consciousness. (2) That consciousness is generated in the cortex. (3) That the ‘level’ of consciousness (i.e., ‘arousal’ or ‘wakefulness’) is devoid of any quality and content. (4) That we can understand how and why consciousness arose while taking its most complex form (viz., human cognition) as our starting point.

EL: And what do you think laypeople will find most surprising about your theory?

MS: That consciousness is generated in the brainstem and, accordingly, that its fundamental form is quite a simple biological phenomenon (raw feeling) which has almost nothing to do with intelligence. They will also be surprised to learn that the fundamental consciousness-generating machinery of the human brain is identical to that of fishes. Probably the most surprising implication of my theory, however, is the prospect that this fundamental form (raw feeling) is artificially engineerable.

EL: How do you think the world needs to change if your ideas are correct?

MS: The world needs to prepare itself for the imminent engineering of artificial consciousness. It needs to take seriously the dangers and ethical implications of this, and also of the fact that almost all the animals we slaughter on an industrial scale for culinary purposes are sentient, feeling beings.

Follow @mark_solms on Twitter

Follow @edjklake on Twitter

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Intensive Care: read an extract

Intensive Care is about how coronavirus emerged, spread across the world and changed all of our lives forever. But it’s not, perhaps, the story you expect.

Gavin Francis is a GP who works in both urban and rural communities, splitting his time between Edinburgh and the islands of Orkney. When the pandemic ripped through our society he saw how it affected every walk of life: the anxious teenager, the isolated care home resident, the struggling furloughed worker and homeless ex-prisoner, all united by their vulnerability in the face of a global disaster.

In this deeply personal account of nine months spent caring for a society in crisis, Francis will take you from rural village streets to local clinics and communal city stairways. And in telling this story, he reveals others: of loneliness and hope, illness and recovery, and of what we can achieve when we care for each other.

Buy your copy

Read an extract below.

INTRODUCTION

‘[I]t is my opinion, and I must leave it as a prescription, viz., that the best physic against the plague is to run away from it.’
Daniel Defoe
A Journal of the Plague Year

At the Covid clinic car park the barrier points skywards: the requirement to pay is suspended, along with so many other rules in this strange, in-between world of coronavirus. The clinic doctors had told you to come alone. You walk to the door, breathless even at that brief exertion, then push a buzzer that will shortly be wiped with alcohol to decontaminate it from your touch. You wait, with your cough and your fever. The door opens; inside, a nurse in blue scrubs, face mask and visor helps you put on a face mask, then leads you down the red or ‘dirty’ corridor (though it is decorated in pastel shades and looks freshly mopped) into a small clinic room with too-bright lights and wipe-down furniture. You’re gasping now for breath, have some pains in your chest, you’re flushed and sweating, frightened by all you’ve heard and read of this virus, this pandemic. The millions downed by it, the lack of ventilators, the military drafted in to help, the global economic ruin.

A doctor comes in; she too is dressed in impersonal blue scrubs, a mask with a spray visor, a flimsy plastic apron and bare forearms ending in blue-gloved hands. She asks you a few questions – how breathless you feel, how high your fever has been, when did your symptoms start, where you have been travelling. She puts a sensor on your finger to gauge the oxygen content of your blood, then slots a thermometer into your ear. You feel hungry for air, and notice her gaze on you, as she counts your breaths.

Your oxygen is too low, your breathing too fast; a wheelchair is brought, a porter takes you to a lift. You still have your mask on and when, inside the lift, you ask the porter where you’re going, his own mask makes it difficult to understand the response. The lift door opens, behind it more blue-suited figures dressed in masks, aprons and gloves. One approaches with a swab on a stick, but you can’t make out clearly what is said. You feel swallowed by the hospital, by the virus, by this pandemic that has broken over the world.

This story begins on 31 December 2019 when the Chinese authorities alerted the World Health Organization (WHO) to a new and dangerous strain of viral pneumonia that had arisen in Wuhan, central China. That virus didn’t yet have a name, though it had already been circulating for some months. As the world turned into a new year, midnight fireworks igniting in a band across the globe, the virus began its worldwide spread. The story of 2020 is the story of this virus, its transmission, its ramifications for global and local economies, for how we travel, how we deliver healthcare, and how we plan for the even more damaging epidemics that will come.

My ambition has been to chart the evolution of this modern epidemic as I saw it, as a GP and as a member of the communities I work with, and for, in Scotland. In fact, the story that I am telling has proven more complex, and its ramifications more extended, than I anticipated in the early weeks of the crisis. Back then my fear was of a deluge of infections and deaths caused by the virus. I didn’t see that this would become not just an account of a pandemic infection, but of the sudden warping of an entire way of life, of all those lives which have been thrown out of kilter and whose trajectories were now so uncertain, and the care those people would need as a result. I didn’t foresee how much the profession that I love would be bruised, transformed and reshaped to cope with the impact of the virus. This book is a contemporary history, an eyewitness account of the most intense months I have known in my twenty-year career, a hot take on the pandemic that speaks of the tragic consequences of measures taken against the virus as much as it tells stories of the virus itself.

‘Crisis’ is a Greek word which originally described the moment in the evolution of an illness on which everything hinges, when death and recovery are held, for a moment, in the balance. The slightest nudge towards one or the other may determine the outcome. In a hospital, the intensive care unit or intensive therapy unit (ICU or ITU) is where the sickest patients, those whose organs are failing and who will die without drastic and intense interventions, are looked after. Those units do extraordinary work, but over the months of this pandemic it has often seemed to me as if many other clinicians, scientists, carers and charity workers outside the ITU have been engaged in something comparably intense. It has frequently seemed as if society itself is on life support, and intensive measures, including huge efforts of selflessness, vision and compassion, have been required to sustain it. ‘Care’ is something we do for others, but it’s also an emotional attitude of attentive compassion, of kindness, and delivering it can be a privilege as much as it can also be a burden and a responsibility. I’d like to cast a modest spotlight on the care I’ve seen delivered in the communities I work with – a care that has often been delivered quietly, without headline news, in rural village streets, community clinics and communal city stairs. It’s my hope that sharing some of those stories will help readers see more clearly what has been gained and lost so far through Covid-19, and what we’re still in danger of losing. It’s only by learning from this pandemic that we can better protect ourselves for the next one.

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Ned Palmer’s perfect Christmas cheese board

The author of A Cheesemonger’s History of the British Isles picks his favourite cheeses for the Christmas table.

Along with the stupefyingly large meal, the crackers, silly hats and terrible jokes, the cheeseboard is a great place to celebrate the traditions of a British Christmas. I would go with a selection of eminently traditional cheeses like Cheddar – the quintessential British cheese, Stilton – the other quintessential British cheese, and Wensleydale, which you will need to go with your Christmas cake. A good cheeseboard needs a decent range of flavours and textures, so I would add to this a Camembert, because everyone needs something luxuriantly gooey and stinky on their cheeseboard. Perhaps this board lacks a little oomph, so for the more jaded palate I would also pick a fulsome barnyardy washed-rind.

It’s all very well of course to say ‘Cheddar’ or ‘Stilton’, but there are a great range to choose from, and while maintaining our reverence towards the traditions of Christmas, there’s no reason not to ring the changes – in a limited and specific way of course. With those thoughts in mind, here is my perfect Christmas Cheeseboard, with suggestions and substitutions.

Buy your copy of A Cheesemonger’s History of the British Isles

Follow @cheesetastingco on Twitter

CHEDDAR

The West Country is the home of Cheddar, so for a really traditional board, you could go with one of the great Somerset Cheddars –  Montgomery’s, Keens, Westcombe or Pitchfork, or the Devonian Quickes.

Ranging further afield there is Hafod, from West Wales, a gentle, soft buttery cheese, or Isle of Mull with notes of iodine, peat and a tang of smoke.

Less traditional is the richly complex Lincolnshire Poacher, a Cheddar/Gruyère hybrid combining the beefy savoury flavour of the former with the sweet nuttiness of the latter.

 

 

STILTON

I favour creaminess, complexity and balance in a Stilton – with a restrained amount of blueing. Colston Basset, hand ladled for extra creaminess is my personal favourite, but Cropwell Bishop, Hartington’s, Tuxford and Tebbut and Websters all have a noble pedigree, and it’s worth trying them all until you find yours.

For an unpasteurised alternative there is the equally complex and creamy Stichelton with its notes of bubblegum, malted milk and Marmite, Leicestershire’s Sparkenhoe Blue – firm and fudgey, or the wilder Northern Irish Young Buck.

 

 

 

WENSLEYDALE

This gentle, mild slightly crumbly cows’ milk cheese is part of a family unique to Britain – the Territorials – which includes Red Leicester, Double and Single Gloucester, Cheshire, Lancashire and Caerphilly. There are many producers to choose from, some of my favourites in order are, Sparkenhoe, Martell’s, Crump’s and Smart’s; Appleby’s and Bourne’s, Kirkhams; Trethowans and Ducketts – what a mouthful!

The role of the Territorials – and this is something our friends in the North have taught us – is to be had with Christmas cake,  its sweet stickiness and the savoury salty tang of the cheese intertwine in an enlivening yet comforting way. If you are in Yorkshire, the cheese would have to be Wensleydale. Hawes’ is the most widely known, with its simple fresh flavour, but there has been a recent revival of more traditional styles often with a mould rind, like Whin Yeats (AKA Fellstone), Stonebeck and Richard III. If you happen to be in Lancashire then it’s Kirkhams Lancashire of course, and if you are lucky you might find a piece of Mrs Kirkham’s Christmas Cake to go with it.

CAMEMBERT

Fromagerie Reaux’s camembert de Normandie  would be a very traditional choice, but whichever producer you favour, do look for the ugly fruit of the Camembert family, a good one ought to have a rumpled wrinkly surface with tawny pinkish flecks setting off the snowy white of its mould rind.

Closer to home there is Tunworth (pictured), made in Hampshire, with all the gooiness, rumpled rind and creamy cabbagey flavour you desire. Raymond Blanc, who knows a thing or two about French cheese, says it’s the best Camembert in the world. Apparently, he’s not allowed back into France until he says sorry.

 

 

 

WASHED-RINDS

Washed in brine, and often after that in some sort of booze, these cheeses are a little more contentious, since the washing creates a pink sticky rind with pungent aromas of the farm yard along with meaty smokey flavours. Epoisses washed in Marc de Bourgogne, is pretty hefty, Langres, washed in Marc de Champagne is gentler.

Back home there is the world famous Stinking Bishop, whose bark is way more friendly than its bite, Edmund Tew mild, creamy with a hint of fresh yeast, or the rumbustious Renegade Monk, a novel hybrid style combining washed-rind with blue.

A big part of Christmas indulgence is the boozing of course, and it is well to pay some attention to your cheese and booze pairings. Personally I am not a big fan of red wine and cheese, I find the tannin in many reds reacts badly with the creamy texture and can lead to bitterness. If you must have a red, have a lighter one like a youngish Pinot Noir or even a Beaujolais-Villages. Off-dry whites are the most versatile partner for cheese, so late bottled Rieslings, Pino Blanc and Gris, perhaps even a Gewürztraminer will all be fun. Champagne or any decent toasty sparkling wine is wonderful with a Camembert style, creating a decadent fizzy mousse in the mouth. Port is of course traditional, although I find rubies a little overwhelming for cheese. Try a white port if you can find one, they seem to get on well with cheese. Beer and cheese is a match worthy of more exploration and a rich dark porter or a warming brown ale make comforting partners to a range of British traditionals.

Plain crackers or sourdough bread make good accompaniments and I have nothing against pickles or chutneys. Rosebud Preserves to a lovely range and Branstons is a stalwart.

An actual independent cheesemonger, or a good deli is your best bet for really good cheese. Many of these are selling online in these interesting times, which vastly increases your choices. I have a list of some favourites on my website Cheese Tasting Co. For a supermarket, Waitrose would be my starting point as they often have a dedicated cheese counter, and have some of the cheeses I have mentioned on their shelves. Tesco’s Finest range or the equivalent at any other supermarket are perfectly fine.

Other than that, remember to take your cheese out of the fridge at least half an our before you want to eat it so that the flavours have had some time to wake up. Finally, I would suggest that you have your cheese before pudding, so that there’s still room to have plenty.

Happy Christmas, Happy New Year and Happy Cheesing!

Buy your copy of A Cheesemonger’s History of the British Isles

 

 

 

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The Souvenir Press Christmas Book Gift Guide 2020

We are proud to publish book treasures for every shelf; non-fiction to help you grow, learn and live well.
Chosen by editor Calah Singleton, each of the books below would make a brilliant, thoughtful gift.

All books are available at your local bookshop or online via the links below.

For all our latest news and new non-fiction reads, join our newsletter and follow us on Twitter and Instagram.

Happy reading!

THIS BOOK WILL MAKE YOU KINDER

Henry James Garrett

Utterly charming illustrations paired with the words of one of the most compassionate people around. Henry James Garrett is an absolute joy to read.

Buy your copy

THE ARTIST’S WAY + THE ARTIST’S WAY WORKBOOK
Julia Cameron

The Artist’s Way is a classic for a reason, and Souvenir has given it the shiny new look it deserves. The ultimate way to reconnect with your creativity and yourself after a difficult year.

Buy your copy

The Artist’s Way Workbook is the perfect companion to The Artist’s Way. The exercises are inventive, thought-provoking and charming – they make you think, feel and get to work. I do at least a couple every week.

Buy your copy

SOLO

Rebecca Seal

Could there be a more timely book? Rebecca Seal has written the essential guide to working from home. From tips for fighting loneliness to figuring out what meaningful work looks like for you, this book is helpful for life – not just lockdown.

Buy your copy

SHE COMES FIRST

Ian Kerner

This is a thoughtful and thorough guide to women’s pleasure, and I know several people who swear by it. Buy a few for your friends to strategically leave around the house. This book has seen a surge this year, so perhaps 2020 hasn’t been a complete loss…

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BUILD YOUR RUNNING BODY

Pete Magill, Thomas Schwartz & Melissa Breyer

As someone who is planning, as I do every year, to start running in January, reading this book has been immensely illuminating. It’s not just for serious runners! There are great tips for how to stretch, how to pace yourself, and even how to enjoy running more.

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DICTIONARY OF OMENS AND SUPERSTITIONS

Philippa Waring

For the witchy ones in your life, or really just anyone who is curious about what it means when your tea is very bubbly. Packed full of history and folklore, this book is a true delight.

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EVERYTHING ISN’T TERRIBLE

Kathleen Smith

This book is practical and also Very Funny – it’s been a great help with managing my anxiety this year. It has exercises, examples, and general advice for how to navigate the more anxiety-inducing aspects of life. A must-have for anyone looking to approach 2021 with a bit more zen.

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CHOOSE YOUR OWN MIDLIFE CRISIS

Marie Phillips

A choose-your-own-adventure book that had me laughing out loud. Polyamory, ayahuasca and Botox are notable features, but this book has something for everyone.

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THE BOOK ON THE TABOO AGAINST KNOWING WHO YOU ARE

Alan Watts

Alan Watts’ legendary book encourages us to view ourselves as part of a larger whole. In a year where we have been so apart, this philosophical classic reveals a deeper understanding of each person’s place in the world. It’s profound and uplifting.
JUMP ATTACK
Tim S. Grover
From the legendary personal trainer of Michael Jordan (yes, THAT Michael Jordan) comes a book full of exercises and workouts that will get you in shape in no time. You may not be an elite athlete (yet!), but you can still train like one. Perfect for fans of ‘The Last Dance.’
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Announcing Kate Mosse’s An Extra Pair of Hands

A personal story of being an ‘extra pair of hands’ by bestselling author Kate Mosse, this is a celebration of older people and aging, and of finding joy in the smallest acts of everyday caregiving.

As our society ages and our medical system struggles to cope, more and more of us will find ourselves helping to care for a loved one at home. Yet this crucial act of love and compassion is one we so rarely celebrate. Ten years ago, Kate Mosse began to help her heroic mother care for her beloved father, who was suffering from Parkinson’s disease. In this lyrical and humorous book, she reflects on more than a decade of multi-generational living and being an ‘extra pair of hands’, first for her parents and now for her wonderful 90-year-old mother-in-law.

Interspersed with snapshots of the overlooked voices of carers of the past – from poems, diaries and folk remedies that have survived the centuries – Kate looks at the contemporary landscape of care in a world of slashed budgets and at the women bearing the brunt of austerity as they battle to hold families of all shapes and sizes together.

Mosse said: ‘This book is a tribute to three extraordinary people – my father, my mother and my mother-in-law. It is a celebration of older people and ageing, a story about learning to live differently, about loss and powerlessness, about landscape, about family, about grief. But most of all, it’s a story about love. It is a huge honour to be published by Wellcome Collection and Profile.’

Profile Books and Wellcome Collection will publish An Extra Pair of Hands as a £12.99 hardback in June 2021.

About Kate Mosse

Kate Mosse is an international bestselling novelist, playwright and nonfiction author with sales of more than seven million copies in thirty-eight languages. Renowned for bringing overlooked histories to life, she is a champion of women’s creativity. Kate is the Founder Director of the Women’s Prize for Fiction, sits on the Executive Committee of Women of the World and is a Visiting Professor of Contemporary Fiction and Creative Writing at the University of Chichester. Kate lives in West Sussex with her husband and mother-in-law, with her sisters and brothers-in-law, nieces and nephews nearby.

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www.katemosse.co.uk