At 2am on October 9th, 1974, police in the picturesque tidal basin area of Washington DC spotted a speeding car, weaving around, headlights off. They pulled it over, and out jumped a flamboyantly dressed woman, yelling in both English and Spanish. She promptly threw...
“The crooks already know these tricks; honest men must learn them in self-defense.” – so wrote nerd legend Darrell Huff, in his million-selling “How To Lie With Statistics” (1954). It’s a delightful little work, full of deceptive graphics, spurious correlations,...
I've been sent an advanced copy of Oliver Roeder's book Seven Games, and of course I'm delighted both by the premise and its execution. Roeder, a game theorist, puzzle fan and keen game player, dives deep into the world of high-level play of seven classic games:...
There's a fine line to walk between writing a book that argues that our mental state is surprisingly powerful, and writing a book that argues that if you ask the universe for a gift, the universe will respond. But @D_A_Robson walks the line skilfully here with The...
Publication day approaches for the paperback of "The Data Detective" (1 Feb). As always, pre-orders of the paperback, positive reviews if you've read the hardback, spreading the word - all are so valuable and very gratefully received. The UK edition of the same book,...
Business School professor Christian Stadler names his "best ten business books of 2021". A good list, including "The Data Detective" (US/Can readers can pre-order the paperback, out 1 Feb). Michael Bungay Stanier's "How To Begin" is out tomorrow. Classic self-help,...
"It was a tune with wings, trampling things, tightened strings, boggarts and bogles and brags on their feet; the man in the oak, sickness and fever, that set in long, lasting sleep the whole great world with the sweetness of sound the bone did play." Where to start...
My resolution this year is to read (and review) more books, so I thought I might start with a book that promises to help me form better habits: (@CDuhigg) Charles Duhigg's The Power of Habit. The book, which is a Gladwell-influenced...
As David Epstein @DavidEpstein recently pointed out in his newsletter, Range Widely, the first of January is a great time to make resolutions. Behavioural economist Katy Milkman @Katy_Milkman, with Hengchen Dai and Jason Riis, discovered evidence for a "fresh start...