Book Reviews

4.9

Chelsea Monroe-Cassel's The Elder Scrolls: The Official Cookbook translates over sixty in-game dishes from across the world of Tamriel — spanning Skyrim, Morrowind, and beyond — into real-world recipes for fans of the beloved video game franchise. Published by Insight Editions in March 2019, the cookbook is a confident piece of licensed fan merchandise from an author with deep experience in the video-game-cookbook niche. Publishers Weekly notes the book is "more gimmicky than go-to reference" but concedes it "will nevertheless inspire Elder Scrolls fans to create at least one feast" — a verdict that neatly frames both its appeal and its limits. This review assesses the book's content, organisation, and published reception from named sources, not a kitchen test.

Run Fast. Eat Slow.: Nourishing Recipes for Athletes: A Cookbook by Shalane Flanagan, Elyse Kopecky

4.8

Run Fast. Eat Slow.: Nourishing Recipes for Athletes is a New York Times bestselling cookbook co-authored by four-time Olympian and 2017 TCS New York City Marathon champion Shalane Flanagan and chef and nutrition coach Elyse Kopecky, built around the argument that athletic performance food can be simultaneously indulgent and deeply nourishing — a philosophy that earned the book strong endorsements from elite running figures and a wide readership beyond competitive athletes.

DK The Philosophy Book Big Ideas Simply Explained (DK Big Ideas). by D.K. Publishing

4.6

DK Publishing's The Philosophy Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained is a visually driven illustrated reference guide that surveys the history of philosophical thought — from antiquity to the modern age — designed to make foundational concepts in ethics, politics, and metaphysics accessible to beginners and established readers alike, as part of DK's award-winning, multimillion-copy Big Ideas Simply Explained series.

The Girl Behind the Gates: The gripping, heartbreaking historical bestseller based by Brenda Davies

4.6

A top ten bestselling debut historical novel published by Hodder & Stoughton, The Girl Behind the Gates is based on a true story and follows seventeen-year-old Nora Jennings, whose life is upended by the psychiatric system of 1939 — a raw, heartbreaking, and ultimately uplifting work of historical fiction that draws on author Brenda Davies's career as a consultant psychiatrist.

Sophie's World: 20th Anniversary Edition by J. Gaarder

Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World remains one of the most commercially successful Norwegian novels ever written — a genre-defying work that smuggles a comprehensive history of Western philosophy into a mystery-laden coming-of-age story, and the 20th Anniversary Edition marks the occasion with a new foreword by the author.

Critique of Pure Reason by

Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason (first published in 1781, with a revised second edition in 1787) is one of the most consequential works in the history of Western philosophy, undertaking a systematic investigation into the limits and scope of human reason and metaphysics — this Penguin Classics edition, translated by Max Müller and revised with an introduction by Marcus Weigelt, makes that landmark text available in a widely accessible English paperback.

Radical Candor: Fully Revised by Kim Scott

Kim Scott's Radical Candor, first published in 2017 and released in a fully revised and updated edition in 2019, is a business leadership book built around one core argument: managers do not have to choose between being a pushover and a jerk. By "caring personally while challenging directly," Scott's framework equips leaders to give honest, kind feedback — and the book's global reach, translated into 20 languages with more than half a million copies sold, reflects how widely that argument has landed.

Philosophy 101: From Plato by Paul Kleinman

Paul Kleinman's Philosophy 101: From Plato and Socrates to Ethics and Metaphysics, an Essential Primer on the History of Thought, published by Adams Media in October 2013, is a wide-ranging introductory reference that walks general readers through the major figures, schools, and thought experiments of Western philosophy — from the Pre-Socratics through thinkers such as Kant, Hegel, and Voltaire — in a compact, entry-by-entry format designed for curious newcomers rather than academic specialists.

A Simpler Life: A guide to greater serenity, ease, and clarity by The School of Life

A Simpler Life is a self-help guide from The School of Life — the global organisation founded under the direction of series editor Alain de Botton — that takes a psychological approach to minimalism, addressing not just the clutter in closets and calendars but the deeper roots of distraction and complexity in relationships, work, social life, and culture. Published in hardcover by The School of Life Press in May 2022, the book is designed for readers who crave a more pared-down, peaceful, and focused existence but recognise that surface-level decluttering is rarely enough to get them there. Multiple NetGalley reviewers responded warmly to its short, accessible chapters and its invitation to self-examination.

Don't Believe Everything You Think: The 6 Basic Mistakes We Make in Thinking by Thomas E. Kida

4.4

Published by Prometheus Books in 2006, Thomas E. Kida's Don't Believe Everything You Think is a popular-science work that identifies six core patterns of faulty reasoning — from misreading coincidence and fabricating associations to confirmation bias and the malleability of memory — and argues that scientific thinking offers a reliable corrective. Michael Shermer, publisher of Skeptic magazine and columnist for Scientific American, called it "exceptionally readable and delightfully informative," adding that Kida's six mistakes "should be printed on a laminated wallet-sized card and examined every morning before we go out into the world." The book is designed for general readers who want to recognize and counter the unconscious errors that distort everyday decision-making.

The Good Lord Bird (National Book Award Winner): A Novel by James McBride

4.4

James McBride's National Book Award–winning novel follows Henry "Little Onion" Shackleford, a young enslaved boy swept into John Brown's abolitionist crusade across the Kansas Territory and ultimately to the 1859 raid on Harpers Ferry — a wildly inventive, darkly comic recasting of one of American history's most explosive chapters.

Every Last Lie by Mary Kubica

3.7

Every Last Lie is a domestic suspense thriller by New York Times bestselling author Mary Kubica, structured around the alternating perspectives of Clara Solberg — a new mother convinced her husband was murdered — and Nick Solberg, whose chapters trace the secrets he kept in the months before his fatal car crash. Critics called it a compelling portrait of grief and coping, while Kirkus Reviews found it overwritten and polarizing; the novel sits squarely in the tradition of psychological domestic thrillers and will appeal most to readers who can invest in an unreliable, grief-consumed narrator.