🧠Because truth is often stranger—and funnier—than fiction.
Memoirs, essays, and deep dives into everything from psychology to platypuses. Smart reads for curious minds.
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“The damnedest mixing of true crime, memoir, and maybe (?) ghost story I’ve ever read. The original Harper’s article gave me the shivers, and this deeper dive is going to have me looking over my shoulder on every hike. Unputdownable." — Patton OswaltWith the immediacy...
The brainy book by the bestselling author of Fermat's Enigma—a must for anyone interested in numbers and mathematics, as well as for the millions of Simpsons fans worldwide."Simon Singh's excellent book blows the lid off a decades-long conspiracy to secretly educate...
"This crash course in critical thinking . . . includes handy rules for evaluating the confused public discourse on climate change, evolution, and even UFOs." —DiscoverRecent polls suggest that fewer than forty percent of Americans believe in Darwin's theory of...
A mind-expanding, deeply humane tour of language by the bestselling author of Born on a Blue Day and Thinking in Numbers.Is vocabulary destiny? Why do clocks "talk" to the Nahua people of Mexico? Will A.I. researchers ever produce true human-machine dialogue? In this...
Answers to the questions that keep you up at night—from Why is bellybutton lint generally blue? to Why does catnip affect cats?BAFFLING AND BIZARRE.ENTERTAINING AND ENLIGHTENING.This witty and compulsive collection of trivia will captivate and surprise you with its...
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The New Yorker’s Best Books of 2024 • TIME’s 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2024 • New York Magazine’s 10 Best Books of the Year • Washington Post’s 50 Notable Works of Nonfiction of 2024 • Smithsonian’s 10 Best Science Books of the Year • A...
This practical guide to educated guessing shows you how to find answers to partly-defined mathematical problems—without needing proof or an exact calculation. In problem solving, as in street fighting, rules are for fools: do whatever works—don’t just stand there! Yet...
"A wide-ranging and dazzlingly informed book about the science of interactions. I can promise you'll be amazed." —Bill Bryson, chair of the 2005 Aventis General Prize Judging PanelWinner of the Aventis Prize for Science BooksAre there any "laws of nature" that...
"[A] marvelous book about the vital importance of librarians in the cyber age. . . . Move over, Google—make way for the . . . all-knowing lady behind the desk." —Christopher Buckley, New York Times–bestselling author of Losing Mum and PupIn a world of streaming media,...
A comprehensive encyclopedia providing the meanings, powers, facts, and folklore for over 1,001 flower species.For centuries, artists and lovers have used the secret language of flowers, or floriography, to discreetly send overt messages of their desires and emotions....