David Farrier Nature’s Genius Evolution’s lessons for a changing planet 288pp. Canongate. £20. In David Farrier’s latest book, he warns us that humanity is endangering every facet of life on Earth thr

Enrique Vila-Matas Montevideo Translated by Sophie Hughes and Annie McDermott 240pp. Yale University Press. £14.99 (US $27). “Words are poor mountaineers and poor miners”, lamented the young Franz Kaf

An academic on the run in 1970s Brazil; a Saharan search for a missing daughter; an animated childhood in ’60s Japan...

PRAYERS, PIRKS AND PRAWNS

BRUSHING wind-whipped hair from her eyes, Catriona crouched, scanning the colourful smorgasbord of stones, seaweed and shells on the shoreline. There! Half-hidden under an empty limpet. A cowrie. Gent

I’m awake. Very awake. It’s early on a wind-whipped Sunday morning and I’m neck-deep in the sea off the Isle of Man’s north-east coast. The rain is steady, the swell is heavy and the water is gaspindu