Europe
Asia
Oceania
Americas
Africa
A single-volume 2,500-year history
NATASHA HELLER
John Tolan Islam A new history from Muhammad to the present 304pp. Princeton University Press. £25 (US $29.95). James McDougall Worlds of Islam A global history 608pp. Allen Lane. £40. Elizabeth Drays
In Caravaggio’s “St Matthew and the Angel” (1602), the Bible seems to arrive as a shock to those who wrote it. Matthew, bare-armed and dirty-toed, is a fisherman stranded on dry land. Everything about
Jo Marchant In Search of Now The science and mystery of the present moment 336pp. Canongate. £20. Robert M. Hazen and Michael L. Wong Time’s Second Arrow Evolution, order, and a new law of nature 176p
“As movers and the moved both know”, John Updike noted, “books are heavy freight ... They make us think twice about changing addresses.” Books: A manifesto, or, How to build a library begins with the
“This tremendous aggregate of a book has many of the characteristics of a Festschrift assembled to honour some Great Influencer”: so, in 1973, the architectural historian Priscilla Metcalf began the f
Lola Young Eight Weeks Looking back, moving forwards, defying the odds 336pp. Penguin. Paperback, £10.99. Lola Young has been a crossbench member of the House of Lords since 2004. She is also an emeri