If there’s one non-fiction book to treat yourself (and your friends) to next year, this is it. Well written easy to read, with such a new and refreshing insight into an issue of timeless importance in the world, since that first question was asked by our distant hominid ancestors. What is a question and where do they come from? How and why do we ask them? And, most critically, how can we harness their power for good? In education, in politics, in law, in medicine, and in our everyday lives. From her own deeply personal experience to her research and interviews across the world, Lani Watson’s book challenges us all to become better questioners. The answers we seek are only ever as good as the questions we ask and, as Indira Ghandi said, “The power to question is the basis of all human progress.” As a scientist and educator myself, questions are my bread-and-butter, but Lani Watson’s book shone a new light on my old ways.
'Q is one of those rare books that hands you back a capability you didn't realise you'd lost' DANIEL H. PINK
'Wonderful ... Immensely entertaining and compelling' SPECTATOR
Our lives are shaped by questions: they are how we connect, persuade and flourish. But we live in a world that wants answers.
Questions are engines of learning, catalysts for connection, and drivers of change. They direct our attention and make us feel closer to loved ones and strangers alike. In fact, we are the only species that truly asks questions of one another.
A neighbour recommended Pachinko as the best book he had read this year. I was sceptical at first but it quickly turned out to be one of mine too. An epic historical novel about a part of the world I love, but a time and place I knew very little about. Excellent, compelling and deeply moving. A ground sweep of Korean/Japanese history (1911-1989) told through the eyes of Kim Sunja, her unexpected pregnancy and extended family. We follow Sunja's life from her early years in a fishing village near Busan, Korea, then desperately poor and under Japanese colonial rule. She moves to Osaka in Japan, and grows to be the matriarch of her family's survival across four generations. It speaks of street food vendors and pachinko gambling houses, of systemic racism and the Yakusa, of suicide and hidden LGQBT, and of resilience to life’s traumas. I travel a lot in South Korea and Japan – this book has given me a view of their culture, richness and advances through the eyepiece of history.
* The million-copy bestseller* * National Book Award finalist * * One of the New York Times's 10 Best Books of 2017 * * Selected for Emma Watson's Our Shared Shelf book club *
'This is a captivating book... Min Jin Lee's novel takes us through four generations and each character's search for identity and success. It's a powerful story about resilience and compassion' BARACK OBAMA.
Yeongdo, Korea 1911. In a small fishing village on the banks of the East Sea, a club-footed, cleft-lipped man marries a fifteen-year-old girl. The couple have one child, their beloved daughter Sunja. When Sunja…
Gripping and fast-paced from the start, this was a crime thriller I couldn’t put down – with unexpected twists and turns to the very end. Two teenage girls, Serena and Poppy, become embroiled in an abusive relationship with their controlling, misogynistic and married schoolteacher. It ends in terrible disaster, and with the media-dubbed ‘Ice Cream Girls’ tried for murder. Poppy is convicted and sent to prison, while Serena is acquitted, but is this a tragic miscarriage of justice? Released after twenty years, Poppy seeks to reveal the truth and attribute justice where it truly belongs – but does it? Serena is happily married with children and a new identity – she will fight to protect her name. One of those books that left me wanting more, and I have now sought out Koomson’s other works.
At only eighteen years of age, Poppy and Serena were the only witnesses to a tragic event. Amid heated public debate and scrutiny, the two glamorous teens were dubbed 'The Ice Cream Girls' by the press and forced to go their separate ways and to lead very different lives. Twenty years later, Poppy is keen to set the record straight about what really happened, while married mother-of-two Serena wants no one in her present to find out about her past. But some secrets will not stay buried - and if theirs is revealed, their lives will start to unravel all…
The importance of the oceans to life on Earth cannot be overstated. Liquid water covers more than 70% of our planet's surface and, in past geological time, has spread over 85%. Life on Earth began in the oceans over 3.5 billion years ago and remained there for the great majority of that time. Today the seas still provide 99% of habitable living space, the largest repository of biomass, and holds the greatest number of undiscovered species on the planet. Our oceans are vital for the regulation of climate, and with global warming and decreasing land area, they have become increasingly important as the source of food, energy in the form of oil and gas, and for their mineral wealth. Oceans also form a key part of the biogeochemical cycles of carbon, nitrogen, and other elements critical to life. Nutrients in upwelling areas are spread by ocean currents, and the plankton of the seas supports a wealth of wildlife.
In this Very Short Introduction Dorrik Stow analyses these most important components of our blue planet and considers their relationship with, and exploitation by, humans. He shows how the oceans are an essential resource to our overpopulated world, and discusses why exploration and greater scientific understanding of the oceans, their chemistry, and their mineral wealth are now a high priority. Stow also explores what we know of how oceans originate, and evolve and change; the shape of the seafloor and nature of its cover; the physical processes that stir the waters and mix such a rich chemical broth; and the inseparable link between oceans and climate. As polar ice melts and sea-levels rise, countless millions who have made their homes on low-lying lands close to the sea are threatened. As scientific exploration of the seas gathers pace, the new knowledge gained of the ocean-Earth systems and their interaction with the human environment is vital to our understanding of how we can preserve these ultimately fragile environments.
