About 	 Lucy Rycroft: Lucy is the founder of The Hope-Filled Family, a ministry encouraging Christian parents, carers and all those investing in the younger generation. She is the author of several books for adults and children, including Busy Family Devotional and the Mighty Girl, Mighty God series. She is mum to four children ages 11 to 16, who arrived by birth and adoption, and is married to Al, a church leader in York, England.

	 Lucy Rycroft

5ive Guys FC

82ASK

A A Gill

About A D Swanston: Andrew Swanston read law at Cambridge, but was inspired to write by his lifelong interest in early modern history. His Thomas Hill novels – The King’s Spy, The King’s Exile and The King’s Return – are set against the backdrops of the English Civil War, Cromwell’s Commonwealth and the early Restoration respectively. He is also the author of Waterloo: The Bravest Man and Beautiful Star and Other Stories. His first historical thriller set during the reign of Elizabeth I – Incendium (published in paperback as The Incendium Plot) – introduced readers to the academic, lawyer and intelligencer Dr Christopher Radcliff, whose adventures continue in Chaos. Andrew Swanston lives in Surrey.

A D Swanston

A E Langsford

A G Hopkins

About A J Baime: A. J. BAIME is the New York Times best-selling author of The Arsenal of Democracy: FDR, Detroit, and an Epic Quest to Arm an America at War and Go Like Hell: Ford, Ferrari, and Their Battle for Speed and Glory at Le Mans. Both books are in development for major motion pictures. Baime is a longtime regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal, and his articles have also appeared in the New York Times, Popular Science, and Men’s Journal. He lives in Granite Bay, California. Visit him at facebook.com/ajbaime and trumanbook.com.

A J Baime

A J Jacobs

A J P Taylor

About A J Pollard: Anthony James Pollard is a British medieval historian, specialising in the fifteenth century and in particular the Wars of the Roses. A leading authority in the field, he is profesor emeritus of Teesside University. His books include North-Eastern England during the Wars of the Roses, Richard III and the Princes in theTower, Imagining Robin Hood: the Late Medieval Stories in Historical Context and Warwick the kingmaker: Politics, Power and Fame.

A J Pollard

A J Rochester

About A K Benjamin: A K Benjamin is a clinical neuropsychologist and the author of Let Me Not Be Mad: A Story of Unravelling Minds.

A K Benjamin

About A L Berridge: A. L. Berridge read English at Oxford, and taught for ten years before moving into television, where her production credits range from period drama and thrillers to long-running soaps. She has written two previous novels, Top Ten besteller Honour and the Sword and In the Name of the King. Into the Valley of Death is her third novel.

A L Berridge

About A L Gaylin: Alison Gaylin's first job was as a reporter for a celebrity tabloid, which sparked a lifelong interest in writing about people committing despicable acts. More than a decade later, she wrote and published her Edgar-nominated first novel, HIDE YOUR EYES. 
 
She's since published nine more books, including the USA Today and international bestselling Brenna Spector suspense series, which has been nominated for the Edgar, Anthony and Thriller awards and won the Shamus award. 
 
She lives in upstate New York with her husband, daughter, cat and dog.

A L Gaylin

A Maxwell-Hyslop

A McArthur

A P Wavell

About A S Webb: A.S. Webb is the Sunday Times bestselling author of Daughter of Chaos, the first instalment of The Dark Pantheon Trilogy. She is inspired by stories rooted in history and mythology, that push the boundaries of imagination and urge us to reflect on what it means to be human.

A S Webb

About A. A. Dhand / A. A. Dhand: A. A. Dhand is the author of six previous novels, and has been shortlisted for the CWA Steel Dagger Award. His DI Harry Virdee novels are currently being adapted for TV by the BBC. He was raised in Bradford and spent his youth observing the city from behind the counter of a small convenience store. After qualifying as a pharmacist, he worked in London and travelled extensively before returning to Bradford to start his own business and begin writing. The history, diversity and darkness of the city have inspired all his novels. For more information about A. A. Dhand and his books, follow him on X @aadhand, and on Instagram @aa_dhand.

A. A. Dhand

A. A. Gill

A. A. Milne

A. Anatoli

About A. B. Poranek / A. B. Poranek: A. B. Poranek grew up sharing her time between Ontario, Canada and rural Poland, and eventually completed a veterinary degree at the Warsaw University of Life Sciences. A lover of mythology and history, she enjoys exploring both in her writing. Her debut novel, Where the Dark Stands Still, an instant New York Times bestseller, is an ode to Poland's folktales, while A Treachery of Swans transports readers to a world inspired by 17th century France.

A. B. Poranek

A. Bradley

About A. C. Grayling / A. C. Grayling: Professor A. C. Grayling is Principal of the New College of the Humanities at Northeastern University, London, and a Supernumerary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford. He has written and edited over thirty books on philosophy, history, science and current affairs. For several years he wrote columns for the Guardian newspaper and The Times and was the chairman of the 2014 Man Booker Prize.

A. C. Grayling

About A. D. Miller / A. D. Miller: A.D. Miller is the author of Snowdrops, The Earl of Petticoat Lane and The Faithful Couple. Snowdrops was a bestseller and was shortlisted for many prizes including the Man Booker and the CWA Gold Dagger. It was translated into 25 languages. As Moscow Correspondent of The Economist A.D. Miller has travelled across the former Soviet Union and covered the Orange Revolution in Ukraine; he is now the magazine’s Culture Editor based in London. 
 
admillerbooks.com

A. D. Miller

A. E. Ellis

A. E. W. Mason

A. Humphreys

PublicationStatus

Brand

Format

AgeRange

Series

Imprint

CategoryLabel

Ian Bogost

In an era dominated by convenience and efficiency, you’d think life would be easier and, most importantly, happier. Shouldn’t all the time saved by technology leave us with more for ourselves? The Atlantic columnist, game designer and philosopher Ian Bogost thinks not. From digital tickets to automated taps, he argues that the simple, tactile pleasures of daily life have been replaced by sleek but soulless design. 
 
Through engaging anecdotes and sharp analysis of our dematerialized lives, Bogost uncovers how modern conveniences not only fail to deliver on their promises but also rob us of moments that keep us grounded and human. The Small Stuff is not a nostalgic trip through the analogue world of a bygone era but instead reframes our view of the material world from merely utilitarian into a site of joy and gratification. Finding happiness, Bogost shows us, doesn’t require complete self-transformation, but simply noticing the sensory pleasures all around us. 
 
Humorous, thought-provoking and practical, The Small Stuff is a manifesto for re-enchanting us with the world, by observing and enjoying the small moments that make up our lives.

The Small Stuff

The Sensory Enchantment of Everyday Life

Dan Wang

America used to pride itself on ambition. Today, it looks stuck. Meanwhile, China has been busy building the future. Over the past six years, technology analyst Dan Wang lived through China’s astonishing, messy progress and the dissolution of its relationship to the West. 
 
In Breakneck, Wang offers a new framework for understanding China — which helps us to see global geopolitics more clearly too. While China is an engineering state, fearlessly building megaprojects, America is a lawyerly society, reflexively blocking everything, good and bad. Building big has fuelled China’s economic ascent. At the same time, social engineering has led to unbearable costs, including the traumas of zero-Covid and the one-child policy. Wang traverses China’s dazzling metropolises and factory complexes, blending political and economic analysis with reportage to show how the Communist Party’s darkening ambitions have unsettled its people. 
 
As the US and China are gearing up for a new Cold War, Breakneck reveals both the remarkable strengths and the appalling weaknesses of the engineering state. China has learned from the West's successes and failures - and now we in turn can learn from China, not least by taking its global ambitions seriously.

Breakneck

China's Quest to Engineer the Future

Beeban Kidron

This is an insider’s guide to how politicians and policy makers have sold our democracy to Silicon Valley and what we need to do to take it back. 
 
In 2013, former Hollywood director Beeban Kidron made a ground-breaking documentary about the lives of children online. She uncovered a shocking story of exploitation and greed that changed everything – and ignited her relentless crusade to hold the tech giants accountable. 
 
In Users, Kidron reveals everything she’s learned from her life as a campaigner and legislator, taking you inside the halls of Parliament and the UN to the White House and Silicon Valley. Through her encounters with lobbyists and tech bros, you’ll witness the ruthless tactics these powerful men use to lie, cheat and steal their way to unchecked power, all while avoiding the rules and regulations meant to protect us. 
 
You’ll see how the issue is not technology itself, but its use and abuse. How tools built to connect people are redeployed to divide, punish, distract, and control; while our tech overlords come to own everything – but continue to be held responsible for nothing. Now that we know their game, it's time to fight back. This book will show you where it all went wrong, who's really to blame, and what we can do about it.

Users

What Big Tech Doesn't Want You to Know - and What to Do About It

David Rooney

‘Vivid and compelling’ John Lancaster 
‘A delectable serving of escapist nostalgia’ The Times, Book of the Week 
 
 A non-stop flight across the Atlantic might seem routine today. But it is only possible because of those who went first. 
 
Newfoundland, 1919. Buffeted by winds, an unwieldy aircraft – made mainly from wood and stiff linen – struggled to take off from the North American island’s rocky slopes. Cramped side by side in its open cockpit were two men, freezing cold and barely able to move, but resolute. They had a dream: to be the first in human history to fly, non-stop, across the Atlantic Ocean. But there were three other teams competing against them, and as the waves raged a few miles below, memories of wartime crashes resurfaced . . . 
 
Mining letters, diaries and evocative unpublished photographs, David Rooney’s deeply researched account of this audacious contest shows how it was the airmen’s thrilling wartime experiences that ultimately led them to the ‘Big Hop’, and brought old friends together for one more daring adventure. 
 
‘An excellent book… The Big Hop consists of colourful biographical sketches of the aviators who took part in the competition and thrilling accounts of their efforts’ Daily Mail 
 
‘The Big Hop is a glorious romp through an overlooked part of aviation history, stuffed full of intriguing characters and white-knuckle courage’ Sunday Times

The Big Hop

The first flight across the Atlantic and the ordinary heroes who risked their lives for it

The First Non-stop Flight Across the Atlantic and Into the Future

Tim Spector

'No one knows more about fermenting'' Davina McCall 
 
‘The master of gut health and intelligent eating' Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall 
 
An inspiring guide to the life-changing power of fermentation from world-leading gut scientist and no. 1 bestselling author Tim Spector 
 
From kombucha and kefir to sourdough, miso and coffee, Professor Tim Spector dispels the myths around fermented foods. He explains what fermented foods are, what to look for when buying them, how to make them at home, and why adding simple ferments to everyday meals can transform your gut health and overall well-being. 
 
Blending cutting-edge science with practical, reassuring advice, Ferment shows how small changes to what’s on your plate can make a big difference to your health. 
 
‘By the end of the book, I had jars of kombucha and sauerkraut brewing in my pantry’ New Scientist 
 
‘A super healthy and tasty gift for you and your gut microbiome’ Clare Bailey Mosley 
 
'Fermentation is the original wellness hack - and Tim reminds us that the best health breakthroughs can begin in a jar' Liz Earle

Ferment

The Life-Changing Power of Microbes

Sarah O'Connor

A tsunami of change, we are told, is sweeping the economy as robots and AI threaten to take over tasks done by humans. But while we worry that we’re robotizing our work, what if the real risk is that we’re robotizing ourselves? 
 
When prize-winning Financial Times journalist Sarah O’Connor set out to investigate what was happening on the front lines of technological change, she found people who weren’t losing their jobs to machines, but who felt they were losing something else instead. From translators forced to edit AI output to university graduates interviewed by software and warehouse workers surrounded by robots, she heard stories of work becoming lonelier, less creative, less human. 
 
But O’Connor also found hopeful stories of jobs being made better, safer and more enjoyable – where workers haven’t rejected the new tools, but instead have learned to control them. Exploring questions of power, design, institutions and ideas, her reporting shows that the way technology changes the world of work is not pre-determined, but must be contested and shaped by all of us. 
 
Inspired by stories from nineteenth-century English cotton mills to twenty-first century Swedish mines, We Are Not Machines reveals how we can fight for work which is more respectful of our limits, and more worthy of our minds.

We Are Not Machines

The Fight for the Future of Work

Benjamin Todd

You have about 80,000 hours in your career: 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year, for 40 years. Your choice of career is the most important decision you’ll make. 
 
So, what should you do? Most advice is based on no research, is woefully out of date for the age of AI, and offers (misleading) platitudes like ‘follow your passion’. Plus, if you want to help others, most advice defaults to medicine, when there are so many other careers that almost anyone can do that save 
more lives. 
 
Here, Benjamin Todd introduces a tried-and-tested toolkit that has already led thousands of people to the right path. It covers:<ul><li>What really makes for a dream job – and why it probably doesn’t involve ‘following your passion’.</li><li>How to identify which global problems are most pressing.</li><li>Which roles are likely to be automated, and how to ensure yours isn’t among them.</li></ul>It’s also full of practical tips and tools. You’ll come away with a plan to use your 80,000 hours in a way that’s rewarding and fulfils your potential to make a difference

80,000 Hours

How to Have a Fulfilling Career That Does Good

Minette Batters

Minette Batters was the first female president of the National Farmers’ Union in its 109-year history. During that time, she fought tooth and nail for the interests of farmers, never afraid to put her head above the parapet. 
 
But Minette’s expertise in British farming spanned many more years than her presidency. In fact, the union was the third act of a life lived at the heart of the farming community: first, she was born and raised on a farm and, even after her father warned her there was no future in farming, her heart brought her home to take over the family farm. In her third act, as advocate for the UK’s farming industry, she became not only a life-long farmer but the most visible agriculture expert in the UK, at a time when Brexit, Covid and international conflict has pushed our farms, and our food production, to a state of crisis. So, who better to understand how British farming really works? 
 
Blending memoir and manifesto, this book will be a powerful insight into the real life of farmers, a love letter to British rural life, and a rallying cry to save it – and how.

Harvest

Darragh McGee

'Meticulous and devastating... Read this book to learn the truth about the game you love' 
Oliver Bullough, author of Moneyland 
 
A cheeky flutter. All part of the game. Get closer to the action. A friendly, familiar voice, inviting you to join the real fans and get involved. What harm could it do… 
 
It has never been easier to stake a bet. Wall to wall adverts have hijacked every sporting event – the mobile slot machine in your pocket all you need to enter an immersive world in which gambling is faceless and frictionless, available 24/7, on almost any aspect of any sport. 
 
Since its origins as a provincial cottage industry almost twenty-five years ago, online gambling has become a globe-straddling behemoth worth more than £10 billion a year. It can sometimes feel as if the point of sport is to bet on it. 
 
How did we get here? How did a new wave of gambling brands hijack sport on a global scale? In Imitation Games, Darragh McGee travels the world to tell the incredible story of the digital brands who unleashed this new world of gambling onto a new generation of fans (and got very rich doing so). 
 
At the same time, he traces the harm and human cost that gambling leaves behind, and shows how we can create a different future for sport and society. Because when the fun stops, it stops hard. 
 
'At last we have a book that explains how we let this happen, what the real costs of the industry are, and what sport might do about it' 
David Goldblatt, author of The Game of our Lives 
 
'McGee takes readers on a gripping journey'Natasha Schüll, author of Addiction by Design

Imitation Games

How Gambling Hijacked Sport

Serhii Plokhy

On 16 July 1945, the Nuclear Age began with the explosion of the first atomic bomb and the words of J. Robert Oppenheimer: 'Now I am become Death, the Destroyer of Worlds.'While the threat of mutually assured destruction kept a lid on a simmering and tense geopolitical landscape, events like the Chernobyl disaster and near-misses like the Cuban Missile Crisis showed that total destruction was only ever one malfunction, mistake, or miscommunication away. Now, as governments re-arm their nuclear arsenals, treaties designed to limit the acquisition and use of nuclear weapons fall away, and nuclear weapons come increasingly within reach of non-state actors, we are on the brink of a renaissance of the nuclear industry.In The Nuclear Age, acclaimed historian Serhii Plokhy paints an intricate picture of a world governed by fear. From the first artificial splitting of the atom in 1917 and the race to create the first atomic bomb in World War II, through the fraught arms race of the Cold War, to the imperialism, neo-colonial motivation and wars being waged today, the threat posed by nuclear weapons is as pertinent as ever. 
 
As he examines the motivations of key players, Plokhy confronts the crucial question of our age: what can we learn from the first nuclear arms race that can help us to stop the new one?

The Nuclear Age

An Epic Race for Arms, Power and Survival

Fred Mills

'The best new popular science books of 2026' - New Scientist 
 
‘A ceaselessly uplifting and positive book’ – Mark Cooper-Jones, author of This Way Up by the Map Men 
 
‘More globe-trotting than an international spy’ – Chris Broad, author of Abroad in Japan 
 
‘Fred has a gift for turning megaprojects into stories you can feel’ – Grady Hillhouse, author of Engineering in Plain Sight and creator of Practical Engineering 
 
‘Mills rightly celebrates how thinking big is often the right answer.’ – Christian Wolmar, author of Blood, Iron and Gold: How the Railways Transformed the World 
 
 
Construction is the most important industry in the world. The homes we wake up to, the schools we raise our children in, the transport infrastructure we all use, the hospitals we rely on – all of it was built and enabled by construction. 
 
In Mega Builds, YouTube sensation Fred Mills charts the story of how ten colossal megaprojects are reshaping our modern world. Fred gives us a front row seat to a fascinating, fact-packed guided tour around the world, shining a spotlight on the incredible feats of engineering that serve as new chapters in the story of what’s to come. 
 
By the end of this book, you’ll learn:<ul><li>Why the world’s biggest city has been built in the worst place imaginable.</li><li>Where the vision of a single ruler in the desert is rewriting our understanding of what’s possible.</li><li>What drives us to build ever-higher buildings and design ever-faster trains.</li><li>And above all, how the dizzying scale of human imagination will inform the future of the man-made world.</li></ul> 
The trajectory of our civilisation is being authored today, all around us, not in words on a page but in steel and concrete, by an industry that most people completely overlook. Learn more about it in Mega Builds.

Mega Builds

Ten Colossal Construction Projects That Will Change Our World

Naomi Alderman

What’s the most useful thing you could know about your own life?In this era-defining book, developed from her groundbreaking Radio 4 essay series, Naomi Alderman turns her boundless curiosity and incisive thinking to a question that affects us all: how do we understand, and navigate, the epoch we’re living through? She calls this epoch the Information Crisis. 
 
The internet has flooded us with more knowledge, opinions, ideas, opportunities, as well as verbal attacks and misinformation, than ever before. It lets us learn more quickly and also spread falsehood more quickly, it brings us together and also divides us in new ways, it is now the lens through which we perceive and understand the world. There is no going back. But we have been here before. In fact, this is humanity’s third information crisis. 
 
The first, the invention of writing 5,000 years ago, and the second, the invention of the printing press 600 years ago, drastically reshaped our perceptions, interactions and mental landscapes in ways that feel acutely familiar. Overwhelmed by information, people become afraid and angry, unsettled and distressed, as well as more knowledgeable, educated and curious. By looking at those previous information crises, both the turmoil and the advances, Alderman asks what we can learn from the past to better understand our present, and prepare for our future. 
 
Drawing on the work of philosophers and historians, Don’t Burn Anyone at the Stake Today explores how new technology opens up new ways of being and helps us chart a way forward (once again), through the turbulent seas of information overload.

Don’t Burn Anyone at the Stake Today

(and other lessons from history about living through an information crisis)

Nick Clegg

The global, open internet is fragmenting. 
 
As democracies seek to rein in the power of Big Tech, as Silicon Valley pivots to an America-first agenda, as authoritarian regimes such as China and Russia segregate their populations from the rest of the internet, the most powerful tool ever created for bringing the world together risks being dismantled. 
 
Taking us behind the scenes at Meta and his interactions with world leaders, Nick Clegg, Meta’s former President, Global Affairs, sets out where Big Tech has gone wrong, how Silicon Valley’s insularity has blinded it to its missteps, and the radical reforms of the global platforms that are now needed if they are to secure a long-term future. 
 
But he also makes the case that many of the charges against them – including that their algorithms polarise, manipulate and harm – are vastly overstated or simply untrue. And while new laws that regulate these corporations are essential, imposing national borders on the internet cannot be the answer. That will fatally undermine its capacity for knowledge-sharing, collaboration, education, trade, medical and scientific research, and ultimately for the improvement and empowerment of billions of lives. 
 
Radical, reasonable, deeply felt and disarmingly honest, How To Save the Internet sets out a blueprint for the global cooperation we need in order to reform Big Tech while preserving the fundamental openness of the internet on which our future so depends.

How to Save the Internet

The Threat to Global Connection in the Age of AI and Political Conflict

Mark Urban

'Punchy. Trenchant. Heavyweight. Mark Urban’s Tank blows the doors off, just as you’d expect from such an accomplished author. Take cover!’ Damien Lewis, author of SAS Great Escapes 
 
An authoritative history of the tank and the remarkable individuals who designed them and fought in them, from a former officer and best-selling historian 
 
Tanks are the ultimate embodiment of industrial age warfare. In the popular imagination, they represent both a terrifying beast of destruction and a potent symbol of liberation. 
 
The technology behind these war machines has evolved relentlessly, and yet the coming of the information age has led many to predict that drones, missiles, and Artificial Intelligence have made the tank obsolete. Time and again, however, tanks have continued to shape – and be shaped by -- battles around the world, from their introduction in 1916, through the Second World War and tank-on-tank fights in 1990s Iraq, to the current conflict in Ukraine. 
 
In TANK, best-selling historian and former officer in the Royal Tank Regiment Mark Urban draws on wide-ranging accounts from soldiers, designers, and politicians, from Winston Churchill to Volodymyr Zelensky, to tell the remarkable story of one of the most important developments in military history. Through the ten most important vehicles ever made, Urban chronicles the incredible advances in tank technology – starting with the Mark IV, the first British tank to be used in large numbers in WW1, and following the story through the T-34 and Tiger to the M1 Abrams, a product of huge American Cold War investment that is still used to this day. 
 
Officially supported by The Tank Museum and using never-before-seen archival sources, interviews and declassified documents, this is a fascinating history of the vehicle that changed conflict forever. 
 
‘An illuminating and exciting drive through the mud and blood of twentieth-century warfare' Dr Robert Lyman, author of Operation Suicide

Tank

The 10 War Machines That Changed the World and the Remarkable Men Behind Them

Scott Galloway

‘You need this book.' Steven Bartlett, author of The Diary of a CEO 
New York Times bestseller 
 
The world is changing. It's time for a new financial playbook. 
 
In this must-have guide to optimizing your life for wealth, success and happiness, you'll learn: 
 
• how to find and follow your talent 
• what small steps you can take now that pay big returns later 
• how to develop better financial habits 
 
Bursting with practical, game-changing advice from one of the world's most popular business school professors, The Algebra of Wealth is the practical guidebook you need to win today's wealth game. 
 
Today's workers have more opportunities and mobility than any previous generation. They also face unprecedented challenges, including inflation, labour and housing shortages, and climate volatility. 
 
Even the notion of 'retirement' is undergoing a profound rethink, as our lifespans extend and our relationship with work evolves. In this environment, the tried-and-true financial advice our parents followed no longer applies. 
 
In The Algebra of Wealth, Galloway lays bare the rules of financial success in today's economy. In characteristic unvarnished, no-BS style, he explains you what you need to know in order to improve your chances of achieving economic security no matter what.

The Algebra of Wealth

A Simple Formula for Success

Simon Rogers

Ever wondered what goes through other people’s minds – their silly questions, their inner anxieties, hopes and dreams? In What We Ask Google, Simon Rogers explores insights from the world's biggest dataset: an epic snapshot, two decades long and counting, of our collective brain. What it reveals about us might surprise you. 
 
Every June, for instance, the UK sees a spike in searches for ‘how to help a bee’. Reassuringly, people consistently want to know, ‘How often can you donate plasma?’ And despite superficial differences (such as the deeply divided world map of cat people vs dog people), humanity has a lot more in common than we often acknowledge: after all, everywhere around the world, it’s 2am when parents want to know how to get their baby to sleep. 
 
Brimming with insights that vary from the playful to the profound, What We Ask Google delves into the momentous and the mundane secrets of what we ask when we get the chance to ask anything, offering a surprisingly hopeful picture of humankind.

What We Ask Google

A surprisingly hopeful picture of humankind

Karen Hao

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award 2025 
Longlisted for the 2025 Financial Times &amp; Schroders Business Book of the Year 
Shortlisted for Foyles Non Fiction Book of the Year 2025 
A New York Times Bestseller 
 
An eye-opening account of the tech arms race shaping out planet, from an award-winning journalist and AI insider to the world of Sam Altman and OpenAI 
 
When longtime AI expert and journalist Karen Hao first began covering OpenAI in 2019, she thought they were the good guys. Founded as a nonprofit with safety enshrined as its core mission, it was meant, its leader Sam Altman told us, to act as a check against more purely market forces. 
But the core truth of this massively disruptive sector is that it requires an unprecedented amount of proprietary resources: the ‘compute’ power of scarce high-end chips, the sheer volume of data that needs to be amassed at scale, the humans on the ground ‘cleaning it up’ for sweatshop wages throughout the Global South, and a truly alarming spike in the need for energy and water underlying everything. We have entered a new, ominous age of empire with OpenAI setting a breakneck pace, as a small group of the most valuable companies in human history try to chase it down. 
In exhilarating prose and with unparalleled access to those closest to Sam Altman, Hao recounts the meteoric rise of OpenAI and shows us the sinister impact that this industry is having on society.

Empire of AI

Inside the reckless race for total domination

Hannah Critchlow

The powerful and practical guide to strengthening your mind for the modern world and thriving in the age of AI, from acclaimed neuroscientist and Sunday Times bestselling author Dr Hannah Critchlow. 
 
How do we nurture our brains – and our children’s brains – so we have the resilience to thrive during the coming wave of technological and societal change? How can we keep up in the face of AI? The 21st Century Brain provides the answers. 
 
In her empowering and practical new book, bestselling neuroscientist Dr Hannah Critchlow takes you on a journey through the fascinating landscape of the latest neuroscience research, detailing how we can develop the essential human skills that technology cannot replace – and that matter most for personal fulfilment, wellbeing and long-term success. 
 
Grounded in the latest science, you’ll discover how to strengthen and future-proof essential skills, including: 
· Emotional intelligence and collaboration 
· Imagination, creativity, and flexible thinking 
· Long-term thinking and decision-making 
· Adaptability and mental resilience 
· Intuition, loyalty, and connection 
 
Writing in her informative and accessible voice, Dr Critchlow shows why our greatest strengths lie not in competing with machines, but in becoming more fully human. 
 
Blending fascinating research with practical advice and simple brain exercises, The 21st Century Brain is the must-read guide to navigating rapid technological change with confidence.

The 21st Century Brain

Cutting edge neuroscience to help us navigate the future

Adam Higginbotham

THE PHENOMENAL GLOBAL BESTSELLER. 
 
'Superb, enthralling and necessarily terrifying . . . every step feels spring-loaded with tension... extraordinary.' 
THE NEW YORK TIMES 
- 
The story of Chernobyl is more complex, more human, and more terrifying than the Soviet myth. Adam Higginbotham has written a harrowing and compelling narrative which brings the 1986 disaster to life through the eyes of the men and women who witnessed it first-hand. 
 
Drawing on hundreds of hours of interviews conducted over the course of more than ten years, as well as letters, unpublished memoirs, and documents from recently-declassified archives, this book makes for a masterful non-fiction thriller. 
 
Chernobyl has become lodged in the collective nightmares of the world: shorthand for the spectral horrors of radiation poisoning, for a dangerous technology slipping its leash, for ecological fragility, and for what can happen when a dishonest and careless state endangers not only its own citizens, but all of humanity. It is a story that has long remained in dispute, clouded from the beginning in secrecy, propaganda, and misinformation. 
 
Midnight In Chernobyl is an indelible portrait of history's worst nuclear disaster, of human resilience and ingenuity and the lessons learned when mankind seeks to bend the natural world to his will - lessons which, in the face of climate change and other threats - remain not just vital but necessary. 
Now, Higginbotham brings us closer to the truth behind this colossal tragedy. 
- 
'Tells the story of the disaster and its gruesome aftermath with thriller-like flair . . . wonderful and chilling ... written with skill and passion.' 
THE OBSERVER 
 
'An invaluable contribution to history.' 
SERHII PLOKHY, EVENING STANDARD 
 
A New York Times Best Book of the Year 
A Time Best Book of the Year 
A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Year 
Longlisted for the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize 
2020 Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence Winner

Midnight in Chernobyl

The Untold Story of the World's Greatest Nuclear Disaster

Tony Fadell

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. 
 
An unorthodox guide to making things worth making, from 'the father of the iPod and iPhone' and the creator of Nest. 
 
Everyone deserves a mentor. 
 
For every career crisis, every fork in the road, you need someone to talk to. Someone who's been there before, who knows exactly how wobbly and conflicted you feel, who can give it to you straight: 
 
Here's how to think about choosing a job. 
Here's how to be a better manager. 
Here's how to approach design. 
Here's how to start a company. 
Here's how to run it. 
 
Tony Fadell learned all these lessons the hard way. He spent the first 10 years of his career in Silicon Valley failing spectacularly, and the next 20 building some of the most impactful devices in history - the iPod, iPhone, and Nest Learning Thermostat. He has enough stories and advice about leadership, design, startups, mentorship, decision making, devastating screwups, and unbelievable success to fill an encyclopedia. 
 
So that's what this book is. An advice encyclopedia. A mentor in a box. 
 
But Tony's doesn't follow the standard Silicon Valley credo that you have to radically reinvent everything you do. His advice is unorthodox because it's old school. Because it's based on human nature, not gimmicks. 
 
Tony keeps things simple: he just tells you what works. He gives you exactly what you need to make things worth making. 
 
PRAISE FOR BUILD 
This is the most fun - and the most fascinating - memoir of curiosity and invention that I've ever read.' 
 
Malcolm Gladwell, 
Host of the Revisionist History podcast. Author of Outliers and Talking to Strangers. 
 
 
Whether you're looking to build a great product, a creative team, a strong culture, or a meaningful career, Tony's guidance will get you thinking and rethinking.' 
 
Adam Grant, 
Author of Think Again & Host of the TED podcast WorkLife

Build

An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making

Jamie Bartlett

A BBC ‘BOOK YOU NEED TO READ IN 2026’ 
 
Discover how artificial intelligence thinks and reasons, and how we can make the most of their super-human abilities, in the must read new book from the prize-winning technology writer and author of The Dark Net and The People vs Tech. 
 
‘[An] essential read’ Emma Saunders, BBC Culture Reporter 
 
Knowing how to speak to AI – and how not to – is a skill that everyone now needs. 
 
Hundreds of millions of people now talk to AI, such as ChatGPT, every day. They organise their finances and holidays, ask advice, seek therapy and find love – via machines. Almost overnight, chatbots are transforming society, politics and business. This is one of the biggest and fastest technological changes in history. 
 
However, most people still don't really understand how AI works, how to make the most of it – or what the dangers are. As some people use it to turbo-charge their productivity at work, others are falling into dangerous conspiracies, delusions and psychosis. 
 
In How to Talk to AI, award-winning technology writer Jamie Bartlett takes you inside the machine: showing how we can stay in control of our powerful new companions, even as they are changing the way we live, feel, and think. 
 
Written in his accessible style, How to Talk to AI is the essential and empowering guide to help you understand how to make the most of these incredible new technologies, without succumbing to new powers of manipulation and control. 
 
Praise for Jamie Bartlett: 
 
‘This book could not have come at a better moment’ Sunday Times 
 
‘One of the world’s leading experts on the digital revolution’ David Patrikarakos, Literary Review 
 
‘Eye-opening … Bartlett is an informal yet informed guide’ Times Literary Supplement 
 
‘Confident and well-informed’ New Scientist 
 
‘A hell of an achievement... Buy it and read it.’ The Times 
 
‘Fascinating… Jamie Bartlett is an expert guide’ Independent 
 
‘Highly readable’ Financial Times 
 
‘Smart, provoking reportage… Required reading for anyone’ Tom Chatfield, author of Wise Animals: How Technology Has Made Us What We Are

How to Talk to AI

(And How Not To)

Stephen Witt

** WINNER OF THE FT SCHRODERS BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2025 ** 
**A SUNDAY TIMES, ECONOMIST AND FINANCIAL TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2025** 
 
This is the story of the company that is inventing the future. 
 
Nvidia is the world’s first $5-trillion company and the most important corporation on Earth. Led by its charismatic CEO, Jensen Huang, it has gone from video game equipment manufacturer to conquering the global market for AI hardware, reinventing the computer and shaping life as we know it. 
 
With unprecedented access to Huang, award-winning investigative journalist Stephen Witt takes us inside Nvidia to tell the definitive story of the greatest technology company of our times. It is the astonishing story of renegade engineers and Silicon Valley disrupters, of fearless entrepreneurs and one revolutionary leader with an extraordinarily singular vision.

The Thinking Machine

Jensen Huang, Nvidia, and the World’s Most Coveted Microchip

Sebastian Mallaby

Even in a tech world crowded with visionary leaders, Demis Hassabis is recognized as a special case. Born to working class, immigrant parents in North London, a chess prodigy by five and wizard coder in his teens, he turned down a seven-figure job offer from a video-game studio to study science at Cambridge. Long before the current obsession with AI, he founded the path-breaking company DeepMind in order to pursue a single, audacious goal: the dream of artificial superintelligence, which would solve humanity’s hardest problems, change life and work as we know it, and perhaps even unlock the deepest mysteries of the Universe. For his scientific achievements, he won a Nobel Prize in 2024, and his company, now Google DeepMind, is considered the tech giant’s engine room. 
 
For the past three years, Sebastian Mallaby has had unprecedented access to Hassabis and DeepMind, conducting hundreds of hours of interviews with him and his inner circle as well as detractors and rivals at other companies. The result is a revelation-packed portrait of a singular mind and a historic reckoning with the AI revolution, a shift potentially more significant than any since the dawn of complex thought 70,000 years ago. 
 
As Mallaby chronicles, DeepMind is locked in an arms race with Silicon Valley competitors to build artificial general intelligence, and thereby become the keeper of humanity’s future. Yet this is not a Silicon Valley story. Hassabis has remained in Britain, and unlike his rivals, his aims are not wealth and power but scientific enlightenment. Like them, however, he is haunted by the memory of Robert Oppenheimer, the creator of the atom bomb. He aims to control the technology, but the technology may ultimately control him – and humanity writ large.

The Infinity Machine

Demis Hassabis, DeepMind and the Quest for Superintelligence

Christopher Summerfield

‘Engaging, insightful, panoramic’ Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Microsoft AI & Cofounder of DeepMind 
 
Stunning advances in digital technology have introduced a new wave of human-like AI systems. Chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini are already reshaping economies, challenge democracies, and reshaping society in unpredictable ways. And soon, these AI systems could make autonomous decisions on their users' behalf, transforming everything we do. Understanding how they work is crucial. 
 
Can AI systems think, know, and understand?Could they manipulate or deceive you, and if so, what might they make you do?Whose interests do they represent?When will they be able to move beyond words and take action in the real world? 
 
Neuroscientist and AI researcher Christopher Summerfield explores these questions, charting AI's evolution from early ideas in the seventeenth century to today's deep neural networks. His book is the most accessible, up-to-date, and authoritative exploration of this radical technology. With an understanding of AI's inner workings, we can address the existential question of our age: can we look forward to a technological utopia, or are we writing ourselves out of history?

These Strange New Minds

How AI Learned to Talk and What It Means

Maggie Aderin

From a childhood in Camden to the frontiers of space, an inspirational memoir from space scientist, presenter of The Sky at Night, and bestselling author Maggie Aderin. 
 
'I'd toast the moon and look at the sky... I think it draws us to it; we wonder what lies beyond.' 
 
Maggie Aderin's destiny was always written in the stars. From the age of three, inspired by The Clangers, her dream was to go into space. Throughout a chaotic childhood, ricocheting between divorced parents and acrimonious custody battles, she attended thirteen schools in fourteen years – but while her environment regularly changed, her fascination with the Universe did not. It became enmeshed in her desire to succeed as a scientist even when her school careers advice was to become a nurse. 
 
Starchild is Maggie’s emotionally honest and revealing memoir, telling a story of education and prejudice, adversity and ambition, motherhood and the moon – all recounted in her characteristically warm and relatable style. From being the only Black woman on her physics course at Imperial College London, to her groundbreaking work on the James Webb and Gemini telescopes, to starting her own public speaking company and sharing the wonders of science with thousands of children every year, Maggie’s story will inspire you to never give up on your dreams.

Starchild

My Life Under the Night Sky

Alexander C.Karp

Nicholas W.Zamiska

**THE SUNDAY TIMES AND #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER** 
 
A sweeping indictment of the West’s culture of complacency and a passionate call to wake up to our new reality from the bold thinkers behind tech giant PalantirOur most brilliant engineering minds once collaborated with government to advance world-changing technologies. Their efforts secured the West’s dominant place in the geopolitical order. But that relationship has now eroded, with perilous repercussions. 
 
In this ground-breaking treatise, one of tech’s boldest thinkers and his longtime deputy offer a searing critique of our collective abandonment of ambition. Palantir co-founder and CEO Alexander C. Karp and Nicholas W. Zamiska argue that in order for the West to retain its global edge?and preserve the freedoms we take for granted?the software industry must renew its commitment to addressing our most urgent challenges, including the new arms race of artificial intelligence. 
 
At once iconoclastic and rigorous, this books also lifts the veil on tech giant Palantir and its broader political project from the inside, offering a passionate call for the West to wake up to our new reality.

The Technological Republic

Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West

Tom Jamieson

Nev Fountain

The impressions show that needs no introduction - with bonus End of Year specials 
 
Radio 4’s award-winning and hugely popular comedy show is back with yet another helping of political-vituperation, media-mauling and celebrity-savaging. Sit back and treat your ears to a bumper edition of superb satirical impressions from the team - Jon Culshaw, Lewis MacLeod, Jan Ravens, Jess Robinson, Duncan Wisbey and Jason Forbes. 
 
Series 26 delivers Greta Thunberg coming to Rachel Reeves’s rescue and Gary Lineker trying something new… Enjoy a mad mix of super injunctions, super heroes, the Epstein files and, er, Diane Abbott. In this series the team's vocal firepower has Iran playing host to a surprising WMD Inspector, Laura Kuenssberg being de-escalated, and Ross Kemp on Grooming Gangs. Trump drops the F-Bomb, Lammy drops another clanger, money saving expert Martin Lewis drops into NATO and in a moment of pure, meta-madness Netanyahu, Trump and Putin play Just A Minute. 
 
Since January 2000, Dead Ringers has served up razor-sharp caricatures and explosively satirical truth-bombs and this latest offering is no exception. Laugh-out-loud as these impressive impressionistas make listening magic out of current affairs. 
 
 
Cast and credits 
Starring Jan Ravens, Jon Culshaw, Lewis Macleod, Jess Robinson, Jason Forbes, Duncan Wisbey and Kieran Hodgson 
 
Written by Nev Fountain, Tom Jamieson, Laurence Howarth, Tom Coles, Sophie Dickson, Toussaint Douglass, Rob Darke, Cody Dahler, Edward Tew, Jon Holmes, Davina Bentley, Katie Sayer, Alice Bright, Chris Donovan, Peter Tellouche, Lizzy Mansfield, Rachel E. Thorn, Jennifer Walker, Cooper Mawhinny-Sweryt, Alex Buchanan, Chris Ballard, Joe Topping, Phoebe Butler, David Whitehead, Nicky Roberts, Pete Redfern, Vicky Richards, Ali Panting and Declan Kennedy 
 
Created by Bill Dare 
Produced by John Holmes 
Executive Producers: James Robinson, Peter Strauss and Richard Morris 
Production Co-ordinators: Caroline Barlow and Jodie Charman 
 
First Broadcast BBC Radio 4, 13th Jun - 18th Jul 2025 (series 26), Dec 2025 (Specials) 
 
©2026 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P)2026 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

Dead Ringers: Series 26 Plus Christmas Specials

The BBC Radio 4 Impressions Show

Eric Schlosser

‘The history of the twentieth century was dominated by the struggle against totalitarian systems of state power. The twenty-first will no doubt be marked by a struggle to curtail excessive corporate power.’ 
 
This landmark work of reportage exposed how a handful of fast-food giants came to dominate America and remake the world in their image: eroding wages, damaging consumers’ health and wrecking the environment. From talking to workers at meatpacking plants with shocking safety records to revealing the tactics used to target ever-younger customers, Eric Schlosser’s blend of humane storytelling and meticulous research encouraged millions to question the industrial food system, and to rethink the way they eat.

Fast Food Nation

The Dark Side of the All-American Meal

What The All-American Meal is Doing to the World

Jason Hazeley

Simon Evans

David Tyler

Frank Skinner hosts series 3 of the panel game based on what we all sit down and do at least once a day – shop online and leave a review, as an all-star panel celebrate the good, the bad & the baffling 
 
Everyone has an online life, and when the great British public put pen to keyboard to leave a review, they almost always write something hilarious. And our all-star panel have to work out just what they were reviewing – and maybe contribute a few reviews of their own... and more... So if you’re the person who went on Trip Advisor to review Ben Nevis as “Very steep and too high”, this show salutes you! 
 
In episode one, Frank & the team discuss looking too much at cats, looking too much like dogs and what to do when your crowbar is the wrong size. With Ian Smith, Jo Caulfield, Pierre Novellie and Rachel Parris. 
 
In episode two, Frank & the team discuss the most fashionable way to wear a pizza, the most unfashionable way to wear a Tam o’Shanter and the tallest swimming trunks in the world. With Dee Allum, Marcus Brigstocke, Hasan Al-Habib and Bella Hull. 
 
In the third episode, Frank & the team discuss the usual; potatoes, limes, feathers, drainage systems of Ancient Civilizations etc etc... With Simon Evans, Harriet Kemsley, Chloe Petts and Rajiv Karia. 
 
In episode four, Frank & the team find out the right way to get frightened by lions, the wrong way to clean a delicious crevice, and what to do if your arms don’t reach the kitchen. With Ahir Shah, Louise Young, Freya Parker and Pierre Novellie. 
 
Episode five, and Frank and the team check out a hospital in Prague, a cheesesteak in New Jersey and how real men cut their nosehairs. With Simon Evans, Jo Caulfield, Kerry Godliman and Ed Byrne. 
 
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas for episode six as Frank and the team don green tights and angels’ wings and jiggle suspiciously to play a Xmas-flavoured episode of the panel game. With Kiri Pritchard-McLean, Sunil Patel, Simon Evans and Ania Magliano. 
 
And in the final episode, Frank & the team discuss giant frogs, redundant tingles and being unexpectedly Danish. With Lucy Porter, Anna Thomas, Finlay Christie and Daliso Chaponda. 
 
Production credits 
Hosted by Frank Skinner 
Devised by Jason Hazeley and Simons Evans with the producer David Tyler 
Written by Frank Skinner, Catherine Brinkworth, Sarah Dempster, Gareth Gwynn, Jason Hazeley, Rajiv Karia, Karl Minns, Katie Sayer & Peter Tellouche 
 
A Pozzitive production for the BBC. 
 
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4, 18 Nov – 30 Dec 2025 
 
(C)2026 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P)2026 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

One Person Found This Helpful: Series 3

A BBC Radio 4 Comedy Panel Game

Christine Rosen

The Extinction of Experience reveals the true cost of our digital age – and shows us how to return to the real world, while we still can. 
 
‘A passionate case for the human experiences which are central to a truly vibrant and meaningful existence’ OLIVER BURKEMAN 
 
'Christine Rosen finds the words I've longer for ... an extremely important book' JONATHAN HAIDT 
 
Human experiences are disappearing. 
 
Community is now found online; schools prioritise typing; and with headphones in and eyes glued to our phones, we’ve even obliterated boredom. Convenient and entertaining, certainly, but with each technological embrace we risk becoming more machine-like ourselves. 
 
In this insightful reckoning with modern life and its acutely modern malady, Christine Rosen leads us toward a healthier, wiser and more humane way. 
 
'Illuminating ... well-argued and well-principled' TELEGRAPH, BEST BOOK OF 2025 
 
'Essential reading in a dislocated world' KATHERINE MAY

The Extinction of Experience

How to Be Human in a Digital World

Reclaiming Our Humanity in a Digital World

The year is 1Q84. This is the real world, there is no doubt about that. But in this world, there are two moons in the sky. Discover the 1Q84 Trilogy by Haruki Murakami.

1Q84

365 Days of Art

A BBC Christmas

A Black Book Thriller

A Box Full of Murders

A Cal Leandros Novel

A Christmas Mystery

The intelligent and capable police commissioner Guido Brunetti confronts crime in and around his home town of Venice.

A Commissario Brunetti Mystery

A DC Smith / Kings Lake Investigation Series

A Daisy Story

Chronicling the lives of over three hundred characters, unrivalled for its scope and humour, this is a unique evocation of life in twentieth-century England.

Filters

Category

Age

Publication Date

Format

Series

Imprint

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter