Tom Standage Book order

The latest edition in the Economist Explainer series, edited and introduced by Deputy Editor Tom Standage.

'Speckled with anecdotes, insights and surprises. It is great fun - and utterly timely' Sunday Times 'Standage writes with a masterly clarity' New York Times 'The product of deep research, great intelligence and burnished prose . . . It is rare that I encounter a non-fiction author whose prose is so elegant that it is worth reading for itself. Standage is a writer of this class' Wall Street Journal Beginning around 3,500 BC with the wheel, and moving through the eras of horsepower, trains and bicycles, Tom Standage puts the rise of the car - and the future of urban transport - into a broader historical context. Our society has been shaped by the car in innumerable ways, many of which are so familiar that we no longer notice them. Why does red mean stop and green mean go? Why do some countries drive on the left, and some on the right? How did cars, introduced only a little over a century ago, change the way the world was administered, laid out and policed, along with experiences like eating and shopping? And what might travel in a post-car world look like? As social transformations from ride-sharing to the global pandemic force us to critically re-examine our relationship with personal transportation, A Brief History of Motion is an essential contribution to our understanding of how the modern world came to be.

Another bestselling collection of astonishing explainers from The Economist.

Another bestselling collection of astonishing explainers from The Economist.

Following up 2016's hit Go Figure and 2018's Sunday Times bestseller Seriously Curious, another collection of astonishing bite-sized explainers from the Economist.

Some questions you never think to ask. Others, you didn't know you didn't know. And some facts are so surprising they cry out for answers. What can a president actually do? Why do cities sink into the ground? Why is Australia seemingly invulnerable to recessions? Why do people in couples do more housework than singletons?The brilliant minds of the Economist collect these questions. Individually, they might seem bite-sized and inconsequential, but taken together they can reveal a whole new world.

Worldwide, increasingly large numbers of people are seeing therapists on a regular basis. In the UK alone, 1.5 million people are in therapy. We go to address past traumas, to break patterns of behaviour, to confront eating disorders or addiction, to talk about relationships, or simply because we want to find out more about what makes us tick. Susie Orbach, the bestselling author of Fat is a Feminist Issue and Bodies, has been a psychotherapist for over forty years. Here, she explores what goes on in the process of therapy - what she thinks, feels and believes about the people who seek her help - through five dramatised case studies. Originally broadcast as a Radio 4 series, here the improvised dialogue is replicated as a playscript, and Orbach offers us the experience of reading along with a session, while revealing what is going on behind each exchange between analyst and client. Insightful and honest about a process often necessarily shrouded in secrecy, In Therapy is an essential read for those curious about, or considering entering, therapy.

Which James Bond drinks the most martinis? What do Satanists really believe? How do hurricanes get their names? Why are bees disappearing? Is chocolate healthy? ...Go Figure has the answers. Bringing together the very best from the clever people at The Economist, Go Figure explains the mind-boggling, the peculiar and the profound, things you might always have quietly wondered about and yet more you didn't know you didn't know. Figure out why so many Koreans are called Kim, how bitcoin mining works, why eating insects makes sense and how to get ahead under a dictator - a treat for the knowing, the uninitiated and the downright curious

Go Figure: Things You Didn't Know You Didn't Know brings together for the first time the very best explainers and charts, written and created by top journalists to help us understand such brain-bending conundrums as why almost half the population of Korea has one of two surnames, how bitcoin mining works, and the seasonal distribution of dog poo on the streets of New York. Subjects both topical and timeless, profound and peculiar, are explained with The Economist's trademark wit and verve. The Economist Explains and its online sister, the Daily Chart, are the two most popular blogs on The Economist's website. Together, these online giants provide answers to the kinds of questions, quirky and serious, that may be puzzling anyone interested in the world around them. Want to know how a tattoo affects your job prospects, why bees are under threat, or even how different countries spend their money? We have the answers. They are sometimes surprising, often intriguing, and always enlightening.

Today we are endlessly connected: constantly tweeting, texting or e-mailing. This may seem unprecedented, yet it is not. Throughout history, information has been spread through social networks, with far-reaching social and political effects. Writing on the Wall reveals how an elaborate network of letter exchanges forewarned of power shifts in Cicero's Rome, while the torrent of tracts circulating in sixteenth-century Germany triggered the Reformation. Standage traces the story of the rise, fall and rebirth of social media over the past 2,000 years offering an illuminating perspective on the history of media, and revealing that social networks do not merely connect us today - they also link us to the past.