The Well Gardened Mind by Sue Stuart-Smith; The Natural Health Service by Isabel Hardman – review
A fascinating pair of books on the therapeutic potential of the natural world
Sitopia by Carolyn Steel review – big questions about food
An ‘all-you-can-eat buffet of thoughts’
Isabel Hardman: ‘One of my most exciting botanical finds was in a Glasgow car park’
The journalist and author on how nature can boost mental health treatment, even on lockdown
Endell Street by Wendy Moore review – the suffragette surgeons
A fascinating, carefully researched study of life partners who became pioneering army hospital doctors in the first world war
The Better Half by Sharon Moalem review – on the genetic superiority of women
Women live longer than men. We know Covid-19 is killing more men than women. This book is an antidote to the myth of the ‘weaker sex’
In brief: The Bass Rock; Radical Acts of Love; Letters of Note: Mothers – review
The subjugation of women throughout history, how to accept death without despair and a selection of letters about mothers
From splendid to stressful: a short history of isolation
Not that long ago, the concept of isolation was seen as something of a luxury
Don’t panic: the best books to help us survive a crisis
Joe Moran looks at books on how to keep calm in times of adversity - and take joy where we find it
Top 10 novels and stories about shame
Anna Ahmatova, David Malouf, Yukio Mishima and more explore the emotion that tears us apart but leads us into compassion, writes Christos Tsiolkas
The Rules of Contagion by Adam Kucharski review – outbreaks of all kinds
Modellers have a saying: “If you’ve seen one pandemic, you’ve seen … one pandemic.” But patterns can be established to do with how things spread