Scribe Publications – serie

We were all taught the fundamentals of writing well in school. But how do we write effectively in today’s hyper-interactive world?When The Elements of Style and On Writing Well were published in 1959 and 1976, the internet hadn’t been invented. Since then, there has been a radical transformation in how we communicate. The average adult receives over 100 emails and tens of text messages each day. With all this correspondence, gaining a busy reader’s attention is now a competition.Todd Rogers and Jessica Lasky-Fink, both behavioural scientists, offer practical writing advice you can use today. They begin by outlining cognitive facts about how busy people read, then detail six research-backed principles for effective writing:Use fewer wordsLower the reading levelUse formatting judiciouslyMake the purpose clear for skimmersEmphasise value for readersMake responding as easy as possible.Including many examples, a checklist, and other tools for the most effective writing, this handbook will make you a more effective communicator. Rogers and Lasky-Fink bring conventional ideas about text-based communication into the 21st century’s radically transformed attention marketplace.

An incisive and deeply candid account that explores autistic women in culture, myth, and society through the prism of the author’s own diagnosis.Until the 1980s, autism was regarded as a condition found mostly in boys. Even in our time, autistic girls and women have largely remained undiagnosed. When portrayed in popular culture, women on the spectrum often appear simply as copies of their male counterparts — talented and socially awkward.Yet autistic women exist, and always have. They are varied in their interests and in their experiences. Autism may be relatively new as a term and a diagnosis, but not as a way of being and functioning in the world. It has always been part of the human condition. So who are these women, and what does it mean to see the world through their eyes?In The Autists, Clara Törnvall reclaims the language to describe autism and explores the autistic experience in arts and culture throughout history. From popular culture, films, and photography to literature, opera, and ballet, she dares to ask what it might mean to re-read these works through an autistic lens — what we might discover if we allow perspectives beyond the neurotypical to take centre stage.

A powerful eyewitness account of the genocide in Gaza by an extraordinary young writer and general physician.Five days before 7 October 2023, a young Palestinian doctor returns to Gaza, having completed his medical studies abroad. His family gathers to celebrate his achievements and to welcome him home. On 11 October, forty-two members of his extended family are killed in an airstrike, and thus begins his incredible story of survival and service to his people.For more than eight months, Dr Ezzideen Shehab volunteers at the Indonesian Hospital in northern Gaza, witnessing at first hand catastrophic injuries and deaths, and working under the most difficult circumstances imaginable. Constantly targeted by the Israeli Defence Forces, the Indonesian hospital is ultimately destroyed.In December 2024, Dr Shehab co-founds the Al-Rahma Medical Clinic to provide free medical care in northern Gaza, where no functioning hospitals remain. The clinic is damaged multiple times, and in July 2025 is forced to close. Dr Shehab and his family are displaced for the fifth time, with no hope of ever returning to their demolished home in the north of Gaza.In his testimony of these months, Dr Shehab’s clarity and humanity shine through. He describes the people he treats, the devastation of his homeland, and his incomprehension at the world’s silence in the face of the unfolding genocide. Diary of a Young Doctor is a deeply moving and unforgettable work that bears witness to one of the most shameful periods in recent history.

How do we manage to transition to a more sustainable world without the collapse of the economy? Capitalism has brought about many positive things. At the same time, however, it is ruining the climate and the environment, so that humanity’s very existence is now at risk. ‘Green growth’ is supposed to be the saviour, but economics expert and bestselling author Ulrike Herrmann disagrees. In this book, she explains in a clear and razor-sharp manner why we need ‘green shrinkage’ instead.Greenhouse gases are increasing dramatically and unchecked. This failure is no coincidence, because the climate crisis goes to the heart of capitalism. Prosperity and growth are only possible if technology is used and energy is utilised. Unfortunately, however, green energy from the sun and wind will never be enough to fuel global growth. The industrialised countries must therefore bid farewell to capitalism and strive for a circular economy in which only what can be recycled is consumed.Herrmann makes a convincing argument that we won’t get anywhere without personal restrictions and government planning. Her example for a solution is the British war economy of the 1940s. This is not a utopian scenario, but a comprehensive example of the restrictions and government-led plans needed now and in the future.The translation of this book was supported by a grant from the Goethe-Institut.

Oceans created, shaped, and sustain not just human life, but all life on Earth, and perhaps beyond it. Deep Water is a reckoning with humankind’s complex relationship with these oceans.In this thrilling work — a blend of history, science, nature, and environmental writing — acclaimed author James Bradley plunges into the unknown to explore the deepest recesses of the natural world, guiding readers through the atomic creation of the oceans to the wonders contained within, like the schools of fish who use electromagnetic sensing to migrate across the globe; describing how human populations have circumnavigated the world by boat; and interrogating the environmental catastrophe already impacting our lives. Deep Water celebrates the ocean’s glories and the extraordinary efforts of the scientists and researchers currently unlocking its secrets.Offering vital new ways of understanding humanity’s place on our planet, Bradley shows that the oceans might yet save us all.

An Irish Times Book of the YearAn electrifying descent from loneliness and grief into obsessive, all-consuming love, by an Italian literary star.‘When Xu bites me, when she has me in her teeth, naked and bad on top of me, everything is good.’In a skyscraper apartment overlooking Shanghai’s blue-tinged, pulsating nightlife and filled with rotting food, two women swallow little yellow pills that will make all things dangerous feel safe. They’re both running from a turbulent past.In abandoned factories and dilapidated slaughterhouses, Xu pushes Ruben to extremes of pleasure and pain that she has never experienced before, to a place where language breaks down and passion becomes consumption.Blue Hunger asks how we create our identities and how we escape them; it is a fever-dream of a novel, visionary and uncanny, that demolishes all taboos and wisely explores, in a wildly imaginative language, the twisted peaks of loss and desire.

An intense, lyrical, witty, and humane exploration of a state we too often consider only superficially.At once philosophical and poetical, Insomnia ranges widely over history and culture, literature and art, exploring a threshold experience that is intimately involved with trespass and contamination: the illicit importing of day into night.

WINNER OF THE ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARDA SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAROut on the road, no one speaks, everything talks.Hard-drinking, foul-mouthed grandma Jean has never been good at getting on with other humans, apart from her granddaughter, Kimberly. Instead, she surrounds herself with animals, working as a guide in an outback wildlife park.Then, a strange pandemic begins sweeping the country, its chief symptom that its victims begin to understand the language of animals. Many infected people lose their minds, including Jean’s son, Lee.When he takes off with Kimberly, Jean follows, with Sue the dingo riding shotgun. As they travel, they discover a stark, strange world in which the animal apocalypse has only further isolated people from other species.

What is it like to radically change your life? Writer Alec Ash meets the Chinese who are doing just this, ‘reverse migrating’ from the cities to the remote countryside of southwest China — and joins them himself, in an extraordinary and inspiring journey of self-discovery.In 2020, Alec Ash left behind his old life as a journalist in buzzy Beijing, and moved to Dali, a rural valley in China’s Yunnan province, centred around a great lake shaped like an ear and overlooked by the Cang mountain range. Here, he hoped to find the space and perspective to mend heartbreak, and escape the trappings of fast-paced, high-pressured city life.Originally home to the Bai people, Dali has become a richly diverse community of people of all ages and backgrounds, with one shared goal: to reject the worst parts of modernity and live more simply, in tune with the natural world and away from the nexus of authoritarian power. It is into this community that Alec embeds himself, charting his first year of life in Dali among these fascinating neighbours, from political dissidents to bohemian hippies.The Mountains Are High is a beautifully written, candid memoir about how reevaluating what is really important and taking a leap of faith to reach it can genuinely transform your life. As one of the ‘new migrants’ tells Alec when he arrives: it is easy to change your environment, far more difficult to change your mind.

A moving portrayal of a troubled mother–daughter relationship, shortlisted for Japan’s prestigious Akutagawa Prize. In 2008, the unnamed narrator of Gifted is working as a hostess and living in Tokyo’s nightlife district. One day, her estranged mother, who is seriously ill, suddenly turns up at her door.As the mother approaches the end of her life, the two women must navigate their strained relationship, while the narrator also reckons with events happening in her own life, including the death of a close friend — all under the bright lights of Tokyo‘s ‘sleepless town’, Kabukicho.In sharp, elegant prose, and based on the author’s own experiences as a sex worker, Gifted heralds the breakthrough of an exciting new literary talent.

For fans of The Black Swan and written by a veteran Wall Street Journal reporter, this is a fascinating deep dive into the world of billion-dollar traders and high-stakes crisis predictors who strive to turn extreme events into financial windfalls.There’s no doubt that our world has gotten more extreme. Pandemics, climate change, superpower rivalries, technological disruption, political radicalisation, religious fundamentalism — all threaten chaos that put trillions in assets at risk. But around the world, across a wide variety of disciplines, would-be super-forecasters are trying to take the guesswork out of what formerly seemed like random chance. Some put their faith in ‘black swans’ — unpredictable, catastrophic events that can’t be foreseen but send exotic financial instruments screaming in high-profit directions. Most famous among this group of big-bet traders are those who run the Universa fund, who, on days of extreme upheaval, have made as much as $1 billion.Author Scott Patterson gained exclusive access to Universa strategists and met with savvy seers in a variety of fields, from earthquake prediction to counterterrorism to climatology, to see if it’s actually possible to bet on disaster — and win. Riveting, relevant, and revelatory, this is a must-read for anyone curious about how some of today’s investors alchemise catastrophe into profit.

A surreal thriller that blurs the lines between lies and truth, between the selves we conceal and the faces we show the world.As winter descends and the city fills with the scent of woodsmoke, a young transcriber follows the same routine each day. She collects tapes from a ghostwriter’s office, stops for an espresso and croissant, and returns home to type out the voices of strangers — stories that will become someone else’s novels. Her solitary life is predictable, unremarkable … until the day she hears something different on the tapes: a message meant only for her.Across the city, two women, Laura and Naomi, accidentally swap coats at a department store cafe. This brief encounter sparks something electric and strange, and soon, Laura has moved in with Naomi. As the days pass, she begins to mirror her more and more closely — her gestures, her habits, her very essence. Slowly, deliberately, Laura starts to take over Naomi’s life.Meanwhile, the transcriber makes a disturbing discovery: she is beginning to disappear …

President Joe Biden tells the story of his extraordinary life and career prior to his emergence as Barack Obama’s beloved, influential vice president.‘I remain captivated by the possibilities of politics and public service. In fact, I believe that my chosen profession is a noble calling.’ – Joe BidenJoe Biden has both witnessed and participated in a momentous epoch of American history. In Promises to Keep, he reveals what these experiences taught him about himself, his colleagues, and the institutions of government.With his customary honesty and wit, Biden movingly and eloquently recounts growing up in a staunchly Catholic multigenerational household in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and Wilmington, Delaware; overcoming personal tragedy, life-threatening illness, and career setbacks; his relationships with presidents, world leaders, and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle; and his leadership of powerful Senate committees.Through these and other recollections, Biden shows us how the guiding principles he learned early in life — to work to make people’s lives better; to honour family and faith; to value persistence, candour, and honesty — are the foundation on which he has based his life’s work as husband, father, and public servant.Promises to Keep is an intimate series of reflections from a politician who surmounted numerous challenges to become one of America’s most effective leaders and who refuses to be cynical about politics. It is also a stirring testament to the promise of the United States.

Could you marry a man you’ve never met? Three Korean women in 1918 make a life-changing journey to Hawaii, where they will marry, having seen only photographs of their intended husbands.Different fates await each of these women. Hong-ju, who dreams of a marriage of ‘natural love’, meets a man who looks twenty years older than his photograph; Song-hwa, who wants to escape from her life of ridicule as the granddaughter of a shaman, meets a lazy drunkard. And then there’s Willow, whose 26-year-old groom, Taewan, looks just like his image …Real life doesn’t always resemble a picture, but there’s no going back. And while things don’t turn out quite as they’d hoped, even for Willow, they do find something that makes their journey worthwhile — each other.

The riveting story of a true-life female Indiana Jones: an archaeologist who survived the Nazis and then saved Egypt’s ancient temples.In the 1960s, the world’s attention was focused on a nail-biting race against time: fifty countries had contributed nearly a billion dollars to save a dozen ancient Egyptian temples from drowning in the floodwaters of the gigantic new Aswan High Dam. It was a project of unimaginable size and complexity that required the fragile sandstone temples to be dismantled, stone by stone, and rebuilt on higher ground. But the massive press coverage of this unprecedented rescue effort completely overlooked the gutsy French archaeologist who made it all happen. Without the intervention of Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, the temples would now be at the bottom of a gigantic reservoir.Desroches-Noblecourt refused to be cowed by anyone or anything. As a brave member of the French Resistance in World War II, she had survived imprisonment by the Nazis. Now, in her fight to save the temples, she had to face down two of the most daunting leaders of the postwar world: Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser and French president Charles de Gaulle.After a century and a half of Western plunder of Egypt’s ancient monuments, Desroches-Noblecourt helped preserve a crucial part of its cultural heritage, and, just as importantly, made sure it remained in its homeland.

Winner of the CWA Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction.A letter arrives. You’ve got an appointment with a trainee clinical psychologist on April 29, 2008.You don’t attend.Another letter arrives. It says they don’t normally reschedule appointments, but they know this is hard for you, so they’re offering you another appointment. It’s on May 13, 2008.You don’t attend.Two years later you shoot three people and shoot yourself. You will be called a monster. You will be called evil. The prime minister, David Cameron, will stand up in Parliament and say you were a callous murderer, end of story. You have nine days and your whole life to prove you are more than a callous murderer.Go.Raoul Moat became notorious one hot July week when, after killing his ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend, shooting her in the stomach, and blinding a policeman, he disappeared into the woods of Northumberland, evading discovery for seven days. Eventually, cornered by the police, Moat shot himself. Here, Andrew Hankinson re-tells Moat's story using Moat’s words, and those of the state services which engaged with him, bringing the reader disarmingly close, at all times, to the mind of Moat.

Winner of the German Book Prize, from the winner of the 2023 Georg Büchner Prize. It is 1989, and a young literature student named Ed travels to the Baltic island of Hiddensee, a notorious destination for hippies, idealists, and those at odds with the East German state. On Hiddensee, Ed joins the community of seasonal workers, led by the charismatic, enigmatic Kruso. At night, they secretly help the refugees who have come to the island seeking passage to the West. But Kruso is preoccupied by another kind of freedom — freedom of the mind.As the wave of history washes over the German Democratic Republic, the friends’ grip on reality loosens and life on the island will never be the same.

Longlisted for the International Man Booker Prize.Two venturesome women on a journey through the land of their fathers and mothers. A wrong turn. A bad decision.They had no idea, when they arrived in Morocco, that their usual freedoms as young European women would not be available. So, when the spry Saleh presents himself as their guide and saviour, they embrace his offer. He extracts them from a tight space, only to lead them inexorably into an even tighter one: and from this far darker space there is no exit.Their tale of confinement and escape is as old as the landscapes and cultures so vividly depicted in this story of where Europe and Africa come closest to meeting, even if they never quite touch.

Film star. Icon. Agitator. Martyr.Paul Robeson was a twentieth-century icon; the most famous African-American of his time. The son of a former slave, he found worldwide fame as a performer, travelling from Hollywood to the West End, and even to communist Russia. A champion of social justice and equality, he would go on to lose everything for the sake of his principles.Here, Jeff Sparrow traces Robeson’s remarkable life. Part travelogue, part biography, this is a story of political ardour, heritage, and trauma — a luminous portrait of a man and an urgent reflection on the politics that define us now.

A jaw-dropping re-evaluation of everything we thought we knew about men, women, and sex.Men are biologically programmed to want sex with lots of different women, whereas women are designed to stay true to one person, right?Wrong.In Untrue, New York Times -bestselling author Wednesday Martin reveals that we are just at the beginning of understanding women’s sexuality properly. From New York to Namibia to a conference of sex researchers in Montreal, she takes us on a journey to understand women who refuse monogamy, posing questions about why we became sexually exclusive in the first place.Martin attends all-female sex parties where married straight women fulfill their fantasies; considers contemporary societies where women take many lovers; analyses how the invention of the plough suppressed female autonomy; and presents fascinating research about why women stray (their motivations are not so different from men’s).Frank and myth busting, Untrue validates the desires of women everywhere, including the ‘silent majority’ in committed relationships who struggle with staying faithful.

An acerbic graphic takedown of capitalism. In Hyper-Capitalism, cartoonist Larry Gonick and psychologist Tim Kasser offer a vivid and an accessible new way to understand how global, privatising, market-worshipping hyper-capitalism is threatening human wellbeing, social justice, and the planet. Drawing from contemporary research, they describe and illustrate concepts (such as corporate power, free trade, privatisation, and deregulation) that are critical for understanding the world we live in, and movements (such as voluntary simplicity, sharing, alternatives to GDP, and protests) that have developed in response to the system. Gonick and Kasser’s pointed and profound cartoon narratives provide a deep exploration of the global economy and the movements seeking to change it, all rendered in clear, graphic — and sometimes hilarious — terms. In the process, they point the way to a healthier future for all of us.

A New Statesman Book of the YearA fierce, feminist retelling of the classic tale Beowulf.Gren and his mother, Dana, a war veteran, live on the side of a mountain, next to Herot Hall, a pristine gated community ruled over by Willa and her son, Dylan. Separated by high gates, surveillance cameras, and motion-activated lights, Dylan and Gren are unaware of the barriers erected to keep them apart. But when Gren crosses the border into Herot Hall and runs off with Dylan, he sets up a collision between Dana’s and Willa’s worlds that echoes the Beowulf story — and gives sharp, startling currency to the ancient epic poem.

A TELEGRAPH BOOK OF THE YEAR.An undercover investigation into the synthetic-drug epidemic.A new group of chemicals is radically transforming the recreational-drug landscape. Known as novel psychoactive substances (NPS), they range from so-called ‘legal highs’ like Spice, to synthetic opioids – most famously, the deadly fentanyl.Designed to replicate the effects of established drugs like cocaine, ecstasy, marijuana, and heroin, NPS are synthesised in laboratories. They are cheap to produce and easy to transport. They are also extremely potent and often deadly. Originally developed for medicinal purposes, and then hijacked by rogue chemists, who change their molecular structures to stay ahead of the law, these chemicals’ effects can be impossible to predict. What we do know is that they have triggered the biggest drug epidemic that America has ever seen, and which is now spreading internationally.In Fentanyl, Inc., award-winning journalist Ben Westhoff goes undercover to investigate the shadowy world of synthetic drugs — becoming, in the process, the first journalist to infiltrate a Chinese fentanyl lab. He tracks down the drug baron in New Zealand who unintentionally helped to start the synthetic-drug revolution; prowls St. Louis streets with a former fentanyl dealer to understand how the epidemic started; and chronicles the lives of addicts and dealers, families of victims, law enforcement officers, and underground drug-awareness organisers in the US and Europe. Fentanyl, Inc. is essential reading on a global calamity we are only just beginning to understand.

‘I swim for every chance to get wasted — after every meet, every weekend, every travel trip. This is what I look forward to and what I tell no one: the burn of it down my throat, to my soul curled up in my lungs, the sharpest pain all over it — it seizes and stretches, becoming alive again, and is the only thing that makes sense.’At fifteen, Casey Legler is already one of the fastest swimmers in the world. She is also an alcoholic, isolated from her family, and incapable of forming lasting connections with those around her.Driven to compete at the highest levels, sent far away from home to train with the best coaches and teams, she finds herself increasingly alone and alienated, living a life of cheap hotels and chlorine-worn skin, anonymous sexual encounters and escalating drug use. Even at what should be a moment of triumph — competing at age nineteen in the 1996 Olympics — she is an outsider looking in, procuring drugs for Olympians she hardly knows, and losing her race after setting a new world record in the qualifying heats.After submitting to years of numbing training in France and the United States, Casey can see no way out of the sinister loneliness that has swelled and festered inside her. Yet wondrously, when it is almost too late, she discovers a small light within herself, and senses a point of calm within the whirlwind of her life.In searing, evocative, visceral prose, Casey gives language to loneliness in this startling story of survival, defiance, and of the embers that still burn when everything else in us goes dark.

What do people with a particularly long life-span eat? How can you lose weight efficiently? Are illnesses in old age avoidable? Can you ‘eat yourself young’?Discover the answers to these questions and more in this practical, science-based guide to eating well and living longer, which has sold over a million copies worldwide.When science journalist Bas Kast collapsed with chest pains, he feared he had ruined his health forever with a diet of junk food. So he set off on a journey to uncover the essentials of diet and longevity. Here, filtered from thousands of sometimes conflicting research findings, Kast presents the key scientific insights that reveal the most beneficial diet possible. From analysing how much sugar you should consume to looking at the impact of supplements, fasting, and even whether you should drink tea or coffee, Kast breaks down diet myths to present the key facts you need to know in clear, accessible language.

A long-term resident and expert observer of dissent in Hong Kong takes readers to the frontlines of Hong Kong’s revolution.Through the long, hot summer of 2019, Hong Kong burned. Anti-government protests, sparked by a government proposal to introduce a controversial extradition law, grew into a pro-democracy movement that engulfed the city for months. Protesters fought street battles with police, and the unrest brought the People’s Liberation Army to the doorstep of Hong Kong. Driven primarily by youth protesters with their ‘Be water!’ philosophy, borrowed from hometown hero Bruce Lee, this leaderless, technology-driven protest movement defied a global superpower and changed Hong Kong, perhaps forever.In City on Fire, Antony Dapiran provides the first detailed analysis of the protests, and reveals the protesters’ unique tactics. He explains how the movement fits into the city’s long history of dissent, examines the cultural aspects of the movement, and looks at what the protests will mean for the future of Hong Kong, China, and China’s place in the world.City on Fire will be seen as the definitive account of an historic upheaval.

An intensive-care doctor reveals the long-term problems caused by ICUs, and how these can be prevented.Thousands of people are admitted to intensive-care units (ICUs) every day, and this is only increasing with the Covid-19 pandemic. Most of these admissions will be sudden, unexpected, and harrowing — an experience that can alter patients and their families in physical, emotional, and spiritual ways, with effects that endure for years. But there is hope.Dr Ely is a leading ICU doctor. His unconventional methods minimise patients being harmed by the cutting-edge technologies that are saving their lives; post–intensive care syndrome (PICS) is a well-established complication that millions of ICU survivors battle, which Dr Ely aims to eradicate. His cutting-edge studies have convinced doctors around the world to change their ICU practices for the better.Through captivating stories, Dr Ely shows how he and colleagues from around the world have re-introduced humanity into the ICU, creating pathways that bring hope and healing to healthcare. This is the future of medicine, and is a must-read for healthcare professionals, patients, and their families.

A bewitching novel set in contemporary Japan about the mysterious suicide of a young woman.Miwako Sumida is dead.Now those closest to her try to piece together the fragments of her life. Ryusei, who always loved Miwako, follows her trail to a remote Japanese village. Chie, her best friend, was the only person to know her true identity — but is now the time to reveal it? Meanwhile, Fumi, Ryusei’s sister, has her own haunting secret.Together, they realise that the young woman they thought they knew had more going on than they could ever have dreamed.

An original graphic novel about the messiness of modern relationships by one of the most exciting voices in contemporary literature.Eliza is a thirtysomething struggling single mother and poet; Sasha, a twentysomething living with her parents, dabbling in sex work, and yearning for direction in life. The two strike up an unlikely friendship that, as it veers towards something more, becomes a deeply resonant exploration of how far people are willing to go to find intimacy in a society that is increasingly closed off.Parrish’s fully realised characters and gorgeously painted pages make Men I Trust one of the most moving and insightful works of fiction in any medium this year.