• Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want by Ruha Benjamin
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole by Susan Cain
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness by Meghan O'Rourke
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Elite Capture: How the Powerful Took Over Identity Politics (And Everything Else) by Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò
  • Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022 - Ritual: How Seemingly Senseless Acts Make Life Worth Living by Dimitris Xygalatas

Five of the Best Self-Help Books of 2022, recommended by Avram Alpert

At the turn of the year, many of us take the opportunity to think about our lives—how they are going, and how we hope to live them in future. We asked Avram Alpert, author of The Good-Enough Life, to recommend five of the best self-help books of 2022 that might help our bids for self-improvement; his choices remind us that self-help is not only about life-hacks and diets, but about bringing the world more in line with our ideals.

  • The Best Popular Science Books of 2022: The Royal Society Book Prize - The Greywacke: How a Priest, a Soldier and a School Teacher Uncovered 300 Million Years of History by Nick Davidson
  • The Best Popular Science Books of 2022: The Royal Society Book Prize - Different: What Apes Can Teach Us About Gender by Frans de Waal
  • The Best Popular Science Books of 2022: The Royal Society Book Prize - Spike: The Virus vs. The People - the Inside Story by Jeremy Farrar & with Anjana Ahuja
  • The Best Popular Science Books of 2022: The Royal Society Book Prize - A (Very) Short History of Life on Earth: 4.6 Billion Years in 12 Chapters by Henry Gee
  • The Best Popular Science Books of 2022: The Royal Society Book Prize - Age Proof: The New Science of Living a Longer and Healthier Life by Rose Anne Kenny
  • The Best Popular Science Books of 2022: The Royal Society Book Prize - Hot Air: The Inside Story of the Battle Against Climate Change Denial by Peter Stott

The Best Popular Science Books of 2022: The Royal Society Book Prize, recommended by Maria Fitzgerald

The renowned UCL neuroscientist Professor Maria Fitzgerald, chair of the 2022 Royal Society Book Prize, talks us through the judges’ selection of the best popular science books of the year—including a whistle-stop tour of the history of the Earth, a self-help book offering evidence-based advice on how to live a longer life, and a primatologist’s study of gender among apes.

  • The Best Economics Books of 2022 - The Journey of Humanity: The Origins of Wealth and Inequality by Oded Galor
  • The Best Economics Books of 2022 - Slouching Towards Utopia: An Economic History of the Twentieth Century by Brad DeLong
  • The Best Economics Books of 2022 - Streets of Gold: America's Untold Story of Immigrant Success by Leah Boustan & Ran Abramitzky
  • The Best Economics Books of 2022 - Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It by Richard V Reeves
  • The Best Economics Books of 2022 - Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology by Chris Miller

The Best Economics Books of 2022, recommended by Jason Furman

As we study the causes of economic prosperity over the millennia and particularly the last century-and-a-half, it’s worth remembering that humans are always the most important driver of economic growth. Jason Furman, a Harvard economics professor and former adviser to Barack Obama, picks out five of the best economics books of 2022, as well as topics he’d like to see books about in 2023.

  • The Best Nonfiction Books: The 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize Shortlist - Legacy of Violence: A History of the British Empire by Caroline Elkins
  • The Best Nonfiction Books: The 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize Shortlist - The Escape Artist: The Man Who Broke Out of Auschwitz to Warn the World by Jonathan Freedland
  • The Best Nonfiction Books: The 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize Shortlist - My Fourth Time, We Drowned by Sally Hayden
  • The Best Nonfiction Books: The 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize Shortlist - The Restless Republic: Britain Without a Crown by Anna Keay
  • The Best Nonfiction Books: The 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize Shortlist - A Fortunate Woman: A Country Doctor’s Story by Polly Morland
  • The Best Nonfiction Books: The 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize Shortlist - Super-Infinite: The Transformations of John Donne by Katherine Rundell

The Best Nonfiction Books: The 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize Shortlist, recommended by Caroline Sanderson

Every year the judges of the Baillie Gifford Prize pick out the best nonfiction books published in the United Kingdom over the previous 12 months. Author and books journalist Caroline Sanderson, chair of this year’s judging panel, talks us through the books that made the 2022 shortlist, books that are important, readable and will hopefully surprise you.

  • The Best Business Books of 2022: the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award - Dead in the Water: Murder and Fraud in the World’s Most Secretive Industry by Kit Chellel & Matthew Campbell
  • The Best Business Books of 2022: the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award - Influence Empire: The Story of Tencent and China’s Tech Ambition by Lulu Chen
  • The Best Business Books of 2022: the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award - The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order: America and the World in the Free Market Era by Gary Gerstle
  • The Best Business Books of 2022: the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award - The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Art of Disruption by Sebastian Mallaby
  • The Best Business Books of 2022: the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award - Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology by Chris Miller
  • The Best Business Books of 2022: the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award - Disorder: Hard Times in the 21st Century by Helen Thompson

The Best Business Books of 2022: the Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award, recommended by Andrew Hill

For its annual book award, the Financial Times looks beyond books that might be filed under business in a bookshop, picking out books that are compelling and enjoyable, explains Andrew Hill, the newspaper’s senior business writer. He talks us through the 2022 shortlist: books that shine a light on obscure but immensely important companies or industries, or address some of the bigger challenges facing our capitalist economies.

  • Notable Nonfiction of Spring 2022 - The Empress and the English Doctor: How Catherine the Great Defied a Deadly Virus by Lucy Ward
  • Notable Nonfiction of Spring 2022 - A Little History of Art by Charlotte Mullins
  • Notable Nonfiction of Spring 2022 - My Fourth Time, We Drowned by Sally Hayden
  • Notable Nonfiction of Spring 2022 - A Brief History of Equality by Thomas Piketty
  • Notable Nonfiction of Spring 2022 - Atoms and Ashes by Serhii Plokhy

Notable Nonfiction of Spring 2022, recommended by Sophie Roell

In the past few months, lots of history books about the past as well as excellent insights into the present have hit the shelves. Some are gripping reads offering a few hours of escapism, others contributions to our human quest to make the world a better place. Some manage both. Five Books editor Sophie Roell offers a roundup of the most notable new books of nonfiction published in March, April and May 2022.

  • Notable Nonfiction of Early 2022 - The Last Emperor of Mexico by Edward Shawcross
  • Notable Nonfiction of Early 2022 - Stalin's Library: A Dictator and his Books by Geoffrey Roberts
  • Notable Nonfiction of Early 2022 - Atomic Steppe: How Kazakhstan Gave Up the Bomb by Togzhan Kassenova
  • Notable Nonfiction of Early 2022 - This Mortal Coil: A History of Death by Andrew Doig
  • Notable Nonfiction of Early 2022 - The Nowhere Office: Reinventing Work and the Workplace of the Future by Julia Hobsbawm

Notable Nonfiction of Early 2022, recommended by Sophie Roell

Even though we’re still in the first couple of months of 2022, there are already lots of really interesting nonfiction books either out or just about to be published. Five Books editor Sophie Roell surveys the flood of books that cover everything from Neolithic archaeology to the latest insights of neuroscience and genetics, as well as books that explore where we work, what we feel, and how we die.

  • The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist - A Little Devil in America: Notes In Praise Of Black Performance by Hanif Abdurraqib
  • The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist - Gay Bar: Why We Went Out by Jeremy Atherton Lin
  • The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist - A Farewell to Gabo and Mercedes: A Son's Memoir of Gabriel García Márquez and Mercedes Barcha by Rodrigo Garcia
  • The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist - A Ghost in the Throat by Doireann Ní Ghríofa
  • The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist - Concepcion: An Immigrant Family’s Fortunes by Albert Samaha

The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist, recommended by Marion Winik

Autobiography is evolving; increasingly we find the field dominated by ‘genre-fluid’ books that plait memoir together with strands of cultural criticism, history, journalism or even poetry. Here, Marion Winik, the memoirist and critic, talks us through the five books that have been shortlisted in the National Book Critic’s Circle autobiography category—and describes the face of memoir in 2022.