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Five Books - Expert Book Recommendations
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Five Books is a book recommendation website where experts pick the five best books in their subject (as an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases) http://fivebooks.com
"Indonesia is the fourth largest country in the world and home to 268 million people."
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Indonesia
The best books about Indonesia, including its culture, its novels, and its natural habitats—as recommended by journalist and author Krithika Varagur.
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November 12, 2025 at 2:00 AM
"Science comes up with new possibilities, new technologies—and science fiction extrapolates that out, imagines several steps ahead of scientific ideas and discoveries."
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The Best Science Fiction Books About Aliens
The best and most mind-boggling aliens in science fiction, as recommended by Jaime Green, author of The Possibility of Life
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November 11, 2025 at 10:02 PM
NEW
Novelist Lauren Ford recommends five great enemies-to-lovers romance books with crackling repartee and sizzling sexual tension.

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Enemies-to-Lovers Romance Books
Five enemies-to-lovers romance books, featuring crackling repartee and sizzling sexual tension, recommended by novelist Lauren Ford
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November 11, 2025 at 7:30 PM
"The paradox is that, although it’s obviously still quite segregated, and there is a huge suspicion on either side, these parallel worlds are tightly braided."
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The Best Historical Fiction Set in the American South
The best historical novels set in the American South, selected by the writer Xan Brooks—H fiction by Flanner O'Connor and Mark Twain
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November 11, 2025 at 7:08 PM
"In our area, we protect the elephants because most of the poachers do it for commercial reasons, they want the ivory to sell it and get some money."
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Wild Animals for Kids
Wildlife ranger Margaret Darawanda recommends books for children about wild animals, books about animals in the wild for children of all ages
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November 11, 2025 at 4:01 PM
"The writing is precise and unsentimental, yet it is brutally affecting and intimate." Flesh by David Szalay wins the Booker, the UK's most prestigious fiction prize:
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Flesh: A Novel
🏆 Winner of the 2025 Booker Prize
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November 11, 2025 at 3:01 PM
"I think gardening is an emotional way to deal with your environment."
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Horticulture
The best books on horticulture, as recommended by Andrea Wulf.
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November 11, 2025 at 2:03 PM
"Abdurraqib’s voice is so powerful and personal that even when he’s writing about Whitney Houston or Michael Jackson, it still reads as personal storytelling."
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The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist
The best recent memoirs: the finalists for the 2022 NBCC autobiography award—recommended by critic and memoirist Marion Winik
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November 11, 2025 at 12:01 PM
"Nixon had enough self-awareness to know that his reputation was turning into a political liability, so he tried to reinvent himself."
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Richard Nixon
The best books about Richard Nixon, 37th President of the United States, recommended by historian David Greenberg.
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November 11, 2025 at 6:00 AM
"I choose not to fly. I’ve got loads of hypocritical behaviours that I engage in, but occasionally I try and do the right thing. We should all do our bit. That’s really important."
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Economics and the Environment
If you want to take an economy that's wholly dependent on fossil fuels and turn it into a low-carbon one it's going to be expensive, says economist Dieter Helm—and the sooner we face up to that…
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November 11, 2025 at 2:00 AM
"People who are able to fit things into their lives and into their relationships will do better than those who fit themselves into the interests of a technology company."
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How To Use Technology And Not Be Used By It: A Psychologist's Reading List
Which books are useful for thinking about how to use technology, rather than being used by it? Psychologist Margaret Morris provides a reading lsit.
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November 10, 2025 at 7:01 PM
"There’s a need to show that the Caribbean is much more than a beautiful place. All of this is reflected in our fiction."
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The Best Caribbean Fiction
Alexia Arthurs, the author of How To Love a Jamaican, recommends novels that explore the myriad expressions of Caribbean identity
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November 10, 2025 at 4:01 PM
"Shmuel Agnon is the only Israeli writer who has won the Nobel Prize for Literature. He is still regarded as the best writer in modern Hebrew literature."
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Israel and Palestine in Art
Award-winning novelist and playwright positions himself among a new breed of Israeli historians: "I think I am part of a new trend in Israel to be critical of the way we tell our history"
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November 10, 2025 at 2:03 PM
"Sicilian Food is not just a book of recipes. Simeti writes about food in a very interesting way, explaining the origins of some dishes and the different versions."
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Mediterranean Cooking
Cook and bestselling author Diane Seed selects five books on Mediterranean cuisine. From the forgotten spices of Turkey to the stews served to Greek freedom fighters, the variety of the region’s food…
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November 10, 2025 at 12:02 PM
"Every new novel by Cusk is a major literary event, although her experiments with form—and her unpicking of what she has previously called the “underpinnings” of narrative—are often initially received with bafflement"
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Notable Novels of Summer 2024
Our deputy editor highlights the unmissable new literary fiction of summer 2024: five of the most hotly anticipated novels.
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November 10, 2025 at 6:00 AM
"Applied ethics is the application of moral theory to the real world."
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Ethical Problems
Given the choice between allowing five people to die, and killing one person, what would you do? The best books on these and other 'ethical problems.'
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November 10, 2025 at 2:00 AM
"Oh, she was Russian. You should have heard her voice! So, Atlas Shrugged is the mature, the fullest expression of her rejection of any kind of collectivism."
Libertarianism
The magazine editor, journalist and biographer of Ayn Rand selects five books that define the essence of libertarianism. Atlas Shrugged is first on her list
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November 9, 2025 at 10:00 PM
"People read romance because it’s a genre that is written mainly for women, it’s built on women’s voices and stories, and there is great comfort to be found in a guaranteed happy ending."
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The Best Romance Books of 2021
The best romance books of 2021, as chosen by romantic fiction junkie and popular romance blogger, Natasha Tomic
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November 9, 2025 at 7:01 PM
"For most self-identifying atheists, it’s not just that they don’t believe in a God or gods, but that they don’t believe in any kind of supernatural realm."
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Atheism
Which are the best books on atheism? The philosopher and author of Atheism: A Very Short Introduction chooses his top five.
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November 9, 2025 at 7:01 PM
"Born digital describes works that are created with a computer and are meant to be read on the computer. They’re not works that you print out."
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The Best Electronic Literature
The best electronic literature, recommended by literary scholar and digital literature specialist, Jessica Pressman.
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November 9, 2025 at 4:00 PM
"Xinjiang was subject to the policies of China in the same way that the Turkic-speaking Muslim regions on the other side of the border in the Soviet Union were subject to the dictates of Moscow."
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Uyghur Nationalism
It's hard to understand what's going on in the Xinjiang region of China and the nationalism of the Uyghurs who live there without reading some history. Here Professor Michael Dillon, a historian at…
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November 9, 2025 at 2:01 PM
"A lot of Brexit is very funny. One of the things the British are world class at is taking the piss."
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Brexit
The best Brexit books, as recommended by Boris Starling, journalist and Bluffer's Guide to Brexit author. Find your Brexit book.
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November 9, 2025 at 12:01 PM
“The Egyptians called the hieroglyphs ‘medu netjer’ which means the words of the gods”
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Hieroglyphics
The best books to start learning about hieroglyphics, the writing of ancient Egypt, as recommended by historian Diane Greco Josefowicz
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November 9, 2025 at 6:00 AM
“Populism has led countries to choose the wrong economic policies that focus mostly on immediate redistribution rather than on sustained economic growth”
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Latin American Politics
Political scientist Patricio Navia recommends books that explain the nature of Latin American politics and discusses how the identity of Latin America is inextricably bound up with its colonial…
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November 9, 2025 at 2:00 AM