A selection of recent paperback releases
Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town
Mary Beard
Profile, £9.99
Mary Beard recently won a Wolfson History Prize for exploding common myths about Pompeii, in this informative study of the ancient Roman town. Beard starts by explaining that, contrary to popular belief, the remains at Pompeii do not reflect the daily life of an average Roman town. Having been shaken by tremors for days, the citizens of Pompeii were responding to an extraordinary situation when they were frozen in time by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. In the chapters which follow, she offers similarly insightful, corrective observations on every aspect of Pompeian life, from town planning to bathing. A professor of classics at Cambridge University, Beard's knowledge of her subject is immense. However, she never overburdens her reader and combines references to classical literature with those to modern popular culture, concluding with a section on practical tips for visiting Pompeii. Nicholas Hamilton
The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World
Niall Ferguson
Penguin, £9.99
The aims of Niall Ferguson's book are: to place money at the centre of every significant flux and crisis in human history; and to educate the layman with no economic training about the workings of such esoteric entities as option contracts, hedge funds and collateralised debt obligations. His history is convincing as we learn of the impact upon states and continents of financial revolutionaries such as the Medicis, John Law, the Rothschilds, George Soros, etc. Ferguson doesn't always succeed in making complicated things clear for the lay reader though, and at times his paragraphs full of statistics and figures are hard work. But his explanation of 2007's credit crisis, beginning with unscrupulous American companies' practice of selling disguised, unstable subprime mortgage debts to foreign investors is excellent. Colm Farren
The Impostor
Damon Galgut
Atlantic Books, £7.99
An air of menace lingers throughout this compelling novel by Galgut, author of the Booker-shortlisted The Good Doctor. Adam has lost his job and decides to move to an abandoned house on the edge of town to write poetry. But he finds himself growing increasingly restless, and slightly deranged, as the days go by. The weeds in the garden, growing into an ominous wall of tangle, seem to echo his own state of mind. There is a "mutually suspicious awareness" between Adam and his neighbour, a secretive man who works on peculiar metal sculptures. When Adam bumps into Canning, an old friend from school, he can't quite place him. As he spends more time with Canning and his beautiful, moody wife on their giant estate, Adam grows increasingly curious about this shady character, who wiles away the hours drinking cocktails or in meetings with vague businessmen. The past remains a dubious and obscure theme throughout The Impostor, a fascinating critique of poverty, morality and materialism in contemporary South Africa. Sorcha Hamilton
Bomb, Book Compass: Joseph Needham and the Great Secrets of China
Simon Winchester
Penguin £9.99
Joseph Needham's monumental work Science and Civilisation in Chinais still being updated today and now stands at 24 volumes. Winchester first encountered Needham's astonishing book in a bookstore in Connecticut; it was Volume 4, Part 3, "Civil Engineering and Nautics", published in 1971. Perhaps the very best volume, it treats of Chinese roads, bridges, canals and boats in detail that only Needham could have attempted. In other volumes, the topics range from tantric sexual techniques (seven pages) to perfumed toilet paper (invented in the sixth century, AD). A lasting image of Needham, in this fascinating biography, is of the chain-smoking genius and ladies' man, sitting at his desk, dreaming of his Chinese mistress and waiting until noon precisely to smoke his first cigarette of the day. Tom Moriarty
Captivated: JM Barrie, Daphne Du Maurier and the Dark Side of Neverland
Piers Dudgeon
Vintage, £9.99
Dudgeon's uncomfortably intimate book detailing the relationship between Peter Pan author JM Barrie and the Du Maurier family solicits readers to join him as he tracks down literary clues to reveal the sinister figure behind Neverland's magic. The portrayal of Barrie as a manipulative and malevolent force is largely speculative and is delivered with such scathing ferocity that one is compelled to question the author's motivation. Dudgeon's argument strengthens towards the book's close and readers will concede there is, perhaps, a Dark Side of Neverland, but a dark side for which many, not just Barrie, are culpable. The book's background is meticulously researched and while the numerous footnotes can be distracting, it is from this generous amount of detail that Captivatedearns its greatest interest. Megan L McCarty