From wildlife photography to the splendour of nature, Markus Berkmann compiles the most aesthetically pleasing books of the year
Relax... with the picture books of the year
THIS WEEK'S REVIEWS
Adventurers are rough, tough and dangerous to know
Grylls prefaces his book with a legal disclaimer: basically, don't try this at home and if you do, don't sue me.
Wake up to our natural treasures
This moving and majestic prize-winner comes garlanded with praise - and for very good reason. After the death of her father, Macdonald became obsessed with the idea of training a goshawk.
Larks with Larkin, a love triangle at No10 and Littlejohn in shorts!
Twenty years ago, Philip Larkin was assumed to have been a liberal intellectual. Then his letters and biography were published - and he plunged from grace into the gutter.
Macca came for tea - and Ringo stayed for dinner
Forster believes your home determines every aspect of your life. Because of that, she tells her life story in terms of the roofs she has known, including one The Beatles (inset) visited
NEW FICTION
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LITERARY
Set in 1922 in South London, this cracking read centres on widowed Mrs Wray and her spinster daughter
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POPULAR
Scientist Douglas is self-deprecating, hapless, good-hearted - and endlessly misunderstood
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RETRO READS
Stand by for snowy streets, bare cupboards, shivering orphans, dutiful daughters and obnoxious, red-faced officialdom
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CRIME
Frederick Chase is intent on discovering whether Moriarty had arranged a meeting with master criminal Clarence Devereux
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CHICK LIT
Protagonist Stella Sweeney's humdrum working mum's life is transformed when a rare syndrome leaves her in intensive care
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HISTORICAL
In a turbulent era six centuries before the Tudors, conflict between Saxon kingdoms darkens the land as a ruler lies dying
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HORROR
Jamie Morton, begins the novel as an innocent kid in pre-Beatles America, when he comes across Charles Jacobs
THIS WEEK'S PAPERBACKS
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THE LOVE CHARM OF BOMBS BY LARA FEIGEL (Bloomsbury £9.99)
When the bombing Blitz of 1940 turned London into a nightly inferno, the lives of ordinary people were transformed by fear. Witnessing death and destruction at such close quarters altered their behaviour, not least sexually, and rendered class barriers redundant, albeit temporarily.
Feigel studies these social changes through the eyes of four famous authors: Graham Greene, Elizabeth Bowen, Rose Macaulay, Henry Yorke (who wrote as Henry Green) and also a lesser-known Austrian writer, Hilde Spiel, who lived in Wimbledon with her husband and child.
Using their memoirs, letters and fiction, she presents a compelling picture of sexual liberation, bravery in the face of physical and emotional horror and a sense of life lived with an intensity that was almost pleasurable - and that could never be replicated once peace came.
SALLY MORRIS
RECIPE FOR LIFE BY MARY BERRY (Penguin £7.99)
She keeps us all entranced with her firm but friendly adjudication on The Great British Bake-Off - but theres a lot more to Mary Berry than a pinny and a patty tin.
Born in 1935, an only daughter with two brothers to toughen her up, Mary experienced inventive wartime cookery, loathed her school days and, at 13, was confined in Bath Isolation Hospital with polio that left her left arm weakened.
But the most moving part of this book is her account of the death of her son, William, in a car accident, aged 19.
The restrained emotion she displays emphasises rather than diminishes her grief, and she is utterly sincere when she says, simply, that it has changed her attitude to everything in life.
A successful career in the days when women stayed at home proves Mary to be an early feminist, though she might demur.
SALLY MORRIS
HANDSOME BRUTE BY SEAN O'CONNOR (Simon & Schuster £7.99)
This brilliantly researched study of the brutal, sexually deviant murderer Neville Heath is chilling and mesmerising in equal measure.
Heath was a fantasist who assumed many upper class, suave aliases and charmed women all his life.
Discharged from the RAF for forgery, he ended up in Borstal then the South Africa Air Force, and married a beautiful wife with whom he had a son.
After she demanded a divorce, he returned to Britain where, in quick succession, he sexually assaulted and murdered two young women - one in London, one in Bournemouth - yet was nonchalant when arrested.
His three-day trial in 1946 attracted predominantly female crowds, and provided rich pickings for the Press.
We never really learn why he did it but the portrait of a wartime hero turned vicious killer is compelling.
SALLY MORRIS
CRACKED BY JAMES DAVIES (Icon £8.99)
Depression and the treatment of it with drugs is one of the fastest growing areas of medicine in the world - 47 million prescriptions for antidepressants were written in the UK alone last year.
But psychological therapist James Davies argues that not only are the drugs ineffective against most forms of depression with no chemical imbalance as a basis, but that the psychiatric profession is constantly reclassifying normal emotional responses as clinical states (being shy is now social phobia), and thereby increasing the potential market for drug companies to target.
This is a profoundly disturbing look at the world of Big Pharma and shadowy truth: drug companies have been allowed not to publish studies which don't support their research; placebos have proved as effective as Prozac.
This is an important book for anyone who has any interest in mental health.
SALLY MORRIS
ABSOLUTELY BARKING BY MICHELE HANSON (Simon & Schuster £8.99)
The title of this book sums it up - the British are really quite mad about their dogs. Hanson, a newspaper columnist and owner of two Boxer dogs named Violet and Lily, is no exception and can work up quite a froth about people who fail to see the attraction of mans best friend: most cyclists are selfish, dog-hating, path-hogging, fairly murderous speed-freaks who think theyre always in the right.
But in her cooler moments she is dry, funny and brilliantly observant about the relationships between humans and their pets.
She visits Dog Camps and training classes, debates the merits of dogs sleeping on owners beds and generally confides the innermost secrets of her dog-loving friends and fellow-walkers. But if youre a cat lover, forget it
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SALLY MORRIS
SEE YOU IN THE MORNING BY BARRY NORMAN (Black Swan £8.99)
Writer and broadcaster Barry Norman met his wife, novelist and journalist Diana, (known as Dee) in 1956 and they were married for over fifty years. She wrote books, he moved into TV and together they raised two daughters.
She died in 2011 and in this memoir Norman paints a picture of a feisty, intelligent, stubborn woman and a marriage that is based on mutual respect, support and warmth. Not to mention frequent arguments from which she always appears to emerge victorious.
It is this honesty and acknowledgement of the multi-layered aspects of marriage that makes this such a funny, poignant and moving testament to her irreplaceable role in his life and the dreadful vacuum left by her death.
SALLY MORRIS
JAMBUSTERS BY JULIE SUMMERS (Simon & Schuster £7.99)
SummersMillions of words have been written about the military and social history of both world wars, but here Summers carves out a little area of her own by examining the vital work performed by the Womens Institute, whose meticulous organisational skills and national network found its finest hour in the face of conflict.
From the well-publicised make do and mend campaign to housing evacuees and establishing canteens and support for the troops, the resilient women who made up the task force not only contributed important practical skills but also changed the perception of what ordinary housewives and mothers were capable of if only given the chance to perform.
A third of a million women entered into action on the home front and this book shines a long overdue light on their efforts.
SALLY MORRIS
THE GIRL FROM STATION X BY ELISA SEGRAVE (Aurum £9.99)
Elisa Segraves mother, Anne, grew up in a world of privilege, of hunt balls and foreign travel but Elisas childhood memory of her is as a depressed drunk: aged five Elisa would take her a breakfast Alka-Seltzer.
Anne had never recovered from the drowning of her son Raymond.
When Anne developed dementia Elisa discovered a hoard of diaries of her teenage and war years which revealed her role in British Intelligence, working at Station X (Bletchley Park) and in Germany.
The diaries also expand on her lifelong preference for women over men and a series of clandestine relationships - including a mysterious incident in which one girlfriend is pushed down a lift shaft.
What emerges is a life of unfulfilled passions and wartime excitement, cruelly curtailed by an unsatisfactory marriage and a terrible personal tragedy.
SALLY MORRIS
THEY EAT HORSES DONT THEY? BY PIU MARIE EATWELL (Head of Zeus £8.99)
Their food is the best in the world, so is their wine, their women are chic and slim and theyre very tolerant of adultery.
Sadly, they dont wash much and are cruel to animals - we all know what the French are like. Or do we? Eatwell is an English barrister who has lived in Paris for a decade and has three children at school there.
With a lawyers forensic approach, she examines the stereotypes of French life, so beloved of the British in particular, and discovers that many are completely false and those that arent, have been exaggerated in the rash of Froglit books.
Nevertheless, foreigners prefer to cling to the romanticised idea of France, and Paris in particular, so much so that there is a recognised Paris Syndrome in which visitors hallucinate and have anxiety attacks as the city fails to live up to their fantasy. The Japanese are especially susceptible, apparently
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SALLY MORRIS
THE GREATEST TRAITOR BY ROGER HERMISTON (Aurum £8.99)
As Russia ratchets up the tension in the Crimea, memories of the Cold War flood back so what better time to read a book about George Blake, the notorious traitor of that complicated era?
Born to a Dutch mother, Blake was working for the wartime Dutch resistance as teenager before joining MI6 where his motivation for spying was never material gain, it was an idealogical hatred for American/British values. He confessed that everything he knew, he passed to the KGB although naively - or cynically - he claimed he was given assurances that no betrayed agent would be harmed.
Sentenced to a record-breaking 42 years in prison, he was sprung after five years in a plot involving a ladder made from knitting needles and rope.
Aged 91, he lives out his life, unrepentant, outside Moscow on a KGB pension.
SALLY MORRIS
THE GREAT ESCAPER BY SIMON PEARSON (Hodder £8.99)
Its 70 years this month since Roger Bushell masterminded the mass escape from Stalag Luft III, immortalised in the Hollywood film The Great Escape, and this fascinating biography reveals the glamorous life of a complicated, charismatic character.
Bushell was a Spitfire pilot when he was shot down on his first operational flight and was bitterly frustrated at sitting out his war in prison camps. Two earlier attempts at escape failed so when he was sent to Stalag Luft III, the construction of tunnels Tom, Dick and Harry was his way of rebelling.
The story of the 76 prisoners who escaped - 50 of whom, including Bushell, were murdered on Hitlers orders - may be well known but the book also focusses on Bushells three main love affairs, all of which ended in unhappiness. His Czech lover who had hidden him in Prague on an earlier escape was shot by the Nazis.
SALLY MORRIS
THE PEOPLES SONGS BY STUART MACONIE (Ebury Press £9.99)
If theres a purer, more joyous and affectionate tribute to the power of popular songs, then Id like to read it
Maconies history of modern Britain filtered through pop songs is a fine example of a perfect marriage: Vera Lynns Well Meet Again conjures up the British wartime resilience while The Strawbs Part of the Union sums up the bitter industrial conflict that defined the 1970s.
Tony Blair stormed to power on the back of D:Reams Things Can Only Get Better while Amy Winehouses Rehab was a sad intimation of the troubles that lay ahead of her.
Maconies passion for his subject is the thread that unites the 50 chapters and provides much material for argument down the pub. But surely no-one could dispute the final choice - the Peoples Song as chosen by radio listeners and social media - Slades storming Merry Christmas Everybody which heralds the arrival of tinsel and turkey every year
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SALLY MORRIS
THE LAZARUS EFFECT BY DR SAM PARNIA (Rider Books £8.99)
Benjamin Franklin once famously wrote, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes. But had he met Dr Sam Parnia, hed have rethought his position on death.
Parnia is a cardiologist who specialises in cardiac arrest and resuscitation and begins the book with the case of a man who was revived forty seven minutes after his heart stopped. Modern medical techniques mean that it is possible to bring patients back to life with no brain damage after a considerable period without a pulse, ie death is reversible.
But, more importantly, asks Parnia, what becomes of the self, or the soul, during the time that one is physically dead?
This is a compelling and profound study of the most basic of human concepts - what constitutes life? - and Parnia is a lucid and thoughtful guide through the maze of philosophy, physiology and spiritual questions.
SALLY MORRIS
The silliest snowball fight ever: Brilliant, beautiful and bonkers books for children, chosen by SALLY MORRIS
Nothing is as tempting as freshly fallen snow - it just begs you to take that first scrunchy step. So, when a boy wakes up to a blanket of white, he can't bear the time it takes his Grandad to get out
Who needs Alan Bennett if you've got Gogglebox?
Steph and Dom, the glorious tipplers from Kent who fall over their own settee, are national treasures, as are the jolly lasses Sandy and Sandra from Brixton.
Snorting coke - the perfect pick-me-up for tired Tommies
There's no shortage of horrors here - a lieutenant describes digging through bodies and a Punjabi Mohammedan writes an anguished letter home to his family
Oh God! So that's what I look like! How inventing mirrors changed the world
In this brilliant idea for a book - which century from 1000-2000 AD brought the most change? - Ian Mortimer treats us to an exhilarating time-travel ride.
Put a little poetry into Christmas
This anthology makes a fine present for anyone interested in poetry, ranging from the earliest English poem through every century to current poetry
Christmas books: Portraits of Palace life - by the insiders
As a former royal correspondent, Dickie Arbiter assumed he had a good idea of what was expected of him in his new role as senior press officer for Her Majesty the Queen.
Christmas gardening books: Plant a few ideas for your dream garden
A cold winter's evening is the ideal time to sit by the fire and plan your garden: what to keep, what to change and what to plant in the coming year.
LITERARY NEWS
- Adrian Mole author Sue Townsend, 68, dies at her home in Leicester after a stroke
- New chapter in the history of the Bronte birthplace as new owners turn it into a cafe honouring the family's literary heritage
- Nobel laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez, author of One Hundred Years of Solitude, hospitalised with lung and urinary tract infections
- You don't need sex to sell! Dan Brown's Inferno tops Amazon best-seller list for 2013 as readers look for different thrills after Fifty Shades trilogy
Laugh? I nearly swallowed my false teeth! ROGER LEWIS on the wits - and twits - among the year's celebrity blockbusters
Roger Lewis rounds up the best, and the worst, of this year's memoirs and autobiographies.
PICTURE THIS: Brigitte Bardot - The life, the legend, the movies
At the height of her fame in Brigitte Bardot rivalled Marilyn Monroe as the world's most photographed woman - and her most famous images are showcased in this retrospective of her life
Why did women put up with cruel, whining Winner?
Winner recruited girlfriends in much the same way as he recruited staff and wasn't kind to either. Dinah May nursed him until his death but was then left to deal with his debts
They climbed fast, lived hard - and died young
This is a book about mountains and lost youth, by a man who is no longer young, but who remembers only too fiercely what it was like.
We can run faster than a mosquito,but not a dragonfly
Simply because motion is relative - an idea that Galileo (bottom right) first articulated 300 years before Einstein (top right) - is not to say it doesn't exist
Meet five stage and screen stars at our Christmas feast
Sir Terry Wogan has been delighting his TOGs on Radio 2 for many years, Sheila Hancock CBE is one of Britain's foremost actresses and Nicholas Parsons CBE is the loved chairman of Just A Minute
The original panto dame? Queen Victoria! Oh yes she was... as the royal who made it respectable to love bawdy festive shows
What must foreigners think of us come Christmas time? The pantomime tradition is so wonderfully and eccentrically uniquely British
RECENT SERIALISATIONS
Brave boys the fat man branded liars: How Cyril Smith's victims were ignored when they tried to expose the abuse they suffered at his hands
All this week, Labour MP Simon Danczuk is laying bare how the Establishment, the Liberal Party, the police and even MI5 covered up the industrial-scale child abuse of 29-stone Rochdale MP Cyril Smith. Today, how his victims were ignored and betrayed when they tried to expose their suffering.
The truth about life in an open prison, by VICKY PRYCE - and why the women in our softest jails really suffer
In the finale of her unique inside story, Vicky Pryce, the wife of disgraced ex-minister Chris Huhne, describes life at open prison East Sutton Park.
His little face still looked so beautiful: In Mary Berry's own moving words, the story of the child she lost so young
In the second extract from her autobiography, published exclusively in the Mail today, Mary Berry describes the sudden death of the son she doted on, pictured left.
Eric Morecambe's son reveals the obsessive dark side of the 'Bring Me Sunshine' boys
In his compelling new biography, Gary Morecambe talks about his father's relationship with Ernie Wise and how he continued to make them laugh even up until the end.
Chaplin accused of being a communist after saying 'the Russian purges' were 'wonderful' while he was harassed by former partner
The star was accused of being a communist after allegedly telling banquet guests 'the Russian purges' were a 'wonderful thing'.
The day Lucian Freud turned Jerry Hall into a man: How the artist painted the model's face as a male after she 'didn't show up for two sittings'
Jerry and Lucian had never quite bonded. While sitting for him she gave him cashmere jerseys, which he loathed. But worse, she had a habit of being late.
'Useless Darling was just in it for himself' : Damian McBride reveals how 'poor Alistair' played the media martyr amid economic crisis
In an extract from his explosive memoirs, Power Trip, Damian McBride reveals how the former Chancellor survived by the skin of his teeth after credit crunch bungle.
