Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer. The Sunday Times describes Foer's story of how he became American Memory Champion as "the most entertaining science book of the year". Also selected by Amazon.com editors as among the year's best non-fiction books.
The Indy says Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature will generate more discussion than any other science book this year, adding: "His explanations for the apparent paradox of how brutality and even genocide in the modern world coexist with a trend towards diminished violence are entirely convincing." Also listed by the New York Times and Marginal Revolution.
Not strictly psychology, but the Times has chosen Tim Harford's Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure as among the year's best science books. His "engaging" book "looks at how science and statistics can be used to predict commercial successes and industrial disasters and to inform public policy."
For the Guardian, both Jeanette Winterson and Hanif Kureishi chose Darian Leader's What is Madness? as among their favourite books of the year. Kureishi calls the book "magisterial" and describes how Leader "explains that the 'irrational' delusions and hallucinations of the mad are their attempts at sense." Winterson says it's a "thought-provoking book about how we diagnose and differentiate our many kinds of insanities."
Before I Go to Sleep, a novel by S. J. Watson is chosen by Waterstones as among their favourite paperbacks of 2011: "Memories define us. So what if you lost yours every time you went to sleep? Your name, your identity, your past, even the people you love - all forgotten overnight. And the one person you trust may only be telling you half the story. Welcome to Christine's life".
The New York Times highlights Thinking Fast, Thinking Slow By Daniel Kahneman: "a lucid and profound vision of flawed human reason in a book full of intellectual surprises and self-help value."
Mind's book of the year was won by Bobby Baker for Diary Drawings: Mental Illness and Me. "A collection of 158 drawings Baker created between 1997 and 2008, the diary provides us with an astonishing insight into her struggle to overcome mental and physical ill-health."
The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry by Jon Ronson, is chosen by Amazon.com's editors as among the best non-fiction titles this year. "In this madcap journey, a bestselling journalist investigates psychopaths and the industry of doctors, scientists, and everyone else who studies them."
Through the Language Glass: How Words Colour Your World by Guy Deutscher was shortlisted for this year's Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books (read the first chapter).
Finally, the British Psychological Society has just announced the shortlist for its 2011 Book of the Year Award.
sursa