What is going on when a book simply makes no sense to you? Perhaps a classic that everyone praises. Or something new you’re being asked to review. I don’t mean that you find the style tiresome, or the going slow; simply that the characters, their reflections, their priorities, the way they interact, do not really add up.

When you're a book-lover like me, you can't help but express your passion for all things literary, all the time. Ask anyone who knows me, and they'll tell you I'm constantly recommending new novels, debating book-to-screen adaptations, sharing author news, or giving books away to anyone who will take them. When people come to my house, whether it's for dinner, a game night, a cookout, or just a quick visit, no one leaves without a book...

Early books and periodicals about the internet were the atlases of the digital world in the mid-90s—and like atlases, they frequently pandered to the largest possible audience.

After being imprisoned for a reading-related prank, the couple never recovered.

A new study represents a new low for pop psychology.

Privacy is one of the most important concepts of our time, yet it is also one of the most elusive. As rapidly changing technology makes information increasingly available, scholars, activists, and policymakers have struggled to define privacy, with many conceding that the task is virtually impossible.

Bill Goldstein’s “The World Broke in Two” looks at four British writers — Woolf, Eliot, Forster and Lawrence — at a turning point in history.

NPR's Ron Elving reviews a massive new tome on the life of Edwin Stanton, certainly one of the most contentious and controversial figures in Abraham Lincoln's cabinet of rivals.

Thinking about running as a slow, meditative practice provides more benefits than viewing it as a sport, author says.

With access to hitherto unused archives, historian Alexandra Richie brings little-known facts and a sobering description of the barbaric destruction of the people and the city of Warsaw.

What books is Elon Musk reading?

Even Einstein was unexceptional in his youth. Now a new book questions our fixation with IQ and says adults can help almost any child become gifted

Texts written in the Middle Ages are a rich source of information about the past – but the DNA in the animal skin pages has its own story to tell

Even today, the 1863 edition of the “Dictionnaire Infernal” is the stuff of nightmares. By Eric Grundhauser.

Read an excerpt from Nobel Prize winner Svetlana Alexievich's breathtaking new book, 'The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II.'

Browse 570 Digitized Pages. By Josh Jones.

The long read: The headlines have never been worse. But an increasingly influential group of thinkers insists that humankind has never had it so good – and only our pessimism is holding us back.

In “Nabokov’s Favorite Word Is Mauve,” Ben Blatt uses data to probe the body of conventional wisdom around creative writing.

Everyone who knows the man seems to think they have a book in them.

Authors and publishers alike are finding that it's hard to sell books in a political climate where truth is stranger than fiction.

Long live the public library! It’s not dead yet. The internet hasn’t rendered physical reference centers obsolete, thanks to millennials.

We all know that a book can change the shape of history. Think "The Communist Manifesto" and "Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis," not to mention the Bible and the Koran. But a book review? How much influence could a book review possibly have? Judging from the political consequences of Norman Mailer’s review of Norman Podhoretz’s 1967 memoir, "Making It," a lot.

For several years in the 1930s the case of a Manx mongoose – who was said to speak in a range of foreign languages including ‘Hindustani’, as well as singing, whistling, coughing ‘in a human manner’, swearing, dancing and attending political meetings – was discussed across Britain. As a fantastical beast, he was a contemporary of Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster, who was first supposedly photographed in 1933, although his fame was shorter-lived.

In Praise of Libraries and the Forests That Surround Them.

“Every vegan seems to have their own lightbulb moment when something clicked and they stopped eating animal products,” says Cambridge University archaeologist Dr Pía Spry-Marqués, who committed to a plant-only diet two years ago as she researched the history of pork. “My son was born three years ago and I was nursing him. People looked at me funny for breastfeeding my child, and yet it was fine to drink lattes with cow’s milk, or eat chocolate spread,” she recalls to The Independent.

By passing as a professor, James Richard Shinn made off with over $100,000 worth of books.

What kind of books do you write when you believe civilization is doomed? By Laura Miller.

Famed historian Alfred McCoy predicts that China is set to surpass the influence of the U.S. globally, both militarily and economically, by the year 2030. By Jeremy Scahill.

A city is a complicated, self-organizing system. In recovery efforts, there’s no one body in charge.

Could a Trump dynasty in the White House survive for three more elections? Post-electoral stress disorder has generated a hysteria still amply manifest. By Edward Luttwak.

Thousands of children who live in San Antonio public housing now have plenty of new books to read, thanks to an initiative that aims to eradicate book deserts and promote literacy.

A new book collects historical images of cactuses and succulents that were tracked down in the wild by devoted photographer-explorers.

A plagiarist in a kitchen and a horse walking into a bar; Dublin crimes and Washington misdemeanours; relationships, revolutions and relaxations ... leading writers reveal their summer recommendations. By Julian Barnes, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, David Hare, Mark Lawson, Pankaj Mishra, George Monbiot, Sarah Perry, Ahdaf Soueif, Colm Tóibín and others

For eight years, King's pseudonym went undiscovered. Then a bookstore clerk took a walk to the Library of Congress.