This is a book that tries to answer a very fundamental question, How to Live?  Not how we should live, in the sense of morality, but how to live a good life, a fully human, satisfying, and flourishing one. Sarah Bakewell tries to answer this question through the medium of the life and writings of one man, Michael de Montaigne, the man who single-handedly created the literary genre of the essay, and gave it its name...

Julian Barnes likes to cook. He's a competent cook with a simple ambition. To cook tasty, nutritious food, and to, over time, expand his culinary repertoire. But with him, it's all about the recipes and the instructions. He can and will follow them faithfully, but he needs them to be precise...In this collection of essays, Barnes brings his pedantic but charming outlook to life in the kitchen.

Tom Fort is a writer, and an angler who aspires to be handy. In 2018, his daughter-in-law, Sharona, took over their local hardware shop, a century old place called Heath and Watkins. While she, as the handy-woman of the family, was the driving force behind it, the rest of the family got involved in some capacity, and the author got to be a part of the day to day working of a village hardware shop...

This is a book about stoicism, an introduction to the fundamental ideas and teachings, and an exploration of the ways in which these ancient ideas apply to our lives today. It’s a very accessible book because the author takes what are sometimes complex ideas, and relates them to events and experiences in her own life...

This book was first published in 1989. It's an account of a year in Provence, the first year that Peter Mayle and his wife Jennie, spent in their new home in the village of Menèrbes. This was a long-held dream. Mayle and his wife used to visit every summer, soak up the heat and the sunshine, a welcome break from the grey and often wet weather in England, and dream of, one day, buying a house and moving to Provence. And then they actually did it...