Books by New Scientist

In How Your Brain Works leading neuroscientists and New Scientist introduce the evolution and anatomy of the brain viewed through traits such as: memory, emotions, sleep, sensing and perception.

Congratulations! You're the proud owner of the most complex information processing device in the known universe. The human brain comes equipped with all sorts of useful design features, but also many bugs and weaknesses. Problem is you don't get an owner's manual. You have to just plug and play. As a result, most of us never properly understand how our brains work and what they're truly capable of. We fail get the best out of them, ignore some of their most useful features and struggle to overcome their design faults. Featuring witty essays, enlightening infographics and fascinating 'try this at home' experiments, New Scientist take you on a journey through intelligence, memory, creativity, the unconscious and beyond. From the strange ways to distort what we think of as 'reality' to the brain hacks that can improve memory, The Brain: A User's Guide will help you understand your brain and show you how to use it to its full potential.

A myth-busting, scientifically proven guide to living a healthier, happier life - without the self-help fads

A myth-busting, scientifically proven guide to making you live longer and live healthier - without the faddy diets

DOES ANYTHING EAT WASPS meets INFORMATION IS BEAUTIFUL: A full-colour infographic journey through life, the universe and everything.

There's a whole universe out there...Imagine you had a spacecraft capable of travelling through interstellar space. You climb in, blast into orbit, fly out of the solar system and keep going. Where do you end up, and what do you see along the way?The answer is: mostly nothing. Space is astonishingly, mind-blowingly empty. As you travel through the void between galaxies your spaceship encounters nothing more exciting than the odd hydrogen molecule. But when it does come across something more exotic: wow!First and most obviously, stars and planets. Some are familiar from our own backyard: yellow suns, rocky planets like Mars, gas and ice giants like Jupiter and Neptune. But there are many more: giant stars, red and white dwarfs, super-earths and hot Jupiters. Elsewhere are swirling clouds of dust giving birth to stars, and infinitely dense regions of space-time called black holes. These clump together in the star clusters we call galaxies, and the clusters of galaxies we call... galaxy clusters.And that is just the start. As we travel further we encounter ever more weird, wonderful and dangerous entities: supernovas, supermassive black holes, quasars, pulsars, neutron stars, black dwarfs, quark stars, gamma ray bursts and cosmic strings.A Journey Through The Universe is a grand tour of the most amazing celestial objects and how they fit together to build the cosmos. As for the end of the journey - nobody knows. But getting there will be fun.ABOUT THE SERIESNew Scientist Instant Expert books are definitive and accessible entry points to the most important subjects in science; subjects that challenge, attract debate, invite controversy and engage the most enquiring minds. Designed for curious readers who want to know how things work and why, the Instant Expert series explores the topics that really matter and their impact on individuals, society, and the planet, translating the scientific complexities around us into language that's open to everyone, and putting new ideas and discoveries into perspective and context.

Machines That Think explores how artificial intelligence helps us understand human intelligence, machines that compose music and write stories - and asks if AI is really a threat.

A voyage through the mind to discover what consciousness really is, and what we can learn when it goes awry.

The End of Money is an essential introduction to cryptocurrencies and the blockchain revolution which has been hailed as the greatest advancement since the invention of the internet.

In The Quantum World leading physicists and New Scientist take you on a journey through quantum theory, its mind-bending properties and the technologies transforming our world.

The Horrible Histories but for science -- packed with all the gross and weird bits.

Everything you need to know about being human: an eye-opening, illustrated handbook.

Why do birds sing at dawn? What's the slowest a plane can fly without stalling and falling out of the sky? And how long can you keep a tiger cub as a pet? Will We Ever Speak Dolphin? has the answers to these questions and many more. By 2012, over two million copies of the New Scientist 'Last Word' series had been sold.

Every year, readers send in thousands of questions to New Scientist, the world's best-selling science weekly, in the hope that the answers to them will be given in the 'Last Word' column - regularly voted the most popular section of the magazine.Does Anything Eat Wasps? is a collection of the best that have appeared, including: Why can't we eat green potatoes? Why do airliners suddenly plummet? Does a compass work in space? Why do all the local dogs howl at emergency sirens? How can a tree grow out of a chimney stack? Why do bruises go through a range of colours? Why is the sea blue inside caves? Many seemingly simple questions are actually very complex to answer. And some that seem difficult have a very simple explanation. New Scientist's 'Last Word' celebrates all questions - the trivial, the idiosyncratic, the baffling and the strange. This selection of the best is popular science at its most entertaining and enlightening.

Why The Universe Exists takes you deep into the world of particle physics to explore how the universe functions at the smallest scales.

A Sunday Times bestsellerHow long is 'now'? The short answer is 'somewhere between 2 and 3 seconds'. The long answer involves an incredible journey through neuroscience, our subconscious and the time-bending power of meditation. Living in the present may never feel the same. Ready for some more? Okay. Why isn't Pluto a planet? Why are dogs' noses wet? Why do hens cluck more loudly after laying an egg? What happens when one black hole swallows another? Do our fingerprints change as we get older? How young can you die of old age? And what is at the very edge of the Universe?Life is full of mind-bending questions. And, as books like What If? and Why Don't Penguins' Feet Freeze? have shown, the route to find each answer can take us on the weirdest and most wonderful journeys. How Long is Now? is a fascinating new collection of questions you never thought to ask, along with answers that will change the way you see everything.

Why Don't Penguins' Feet Freeze? is the latest compilation of readers' answers to the questions in the 'Last Word' column of New Scientist, the world's best-selling science weekly. Following the phenomenal success of Does Anything Eat Wasps? - the Christmas 2005 surprise bestseller - this new collection includes recent answers never before published in book form, and also old favourites from the column's early days.Yet again, many seemingly simple questions turn out to have complex answers. And some that seem difficult have a very simple explanation. New Scientist's 'Last Word' is regularly voted the magazine's most popular section as it celebrates all questions - the trivial, idiosyncratic, baffling and strange. This new selection of the best is popular science at its most entertaining and enlightening.

Do Polar Bears Get Lonely? is the third compilation of readers' answers to the questions in the 'Last Word' column of New Scientist, the world's best-selling science weekly. Following the phenomenal success of Does Anything Eat Wasps? (2005) and the even more spectacularly successful Why Don't Penguins' Feet Freeze? (2006), this latest collection includes a bumper crop of wise and wonderful answers never before seen in book form.As usual, the simplest questions often have the most complex answers - while some that seem the knottiest have very simple explanations. New Scientist's 'Last Word' is regularly voted the magazine's most popular section as it celebrates all questions - the trivial, idiosyncratic, baffling and strange. This all-new and eagerly awaited selection of the best again presents popular science at its most entertaining and enlightening.

A journey through 55 alternative realities, parallel worlds and possible futures from the million-selling New Scientist series.