The Tell-Tale Brain by VS Ramachandran – review

A neuroscientist's explanation of how brain damage can unlock hidden talents is gripping, says Ian Thomson

The Kama Sutra’s lessons for modern lovers

Sam Jordison: As well as a welcome reminder that ancient wisdom is all too often timeworn inanity, it also teaches us that obscenity is nothing new

Proust Was a Neuroscientist by Jonah Lehrer – review

It is the humanities that tell us what it is like to be human, says Simon Ings

Author, author: Lisa Appignanesi on the language of love

'Love is one of our last socially sanctioned forms of madness'

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua – review

Amy Chua reckons tough love is good for children. Terri Apter can't wait to read their memoirs

The Immortalization Commission by John Gray – review

Thank God – or whomever– for this look at transcendentalism says John Banville

The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee – review

This magnificent study of cancer suggests that, for all medicine's advances, we cannot beat a disease that is a distorted version of ourselves, says Alexander Linklater

Your Voice in My Head by Emma Forrest — review

Emma Forrest's account of mental illness is frank and frequently funny but bears the scars of self-obsession, writes Julie Myerson

Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses by Claire Dederer

Carrie O'Grady welcomes a yoga book by a mother who wasn't very good at it

Help!: How to Become Slightly Happier and Get a Bit More Done by Oliver Burkeman

Nicholas Lezard on the self-help book to end all self-help books