Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman review – a brief treatise on time

A sage and sane theory of ‘time unmanagement’ exhorts us to stop chasing the seconds and embrace the joy of missing out

Inflamed by Rupa Marya and Raj Patel review – modern medicine’s racial divide

The colonial legacy of healthcare is laid bare in an urgent study of how medicine has progressed – and who has been left behind

Through the Looking Glasses by Travis Elborough review – the spectacular life of spectacles

From Henry VIII on his charger to the sex symbol Michael Caine, this close-up history of glasses illuminates their special kind of cool

Spike by Jeremy Farrar and Anjana Ahuja; and Vaxxers by Sarah Gilbert and Catherine Green – review

Two urgent and fascinating accounts from the frontlines show how scientists succeeded, and failed, at saving us from Covid-19

This Is Your Mind on Plants by Michael Pollan review – the trip of a lifetime

This fascinating insight into our relationship with mind-altering plants weaves personal experimentation with cultural history

Hello, Stranger by Will Buckingham review – how we find connection in a disconnected world

An elegant and moving exploration of what it means to connect with strangers turns into an elegy for a much-missed way of life

Head First by Alastair Santhouse review – a medical memoir with elegance and integrity

In a passionate blend of anecdote and evidence, a consultant psychiatrist shows how the mind and the body are irrevocably connected, despite medicine’s desire to separate and specialise

Many Different Kinds of Love by Michael Rosen review – life after Covid

The much loved writer gives a memorable account of the disease from a patient’s point of view, in poems, notes and emails – and conveys how it feels to come back from the brink

Friends by Robin Dunbar review – why it pays to be sociable

Is it possible to have more than five very close friends? A miscellany of modern research reveals the life-saving power of our relationships

Beyond Order by Jordan Peterson review – more rules for life

Despite the psychologist’s role in the culture wars, his books present him as a personal trainer for the soul ... Is his latest advice bracing and useful or merely humourless and banal?