Profile Books Ltd

Why are some nations more prosperous than others? This book sets out to answer this question, with a compelling and elegantly argued new theory: that it is not down to climate, geography or culture, but because of institutions. It explains why the world is divided into nations with wildly differing levels of prosperity.

A pack of dogs are granted the power of human thought - but what will it do to them? A surprising and insightful look at the beauty and perils of consciousness.

A lead debut novel: a literary thriller about a pandemic, the rise of AI, and how - or why - we might save the human race.

The essential writings of the greatest music writer of the twentieth, or any, century, reissued as a Serpent's Tail Classic.

The ruined silhouette of the Parthenon on its hill above Athens is one of the world's most famous images. Its 'looted' Elgin Marbles are a global cause celebre. But what actually are they? This work tells the history and explains the significance of the Parthenon, the temple of the virgin goddess Athena, the divine patroness of ancient Athens.

Mary Beard on Ancient Rome: Britain's favourite classicist lifts the lid on the Roman Empire.

Explores our rich classical heritage - from Greek drama to Roman jokes, introducing some larger-than-life characters of history, such as Alexander the Great, and Nero. The author invites you into the places where Greeks and Romans lived and died, from the palace at Knossos to Cleopatra's Alexandria - and reveals the often hidden world of slaves.

Contains chapters that include Street Life, Earning a Living: Baker, Banker and Garum Maker (who ran the city), and The Pleasure of the Body: Food, Wine, Sex and Baths. This book offers an insight into the workings of a Roman town.

'The world's most controversial classicist debunks our movie-style myths about the Roman town with meticulous scholarship and propulsive energy - scrutinising and animated in equal measure' Laura Silverman, Daily Mail

Ernest Becker tackles our relationship to mortality and searches for alternative ways to live.

Restore your overworked nervous system with the transformative powers of movement

Mrs Donaldson is a conventional middle-class woman beached on the shores of widowhood after a marriage that had been much like many others: happy to begin with, then satisfactory and finally dull. But when she decides to take in two lodgers, her mundane life becomes much more stimulating.