Crimes and Misdemeanors
A look back at the eight best mystery books of 2020
New York Minute
Ernst Haas’s bright, blurry photographs capture the vibrancy and transience of a city on the move
An Empress in Code
She was known for her three-hour hairstyling sessions, but Elizabeth of Austria also provided key, secret support to her husband, the Habsburg emperor
Back in the U.S.S.R.
A new book peels back the Iron Curtain with nostalgic photographs of life in the Soviet Union
Yuval Noah Harari
The author of Sapiens recommends three books for developing our sense of perspective
Short List
What to read this week, from Roger Rosenblatt’s new essays to books on Venice and the origins of humankind
Doctors’ Orders
The story of two pioneering women doctors and the London hospital they founded amid the turmoil of World War I
Night and Day
The centenarian Eddie Jaku, who survived Kristallnacht and Auschwitz, considers himself “the happiest man on Earth”
The Female Gaze
Alongside a show at Washington, D.C.’s National Gallery, a book re-evaluates the history of photography through the lens of the New Woman
On Thin Ice
Confessions of a hockey dad
Hollywood Ending
History forgot Arthur Calder-Marshall, the popular writer whose novel was picked up by Orson Welles. Now his grandson plays Welles in David Fincher’s Mank
AIR MAIL’s 10 Best Books of 2020
Music, film, history, and its bad boys: holiday reading for every type
