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THROUGH THE LANGUAGE GLASS by Guy Deutscher (Arrow, Pounds 7.99) GUY Deutscher starts this book about language by looking at William Ewart Gladstone before he became Prime Minister. In his spare time, Gladstone was a Homeric scholar. He noticed something odd about Homer's writing. Colours were described in an unusual way. Was Homer colour-blind? No, it turns out. But the ancient Greeks chopped up the colour spectrum in a way that seems alien to us. From here, Deutscher leads us into a fascinating study of the way every language divides the world into its own unique jigsaw. Beautifully argued.

THE BIG SHORT by Michael Lewis (Penguin, Pounds 9.99) HERE, Michael Lewis …