2012 Books of the Year illustration ©Chris Wormell Dec 3, 2012

Best books of 2012

From 3D printing to the perfect Zen garden, FT writers and guests pick their favourite books from the past year

Torres del Paine National Park, Chile ©Corbis Gillian Tett Nov 23, 2012

‘Antifragile’ by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The new book from the author of ‘The Black Swan’ calls for resilience in the face of stress

Through the Window Nov 23, 2012

The truth about fiction

The essays collected in Julian Barnes’s ‘Through the Window’ exhibit the astringent virtues of his novels but are somehow more revealing of the writer himself

Korea Nov 23, 2012

From Seoul with sorrow

Daniel Tudor’s ‘Korea: The Impossible Country’ explores the two sides of a success story

J Robert Oppenheimer in New Jersey, 1947 ©Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images Nov 16, 2012

The ‘father of the atomic bomb’

Lisa Jardine reviews ‘Inside the Centre: The Life of J Robert Oppenheimer’ by Ray Monk

La Folie Baudelaire Nov 16, 2012

The critical eye

In ‘La Folie Baudelaire’, Roberto Calasso locates the birth of the modern in Paris through the life and work of the 19th-century poet and critic

Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac Nov 16, 2012

Seeds of subprime

‘Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac‘ by Oonagh McDonald explains how flawed policies led to disaster in the US housing market

Artful Nov 16, 2012

Second readings

‘Artful’ by Ali Smith is a hybrid work of fictional narrative and literary criticism that sheds light on the ways literature can shape our lives and relationships

Russian billionaire Andrey Melnichenko's superyacht, 'A' ©Rex Features Nov 9, 2012

‘Plutocrats’ by Chrystia Freeland

Forget the 1% - it’s the richest 0.1% who have been really pulling away from the rest. Review by Bill Emmott

On the Map Nov 9, 2012

It goes with the territory

Maps tell us as much about the societies that produced them as the cities, continents and oceans they represent, writes Carl Wilkinson