Everyone is Watching, by Megan Bradbury

A lovely book about New York City, focused on its history through an artistic vantage point. Very well written, it has a certain dreamy character. And it makes one want to see the art works the author talks about, like the beautiful photos by Robert Mapplethorpe or Thomas Eakins.It's also about how cities change, the nostalgia for a lost past, and the bittersweet effects of gentryfication. A very good debut novel.

La Grande Illusion, de Jean Renoir

This is a wonderful movie - beautifully directed and acted, a strong story about war and changing times, solidarity and humanity in hard times. It's amazingly modern for the time when it was made (1937) - the use of different languages (something unthinkable in Hollywood until recently), the portrayal of Germans as men as humane as the French. All in all, a great French movie, on a par with others such as Jeux Interdits, Le Salaire de la Peur or Les Diaboliques.

2084, La Fin du Monde, par Boualem Sansal

A very good book; a novel set in a dystopian world ruled by radical Islam. It cleverly depicts the dangers of religion and theocracy, as Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale also did using radical Evangelical Christianism, and the corruption, hypocrisy and moral decadence so characteristic of any totalitarian regime. The writing is excellent, in a beautiful and elegant French.

La religion fait peut-être aimer Dieu mais rien n'est plus fort qu'elle pour faire détester l'homme et haïr l'humanité.

Depressingly true words.

The Undoing Project, by Michael Lewis

A very interesting book, worth reading by its content if not by its writing, which is overall fairly poor. But the story is fascinating - it depicts the lives and work of the two Israeli psychologists, Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, whose collaboration produced the fundamental work about human bias in decision making, proving that we are not that rational in our choices after all and that our mistakes are actually systematic and so mostly predictable - and unavoidable? It's a knowledge relevant to all fields of work, including Medicine, and explains many of our mistakes in work and life - politics included. So, even if the writing is not that good (but an easy reading nonetheless), it's still worth reading.

The Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K. Le Guin

A great book by Ursula K. Le Guin, from whom I had loved the first three books of the Earthsea series and the wonderful The Dispossessed, read many years ago. The recent death of the author made me wish to read more from her, and I'm happy I did - this book is intelligent, imaginative and beautiful.