Earth

The story of the United States was determined from the start by the manner of its birth. The original 13 English colonies may seem lost in the distant past. Yet it was their diversity that was the key to their union. The creation of the US reflected the tensions of 17th-century England, pitting the Puritan republicans of Massachusetts against the landed gentry of Virginia, Quaker New Jersey against Catholic Maryland. The Founding Fathers resolved these tensions by instituting the concept of states’ rights. Their Constitution was a tissue of compromise, yet it was robust. What served to unite 13 colonies still holds together the mightiest nation on Earth.

This slender, gleaming novel depicts a day in the life of six astronauts at the International Space Station – but a day isn’t a day for a crew orbiting Earth at more than 17,000 miles an hour. Space ‘takes their 24 hours and throws 16 days and nights at them in return’. Weaving a line of philosophical enquiry through her luminous prose has become something of a trademark for Samantha Harvey, who probed the elasticity of time through a portrayal of Alzheimer’s disease in her prize-winning debut The Wilderness and, in All is Song, transported Socrates to the 21st century.

As humans, we are supposed to have an aversion to slime. It should repel us. Objects and organisms that might be harmful trigger feelings of disgust which keep us away. And, according to the biologist Susanne Wedlich, the common denominator of ‘wide-ranging microbial threats, covering sickness, sex, death and putrefaction’ is their sliminess. It is easy to test this theory. Google ‘slime moulds’ and note your first response. They are gross. But these organisms are worth sticking with. Japanese researchers once conducted an experiment using a slime mould and a map of the country. They put the mould on top of Tokyo and dropped food on to the city’s surrounding towns.