Book lovers, rejoice: reading is back in style. Which really means that being seen reading has come back in style. Books have taken on the mantle of fashion accessories, with each new title offering an opportunity for personal branding. Are you leafing through yet another biography of Napoleon (intellectual), clutching a copy of Asako Yuzuki’s Butter as if it’s a mini-Birkin (in the know) or using Irvine Welsh’s Men In Love as a cocktail saucer somewhere in east London (edgy, if a little try hard)? Presumably, you’ve tossed out your copy of The Salt Path by now.

Summer reading has become a conspicuously performative activity: books left on the side of a counter as you sip a coffee (Lavazza, please) in Italy or dusty anthologies piled up in the corner of a living room for an architec

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