The world is completely out of joint and most of us haven't even noticed. However there are some people who are only too well aware of this predicament: terrorists and heads of state. They are taking advantage of the cracks in failing states for their own gain-and the number of failed and ...

This series on the philosophy of passions is a search for a free time in the truest sense of the word, when the everyday ego takes "time out" and loses itself in the passionate pursuit of sports, hobbies or tricks. The authors describe their passions subjectively, likably and self-ironically, even ...

Contents:

Eastern philosophy (Upanishades, Buddhism, Confucianism, Daoism) - Antiquity (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Epicure) - Patristic - Scholasticism - Arab philosophy - The Enlightenment (Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Hume, Voltaire, Montesquieu) - Idealism (Kant, Fichte, ...

Nicki and Canon are meant for each other. So when Canon disappears, Nicki sets off on a quest to find him - and uncovers a dark secret in his life that leads her into totally alien territory. Running parallel to familiar reality there exists a world of flowing creatures: creatures that ...

Johann, Nick, Florian and Mark are best friends. They have been inseparable for nearly ten years. But somewhere along the line, something has subtly changed. They have all begun to notice how different they are, and realise that each of them needs to grow up in their own way. But what is the ...

Our past and our future are buried beneath the ice.

The ice-cap in the Arctic and Antarctic has always played a crucial role in the earth's complex eco-system. So this 740,000-year old ice contains valuable information about the climatic changes which took place in the ...

A girl named Johnny

Early on, Joana Wolkenzin knows that she is different. She spends hours reading and learns song lyrics by heart. As she grows older, she falls in love with both boys and girls. In the No Man's Land of Western Pomerania in the 1990s, she gives herself a new name: ...

Tegel airport, Berlin, 2015: a woman who has just arrived from Munich hails a taxi. Nico, the driver, soon realises that he recognises the passenger in his rearview mirror. Back in 1991 Nico and Jule spent a short but intensely passionate night together in the wake of a demonstration against the ...

"People tell each other stories in order to survive-but for death they need music." Marten feels most at home in graveyards: they are quiet and their trees offer plenty of shade. Even as a child he was the odd one out-and as an adult he takes up the profession that fits him like a lid fits ...

Just how free are we?

A bizarre murder: the body of a prostitute is discovered in the garden of a Free Church parish hall. There's a note in her skull bearing the religious epigram: "the truth will set you free".

When Detective Anton Glauberg returns home ...

Lorenz, a former librarian and cinema usher, is now pushing 30 and working in a copy shop. One day he holds onto one of several copies of a diary he is binding for a diplomat. He gives it unread to his girlfriend Iris, a substitute teacher, so they can read it together. The diary is the ...

Roland Ziegler is a confident 36-year-old entrepreneur. One day he bumps into Zoe, a young jazz singer, in Berlin. To his surprise, she agrees to go with him to Amsterdam, where he falls deeply in love with her. But his family history and his company's shady past are beginning to close in.