Books by Amitav Ghosh

4. Amitav Ghosh, Smoke and Ashes: Opium’s Hidden Histories .  An extremely well-written, and also useful history of the opium trade, albeit with more than its fair share of left-wing jargon.  And yes that is the novelist Ghosh.  Due out in February.

During the year I saw many favorable reviews for Alexsandar Hemon’s The Lazarus Project (I liked it) and Amitav Ghosh’s Sea of Poppies (I haven’t read it yet), though neither seems to be popping up on so many "best of" lists.  Perhaps Robin Hanson would view such lists as signaling rather than a honest statement of preferences.