Welcome to a new year and a new installment of Recommended Reads. Here are some new releases to get you started on that 2013 reading list:

Unusual Uses For Olive Oil is the latest novel from the inimitable Alexander McCall Smith, author of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series. Detailing the further adventures of Professor Dr von Igelfeld, the novel evokes the joy of earlier installments in the series, such as The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs.

And as with that book, daschunds are featured prominently (as you can probably tell by the cover).

In 2012, Lawrence M. Krauss, director of the Origins Project at Arizona State University, published A Universe from Nothing: Why There is Something Rather Than Nothing, which details theories surrounding the origin of the universe.

Presenting scientific data in an accessible way, the paperback edition comes out today, featuring a new preface regarding the Higgs particle discovery and an afterword by the great Richard Dawkins.

Of course, this book will appeal to intellectual types, but is of value to all, as it engages the reader with the latest scientific theories.