The Observer Decameron—Eighth Day

The Chinese Photobook: From the 1900s to the Present
Martin Parr and WassinkLundgren, editors
A monumental feat of collecting and research, and a survey that breaks important new ground. One of the year’s most indispensable (and heaviest) photography books.

A Fortunate Man: The Story of a Country Doctor
Jean Berger and Jean Mohr
This classic fusion of literary writing by Berger and documentary pictures by Mohr—first published in 1967—receives a welcome reissue after being out of print in the UK for years.

Posters: A Global History
Elizabeth E. Guffey
Guffey gives a familiar subject a brand new scholarly treatment, paying close critical attention to the poster’s social history. Anyone with an interest in the medium should read this book.

Revelations: Experiments in Photography
Ben Burbridge, editor
The experiments begin as aids to science, and then, over the decades, feed back into the aesthetic practices of photographers. Compact, deftly laid out, and crammed with stimulating ideas and images.

Fantasia of Color in Early Cinema
Tom Gunning, Joshua Yumbie, Giovanna Fossati, and Jonathon Rosen
The largely unknown history of color in silent film. Stunning, revelatory, and put together with a wonderfully scrupulous eye—a “gluttonous visual overdose” to quote the title of one section.

Very Graphic: Polish Designers of the 20th Century
Jacek Mrowczyk, editor
This hefty overview covers all the major innovators of Polish graphic design, each given a generously illustrated chapter written by an expert. Difficult to find but it will receive wider distribution in early 2016.

Images of Conviction: The Construction of Visual Evidence
Diane Dufour, editor
Photographs of crime scenes from ordinary homicide to the evidence of Nazi atrocities presented at the Nuremberg Trials. Intelligently written by specialists, and visually edited with forensic care.

Gathered Leaves
Alec Soth
A box set gathering Soth’s four influential photobooks presented as miniature facsimilies, along with a set of beautifully printed photographs on cards. Will other photographers now do the same?

Every Photograph is an Enigma
Michel Frizot
Extraordinary anonymous photographs from Frizot’s collection coupled with the French writer’s superb analysis—it’s a dual-language edition. The accompanying exhibition is now at the Fotomuseum Winterthur in Switzerland.

The Bone Clocks
David Mitchell
The author of Cloud Atlas has an astonishing dexterity. Here, he uses meticulous realism to prepare the ground for flights of mystical fantasy that are beyond improbable, yet weirdly convincing.

See all of our contributors’ Top Ten books of the year here

Observed