Lucas Wittmann

Lucas Wittmann is an editorial director at TIME. He oversees the Ideas section. He is the recipient of a National Magazine Award.

Recent Articles

6 Essential Cormac McCarthy Books

From 'The Road' to 'No Country for Old Men'

By Annabel Gutterman , Cady Lang and Lucas Wittmann

George Saunders Is Settling Into Ambiguity

'Life is complicated. Let’s leave everything in'

By Lucas Wittmann

The Best Books of 2021 So Far

Some of the best books of the year so far provide welcome respite from the outside world—while others aim directly for the turbulence, providing frameworks to understand how the past informs our present. Michelle Zauner...

By Andrew R. Chow , Kelly Conniff , Lucy Feldman , Mahita Gajanan , Annabel Gutterman and Lucas Wittmann

The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2020

In a year when the headlines were dominated by conflict around the things that make us different—race, class, gender, politics and all the other markers of identity—the best nonfiction books tore into those tensions and...

By Andrew R. Chow , Lucy Feldman , Annabel Gutterman and Lucas Wittmann

The 10 Best Fiction Books of 2020

Reading fiction in 2020 was an act of defiance—of turning our attention away from the catastrophes playing out around us to engage in a quiet, imaginative act. And the year’s best fiction offered many paths...

By Lucy Feldman , Annabel Gutterman , Suyin Haynes , Ciara Nugent , Dan Stewart and Lucas Wittmann

The 42 Most Anticipated Books of Fall 2020

For the publishing industry, the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic meant that many books slated for spring and summer of this year were moved to the fall. Now, the last months of 2020 will...

By Raisa Bruner , Andrew R. Chow , Annabel Gutterman , Cady Lang and Lucas Wittmann

'Veritas' Reexamines the Truth of Jesus' Wife

Ariel Sabar's 'Veritas' offers a damning assessment of a scholar who was duped by a forged scrap of papyrus that suggested Jesus may have had a wife

By Lucas Wittmann

The Little-Known Story of Harper Lee's Failed Attempt to Write a True Crime Novel

One of the great mysteries in American literary history is what happened to Nelle Harper Lee after July 11, 1960, when To Kill a Mockingbird was published. While her novel sold millions of copies, Atticus...

By Lucas Wittmann

Dystopian Novel The Wall Shows Us What Goes Down When a Wall Goes Up

John Lanchester’s last novel, Capital, published in 2012, was a Dickensian tour of London in the era of global capital–but before crises of xenophobia and worsening climate change came crashing down. The British journalist and...

By Lucas Wittmann

8 Must-Read Books You Might Have Missed in 2018

Engrossing novels, smart short stories and mind-expanding nonfiction

By Lucas Wittmann

Best-Selling Historian Joseph J. Ellis Explains What the Founding Fathers Got Wrong

The best-selling historian on what the Founders got wrong, restoring faith in government and the case for national serviceAmerican Dialogue examines what George Washington, John Adams, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson might think about issues...

By Lucas Wittmann

Why Best-Seller Paulo Coelho Thinks Books Should Never Be Made Into Movies

The Brazilian novelist, one of the world’s best-selling authors, on nostalgia for his hippie days and the forms that love takesYour new novel, Hippie, is based on your experiences exploring South America and Europe in...

By Lucas Wittmann
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