Le Cabinet des Merveilles de M. Wilson

I picked this up for the fruit-pit carvings chapter alone, but the pronged ant details pulled me in even deeper. It’s the kind of book you end up reading aloud to whoever’s nearby, which is exactly what I did.

I’ve never read anything quite like this—the section on those pronged ants alone is worth the price. It’s dense in the best way, and the historical details feel utterly strange and real.

The way it weaves the story of those pronged ants and horned humans into a bigger meditation on curiosity is unlike any architecture book I've read. The prose is so vivid I felt like I was walking through the cabinets myself.