Touch by David J. Linden; House Guests House Pests by Richard Jones; Dinner of Herbs by Clara Grissman, paperback reviews

Rich anecdotes and revelations, bacon beetles, and a closely observed account of a Turkish village in the Sixties

Touch by David J. Linden (Penguin, £8.99)

This investigation of the "weird, complex and often counter-intuitive" nature of "our touch circuits" takes an equally erratic approach. Discussing the nature of orgasm, for example, Linden zigzags between the universal ("the exquisite sensation of inevitability") and the recondite ("ventral tegmental area axons"). Along with lots of sex, the book is rich in anecdote and revelations. The reason you can't use your genitals to read Braille (should you so desire) is that, despite being highly sensitive, they are low in Merkel discs, responsible for "fine discrimination". Lips and tongue, on the other hand, would be fine.

House Guests House Pests by Richard Jones (Bloomsbury, £9.99)

Happening on the latest volume from the author of The Little Book of Nits, my wife was simultaneously aghast and enthralled. She was particularly stirred by Jones's account of finding "thousands of bacon beetles [Dermestes lardariius]" under a rug in south-east London, where we happen to live. Looking on the bright side, houseflies are declining in developed countries, which is just as well since each can carry 6.6 million bacteria. Despite noting "whatever their size, all spiders are venomous", Jones ends with the benign thought: "If you want to live and thrive, let a spider run alive."

Dinner of Herbs by Clara Grissman (Eland, £12.99)

From an American traveller, this closely observed account of a Turkish village in the Sixties transports the reader to a very different world, both physically (sit-down toilets were seen as "unhygienic and unclean") and mentally. Grissman's creation of toy boats meant nothing to children who had never seen the sea. She rises for freezing breakfasts in the small hours during Ramadan and observes a newborn baby being wrapped in swaddling bands "for several months". Initially written as a private memoir, Grissman's portrait of an achingly poor but hugely hospitable community radiates honesty and affection.