Striking a superhero stance is unlikely to change your emotions, but it could help conquer those difficult moments

You may have noticed it before: someone standing feet apart, hands on hips, chest out. Or maybe you’ve done it yourself before a job interview or big presentation. This is “power posing” – the idea that striking a bold posture can make you feel more confident and improve performance. But does it work?

The concept took off in the early 2010s. “A few studies seemed to show if you expanded your body position, it would change your psychological state,” says Professor Ian Robertson of Trinity College Dublin and author of How Confidence Works. “Other studies showed that it could alter testosterone levels, boosting motivation.”

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Jaw-dropping formal invention turns this witty heist tale of endangered snails and ‘mail-order’ brides into an urgent dispatch about writing during conflict

Maria Reva’s dexterous and formally inventive debut novel is impossible to review without giving away a major surprise. I do this with a heavy heart: one of the pleasures of this book is the jaw‑dropping coup de théâtre that comes halfway through. Until that point, Endling offers its readers the pleasures of a more or less conventional novel.

The central character is a misanthropic obsessive called Yeva who drives a converted campervan around the countryside of her native Ukraine, rescuing endangered snails. She’s hoping to get them to breed, but some turn out to be endlings – the last living member of a species. First coined in the 1990s, the word was unknown to me before I read this book, but the tragic biological checkmate it describes is older than history. Aurochs, dodos, quaggas, mammoths and Tasmanian tigers must all have culminated in an endling.

Snails weren’t pandas – those oversize bumbling toddlers that sucked up national conservation budgets – or any of the other charismatic megafauna, like orcas or gorillas. Snails weren’t huggy koala bears, which in reality were vicious and riddled with chlamydia. Nor were snails otters, which looked like plush toys made for mascots by aquariums, despite the fact that they lured dogs from beaches to drown and rape them.

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TJ Dominguez opens up about his extraordinary life doing drug runs for Pablo Escobar. Plus, the incredible story of Hollywood legend Hedy Lamarr

Two days after his release from prison, TJ Dominguez opens up about a life where he ran the largest Lamborghini dealership in the world by day, then by night made $100m a month flying cocaine for Pablo Escobar. Host Jonathan Walton’s rapport-packed interview with him makes for a wild story – of how Dominguez only ended up there after being conned, desperately needing to make a quick buck to fulfil his late dad’s last wishes. Alexi Duggins
Widely available, episodes weekly

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Experts says organised criminal gangs could be behind spate of incidents over past few months

Copper thieves have been targeting England’s onshore windfarms, and security experts say organised gangs could be behind the crimewave.

At least 12 large windfarms across Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Derbyshire, Essex, Humberside, Northamptonshire, North Yorkshire and Lincolnshire have fallen victim to cabling thieves in the past three months.

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Scientists fear thousands of tonnes of chemicals dumped in mining tunnels in Alsace may seep into an aquifer, with devastating consequences for people and wildlife

Eight police officers linger with their backs to the two-hectare (five-acre) site known as Stocamine. The place is nondescript in the morning drizzle: two mine shafts, some modern-looking office buildings, a staff car park, lines of landscaped trees. The reason for the police presence, however, is what lies beneath: 42,000 tonnes of toxic waste stored under our feet.

Stocamine, which lies in the old industrial town of Wittelsheim, Alsace, once held an old potash mine. Now, the mine shafts are closed, storing poisonous waste from elsewhere. Above the mine shafts is one of Europe’s largest aquifers.

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Trump claims the assault ‘totally obliterated’ the key facilities, but what do we know about its impact?

• Middle East crisis – latest updates

Donald Trump was quick to claim that US strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities had “completely and totally obliterated” them. Still, it remains unclear how much physical damage has been done or what the longer-term impact might be on Iran’s nuclear programme.

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The political temperature is dangerously high – and shows few signs of cooling

It has been a grim couple of weeks in the US, as multiple acts of politically motivated violence have dominated headlines and sparked fears that a worrying new normal has taken hold in America.

Last Saturday, a man disguised as a police officer attacked two Democratic legislators at their homes in Minnesota, killing a state representative and her husband, and wounding another lawmaker and his wife. The alleged murderer was planning further attacks, police said, on local politicians and abortion rights advocates.

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And Iran warns of "everlasting consequences".

Social media popularizes the deadly activity, and an 1847 law stymies families who try to hold the city to account

Jaida Rivera’s 11-year son, Cayden, was supposed to be in school at Brooklyn’s Fort Greene preparatory academy on the morning of 16 September last year. Staff saw him in the cafeteria after his grandmother dropped him off at 7.45am.

But 30 minutes later he was marked as absent. Cayden had somehow slipped out, boarded a G subway train traveling south and was riding on top of one of its carriages when he fell on to the tracks at the Fourth Avenue-Ninth Street station just after 10.00am. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

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Royal Albert Hall, London
Elton John was a constant silent presence as Carlile veered from crooner ballads to hot-rubber-and-leather vibes

‘I’ve waited to stand on this stage since I was 12 years old,” said Brandi Carlile, and somehow, she made her achievement feel like everyone’s success. Within three songs of appearing at the Royal Albert Hall she had invited her 5,000-strong audience to sing along with her. You and Me on the Rock’s evocation of family life became the best wedding karaoke ever.

Carlile has been a voice for the marginalised in the rural roots scene for two decades. But her largest headline show in the UK – part of a five-date UK and Ireland tour climaxing at Glastonbury – suggests her outlier-country is now legitimately mainstream here. Her No 1 album with Elton John played no small part and this setlist paid gracious tribute to her collaborator. She even serenaded him with a yearningly harmonised version of its title track as he sat in his box like a silent angel.

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