The story of Putin's rise from a low-level KGB operative to leader of the world's largest country in Masha Gessen''s ‘The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin’, features alongside Wade Davis'' book, named ‘Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory and the Conquest of Everest’.

Rushdie's latest book, named ‘Joseph Anton’, is about the pseudonym that he used following a fatwa being issued against him, the BBC reports.

Bbiologist Thor Hanson’s ‘Feathers’, which is also one of the 14 books that have been nominated for the coveted prize, details a sweeping natural history of feathers that have been used to fly, protect, attract, and adorn throughout the world.

The prize aims to highlight original, diverse and thought-provoking books which bring non-fiction subjects to a wide audience. The winner will be announced on 12th November.

The judges for the competition will be chaired by MP David Willetts, who is the Minister for Universities and Science, Guardian''s non-fiction editor Paul Laity, editor of Prospect magazine Bronwen Maddox, writer and biographer Patrick French and philosopher, poet, and novelist Professor Raymond Tallis, the report said.

The list of the 14 books nominated for Samuel Johnson Prize for this year are:

 Joseph Anton, by Salman Rushdie

The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin, by Masha Gessen

Behind the Beautiful Forevers, by Katherine Boo

One on One, by Craig Brown

Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory and the Conquest of Everest, by Wade Davis

Feathers, by Thor Hansen

Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman

The Old Ways, by Robert MacFarlane

Inside the Centre: The Life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, by Ray Monk

Grand Pursuit: The Story of Economic Genius, by Sylvia Nasar

Winter King, by Thomas Penn

The Better Angels of our Nature, by Steven Pinker

The Spanish Holocaust, by Paul Preston

Strindberg A Life, by Sue Prideaux