October abounds with some of the most notable nonfiction of the year!
Celebrity autobiographies are in demand this month: Britney Spears details her journey to freedom following the end of her conservatorship in The Woman in Me; Henry Winkler revisits The Fonz, and more lovable TV characters, in Being Henry; Dolly Parton celebrates her passion for fashion in Behind the Seams; John Stamos recounts his career, from General Hospital to Full House, in If You Would Have Told Me; Jada Pinkett Smith teaches us about courage and authenticity in Worthy; Werner Herzog tells the story of legendary career as a filmmaker in Every Man for Himself and God Against All; actress and fashionista Julia Fox chronicles her shocking teen years in Down the Drain; and
Reggie Watts shares his story of growing up as a biracial oddball in America’s heartland in Great Falls, MT.
Bestselling author Adam Grant is back with the science to help you achieve greater things in Hidden Potential; Arnold Schwarzenegger distills the seven rules you need to follow to be successful in Be Useful; behavioral scientist Robert Sapolsky considers the science of life without free will in Determined; philosopher Daniel C. Dennett celebrates the life of the mind in I’ve Been Thinking; Liz Moody arms readers with science-based tools for health and happiness in How to Build Your Best Life; Shane Parrish helps you turn ordinary moments into extraordinary results in Clear Thinking; New York Times columnist David Brooks discusses the art of seeing other deeply, and being deeply seen, in How To Know A Person; and osteopath Gabrielle Lyon
identifies a science-based strategy for aging well in Forever Strong.
Ree Drummond shares 112 fast and fabulous recipes for slightly impatient cooks in The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Dinner’s Ready; Sohla El-Waylly provides instructions for becoming a better cook in Start Here; Joshua Weissman takes cooking to an entirely different level with his latest, Texture Over Taste; “Third-culture” kid Jon Kung re-examines Chinese American recipes in Kung Food; restaurateur Erin French brings 75 recipes from The Lost Kitchen in Big Heart Little Stove; Nik Sharma presents a cookbook heavy on technique for plant-focused meals in Veg-table; Michelle Davis & Matt Holloway, the duo behind Bad Manners, reboot your home cooking with 100 plant-based recipes in Hungry as Hell; Palak Patel inspires with 100 easy-to-make Indian meals in The Chutney Life; Molly Baz helps cooks get loose in the kitchen in More is More; and Curtis Chin revisits his childhood as a gay Chinese American kid in his family’s restaurant in Detroit in Everything I Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant.
Liza Mundy uncovers the secret history of women and the CIA in The Sisterhood; Mary Beard spotlights the rulers of the ancient Roman world in Emperor of Rome; Steve Inskeep illustrates how Lincoln succeeded in a divided America in Differ We Must; David Leonhardt tracks the rise and fall of the American dream in Ours Was the Shining Future; Roger Moorhouse unfolds the forgotten story of the Holocaust’s most audacious rescue operations in The Forgers; Gary J. Bass looks at the Asian counterpart to Nuremburg in Judgment at Tokyo; Sarah Ogilvie celebrates the unsung heroes who created the Oxford English Dictionary in The Dictionary People; David Mitchell presents a ridiculous history of England’s kings and queens in Unruly; Rebecca Clarren investigates the history of her Jewish ancestors who forced the Lakota off their in The Cost of Free Land; Seattleite Cat Bohannon covers two hundred million years of the female body in Eve; Stuart A. Reid tells the secret history of the CIA and a Cold War assassination in the Congo in The Lumumba Plot; and picture book author Oliver Jeffers illuminates our human story, so far, in the all ages illustrated book Begin Again.
Roxane Gay presents a decade’s worth of arguments, criticism and minding other people’s business in Opinions; Yung Pueblo completes his poetic trilogy with The Way Forward; Athena Dixon reflects on what it means to be lonely in
The Loneliness Files; and the late Hilary Mantel dazzles with her final book, A Memoir of My Former Self.
Martin Baron chronicles the power struggle between Trump and Jeff Bezos at the Washington Post in Collision of Power; Taylor Lorenz tells the untold story of fame, influence, and power on the Internet in Extremely Online; Greg Lukianoff argues that cancel culture undermines trust, and offers a solution, in The Canceling of the American Mind; Elena Kostyuchenko reports from the “lost country” of her birth in I Love Russia; McKay Coppins profiles Utah Senator and former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney in Romney; and former Republican strategist Stuart Stevens warns readers how his old party is driving our democracy to autocracy in The Conspiracy to End America.
Amber Lewis reveals her approach to renovation is in the details in Call It Home; Erin Napier celebrates the home with soulful stories in Heirloom Rooms; and Minimalista Shira Gill provides solutions and inspiration for your home in Organized Living.
Carl Safina chronicles the impact of restoring a near-death baby owl to health in Alfie and Me; Carlo Rovelli takes us on a mesmerizing trip through the universe to discover White Holes; Helen Czerski illustrates how the ocean works in The Blue Machine; and Margaret Renkl follows the plants and animals in her backyard for a year in The Comfort of Crows.
Sonic Youth bandmember Thurston Moore traces his life and art in Sonic Life; Sly Stone sheds light on his mysterious life in Thank You (falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin); Filmmakers David Zucker, Jim Abrahams and Jerry Zucker tell the hysterical true story of the movie Airplane! in Surely You Can’t Be Serious; Staci Robinson pens the first authorized biography of Tupac Shakur; Matthew Singer shows how Siskel & Ebert changed movies forever in Opposable Thumbs; Will Hermes presents a complete biography of the King of New York, Lou Reed; Laurence Leamer shines a light on the unforgettable women behind the legendary director’s dark obsession in Hitchcock’s Blondes; and Jeopardy champion Amy Schneider reflects on the joys and rewards of a curious life in
In the Form of a Question.
And in true crime, Australian writer Helen Garner chronicles an infamous crime where a father is suspected of murdering his three sons in This House of Grief, and Kim Cross embeds readers inside the Polly Klass kidnapping in In Light of All Darkness.
And don’t forget the month’s Peak Picks!
~posted by Frank
Leave a Comment