Books & Reading Lists

← Back to Stuff

Books & Reading Lists

1. Memoirs & Biographies

• Know My Name: A Memoir by Chanel Miller
• Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! Adventures of a Curious Character by Richard P. Feynman
• Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey
• Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed
• Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan
• Educated by Tara Westover
• Red Velvet Underground: A Rock Memoir, with Recipes by Freda Love Smith
• The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
• The Many Lives of Mama Love: A Memoir of Lying, Stealing, Writing, and Healing by Lara Love Hardin
• Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body by Roxane Gay
• Untamed by Glennon Doyle
• Men We Reaped: A Memoir by Jesmyn Ward
• A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy by Tia Levings
• Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother’s Will to Survive by Stephanie Land
• Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton
• The Best Minds: A Story of Friendship, Madness, and the Tragedy of Good Intentions by Jonathan Rosen
• Unbound: My Story of Liberation and the Birth of the Me Too Movement by Tarana Burke
• Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
• The Color of Water by James McBride
• Semi-Well-Adjusted Despite Literally Everything by Alyson Stoner
• Recollections of My Nonexistence: A Memoir by Rebecca Solnit
• The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row by Anthony Ray Hinton
• This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor by Adam Kay
• The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks
• Mark Lanegan (Author of Sing Backwards and Weep)

---

2. Music & Art

• The Art of Practicing: A Guide to Making Music from the Heart by Madeline Bruser
• The Joy of Music by Leonard Bernstein
• La literatura y la música son parte de mi by Julieta Venegas
• Music Theory for Dummies by Michael Pilhofer

---

3. AI, Product, Business & UX

• The Upstarts: How Uber, Airbnb, and the Killer Companies of the New Silicon Valley Are Changing the World by Brad Stone
• Apple in China: The Capture of the World’s Greatest Company by Patrick McGee
• Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal
• Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler
• Evidence-Guided: Creating High Impact Products in the Face of Uncertainty by Itamar Gilad
• How to Break Up with Your Phone: The 30-Day Plan to Take Back Your Life by Catherine Price
• Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code by Ruha Benjamin

---

4. Health, Psychology & Wellness

• The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom by Jonathan Haidt
• The Parent’s Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for Modern Parents by William Martin
• The Way Out: A Revolutionary, Scientifically Proven Approach to Healing Chronic Pain by Alan Gordon
• Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health by Casey Means
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Made Simple: 10 Strategies for Managing Anxiety, Depression, Anger, Panic, and Worry by Seth J. Gillihan
• Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic by Sam Quinones
• The Wisdom of Wolves: Lessons From the Sawtooth Pack by Jim Dutcher
• Scattered Minds: The Origins and Healing of Attention Deficit Disorder by Gabor Maté
• The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
• Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer
• The Plantpower Way: Whole Food Plant-Based Recipes and Guidance for The Whole Family by Rich Roll
• The Happy Runner: Love the Process, Get Faster, Run Longer by David Roche

---

5. Science, Classics & Literature

• East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• El lugar by Annie Ernaux
• El adversario by Emmanuel Carrère
• Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World by Rutger Bregman
• The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow’s World by Charles C. Mann
• What is Life? by Erwin Schrödinger
• The Fabric of Reality: The Science of Parallel Universes by David Deutsch
• Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
• Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself: How to Lose Your Mind and Create a New One by Dr Joe Dispenza
• The Aeronaut’s Windlass by Jim Butcher
• Come as You Are: The Surprising New Science that Will Transform Your Sex Life by Emily Nagoski
• The Four Tendencies by Gretchen Rubin
• The Toaster Project: Or a Heroic Attempt to Build a Simple Electric Appliance from Scratch by Thomas Thwaites
• The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin
• Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter
• The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes
• Funny Story by Emily Henry
• G.K. Chesterton:
  • Orthodoxy
  • The Innocence of Father Brown
  • Saint Thomas Aquinas
  • The Everlasting Man
  • Heretics
• The Book that Made Your World: How the Bible Created the Soul of Western Civilization by Vishal Mangalwadi
• The Hidden Oracle by Rick Riordan
• El imperio final by Brandon Sanderson
• Catedrales by Claudia Piñeiro
• A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman
• Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive by Noah J. Goldstein
• The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
• Antes que nada by Martín Caparrós
• Nada se opone a la noche by Delphine de Vigan
• El gaucho insufrible by Roberto Bolaño
• El buen mal by Samanta Schweblin
• Women Who Run With the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés

---

6. Curated Goodreads Shelves

• Melissa’s ‘Read’ Books
• Venhamon’s ‘01-top’ Books
• Venhamon’s ‘02-bio-memoirs’ Books
• Venhamon’s ‘02-art-music-more’ Books (160 books)
• Venhamon’s ‘09-woman-gender-race’ Books (167 books)
• maraoz’s ‘Read’ Books
• Great “Dog” Books List (1338 books)
• Non-Fiction Dogs Shelf

---

7. Read This Twice (Celebrity & Thinker Recommendations)

• 5 books Jon Stewart recommended
• 6 books Tom Hanks recommended
• 6 books Sarah Silverman recommended
• 11 books Russell Brand recommended
• 11 books Tony Robbins recommended
• 11 books Brian Cox recommended
• 29 books Mark Zuckerberg recommended
• 30 books Anthony Bourdain recommended
• 30 books Steve Jobs recommended
• 43 books Stephen King recommended