Biography & Memoir bestsellers

A riveting, deeply personal account of history in the making—from the president who inspired us to believe in the power of democracy
 
In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing... Read more »

Bob Woodward’s new book, Rage, is an unprecedented and intimate tour de force of new reporting on the Trump presidency facing a global pandemic, economic disaster and racial unrest.

Woodward, the #1 international bestselling author of Fear: Trump in the White House, has uncovered the precise moment the president was warned that the Covid-19... Read more »

The first book from Ruth Bader Ginsburg since becoming a Supreme Court Justice in 1993—a witty, engaging, serious, and playful collection of writings and speeches from the woman who has had a powerful and enduring influence on law, women’s rights, and popular culture.

My Own Words offers Justice Ginsburg on wide-ranging topics, including gender... Read more »

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • James Baldwin grew disillusioned by the failure of the civil rights movement to force America to confront its lies about race. In our own moment, when that confrontation feels more urgently needed than ever, what can we learn from his struggle?
 
“In the midst of an ugly Trump regime and a beautiful Baldwin revival,... Read more »

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • NAMED ONE OF TIME’S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST
 
Hailed by Toni Morrison as “required reading,” a bold and personal literary exploration of America’s racial history by “the most important essayist in a... Read more »

A close friendship is one of the most influential and important relationships a human life can contain. Anyone will tell you that! But for all the rosy sentiments surrounding friendship, most people don’t talk much about what it really takes to stay close for the long haul.

Now two friends, Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman, tell the story of their... Read more »

In this revelatory, authoritative portrait of Donald J. Trump and the toxic family that made him, Mary L. Trump, a trained clinical psychologist and Donald’s only niece, shines a bright light on the dark history of their family in order to explain how her uncle became the man who now threatens the world’s health, economic security, and social... Read more »

“Maria’s perspective is powerful and vital. Years ago, when In the Heights was just starting off-Broadway, Maria got the word out to our community to support this new musical about our neighborhoods. She has been a champion of our triumphs, a critic of our detractors, and a driving force to right the wrongs our society faces. When Maria speaks,... Read more »

The first full life—private, public, legal, philosophical—of the 107th Supreme Court Justice, one of the most profound and profoundly transformative legal minds of our time; a book fifteen years in work, written with the cooperation of Ruth Bader Ginsburg herself and based on many interviews with the justice, her husband, her children, her... Read more »

Maya Angelou’s debut memoir is a modern American classic beloved worldwide. Her life story is told in the documentary film And Still I Rise, as seen on PBS’s American Masters.

Here is a book as joyous and painful, as mysterious and memorable, as childhood itself. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings captures the longing of lonely children, the brute... Read more »

A new rip-roaring essay collection from the smart, edgy, hilarious, unabashedly raunchy, and bestselling Samantha Irby.

Irby is forty, and increasingly uncomfortable in her own skin despite what Inspirational Instagram Infographics have promised her. She has left her job as a receptionist at a veterinary clinic, has published successful books and... Read more »

OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

The heartrending story of a midcentury American family with twelve children, six of them diagnosed with schizophrenia, that became science's great hope in the quest to understand the disease.

Don and Mimi Galvin seemed to be living the American dream. After World War II, Don's work with the Air... Read more »

One in five people in the United States lives with a disability. Some disabilities are visible, others less apparent—but all are underrepresented in media and popular culture. Now, just in time for the thirtieth anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, activist Alice Wong brings together this urgent, galvanizing collection of... Read more »

The #1 New York Times Bestseller

Includes six new songs by Jessica Simpson, available exclusively in the Open Book audiobook.

Performed by the author featuring her music throughout.

Jessica reveals for the first time her inner monologue and most intimate struggles. Guided by the journals she's kept since age fifteen, and brimming with her unique... Read more »

"The audiobook version includes recorded conversations between the two from the 1990s to the present, delivering a compelling informal profile. As a permanent record of Ginsburg’s voice and fighting spirit, it’s an inspiring listen." — Paste

This program includes recorded conversations between Jeffrey Rosen and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

In this... Read more »

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

Featured in the critically acclaimed documentary RBG

“The authors make this unassuming, most studious woman come pulsing to life. . . . Notorious RBG may be a playful project, but it asks to be read seriously. . . . That I responded so personally to it is a testimony to [its] storytelling and panache.”— Jennifer Senior,... Read more »

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • REESE’S BOOK CLUB X HELLO SUNSHINE BOOK PICK • From a leading voice on racial justice, an eye-opening account of growing up Black, Christian, and female that exposes how white America’s love affair with “diversity” so often falls short of its ideals.
 
“Austin Channing Brown introduces herself as a master memoirist.... Read more »

This "hilarious and honest" bestselling memoir from a rising comedy star tackles issues of gender, sexuality, feminism, and the Catholic childhood that prepared her for a career as an outspoken lesbian comedian (Abby Wambach).
Cameron Esposito wanted to be a priest and ended up a stand-up comic. Now she would like to tell the whole queer as... Read more »

A call to action from Jane Fonda, one of the most inspiring activists of our time, urging us to wake up to the looming disaster of climate change and equipping us with the tools we need to join her in protest

"This is the last possible moment in history when changing course can mean saving lives and species on an unimaginable scale. It's too late... Read more »

Universally acclaimed, rapturously reviewed, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for autobiography, and an instant New York Times bestseller, Chanel Miller's breathtaking memoir "gives readers the privilege of knowing her not just as Emily Doe, but as Chanel Miller the writer, the artist, the survivor, the fighter." (The Wrap).

"I... Read more »

A scorching memoir of a love affair with an addict, weaving personal reckoning with psychology and history to understand the nature of addiction, codependency, and our appetite for obsessive love

“The disease he has is addiction,” Nina Renata Aron writes of her boyfriend, K. “The disease I have is loving him.” Their love affair is dramatic,... Read more »

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “The story of modern medicine and bioethics—and, indeed, race relations—is refracted beautifully, and movingly.”—Entertainment Weekly

NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE FROM HBO® STARRING OPRAH WINFREY AND ROSE BYRNE • ONE OF THE “MOST INFLUENTIAL” (CNN), “DEFINING” (LITHUB), AND “BEST” (THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER) BOOKS OF... Read more »

A deeply moving and insightful collection of personal essays from #1 bestselling author John Green, adapted from his critically acclaimed podcast The Anthropocene Reviewed.
 
The Anthropocene is the current geological age, in which human activity has profoundly shaped the planet and its biodiversity. In this remarkable symphony of essays adapted... Read more »

“Elaine gifts us all with a beautifully intimate and powerful retelling of her ever-unfolding journey. In sharing her joys, pitfalls, adventures, self-doubt, and successes, she reminds us that through uncovering and discovering the many facets of ourselves, we are more than enough.”
—Yara Shahidi
 
“Elaine’s book is a call for young women to... Read more »

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • #ReadWithJenna Book Club Pick as Featured on Today • From the creator of Elle’s “Eric Reads the News,” a heartfelt and hilarious memoir-in-essays about growing up seeing the world differently, finding unexpected hope, and experiencing every awkward, extraordinary stumble along the way.

“Pop culture–obsessed, Sedaris-level... Read more »

"Narrating her own work, Patrisse Khan-Cullors shares the salient moments of her life that led her to become a founder of Black Lives Matter...pain, frustration, and joy [emblazon] each word she utters." — AudioFile Magazine

This program is read by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and includes a bonus conversation.

The emotional and powerful story of one of... Read more »

At once a powerful evocation of his early life in Harlem and a disturbing examination of the consequences of racial injustice to both the individual and the body politic, James Baldwin galvanized the nation in the early days of the civil rights movement with his eloquent manifesto. The Fire Next Time stands as one of the essential works of our... Read more »

The inspiration for the hit Broadway musical Hamilton! 

In the first full-length biography of Alexander Hamilton in decades, National Book Award winner Ron Chernow tells the riveting story of a man who overcame all odds to shape, inspire, and scandalize the newborn America. According to historian Joseph Ellis, Alexander Hamilton is “a robust... Read more »

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • With unparalleled reporting, a Pulitzer Prize–winning New York Times reporter continues to break news about the most important political story of our lives as he chronicles the clash between a president and the officials of his own government who tried to stop him.

In the early days of the Trump presidency, the people... Read more »

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Ali Wong’s heartfelt and hilarious letters to her daughters (the two she put to work while they were still in utero) cover everything they need to know in life, like the unpleasant details of dating, how to be a working mom in a male-dominated profession, and how she trapped their dad.

“Knife-sharp . . . a genuine... Read more »

Now a Netflix original series!

Unorthodox is the bestselling memoir of a young Jewish woman’s escape from a religious sect, in the tradition of Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Infidel and Carolyn Jessop’s Escape, featuring a new epilogue by the author.

As a member of the strictly religious Satmar sect of Hasidic Judaism, Deborah Feldman grew up under a code... Read more »

“Kwame Onwuachi’s story shines a light on food and culture not just in American restaurants or African American communities but around the world.” —Questlove
 
By the time he was twenty-seven years old, Kwame Onwuachi had opened—and closed—one of the most talked about restaurants in America. He had launched his own catering company with twenty... Read more »

**New York Times Bestseller**USA Today Bestseller**The Sunday Times Bestseller**The Globe and Mail Bestseller**ABA Indie Bestseller**The Times (UK) Memoir of the Year**One of Newsweek's Most Anticipated Books of 2020**

An extraordinary memoir of drama, tragedy, and royal secrets by Anne Glenconner--a close member of the royal circle and... Read more »

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • In these hilarious essays, the Saturday Night Live head writer and Weekend Update co-anchor learns how to take a beating.

“I always wanted to punch his face before I read this book. Now I just want to kick him in the balls.”—Larry David

If there’s one trait that makes someone well suited to comedy, it’s being able to... Read more »