Category: True Story

Hello, nonfiction nerds, and congrats on making it to the end of another week. I’m excited to be bringing you some nonfiction news today… but honestly, even more excited that this is my last newsletter before I head on a vacation! Next week I’ll be going up north, as we Minnesotans like to say, to spend time at the lake with books and booze and boat rides.

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Sponsored by Libro.fm

Libro.fm lets you purchase audiobooks directly from your favorite local bookstore. You can pick from more than 100,000 audiobooks, including New York Times best sellers and recommendations from booksellers around the country. With Libro.fm you’ll get the same audiobooks, at the same price as the largest audiobook company out there (you know the name), but you’ll be part of a much different story, one that supports community. In June, Libro.fm is launching their Kids Club and YA Club, which will offer select audiobooks priced under $10 each month, as well as their Summer Listening Challenge–each person to finish will get free audiobook credit and the chance to win free audiobooks for a year! Sign up here to get three audiobooks for the price of one.

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Since I’ll be away from my desk I’ve tapped Alice Burton, the amazing co-host of the For Real podcast, to write next week’s newsletters. She’s one of my favorite funny people on the Internet, so I know you’ll be in good hands.

This week I have a few exciting book announcements, a list of best memoirs, and some thoughts on why it’s a terrible idea to climb Mount Everest. Onwards!

Author and creator Noelle Stevenson is writing a graphic memoir! The Fire Never Goes Out will be “a collection of seven or eight years of Stevenson’s personal comics, which come together in a memoir about her life.” I want to read this immediately but will have to be content to wait until January 2020.

Mallory O’Meara, author of The Lady from the Black Lagoon, has another book! Girly Drinks will be “a narrative nonfiction look into the history of women making and drinking alcohol all over the world” and sounds totally amazing.

The New York Times published a list of the 50 best memoirs of the past 50 years. It’s a really interesting list, and more diverse than I was expecting. I was pleased to see a few of my favorites – The Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward, Wave by Sniali Deraniyagala, and The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion, among others.

John Oliver did a segment on climbing Mount Everest and how the “expedition industry has devalued a once-historic achievement” and also made it a lot more dangerous. It’s interesting that this is in the news again, since this whole issue is at the center of Jon Krakauer’s 1997 book Into Thin Air. If you haven’t read that one, go get the audiobook right now – it’s incredible.

While it’s not exclusively nonfiction, the summer book club list from NPR’s Code Switch podcast looks excellent. The list is a collection of summer reads suggested by podcast listeners, as well as members of the Code Switch team.

If you haven’t gotten to read Furious Hours by Casey Cep, you can check out an excerpt from The Guardian. This piece came out back in May, but somehow didn’t cross my radar until this week. I’m psyched to get to this book.

And that’s all for this week! You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. This week we set sail on the high seas to talk about books on the ocean. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy Wednesday, nonfiction lovers! I cannot believe we’re in the last week of June… that means we’re nearly halfway through 2019 already! Bananas.

This week’s new books are a good mix — a little TV criticism, and little sociology, and a little fashion history. Let’s dive in!

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Sponsored by Libro.fm

Libro.fm lets you purchase audiobooks directly from your favorite local bookstore. You can pick from more than 100,000 audiobooks, including New York Times best sellers and recommendations from booksellers around the country. With Libro.fm you’ll get the same audiobooks, at the same price as the largest audiobook company out there (you know the name), but you’ll be part of a much different story, one that supports community. In June, Libro.fm is launching their Kids Club and YA Club, which will offer select audiobooks priced under $10 each month, as well as their Summer Listening Challenge–each person to finish will get free audiobook credit and the chance to win free audiobooks for a year! Sign up here to get three audiobooks for the price of one.

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I Like to Watch: Arguing My Way Through the TV Revolution by Emily Nussbaum – A collection of new and previously-published essays and criticism by a Pulitzer Prize-winning critic. Emily Nussbaum’s passion for television began with Buffy the Vampire Slayer and continues to include shows that are not traditionally part of the hierarchy that raises “violent, dramatic, gritty” shows over those that bring joy and lightness.

Further Reading: Nussbaum won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize in Criticism. Her winning columns are about Joan Rivers, Robert Durst, and The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

The Power of Human: How Our Shared Humanity Can Help Us Create a Better World by Adam Waytz – A look at how our “unprecedented access to other humans” via technology has, paradoxically, “freed us from engaging with them.” Social psychologist Adam Waytz looks at the cost of living human-free lives and offers some scientifically sound ideas about how to reclaim humanity and social connections.

Further Reading: Waytz recently published an article about how “humans’ competitive edge over robots” is leisure. The full article is behind a paywall, but there’s a summary and link here.

Dressed in Dreams: A Black Girl’s Love Letter to the Power of Fashion by Tanisha C. Ford – A “fashionista and pop culture expert” dives deep into the history of fashion, connecting the stories of garments like dashikis and bamboo earrings to her story as “a black girl coming of age in a Midwestern rust belt city.” It’s also “a story of desire, access, conformity, and black innovation.” This sounds so good.

Further Reading: Newsweek published an excerpt of the book where Ford shared the 10 most important items in her closet.

And finally, a few other titles that might appeal to you this week:

• Superpower: One Man’s Quest to Transform American Energy by Russell Gold
• Emperors of the Deep: Sharks—The Ocean’s Most Mysterious, Most Misunderstood, and Most Important Guardians by William McKeever
• The Weather Machine: A Journey Inside the Forecast by Andrew Blum
• Why Young Men: The Dangerous Allure of Violent Movements and What We Can Do About It by Jamil Jivani
• That Other World: Nabokov and the Puzzle of Exile by Azar Nafisi, Valerie Miles, and Lotfali Khonji
• The Drama of Celebrity by Sharon Marcus

Whew! That’s another good week of books. You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. I hope your weekend is full of great reads! – Kim

Happiest of Friday, nonfiction lovers! With the arrival of this newsletter in your inbox, I am officially one week away from a much-needed vacation. I’m not really going anywhere, just taking a week to catch up on life and spend time up at the lake with my family.

I’ve already got an unreasonably high stack of books piled up, which isn’t being helped by the trend of “best books of the year (so far)” lists that have been out this month. This week I’ve got some thoughts on two of them – Amazon and Barnes and Noble – along with some other nonfiction news to round things out. Let’s dive in!

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Sponsored by Libro.fm

Libro.fm lets you purchase audiobooks directly from your favorite local bookstore. You can pick from more than 100,000 audiobooks, including New York Times best sellers and recommendations from booksellers around the country. With Libro.fm you’ll get the same audiobooks, at the same price as the largest audiobook company out there (you know the name), but you’ll be part of a much different story, one that supports community. In June, Libro.fm is launching their Kids Club and YA Club, which will offer select audiobooks priced under $10 each month, as well as their Summer Listening Challenge–each person to finish will get free audiobook credit and the chance to win free audiobooks for a year! Sign up here to get three audiobooks for the price of one.

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Amazon released their top books of the year (so far) list that includes a top 20 picks, then favorites in memoirs, food books, history, and more. There are a good number of nonfiction books in their top 20, which is always a delight. Titles in the top 20 include:

• Once More We Saw Stars by Jayson Greene
• Underland by Robert Macfarlane
• The Unwinding of the Miracle by Julie Yip-WIlliams
• Save Me the Plums by Ruth Reichl
• Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Lori Gottlieb
• Formation by Ryan Leigh Dostie
• Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe

I’ve officially read… none of those! But I have two sitting on my shelves just waiting to be finished, so clearly I should get on those.

Barnes and Noble also put together their top list so far, with 15 totally different nonfiction picks than the Amazon list! It truly is an epic year for new books. This list feels a little more eclectic to me, and leans heavier on more serious, historical nonfiction titles like Midnight in Chernobyl by Adam Higginbotham, The Pioneers by David McCullough, and A Woman of No Importance by Sonia Purnell.

The street in front of NASA headquarters is getting a new name! Inspired by the stories of African American women like Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson, the street will now be named Hidden Figures Way. I am entirely and totally delighted by this. If you haven’t read it, Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly is excellent too.

The woman assaulted by Brock Turner is writing a memoir. Emily Doe, as the woman has been known during court proceedings, will release a memoir in September 2019. According to her publisher, the memoir “will reclaim the story of [Doe’s] sexual assault, expose the arduous nature of the legal system, and emerge as a bold, unifying voice.”

Finally, some follow up related to Naomi Wolf’s new book Outrages. As you may recall, a British journalist pointed out one of the major arguments of her book was based on an incorrect understanding of a historical legal term. Wolf acknowledged two errors and agreed to work on corrections, which was initially enough for her US publisher to move ahead with publication. Not anymore! Late last week, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt said the book will be delayed, adding, “new questions have arisen that require more time to explore.” The book is still out in the UK, with corrections to be made in future editions.

And that’s all I’ve got. You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. I hope your weekend is full of great reads! – Kim

Hello and welcome to a new week, fellow nonfiction fans! It feels like we’re in a bit of a lull for new releases, or at least not quite in the deluge we have been the last month or so. This week I’ve got books about exploring creativity, dying languages, and understanding menopause. Let’s dive in!

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Sponsored by Oxford University Press

In 1621, fifty-six young women left their homes and boarded ships bound for Virginia. Their ages ranged from sixteen to twenty-eight, and they were deemed “young and uncorrupt.” Each had a bride price of 150 pounds of tobacco set by the Virginia Company, which funded their voyage. Though the women had all gone of their own free will, they were to be sold into marriage, generating a profit for investors and helping ensure the colony’s long-term viability. In The Jamestown Brides, Jennifer Potter spins a fascinating tale of courage and survival, exploring their lives in England and experiences in Jamestown.

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Broken Places and Outer Spaces: Finding Creativity in the Unexpected by Nnedi Okorafor – After waking up from back surgery to discover she can’t move her legs, Nnedi Okorafor’s entire sense of self began to feel fluid. This formative experience also bled into her writing, and led her to this manifesto about how “what we perceive as limitations have the potential to become our greatest strengths.”

Further Reading: Marie Claire interviewed Okorafor (who’s probably best known for her science fiction writing) about writing African superheroes for comics and television.

A Death in the Rainforest: How a Language and a Way of Life Came to an End in Papua New Guinea by Don Kulick – As a young anthropologist, Don Kulick wanted to document the death of a native language in New Guinea. Over a thirty-year period, Kulick returned to the village of Gapun many times as he tried to understand the language and the daily lives of the people who spoke it. This book is a look at the remote, isolated village of 200 people and “why this anthropologist realized finally that he had to give up his study of this language and this village.”

More Recommendations: TIME Magazine included this book on their list of best books of summer 2019, which is a pretty impressive list.

Flash Count Diary: Menopause and the Vindication of Natural Life by Darcey Steinke – When menopause hit Darcey Steinke, she quickly discovered that a culture of silence and sexism made this period of life especially difficult and misunderstood. In this book, she explores different aspects of menopause “including the changing gender landscape that reduced levels of hormones brings, the actualities of transforming desires, and the realities of prejudice against older women.”

Further Listening: NPR’s All Things Considered interviewed Steinke as part of its “Let’s Talk about Sex” series where she talked about “navigating a new sexual life after menopause.”

And before I close, three other books that caught my eye this week:

• The Hidden Power of F*cking Up by Try Guys
• The Best People: Trump’s Cabinet and the Siege on Washington by Alexander Nazaryan
• My Seditious Heart: Collected Nonfiction by Arundhati Roy

You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcasthere at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Happiest of Friday, fellow nonfiction fiends! The weather forecast for this weekend in Minnesota looks pretty rainy, which means I have nothing better to do than hide out in the house with books. I am really excited about that.

This week’s newsletter is a deepish dive into a nonfiction controversy that brings to light one of the dirty little secrets of publishing. After that, I’ve got some Kindle deals you can check out this month!

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Sponsored by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, publishers of Reckoning: The Epic Battle Against Sexual Abuse and Harassment by Linda Hirshman.

Linda Hirshman, acclaimed historian of social movements, delivers the sweeping story of the struggle leading up to #MeToo and beyond: from the first tales of workplace harassment percolating in the 1970s, to the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal—when liberal women largely forgave Clinton, giving men a free pass for two decades. And yet, legal, political, and cultural efforts were quietly paving the way for the takedown of abusers and harassers. Reckoning delivers the stirring tale of a movement catching fire as pioneering women in the media exposed the Harvey Weinsteins of the world, women flooded the political landscape, and the walls of male privilege finally began to crack. This is revelatory, essential social history

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When You Don’t Understand Old Legal Terms…

Last month, author Naomi Wolf was confronted with an embarrassing mistake at the heart of her new book Outrages: Sex, Censorship, and the Criminalization of Love, a look at the criminalization of same-sex relationships in the Victorian Era. During an interview about the book, BBC Radio host Matthew Sweet pointed out one major argument was based on a misunderstanding of a legal term from the 1800s. Yikes!

The phrase in question is “death recorded,” which Wolf took to mean execution. On air, Sweet explained that wasn’t correct: “It was a category that was created in 1823 that allowed judges to abstain from pronouncing a sentence of death on any capital convict whom they considered to be a fit subject for pardon … I don’t think any of the executions you’ve identified here actually happened.” Yikes again!

Since then, Wolf’s publisher has reminded the world that publishers rely on authors to verify their research instead of hiring fact-checkers, and Wolf committed to fact-checking the book on Twitter. That’s a start, although something that major seems like it ought to at least delay publication a bit, right? Three other pieces of note:

• I thought Parul Sehgal’s review of Outrages was a good one, putting Wolf’s writing career in context and giving a pretty damning assessment of this book.
• Karin Wulf also wrote a piece about how this incident and others emphasize the need for trained historians, and that most historians aren’t generalists.
• On NPR, Lynn Neary did a piece about fact-checking, the impact of errors like this in the era of “fake news,” and the economics fact-checking in publishing.

I’m not sure if there will be much more to this story or not, but it’s been an interesting one to watch play out via Twitter and other think-pieces. The lesson I take away from it is to always be a little skeptical about what you’re reading, and take some time to peek into the notes section of any nonfiction book – often, the detail an author includes there will give you a good idea about their sources, methods, and reliability.

Cheap Memoirs to Buy Now

To close, a few ebook deals on memoirs that you can take advantage of this month:

• The Stranger Beside Me by Ann Rule for $1.99
• The Broken Circle: A Memoir of Escaping Afghanistan by Enjeela Ahmadi-Miller for $1.99
• I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai and Christina Lamb for $4.99
• Coming Clean: A Memoir by Kimberly Rae Miller for $.99
• Dry: A Memoir by Augusten Burroughs for $3.99

While you’re browsing cheap ebooks, check out Book Riot’s Amazon storefront, we’ve put together a selection of our favorite books and bookish stuff for summer!

You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy Wednesday, nonfiction friends! It’s another full week of new books, although not quite a jam-packed as last week. I’ve pulled 11 new titles I’m particularly curious about to share this week. Onwards!

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Sponsored by Monkfish Publishing

Part memoir, part practical guide, Spiritual Rebel urges, “How can we uncover the most meaning in our lives?” Through witty and thought-provoking personal anecdotes, author Sarah Bowen confesses her challenges with the religion of her birth, descent into addiction, and recovery into a life where everything can be sacred. Next, Sarah mines the world’s philosophical, scientific, and spiritual traditions to offer readers unconventional practices for uncovering more meaningful moments in their own lives. “A balance of careful scholarship and refreshing irreverence” – Mirabai Starr

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Life Finds a Way: What Evolution Teaches Us About Creativity by Andreas Wagner – A biologist looks at the connections between innovation in evolution and cultural creativity, specifically how both are marked by incremental progress over time.

Giants of the Monsoon Forest: Living and Working with Elephants by Jacob Shell – A geographer goes deep into the rainforests of Burma and India to see the relationship between elephants and riders in these mountain communities.

One Giant Leap: The Impossible Mission That Flew Us to the Moon by Charles Fishman – A story of “the trailblazers and the ordinary Americans on the front lines of the epic mission to reach the moon.”

Mamaskatch: A Cree Coming of Age by Darrel J. McLeod – A memoir about growing up in a Cree family in rural Canada and the ways trauma can be handed down through generations.

Love Thy Neighbor: A Muslim Doctor’s Struggle for Home in Rural America by Ayaz Virji and Alan Eisenstock – A memoir by a Muslim doctor about his efforts to support, educate, and connect with the residents of his small, rural community after the 2016 election brought prejudices about Muslims to the surface.

Let Me Not Be Mad: My Story of Unraveling Minds by A. K. Benjamin – A clinical neuropsychologist shares his experiences working with patients who have a mental illness, weaving in his “own sometimes shocking personal experiences.”

More Than Enough: Claiming Space for Who You Are, No Matter What They Say by Elaine Welteroth – A memoir by the former editor of Teen Vogue about her rise through journalism and her position as a “barrier-breaker across so many intersections.”

Reckoning: The Epic Battle Against Sexual Abuse and Harassment by Linda Hirshman – A history of the fight against sexual harassment, starting in the 1970s and going through the #MeToo movement.

The Ice at the End of the World: An Epic Journey into Greenland’s Buried Past and Our Perilous Future by Jon Gertner – An exploration of Greenland, including the essential information it contains about our climate. The history of Greenland’s ice starts with 19th-century explorers and continues to scientists today.

Kingdom of Lies: Unnerving Adventures in the World of Cybercrime by Kate Fazzini – “A behind-the-scenes look at the interconnected cultures of hackers, security specialists, and law enforcement,” told by a cybersecurity expert turned journalist.

Childfree by Choice: The Movement Redefining Family and Creating a New Age of Independence by Amy Blackstone – A look at the growing trend of choosing to forgo parenthood, using the author’s personal experience and contemporary research about the childfree movement.

That’s all the new books for this week! One more quick plug – go check out Book Riot’s Amazon storefront, we’ve put together a selection of our favorite books and bookish stuff for summer!

You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. This week, Alice and I shared some great reads to celebrate Pride Month. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy Friday, fellow readers! It feels like a quiet-ish week in the world of nonfiction books, but I’ve still got a few bits and pieces to share. Let’s dive in!

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Sponsored by The Collected Schizophrenias by Esmé Weijun Wang

Schizophrenia is not a single unifying diagnosis, and Esmé Weijun Wang writes not just to her fellow members of the “collected schizophrenias” but to those who wish to understand it as well. In essays that range from using fashion to present as high-functioning to the depths of a rare form of psychosis, and from the failures of the higher education system and the dangers of institutionalization to the complexity of compounding factors such as PTSD and Lyme disease, Wang’s analytical eye, honed as a former lab researcher at Stanford, allows her to balance research with personal narrative. An essay collection of undeniable power, The Collected Schizophrenias dispels misconceptions and provides insight into a condition long misunderstood.

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Murderonios and other true crime lovers… This Bustle interview with My Favorite Murder’s Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark is fun. They talk about the book, how writing is hard, and some of the therapeutic value of writing.

Hillary and Chelsea Clinton are starting a production company! The company is in early stages and doesn’t have a name yet, but “will spotlight stories by and about women.” I’m pretty psyched about this!

Fascinated as I am by the National Spelling Bee? The New York Times offered some book and movie recommendations, including Beeline by Shalini Shankar.

Debbie Harry of Blondie is releasing a memoir in October! The book “blends first-person essays with interviews conducted by journalist Sylvie Simmons.” It also includes new photos and fan art, which seems really fun to me.

Michael Wolff’s next book on the Trump administration is barely out, but he’s already having to defend his reporting. In a nutshell, Wolff claims to have reviewed a “draft indictment” of the president prepared by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team, but a spokesman for the office said that document doesn’t exist. Siege: Trump Under Fire came out on Tuesday.

Simon & Schuster has elected not to publish a book by Tony Robbins after news reports surfaced that Robbins has berated rape and domestic violence victims and has been accused of sexually harassing staffers and fans (you can read more in the link, if so inclined). Good job, Publishing.

Finally, I’ll close with a couple of interesting podcasts to check out:

• Slow Burn is doing a series based on The Queen by Josh Levin, a new nonfiction book about the first “welfare queen” who was actually an accused murderer and fraudster. Levin is one of the editors behind slow burn, so this one makes a lot of sense.
• One of this week’s episodes of The Daily was on “The Legacy of Rachel Held Evans.” Elizabeth Dias, a reporter who covers religion for the New York Times, shared her story and brought in guests who spoke about her impact. It was a moving episode.

Thanks for checking in again this week! You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Friends. There are so many books coming out this week, it’s bananas. I haven’t even come close to catching them all, but I had to cut myself off at some point. I arbitrarily decided that number is 14, so there you have it… 14 new nonfiction books out this week. Let’s go!

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Sponsored by The Collected Schizophrenias by Esmé Weijun Wang

Schizophrenia is not a single unifying diagnosis, and Esmé Weijun Wang writes not just to her fellow members of the “collected schizophrenias” but to those who wish to understand it as well. In essays that range from using fashion to present as high-functioning to the depths of a rare form of psychosis, and from the failures of the higher education system and the dangers of institutionalization to the complexity of compounding factors such as PTSD and Lyme disease, Wang’s analytical eye, honed as a former lab researcher at Stanford, allows her to balance research with personal narrative. An essay collection of undeniable power, The Collected Schizophrenias dispels misconceptions and provides insight into a condition long misunderstood.

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The Truffle Underground: A Tale of Mystery, Mayhem, and Manipulation in the Shadowy Market of the World’s Most Expensive Fungus by Ryan Jacobs – True crime and high cuisine in the world of truffles! I feel like I could just end the list here and be happy… but I won’t.

Leaving the Witness: Exiting a Religion and Finding a Life by Amber Scorah – A third-generation Jehovah’s Witness loses her faith while preaching in China and ends up being cast out of her family and community.

This Land Is Our Land: An Immigrant’s Manifesto by Suketu Mehta – An exploration of anti-immigrant backlash around the world and the benefits immigrants bring to communities.

Naturally Tan: A Memoir by Tan France – Queer Eye’s fashion expert “reveals how an Englishman raised in a traditionally religious home became a fashion icon.”

The Beautiful No: And Other Tales of Trial, Transcendence, and Transformation by Sheri Salata – A producer at The Oprah Winfrey Show leaves her decades-long career to try and “produce” her own life transformation.

Why Cities Lose: The Deep Roots of the Urban-Rural Political Divide by Jonathan Rodden – A look at the divide between urban and rural communities and the economic and political roots of the electoral challenges faced by the Left.

The Last Pirate of New York: A Ghost Ship, a Killer, and the Birth of a Gangster Nation by Rich Cohen – The legend of an under-the-radar New York criminal and his attempt to rob a ship and return home.

The Moon: A History for the Future by Oliver Moon – A look at how we’ve looked at the moon through its history and its place in the future of space exploration.

Formation: A Woman’s Memoir of Stepping Out of Line by Ryan Leigh Dostie – A woman finds space for herself in the Army, only to have her sense of security and camaraderie destroyed after being raped by a fellow soldier.

On Being Human: A Memoir of Waking Up, Living Real, and Listening Hard by Jennifer Pastiloff – A memoir about “how a starved person grew into the exuberant woman she was meant to be all along by battling the demons within and winning.”

Grace Will Lead Us Home: The Charleson Church Massacre and the Hard, Inspiring Journey to Forgiveness by Jennifer Berry Hawes – A narrative account of the shooting at Mother Emanuel AME church and what has happened since.

The Targeter: My Life in the CIA, Hunting Terrorists and Challenging the White House by Nada Bakos with David Coburn – A memoir set in the world of high-stakes foreign intelligence about one analyst’s role in the war against Islamic extremists.

Waking the Witch: Reflections on Women, Magic, and Power by Pam Grossman – A look at the world’s fascination with witches and why they matter now.

Tell Me Who You Are: Sharing Our Stories of Race, Culture, and Identity by Winona Guo and Priya Vulchi – Two women travel the United States gathering stories about how racism plays out in communities across the country.

Whew! That’s such a good list. You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello, fellow nonfiction readers.

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Sponsored by Lion Forge

In Gender Queer, Maia Kobabe has crafted an intensely cathartic autobiography about eir path to identifying as nonbinary and asexual, and coming out to eir family and society. By addressing questions about gender identity—what it means and how to think about it—the story also doubles as a much-needed, useful, and touching guide. Find the graphic novel memoir in stores now from Lion Forge!

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I’m sad to be opening this newsletter with the announcement of another major death in the nonfiction world. Author and journalist Tony Horwitz died Monday at just 60 years old. He was on tour for his latest book, Spying On The South, when he suffered what appeared to be a cardiac arrest. He leaves behind his wife, novelist Geraldine Brooks, and two sons.

Since his death Monday, there’s been an outpouring of writing about Horwitz and his work, particularly admiration for his 1998 book Confederates in the Attic. NPR’s Fresh Air replayed an interview with Horwitz from 1998 talking about the book. It also includes Maureen Corrigan’s review of Spying On The South, a travel narrative that uses the 19th century meanderings of Frederick Law Olmsted as a guide for Horwitz’s own travels through the American South today.

I’m disappointed I haven’t read any of his work so far, but this has been an inspiration to address that hole in my nonfiction reading. His 2002 book, Blue Latitudes: Boldly Going Where Captain Cook Has Gone Before is calling my name.

It again feels weird to be transitioning from that story to lighter news, but that is the nature of a newsletter. Here are a few lists, book announcements, and stories that caught my attention this week:

Time Magazine released a list of the 10 best nonfiction books of the year so far, a list that looks particularly good and includes one of my favorites so far, The Collected Schizophrenias by Esmé Weijun Wang. Add to your TBR!

Mindy Kaling is publishing a new essay collection 2020. One of the interesting bits about this story is that she’s releasing the collection with Amazon Publishing, which means it’ll be free for all Amazon Prime and Kindle Unlimited customers, and available on Audible. I’m curious to see if the choice of publisher has an impact on sales compared to her previous books.

The Jonas Brothers are releasing a memoir. Blood, co-authored with the guy who wrote Mötley Crüe’s book, will “detail the brothers’ journey as a band, from the group’s inception through their rise, breakup, and comeback.” It’ll be out November 12.

It’s not news that Brené Brown has a Netflix special, but I still like finding stories about it. This piece from Entertainment Weekly about “what’s making Brené Brown feel vulnerable right now,” isn’t super new, but I didn’t catch it back in April and I thought it was interesting.

Love reading about con artists? Bustle has a list of true crime books about con artists for people interested in the Anna Delvey case. Just care about Anna Delvey? Hold out for My Friend Anna, a memoir by one of her former friends that’s coming out on July 23.

That’s all for this week! You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim

Hello and happy end of May, nonfiction nerds! I spent Memorial Day weekend up at my parents’ cabin and managed to read a ton. We had one day of truly beautiful weather, then a couple days where it was cold or rainy, which is a bummer for outdoor activities but great for reading.

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Sponsored by Oxford University Press

On Streisand begins with a broad year-by-year outline of the landmark achievements which is followed by a long essay on how Streisand’s idiosyncratic self-realization marks her as a unique talent. Then, the major part of the book is a work-by-work analysis broken down into separate chapters, each organized chronologically: the stage shows, the television shows and concerts, the recordings, and, finally, the movies. Barbra Streisand said, “I became a singer because I couldn’t get work as an actress,” but she not only became both but revolutionized the two professions forever.

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Before we dive into a few exciting new releases for this week, I wanted to let you know I was a guest on this week’s episode of the All the Books podcast where I got to talk about a couple of nonfiction books you should check out – Stay Sexy and Don’t Get Murdered by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark and Wordslut by Amanda Montell.

And now… more books!

Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein – Many experts argue that the best way to become an expert is to start early and specialize, getting in Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000 hours as soon as possible. In this book, David Epstein argues that the opposite is true – the most successful athletes, thinkers, artists and more are actually generalists. He suggests generalists find their path late, juggle many interests, and are more creative and agile thinkers. I’m really interested in the ideas of this one!

Further Watching: Epstein appeared on CBS This Morning on Monday talking about the book, and shared that he even managed to convince Malcolm Gladwell just a little bit.

Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want to Come: One Introvert’s Year of Saying Yes by Jessica Pan – What might happen if a shy introvert spent a year trying to live like an extrovert? As an introvert myself, this seems horrifying… but that’s exactly the experiment Jessica Pan writes about in this memoir. She turns to extrovert mentors to set her challenges, then tries to explore what she might learn. This one seems like it’ll be like Quiet by Susan Cain meets A.J. Jacobs, and I’m totally here for it.

Further Reading: Pan was interviewed for the Los Angeles Review of Books blog where she talked about gender, self-care versus self-coddling, and more.

Anthony Bourdain Remembered from CNN – If you were a fan of the late Anthony Bourdain, then this is a book you will want to pick up. After his death in 2018, there was an outpouring of love from fans and friends around the world. This book brings together memories and anecdotes from fans like Barack Obama, Ken Burns, Questlove and more, to show his impact around the world.

Further Reading: Travel and Leisure shared seven quotes from the book that “highlight his lasting legacy.” I think it’s going to be a beautiful book.

And finally, a few more titles of the week that might be of interest:

• The Lives of Bees: The Untold Story of the Honey Bee in the Wild by Thomas D. Seeley
• Supernavigators by Davie Barrie
• The Red Ribbon by Nancy Freund Bills
• The Jamestown Brides by Jennifer Potter

That’s all for this week! You can find me on Twitter @kimthedork, on email at kim@riotnewmedia.com, and co-hosting the For Real podcast here at Book Riot. Happy reading! – Kim