By skyforbes 
with just enough tragedy and pathos to make it worthwhile, Jenny Lawson
examines her own experience with severe depression and a host of other
conditions, and explains how it has led her to live life to the fullest.
Why I love it: It’s hilarious! I also found it relatable because I have depression, just like the author. We both cope with it by laughing at the absurdity of the world. This is a must-read if you have a mental illness or just want to understand depression better.
2. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
On November
15, 1959, in the small town of Holcomb, Kansas, four members of the Clutter
family were savagely murdered by blasts from a shotgun held a few inches from
their faces. There was no apparent motive for the crime, and there were almost
no clues.
As Truman Capote reconstructs the murder and the
investigation that led to the capture, trial, and execution of the killers, he
generates both mesmerizing suspense and astonishing empathy. At the center of
his study are the amoral young killers Perry Smith and Dick Hickcock, who,
vividly drawn by Capote, are shown to be reprehensible yet entirely and
frighteningly human.
Why I love it: It’s a classic for a reason: It reads like fiction. The story of the crime is intense, riveting, and completely chilling. Capote has done so much research that the reader really gets to know the “characters.” This is a book you’ll never forget.
In 1964,
Daniel Ellsberg was one of the Pentagon insiders helping to plan a war in
Vietnam. The mountainous Asian country had long been a clandestine front in
America’s Cold War with the Soviet Union. The U.S. Government would do anything
to stop the spread of communism—with or without the consent of the American
people.
But as the fighting in Vietnam escalated, Ellsberg
turned against the war. He had access to a top-secret government report known
as the Pentagon Papers and knew it could blow the lid off of years of
government lies. But did he have the right to expose decades of presidential
secrets? And could one man, alone, face the wrath of the government?This is the story of the seven bloody years that
transformed Daniel Ellsberg from a government insider into “the most
dangerous man in America,” and of the storm that would follow when the
secrets of the Vietnam War were finally known.
Why I love it: Don’t let the boring suit man fool you, this book is wild. The pace moves like a pulse-pounding thriller, and the author doesn’t leave out the scandalous (and slightly gory) details. This is definitely not a dry history textbook. It’ll keep you up past bedtime and make you lose faith in politicians. (If you haven’t lost faith in those already.)
For centuries
scientists have written off cannibalism as a bizarre phenomenon with little
biological significance. Its presence in nature was dismissed as a desperate
response to starvation or other life-threatening circumstances, and few spent
time studying it. A taboo subject in our culture, the behavior was portrayed
mostly through horror movies or tabloids sensationalizing the crimes of
real-life flesh-eaters. But the true nature of cannibalism—the role it plays in
evolution as well as human history—is even more intriguing (and more normal)
than the misconceptions we’ve come to accept as fact.
In Cannibalism: A Perfectly Natural History, zoologist Bill Schutt sets the record straight, debunking
common myths and investigating our new understanding of cannibalism’s role in
biology, anthropology, and history in the most fascinating account yet written
on this complex topic. Schutt takes readers from Arizona’s Chiricahua
Mountains, where he wades through ponds full of tadpoles devouring their
siblings, to the Sierra Nevadas, where he joins researchers who are shedding
new light on what happened to the Donner Party—the most infamous episode of
cannibalism in American history. He even meets with an expert on the
preparation and consumption of human placenta (and, yes, it goes well with
Chianti).
Why I love it: I learned a ton about animals and our human ancestors. It gave me nightmares about dying from mad cow disease, which was unpleasant, but if I’m thinking about a book in my sleep, it must be doing something right. The author has a humorous, lively writing style and examines cannibalism from a scientific point-of-view instead of a sensational one. This is one of the best educational books I’ve ever read.
For the past three years, Jon Ronson
has traveled the world meeting recipients of high-profile public shamings. The
shamed are people like us. People who, say, made a joke on social media that
came out badly, or made a mistake at work. Once their transgression is
revealed, collective outrage circles with the force of a hurricane and the next
thing they know they’re being torn apart by an angry mob, jeered at, demonized,
sometimes even fired from their job.
A great renaissance of public shaming is sweeping our land. Justice has been
democratized. The silent majority are getting a voice. But what are we doing
with our voice? We are mercilessly finding people’s faults. We are defining the
boundaries of normality by ruining the lives of those outside it. We are using
shame as a form of social control.
Simultaneously powerful and hilarious in the way only Jon Ronson can be, So
You’ve Been Publicly Shamed is a deeply honest book about modern life,
full of eye-opening truths about the escalating war on human flaws and the
very scary part we all play in it.
Why I love it: If you use social media, this is required reading. Twitter would be a kinder place if everybody got a copy of this book when they signed up. It will make you rethink how you interact with strangers online. This book was life changing for me.
In August of
1914, the British ship Endurance set sail for the South Atlantic. In October
1915, still half a continent away from its intended base, the ship was trapped,
then crushed in the ice. For five months, Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men,
drifting on ice packs, were castaways in one of the most savage regions of the
world.
Lansing describes how the men survived a
1,000-mile voyage in an open boat across the stormiest ocean on the globe and
an overland trek through forbidding glaciers and mountains. The book recounts a
harrowing adventure, but ultimately it is the nobility of these men and their
indefatigable will that shines through.
Why I love it: It’s a testament to human courage and human stupidity. Also, it’s a highly entertaining adventure. There’s tension and many moments of near-disaster. You’ll constantly find yourself saying, “How did they survive that?“
South of the 1950s, journalist John
Howard Griffin decided to cross the color line. Using medication
that darkened his skin to deep brown, he exchanged his privileged life as a
Southern white man for the disenfranchised world of an unemployed black man.
His audacious, still chillingly relevant eyewitness history is a work about
race and humanity that in this new millennium still has something important to
say to every American.
Why I love it: If you’re interested in US history, you need to read this book. It’s an eye-opening peek into the day-to-day challenges that Black Americans faced in the 1950s. You’ll realize that we still have a long way to go when it comes to equality and racism.
8. Fatty Legs: A True Story by Christy Jordan-Fenton & Margaret
Pokiak-Fenton
Eight-year-old
Margaret Pokiak has set her sights on learning to read, even though it means
leaving her village in the high Arctic. Faced with unceasing pressure, her
father finally agrees to let her make the five-day journey to attend school,
but he warns Margaret of the terrors of residential schools.
At school Margaret soon encounters the Raven, a black-cloaked
nun with a hooked nose and bony fingers that resemble claws. She immediately
dislikes the strong-willed young Margaret. Intending to humiliate her, the
heartless Raven gives gray stockings to all the girls—all except Margaret, who
gets red ones. In an instant Margaret is the laughingstock of the entire school.
intimidated and bravely gets rid of the stockings. Although a sympathetic nun
stands up for Margaret, in the end it is this brave young girl who gives the
Raven a lesson in the power of human dignity.
Why I love it: This is a children’s book, so you can finish it quickly if you’re behind on your Nonfiction November goal. You will fall in love with Margaret. She’s tenacious, imaginative, and won’t let anyone bring her down. As someone who was bullied in school, I could relate to her experiences. I’ll be passing this book on to my niece when she’s old enough to appreciate it.
and intelligent twenty-year-old named Christopher Knight left his home in
Massachusetts, drove to Maine, and disappeared into the forest. He would not
have a conversation with another human being until nearly three decades later,
when he was arrested for stealing food. Living in a tent even through brutal
winters, he had survived by his wits and courage, developing ingenious ways to
store edibles and water, and to avoid freezing to death. He broke into nearby
cottages for food, clothing, reading material, and other provisions, taking
only what he needed but terrifying a community never able to solve the
mysterious burglaries. Based on extensive interviews with Knight himself, this
is a vividly detailed account of his secluded life—why did he leave? What did
he learn?—as well as the challenges he has faced since returning to the world.
It is a gripping story of survival that asks fundamental questions about
solitude, community, and what makes a good life, and a deeply moving portrait
of a man who was determined to live his own way, and succeeded.
Why I love it: Have you ever wanted to leave your entire life behind, walk into the woods, and live alone forever? Then, this book is for you! It chronicles the lives of real hermits, modern and historical. It’s a fascinating look at the psychology of extreme introverts.
was the thirty-ninth of her father’s forty-two children. Growing up on a farm
in rural Mexico, where authorities turned a blind eye to the practices of her
community, Ruth lives in a ramshackle house without indoor plumbing or
electricity. At church, preachers teach that God will punish the wicked by
destroying the world and that women can only ascend to Heaven by entering into
polygamous marriages and giving birth to as many children as possible. After
Ruth’s father—the man who had been the founding prophet of the colony—is
brutally murdered by his brother in a bid for church power, her mother
remarries, becoming the second wife of another faithful congregant.
In need of government assistance and supplemental
income, Ruth and her siblings are carted back and forth between Mexico and the
United States, where her mother collects welfare and her stepfather works a
variety of odd jobs. Ruth comes to love the time she spends in the States,
realizing that perhaps the community into which she was born is not the right
one for her. As Ruth begins to doubt her family’s beliefs and question her
mother’s choices, she struggles to balance her fierce love for her siblings
with her determination to forge a better life for herself.
Why I love it: You won’t believe this story is true. Parts of it are so wild that you’ll have to keep reminding yourself that you’re reading a memoir. It’ll break your heart, but you’ll admire the author’s optimism. Even though she lived through horrible abuse, she doesn’t wallow in self-pity.
favorite nonfiction books?