Genre
The best Biography books
A specific life told from outside, with the documentary discipline the subject earned. The best of it reads like a novel without inventing anything.
7 reviews in this genre.
Editor's picks
Highest-rated biography on the shelf
A Promised Land
by Barack Obama
A Promised Land by Barack Obama 2020 review. The first volume of Barack Obama's presidential memoirs, covering his early political life through the killing of Osama bin Laden in 2011. The most thoroughly written contemporary presidential memoir in modern American letters.
Becoming
by Michelle Obama
Becoming by Michelle Obama 2018 review. Michelle Obama's memoir, from her South Side Chicago childhood through the Obama White House. The political memoir that sold seventeen million copies, and the one that genuinely earns its bestseller status.
Educated
by Tara Westover
Educated by Tara Westover 2018 review. The memoir of growing up in a survivalist Idaho family that kept her out of school until age seventeen, and her subsequent education through Brigham Young University and Cambridge. The PEN/Bingham winner and one of the canonical contemporary memoirs.
First Man : The Life of Neil A. Armstrong
by James R. Hansen
First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong by James R. Hansen 2005 review. The authorized 769-page biography of Armstrong that became the source for the 2018 Ryan Gosling film, and is meaningfully better than the film remembers.
Spare
by Prince Harry
Spare by Prince Harry 2023 review. The Duke of Sussex's memoir of his life from Diana's death through the 2020 California relocation. The fastest-selling non-fiction book in English-language publishing history.
My Life
by Bill Clinton
My Life by Bill Clinton 2004 review. The 42nd President’s 957-page memoir, exhaustive on policy, charming on biography, evasive on Lewinsky, and surprisingly self-aware on race.
Ed McBain / Evan Hunter : A Literary Companion
by Elizabeth Foxwell
Ed McBain Evan Hunter A Literary Companion by Erin E. MacDonald, with Elizabeth Foxwell. A reference work on the 87th Precinct and Blackboard Jungle author. Sharp, comprehensive.
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