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  1. Genres
  2. ›Biography

Best Biography Books

Life stories of notable people

451 summaries

Showing 97–120 of 451

  1. How to Be a Woman

    Caitlin Moran

    ★ 3.7 (99k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    Caitlin Moran humorously examines the difficult and often contradictory reality of being female, from puberty's awkwardness to modern womanhood's confusing demands.

  2. A Stolen Life

    Jaycee Dugard

    ★ 3.9 (97k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    Abducted at eleven, Jaycee Dugard's memoir recounts eighteen years living in a hidden backyard camp, raising two daughters fathered by her captor, and her difficult return to a world she barely knew.

  3. Twelve Years a Slave

    Solomon Northup

    ★ 4.2 (95k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    A free black man's harrowing twelve-year odyssey from Northern liberty to the brutal cotton plantations of the South, exposing the raw, dehumanizing machinery of American slavery.

  4. The Art of Happiness

    Dalai Lama XIV

    ★ 4.2 (93k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    The Dalai Lama, guided by a Western psychiatrist, shares practical wisdom on finding lasting inner peace amid life's challenges and achieving happiness.

  5. In a Sunburned Country

    Bill Bryson

    ★ 4.1 (90k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    Join Bill Bryson as he humorously travels across Australia, meeting its resilient people and dangerous animals, all while discovering interesting history with his usual wit.

  6. The Blind Side

    Michael Lewis

    ★ 4.2 (84k) average on GoodreadsBusiness

    A homeless, illiterate giant finds family, purpose, and a multi-million dollar destiny on the football field as the protector of a quarterback's blind side, forever changing the game and his own improbable life.

  7. Hidden Figures

    Margot Lee Shetterly

    ★ 3.9 (82k) average on GoodreadsHistory

    During the Civil Rights era, a team of African-American women mathematicians at NASA overcame racial and gender segregation to calculate the trajectories that launched America's astronauts into space.

  8. The Magnolia Story

    Chip Gaines

    ★ 4.2 (82k) average on GoodreadsBusiness

    Chip and Joanna Gaines's journey from a chance meeting and early business challenges to building a design company and renovating homes, one fixer-upper at a time.

  9. Life

    Georges Perec

    ★ 3.9 (82k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    In a Paris apartment building, an artist's grand painting opens a window into the peculiar lives of its residents, revealing decades of intertwined fates, strange hobbies, and lingering secrets, all seen through the building's walls.

  10. Open

    Andre Agassi

    ★ 4.3 (81k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    Andre Agassi's 'Open' tells the story of a child tennis prodigy who grew to resent the sport that imprisoned him, battling fame, personal struggles, and injuries to find his own path to redemption and love.

  11. Infidel

    Ayaan Hirsi Ali

    ★ 4.2 (78k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    From a childhood marked by civil war, female mutilation, and strict Islamic dogma, Ayaan Hirsi Ali develops the will to escape a forced marriage and become a champion for free speech and women's rights, even while facing death threats and political ostracization.

  12. My Life in France

    Julia Child

    ★ 4.2 (78k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    Julia Child's "My Life in France" follows her path from a cooking beginner to a famous chef, detailing her discovery of French food and culture.

  13. Scrappy Little Nobody

    Anna Kendrick

    ★ 3.9 (77k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    Anna Kendrick's 'Scrappy Little Nobody' is a funny and honest look into the mind of a self-proclaimed oddball, charting her rise from Broadway-bound middle schooler to Hollywood star with sharp humor and a refreshing defiance.

  14. Truman

    David McCullough

    ★ 4.1 (77k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    From a Missouri farm to the Oval Office, Harry S. Truman unexpectedly faced the atomic age, the start of the Cold War, and the Korean conflict, showing a courageous resolve that reshaped the 20th century.

  15. The Wright Brothers

    David McCullough

    ★ 4.1 (75k) average on GoodreadsHistory

    Wilbur and Orville Wright, two bicycle mechanics, used grit, curiosity, and ingenuity to achieve human flight.

  16. Zeitoun

    Dave Eggers

    ★ 4.1 (72k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    After Hurricane Katrina, a Syrian-American man's efforts to help his community are misunderstood, leading to his imprisonment during the War on Terror.

  17. Columbine

    Dave Cullen

    ★ 4.3 (71k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    This book examines the Columbine massacre, correcting myths to show the killers' true psychological profiles and the lasting, misunderstood impact that shaped future 'spectacle murders.'

  18. Long Walk to Freedom

    Nelson Mandela

    ★ 4.3 (68k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    Nelson Mandela's autobiography chronicles his transformative journey from tribal upbringing to anti-apartheid revolutionary, detailing his 27 years of imprisonment and eventual leadership in dismantling racial oppression in South Africa.

  19. Scar Tissue

    Anthony Kiedis

    ★ 4.1 (66k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    Anthony Kiedis chronicles a life lived on the edge, from the raw energy of the Red Hot Chili Peppers' rise to the depths of addiction and the search for redemption amidst rock and roll's tumultuous embrace.

  20. Wishful Drinking

    Carrie Fisher

    ★ 3.8 (65k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    From Princess Leia's intergalactic fame to personal battles with addiction and bipolar disorder, Carrie Fisher's 'Wishful Drinking' is a raw, funny, and ultimately moving account of Hollywood and her own mind.

  21. A Year in Provence

    Peter Mayle

    ★ 4.0 (63k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    Peter Mayle moves to a 200-year-old farmhouse in Provence, where he learns to live by the seasons, not the clock, navigating frosty mistrals, goat races, and regional cuisine with humor and charm.

  22. Down and Out in Paris and London

    George Orwell

    ★ 4.1 (62k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    Orwell exposes the truths of poverty in Parisian kitchens and among London tramps, using wit and a sharp eye for societal hypocrisy.

  23. Leonardo da Vinci

    Walter Isaacson

    ★ 4.1 (62k) average on GoodreadsHistory

    Walter Isaacson shows Leonardo da Vinci as the ultimate Renaissance man, whose curiosity and imagination joined art and science, from the Mona Lisa to flying machines, revealing a genius at the crossroads of humanistic creativity and scientific inquiry.

  24. Black Like Me

    John Howard Griffin

    ★ 4.1 (61k) average on GoodreadsMemoir

    Journalist John Howard Griffin changes his skin color and lives as a Black man in the Jim Crow South, revealing the harsh reality of being Black in 1959 America.

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