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  1. Genres
  2. ›Memoir

Best Memoir Books

Personal memoirs and autobiographies

388 summaries

Showing 25–48 of 388

  1. Under the Tuscan Sun

    Frances Mayes

    ★ 3.8 (316k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    An American writer buys a run-down Tuscan villa, beginning a journey of restoration, cooking, and self-discovery in the Italian countryside.

  2. The Last Lecture

    Randy Pausch

    ★ 4.3 (303k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    With terminal cancer, a professor gives his 'last lecture' not as a farewell, but as a guide to living fully, achieving childhood dreams, and helping others achieve theirs.

  3. Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis

    J.D. Vance

    ★ 3.9 (302k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    A Yale Law graduate's memoir of his chaotic Rust Belt upbringing shows the ingrained struggles of family, class, and the fading American dream for the white working class.

  4. Heaven is for Real: A Little Boy's Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back

    Todd Burpo

    ★ 4.0 (277k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    A four-year-old boy's vivid, innocent account of his journey to heaven and back, complete with encounters with long-lost relatives and Jesus, challenges earthly perceptions of eternity.

  5. The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom

    Corrie ten Boom

    ★ 4.4 (257k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    During World War II, a Dutch watchmaker and her family turn their home into a refuge for Jewish people, risking their lives and eventually facing a concentration camp.

  6. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim

    David Sedaris

    ★ 4.1 (245k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    Sedaris shows the humor and warmth in the everyday absurdities of his family life.

  7. Between the World and Me

    Ta-Nehisi Coates

    ★ 4.4 (235k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    In a letter to his son, Ta-Nehisi Coates explores the reality of being black in America, combining personal stories with history to show how race is a social construct and how people continue to fight for freedom.

  8. Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

    Anthony Bourdain

    ★ 4.1 (227k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    Dive into the chaotic, exhilarating, and often gritty world behind the kitchen doors of a seasoned chef, where drugs, sex, and fine cuisine meet in a no-holds-barred memoir.

  9. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil

    John Berendt

    ★ 3.9 (224k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    Step into Savannah's sultry, Spanish moss-draped world, where a high-society murder uncovers eccentric characters, voodoo rituals, and Old South secrets.

  10. The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

    Daniel James Brown

    ★ 4.3 (223k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    During the Great Depression and rise of Nazism, nine working-class American rowers form a strong bond, pursue Olympic gold, and show the power of unity and determination.

  11. On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

    Stephen King

    ★ 4.3 (222k) average on GoodreadsBiography
  12. Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead

    Sheryl Sandberg

    ★ 4.0 (222k) average on GoodreadsBusiness

    Sheryl Sandberg encourages women to overcome personal and external challenges to achieve leadership roles in their careers.

  13. A Million Little Pieces

    James Frey

    ★ 3.6 (222k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    A raw, controversial memoir that blurs the lines between brutal addiction and embellished reality, leaving readers to question the very nature of truth in recovery.

  14. The Autobiography of Malcolm X

    Malcolm X

    ★ 4.3 (205k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    From street crime and prison, Malcolm X's autobiography chronicles his transformation into a powerful voice for Black liberation and a devout Muslim, ultimately challenging his fiery rhetoric with a message of universal brotherhood.

  15. Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance

    Barack Obama

    ★ 3.9 (193k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    Barack Obama's personal journey explores his American and Kenyan heritage, forming an identity from the stories and facts of his absent father.

  16. When You Are Engulfed in Flames

    David Sedaris

    ★ 4.1 (184k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    From a parasitic worm in his mother-in-law's leg to the struggles of quitting smoking in Tokyo, David Sedaris shows life's absurdities with his usual self-deprecating humor and sharp observation.

  17. Orange Is the New Black

    Piper Kerman

    ★ 3.7 (182k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    A privileged Smith College alumna trades her comfortable life for a fifteen-month sentence in a federal prison, offering a raw, often humorous, and deeply human look into the hidden world of women behind bars.

  18. Girl, Interrupted

    Susanna Kaysen

    ★ 3.9 (181k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    Confined to a 1960s psychiatric hospital, Susanna Kaysen navigates sanity and madness, offering a sharp look into the lives of "interrupted" girls and the blurry lines that define them.

  19. Just Kids

    Patti Smith

    ★ 4.2 (179k) average on GoodreadsBiography

    Patti Smith's 'Just Kids' tells the story of her early life and artistic journey with Robert Mapplethorpe in 1970s New York, centered around the Chelsea Hotel.

  20. Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America

    Barbara Ehrenreich

    ★ 3.6 (178k) average on GoodreadsPolitics

    Barbara Ehrenreich's undercover expose on minimum-wage work reveals that even two jobs are not enough to escape poverty.

  21. Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened

    Allie Brosh

    ★ 4.2 (177k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    Allie Brosh hilariously recounts her chaotic life, from debilitating depression to the absurdities of dog ownership, with stick-figure drawings that perfectly capture the human experience of being human.

  22. Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen

    Christopher McDougall

    ★ 4.3 (168k) average on GoodreadsLifestyle

    A journalist's quest to understand his running injuries leads him to Mexico's Copper Canyons, where he uncovers the secrets of the Tarahumara runners and challenges common beliefs about the human body's natural ability to run.

  23. Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness

    Susannah Cahalan

    ★ 4.1 (168k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    A young journalist's terrifying descent into a mysterious mental illness is chronicled as she and her family fight for a diagnosis and her very identity.

  24. Modern Romance

    Aziz Ansari

    ★ 3.8 (165k) average on GoodreadsPsychology

    Aziz Ansari humorously examines modern dating, from understanding pizza emojis to the search for a 'soul mate,' using global research.

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