biography you should read

50 Must-Read Biographies

Rebecca Hussey

Rebecca holds a PhD in English and is a professor at Norwalk Community College in Connecticut. She teaches courses in composition, literature, and the arts. When she’s not reading or grading papers, she’s hanging out with her husband and son and/or riding her bike and/or buying books. She can't get enough of reading and writing about books, so she writes the bookish newsletter "Reading Indie," focusing on small press books and translations. Newsletter: Reading Indie Twitter: @ofbooksandbikes

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The best biographies give us a satisfying glimpse into a great person’s life, while also teaching us about the context in which that person lived. Through biography, we can also learn history, psychology, sociology, politics, philosophy, and more. Reading a great biography is both fun and educational. What’s not to love?

Below I’ve listed 50 of the best biographies out there. You will find a mix of subjects, including important figures in literature, science, politics, history, art, and more. I’ve tried to keep this list focused on biography only, so there is little in the way of memoir or autobiography. In a couple cases, authors have written about their family members, but for the most part, these are books where the focus is on the biographical subject, not the author.

The first handful are group biographies, and after that, I’ve arranged them alphabetically by subject. Book descriptions come from Goodreads.

Take a look and let me know about your favorite biography in the comments!

All We Know: Three Lives by Lisa Cohen

“In  All We Know , Lisa Cohen describes their [Esther Murphy, Mercedes de Acosta, and Madge Garland’s] glamorous choices, complicated failures, and controversial personal lives with lyricism and empathy. At once a series of intimate portraits and a startling investigation into style, celebrity, sexuality, and the genre of biography itself,  All We Know  explores a hidden history of modernism and pays tribute to three compelling lives.”

Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly

“Set amid the civil rights movement, the never-before-told true story of NASA’s African-American female mathematicians who played a crucial role in America’s space program. Before Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, a group of professionals worked as ‘Human Computers,’ calculating the flight paths that would enable these historic achievements. Among these were a coterie of bright, talented African-American women.”

The Life You Save May Be Your Own: An American Pilgrimage by Paul Elie

“In the mid-twentieth century four American Catholics came to believe that the best way to explore the questions of religious faith was to write about them – in works that readers of all kinds could admire.  The Life You Save May Be Your Own  is their story – a vivid and enthralling account of great writers and their power over us.”

The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary by Simon Winchester

“As definitions were collected, the overseeing committee, led by Professor James Murray, discovered that one man, Dr. W. C. Minor, had submitted more than ten thousand. When the committee insisted on honoring him, a shocking truth came to light: Dr. Minor, an American Civil War veteran, was also an inmate at an asylum for the criminally insane.”

The Wives of Henry VIII by Antonia Fraser

“In a sweeping narrative, Fraser traces the cultural, familial and political roots of each of Henry’s queens, pushes aside the stereotypes that have long defined them, and illuminates the complex character of each.”

John Adams by David McCullough

“In this powerful, epic biography, David McCullough unfolds the adventurous life-journey of John Adams, the brilliant, fiercely independent, often irascible, always honest Yankee patriot — ‘the colossus of independence,’ as Thomas Jefferson called him.”

A Hope More Powerful Than the Sea: One Refugee’s Incredible Story of Love, Loss, and Survival by Melissa Fleming

“Emotionally riveting and eye-opening,  A Hope More Powerful Than the Sea  is the incredible story of a young woman, an international crisis, and the triumph of the human spirit. Melissa Fleming shares the harrowing journey of Doaa Al Zamel, a young Syrian refugee in search of a better life.”

At Her Majesty’s Request: An African Princess in Victorian England by Walter Dean Myers

“One terrifying night in 1848, a young African princess’s village is raided by warriors. The invaders kill her mother and father, the King and Queen, and take her captive. Two years later, a British naval captain rescues her and takes her to England where she is presented to Queen Victoria, and becomes a loved and respected member of the royal court.”

John Brown by W.E.B. Du Bois

“ John Brown is W. E. B. Du Bois’s groundbreaking political biography that paved the way for his transition from academia to a lifelong career in social activism. This biography is unlike Du Bois’s earlier work; it is intended as a work of consciousness-raising on the politics of race.”

Invisible: The Forgotten Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster by Stephen L. Carter

“[Eunice Hunton Carter] was black and a woman and a prosecutor, a graduate of Smith College and the granddaughter of slaves, as dazzlingly unlikely a combination as one could imagine in New York of the 1930s ― and without the strategy she devised, Lucky Luciano, the most powerful Mafia boss in history, would never have been convicted.”

Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang

“An engrossing record of Mao’s impact on China, an unusual window on the female experience in the modern world, and an inspiring tale of courage and love, Jung Chang describes the extraordinary lives and experiences of her family members.”

Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff

“Her palace shimmered with onyx, garnet, and gold, but was richer still in political and sexual intrigue. Above all else, Cleopatra was a shrewd strategist and an ingenious negotiator. Though her life spanned fewer than forty years, it reshaped the contours of the ancient world.”

Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson

“Einstein was a rebel and nonconformist from boyhood days, and these character traits drove both his life and his science. In this narrative, Walter Isaacson explains how his mind worked and the mysteries of the universe that he discovered.”

Enrique’s Journey: The Story of a Boy’s Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite with His Mother by Sonia Nazario

“In this astonishing true story, award-winning journalist Sonia Nazario recounts the unforgettable odyssey of a Honduran boy who braves unimaginable hardship and peril to reach his mother in the United States.”

The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann

“After stumbling upon a hidden trove of diaries, New Yorker writer David Grann set out to solve ‘the greatest exploration mystery of the 20th century’: What happened to the British explorer Percy Fawcett & his quest for the Lost City of Z?”

Georgiana: Duchess of Devonshire by Amanda Foreman

“Amanda Foreman draws on a wealth of fresh research and writes colorfully and penetratingly about the fascinating Georgiana, whose struggle against her own weaknesses, whose great beauty and flamboyance, and whose determination to play a part in the affairs of the world make her a vibrant, astonishingly contemporary figure.”

Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsburg by Irin Carmon and Shana Knizhnik Ping Zhu

“Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg never asked for fame she was just trying to make the world a little better and a little freer. But along the way, the feminist pioneer’s searing dissents and steely strength have inspired millions. [This book], created by the young lawyer who began the Internet sensation and an award-winning journalist, takes you behind the myth for an intimate, irreverent look at the justice’s life and work.”

Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora Neale Hurston by Valerie Boyd

“A woman of enormous talent and remarkable drive, Zora Neale Hurston published seven books, many short stories, and several articles and plays over a career that spanned more than thirty years. Today, nearly every black woman writer of significance—including Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker—acknowledges Hurston as a literary foremother.”

Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin

“ Shirley Jackson  reveals the tumultuous life and inner darkness of the literary genius behind such classics as ‘The Lottery’ and  The Haunting of Hill House .”

The Path to Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson by Robert A. Caro

“This is the story of the rise to national power of a desperately poor young man from the Texas Hill Country. The Path to Power reveals in extraordinary detail the genesis of the almost superhuman drive, energy, and ambition that set LBJ apart.”

The Life of Samuel Johnson   by James Boswell

“Poet, lexicographer, critic, moralist and Great Cham, Dr. Johnson had in his friend Boswell the ideal biographer. Notoriously and self-confessedly intemperate, Boswell shared with Johnson a huge appetite for life and threw equal energy into recording its every aspect in minute but telling detail.”

Barbara Jordan: American Hero by Mary Beth Rogers

“Barbara Jordan was the first African American to serve in the Texas Senate since Reconstruction, the first black woman elected to Congress from the South, and the first to deliver the keynote address at a national party convention. Yet Jordan herself remained a mystery.”

Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera

“This engrossing biography of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo reveals a woman of extreme magnetism and originality, an artist whose sensual vibrancy came straight from her own experiences: her childhood near Mexico City during the Mexican Revolution; a devastating accident at age eighteen that left her crippled and unable to bear children.”

Florynce “Flo” Kennedy: The Life of a Black Feminist Radical by Sherie M. Randolph

“Often photographed in a cowboy hat with her middle finger held defiantly in the air, Florynce ‘Flo’ Kennedy (1916–2000) left a vibrant legacy as a leader of the Black Power and feminist movements. In the first biography of Kennedy, Sherie M. Randolph traces the life and political influence of this strikingly bold and controversial radical activist.”

The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit by Michael Finkel

“In 1986, a shy 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.”

The Lady and the Peacock: The Life of Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma by Peter Popham

“Peter Popham … draws upon previously untapped testimony and fresh revelations to tell the story of a woman whose bravery and determination have captivated people around the globe. Celebrated today as one of the world’s greatest exponents of non-violent political defiance since Mahatma Gandhi, she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize only four years after her first experience of politics.”

Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”   by Zora Neale Hurston

“In 1927, Zora Neale Hurston went to Plateau, Alabama, just outside Mobile, to interview eighty-six-year-old Cudjo Lewis. Of the millions of men, women, and children transported from Africa to America as slaves, Cudjo was then the only person alive to tell the story of this integral part of the nation’s history.”

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

“Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land as her slave ancestors, yet her cells—taken without her knowledge—became one of the most important tools in medicine.”

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin

“Acclaimed historian Doris Kearns Goodwin illuminates Lincoln’s political genius in this highly original work, as the one-term congressman and prairie lawyer rises from obscurity to prevail over three gifted rivals of national reputation to become president.”

The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke by Jeffrey C. Stewart

“A tiny, fastidiously dressed man emerged from Black Philadelphia around the turn of the century to mentor a generation of young artists including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Jacob Lawrence and call them the New Negro — the creative African Americans whose art, literature, music, and drama would inspire Black people to greatness.”

Warrior Poet: A Biography of Audre Lorde by Alexis De Veaux

“Drawing from the private archives of the poet’s estate and numerous interviews, Alexis De Veaux demystifies Lorde’s iconic status, charting her conservative childhood in Harlem; her early marriage to a white, gay man with whom she had two children; her emergence as an outspoken black feminist lesbian; and her canonization as a seminal poet of American literature.”

Thurgood Marshall: American Revolutionary by Juan Williams

“Thurgood Marshall stands today as the great architect of American race relations, having expanded the foundation of individual rights for all Americans. His victory in the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954, the landmark Supreme Court case outlawing school segregation, would have him a historic figure even if he had not gone on to become the first African-American appointed to the Supreme Court.”

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

“In April 1992 a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless. He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself.”

The Mayor of Castro Street: The Life and Times of Harvey Milk by Randy Shilts

“ The Mayor of Castro Street  is Shilts’s acclaimed story of Harvey Milk, the man whose personal life, public career, and tragic assassination mirrored the dramatic and unprecedented emergence of the gay community in America during the 1970s.”

Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay by Nancy Milford

“The most famous poet of the Jazz Age, Millay captivated the nation: She smoked in public, took many lovers (men and women, single and married), flouted convention sensationally, and became the embodiment of the New Woman.”

How to Live: A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at An Answer by Sarah Bakewell

This book is “a vivid portrait of Montaigne, showing how his ideas gave birth to our modern sense of our inner selves, from Shakespeare’s plays to the dilemmas we face today.”

The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes by Janet Malcolm

“From the moment it was first published in The New Yorker, this brilliant work of literary criticism aroused great attention. Janet Malcolm brings her shrewd intelligence to bear on the legend of Sylvia Plath and the wildly productive industry of Plath biographies.”

Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley   by Peter Guralnick

“Based on hundreds of interviews and nearly a decade of research, [this book] traces the evolution not just of the man but of the music and of the culture he left utterly transformed, creating a completely fresh portrait of Elvis and his world.

Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady by Kate Summerscale

“Kate Summerscale brilliantly recreates the Victorian world, chronicling in exquisite and compelling detail the life of Isabella Robinson, wherein the longings of a frustrated wife collided with a society clinging to rigid ideas about sanity, the boundaries of privacy, the institution of marriage, and female sexuality.”

Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare by Stephen Greenblatt

“A young man from a small provincial town moves to London in the late 1580s and, in a remarkably short time, becomes the greatest playwright not of his age alone but of all time. How is an achievement of this magnitude to be explained?”

The Invisible Woman: The Story of Charles Dickens and Nelly Ternan by Claire Tomalin

“When Charles Dickens and Nelly Ternan met in 1857, she was 18: a professional actress performing in his production of  The Frozen Deep . He was 45: a literary legend, a national treasure, married with ten children. This meeting sparked a love affair that lasted over a decade, destroying Dickens’s marriage and ending with Nelly’s near-disappearance from the public record.”

Sojourner Truth: A Life, A Symbol by Nell Irvin Painter

“Slowly, but surely, Sojourner climbed from beneath the weight of slavery, secured respect for herself, and utilized the distinction of her race to become not only a symbol for black women, but for the feminist movement as a whole.”

The Black Rose by Tananarive Due

“Born to former slaves on a Louisiana plantation in 1867, Madam C.J. Walker rose from poverty and indignity to become America’s first black female millionaire, the head of a hugely successful beauty company, and a leading philanthropist in African American causes.”

Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow

“With a breadth and depth matched by no other one-volume life, [Chernow] carries the reader through Washington’s troubled boyhood, his precocious feats in the French and Indian Wars, his creation of Mount Vernon, his heroic exploits with the Continental Army, his presiding over the Constitutional Convention and his magnificent performance as America’s first president.”

Ida: A Sword Among Lions by Paula J. Giddings

“ Ida: A Sword Among Lions  is a sweeping narrative about a country and a crusader embroiled in the struggle against lynching: a practice that imperiled not only the lives of black men and women, but also a nation based on law and riven by race.”

Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder by Caroline Fraser

“But the true saga of [Wilder’s] life has never been fully told. Now, drawing on unpublished manuscripts, letters, diaries, and land and financial records, Caroline Fraser—the editor of the Library of America edition of the Little House series—masterfully fills in the gaps in Wilder’s biography.”

Romantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and Her Daughter Mary Shelley by Charlotte Gordon

“Although mother and daughter, these two brilliant women never knew one another – Wollstonecraft died of an infection in 1797 at the age of thirty-eight, a week after giving birth. Nevertheless their lives were so closely intertwined, their choices, dreams and tragedies so eerily similar, it seems impossible to consider one without the other.”

Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee

“Subscribing to Virginia Woolf’s own belief in the fluidity and elusiveness of identity, Lee comes at her subject from a multitude of perspectives, producing a richly layered portrait of the writer and the woman that leaves all of her complexities and contradictions intact.”

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

“Of the great figures in twentieth-century American history perhaps none is more complex and controversial than Malcolm X. Constantly rewriting his own story, he became a criminal, a minister, a leader, and an icon, all before being felled by assassins’ bullets at age thirty-nine.”

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand

“On a May afternoon in 1943, an Army Air Forces bomber crashed into the Pacific Ocean and disappeared, leaving only a spray of debris and a slick of oil, gasoline, and blood. Then, on the ocean surface, a face appeared. It was that of a young lieutenant, the plane’s bombardier, who was struggling to a life raft and pulling himself aboard. So began one of the most extraordinary odysseys of the Second World War.”

Want to read more about great biographies? Check out this post on presidential biographies , this list of biographies and memoirs about remarkable women , and this list of 100 must-read musician biographies and memoirs .

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The 50 Best Biographies of All Time

Think you know the full and complete story about George Washington, Steve Jobs, or Joan of Arc? Think again.

Every product was carefully curated by an Esquire editor. We may earn a commission from these links.

Biographies have always been controversial. On his deathbed, the novelist Henry James told his nephew that his “sole wish” was to “frustrate as utterly as possible the postmortem exploiter” by destroying his personal letters and journals. And one of our greatest living writers, Hermione Lee, once compared biographies to autopsies that add “a new terror to death”—the potential muddying of someone’s legacy when their life is held up to the scrutiny of investigation.

Why do we read so many books about the lives and deaths of strangers, as told by second-hand and third-hand sources? Is it merely our love for gossip, or are we trying to understand ourselves through the triumphs and failures of others?

To keep this list from blossoming into hundreds of titles, we only included books currently in print and translated into English. We also limited it to one book per author, and one book per subject. In ranked order, here are the best biographies of all time.

Crown The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo, by Tom Reiss

You’re probably familiar with The Count of Monte Cristo , the 1844 revenge novel by Alexandre Dumas. But did you know it was based on the life of Dumas’s father, the mixed-race General Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, son of a French nobleman and a Haitian slave? Thanks to Reiss’s masterful pacing and plotting, this rip-roaring biography of Thomas-Alexandre reads more like an adventure novel than a work of nonfiction. The Black Count won the Pulitzer Prize for Biography in 2013, and it’s only a matter of time before a filmmaker turns it into a big-screen blockbuster.

Farrar, Straus and Giroux Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret, by Craig Brown

Few biographies are as genuinely fun to read as this barnburner from the irreverent English critic Craig Brown. Princess Margaret may have been everyone’s favorite character from Netflix’s The Crown , but Brown’s eye for ostentatious details and revelatory insights will help you see why everyone in the 1950s—from Pablo Picasso and Gore Vidal to Peter Sellers and Andy Warhol—was obsessed with her. When book critic Parul Sehgal says that she “ripped through the book with the avidity of Margaret attacking her morning vodka and orange juice,” you know you’re in for a treat.

Inventor of the Future: The Visionary Life of Buckminster Fuller, by Alec Nevala-Lee

If you want to feel optimistic about the future again, look no further than this brilliant biography of Buckminster Fuller, the “modern Leonardo da Vinci” of the 1960s and 1970s who came up with the idea of a “Spaceship Earth” and inspired Silicon Valley’s belief that technology could be a global force for good (while earning plenty of critics who found his ideas impractical). Alec Nevala-Lee’s writing is as serene and precise as one of Fuller’s geodesic domes, and his research into never-before-seen documents makes this a genuinely groundbreaking book full of surprises.

Free Press Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original, by Robin D.G. Kelley

The late American jazz composer and pianist Thelonious Monk has been so heavily mythologized that it can be hard to separate fact from fiction. But Robin D. G. Kelley’s biography is an essential book for jazz fans looking to understand the man behind the myths. Monk’s family provided Kelley with full access to their archives, resulting in chapter after chapter of fascinating details, from his birth in small-town North Carolina to his death across the Hudson from Manhattan.

University of Chicago Press Frank Lloyd Wright: A Biography, by Meryle Secrest

There are dozens of books about America’s most celebrated architect, but Secrest’s 1998 biography is still the most fun to read. For one, she doesn’t shy away from the fact that Wright could be an absolute monster, even to his own friends and family. Secondly, her research into more than 100,000 letters, as well as interviews with nearly every surviving person who knew Wright, makes this book a one-of-a-kind look at how Wright’s personal life influenced his architecture.

Ralph Ellison: A Biography, by Arnold Rampersad

Ralph Ellison’s landmark novel, Invisible Man , is about a Black man who faced systemic racism in the Deep South during his youth, then migrated to New York, only to find oppression of a slightly different kind. What makes Arnold Rampersand’s honest and insightful biography of Ellison so compelling is how he connects the dots between Invisible Man and Ellison’s own journey from small-town Oklahoma to New York’s literary scene during the Harlem Renaissance.

Oscar Wilde: A Life, by Matthew Sturgis

Now remembered for his 1891 novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde was one of the most fascinating men of the fin-de-siècle thanks to his poems, plays, and some of the earliest reported “celebrity trials.” Sturgis’s scintillating biography is the most encyclopedic chronicle of Wilde’s life to date, thanks to new research into his personal notebooks and a full transcript of his libel trial.

Beacon Press A Surprised Queenhood in the New Black Sun: The Life & Legacy of Gwendolyn Brooks, by Angela Jackson

The poet Gwendolyn Brooks was the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize in 1950, but because she spent most of her life in Chicago instead of New York, she hasn’t been studied or celebrated as often as her peers in the Harlem Renaissance. Luckily, Angela Jackson’s biography is full of new details about Brooks’s personal life, and how it influenced her poetry across five decades.

Atria Books Camera Man: Buster Keaton, the Dawn of Cinema, and the Invention of the Twentieth Century, by Dana Stevens

Was Buster Keaton the most influential filmmaker of the first half of the twentieth century? Dana Stevens makes a compelling case in this dazzling mix of biography, essays, and cultural history. Much like Keaton’s filmography, Stevens playfully jumps from genre to genre in an endlessly entertaining way, while illuminating how Keaton’s influence on film and television continues to this day.

Algonquin Books Empire of Deception: The Incredible Story of a Master Swindler Who Seduced a City and Captivated the Nation, by Dean Jobb

Dean Jobb is a master of narrative nonfiction on par with Erik Larsen, author of The Devil in the White City . Jobb’s biography of Leo Koretz, the Bernie Madoff of the Jazz Age, is among the few great biographies that read like a thriller. Set in Chicago during the 1880s through the 1920s, it’s also filled with sumptuous period details, from lakeside mansions to streets choked with Model Ts.

Vintage Penelope Fitzgerald: A Life, by Hermione Lee

Hermione Lee’s biographies of Virginia Woolf and Edith Wharton could easily have made this list. But her book about a less famous person—Penelope Fitzgerald, the English novelist who wrote The Bookshop, The Blue Flower , and The Beginning of Spring —might be her best yet. At just over 500 pages, it’s considerably shorter than those other biographies, partially because Fitzgerald’s life wasn’t nearly as well documented. But Lee’s conciseness is exactly what makes this book a more enjoyable read, along with the thrilling feeling that she’s uncovering a new story literary historians haven’t already explored.

Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath, by Heather Clark

Many biographers have written about Sylvia Plath, often drawing parallels between her poetry and her death by suicide at the age of thirty. But in this startling book, Plath isn’t wholly defined by her tragedy, and Heather Clark’s craftsmanship as a writer makes it a joy to read. It’s also the most comprehensive account of Plath’s final year yet put to paper, with new information that will change the way you think of her life, poetry, and death.

Pontius Pilate, by Ann Wroe

Compared to most biography subjects, there isn’t much surviving documentation about the life of Pontius Pilate, the Judaean governor who ordered the execution of the historical Jesus in the first century AD. But Ann Wroe leans into all that uncertainty in her groundbreaking book, making for a fascinating mix of research and informed speculation that often feels like reading a really good historical novel.

Brand: History Book Club Bolívar: American Liberator, by Marie Arana

In the early nineteenth century, Simón Bolívar led six modern countries—Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela—to independence from the Spanish Empire. In this rousing work of biography and geopolitical history, Marie Arana deftly chronicles his epic life with propulsive prose, including a killer first sentence: “They heard him before they saw him: the sound of hooves striking the earth, steady as a heartbeat, urgent as a revolution.”

Charlie Chan: The Untold Story of the Honorable Detective and His Rendezvous with American History, by Yunte Huang

Ever read a biography of a fictional character? In the 1930s and 1940s, Charlie Chan came to popularity as a Chinese American police detective in Earl Derr Biggers’s mystery novels and their big-screen adaptations. In writing this book, Yunte Huang became something of a detective himself to track down the real-life inspiration for the character, a Hawaiian cop named Chang Apana born shortly after the Civil War. The result is an astute blend between biography and cultural criticism as Huang analyzes how Chan served as a crucial counterpoint to stereotypical Chinese villains in early Hollywood.

Random House Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay, by Nancy Milford

Edna St. Vincent Millay was one of the most fascinating women of the twentieth century—an openly bisexual poet, playwright, and feminist icon who helped make Greenwich Village a cultural bohemia in the 1920s. With a knack for torrid details and creative insights, Nancy Milford successfully captures what made Millay so irresistible—right down to her voice, “an instrument of seduction” that captivated men and women alike.

Simon & Schuster Steve Jobs, by Walter Isaacson

Few people have the luxury of choosing their own biographers, but that’s exactly what the late co-founder of Apple did when he tapped Walter Isaacson, the Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer of Albert Einstein and Benjamin Franklin. Adapted for the big screen by Aaron Sorkin in 2015, Steve Jobs is full of plot twists and suspense thanks to a mind-blowing amount of research on the part of Isaacson, who interviewed Jobs more than forty times and spoke with just about everyone who’d ever come into contact with him.

Brand: Random House Véra (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov), by Stacy Schiff

The Russian-American novelist Vladimir Nabokov once said, “Without my wife, I wouldn’t have written a single novel.” And while Stacy Schiff’s biography of Cleopatra could also easily make this list, her telling of Véra Nabokova’s life in Russia, Europe, and the United States is revolutionary for finally bringing Véra out of her husband’s shadow. It’s also one of the most romantic biographies you’ll ever read, with some truly unforgettable images, like Vera’s habit of carrying a handgun to protect Vladimir on butterfly-hunting excursions.

Greenblatt, Stephen Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare, by Stephen Greenblatt

We know what you’re thinking. Who needs another book about Shakespeare?! But Greenblatt’s masterful biography is like traveling back in time to see firsthand how a small-town Englishman became the greatest writer of all time. Like Wroe’s biography of Pontius Pilate, there’s plenty of speculation here, as there are very few surviving records of Shakespeare’s daily life, but Greenblatt’s best trick is the way he pulls details from Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets to construct a compelling narrative.

Crown Begin Again: James Baldwin's America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own, by Eddie S. Glaude Jr.

When Kiese Laymon calls a book a “literary miracle,” you pay attention. James Baldwin’s legacy has enjoyed something of a revival over the last few years thanks to films like I Am Not Your Negro and If Beale Street Could Talk , as well as books like Glaude’s new biography. It’s genuinely a bit of a miracle how he manages to combine the story of Baldwin’s life with interpretations of Baldwin’s work—as well as Glaude’s own story of discovering, resisting, and rediscovering Baldwin’s books throughout his life.

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The best biographies to read in 2023

• Nik Rawlinson

Discover what inspired some of history’s most familiar names with these comprehensive biographies

The best biographies can be inspirational, can provide important life lessons – and can warn us off a dangerous path. They’re also a great way to learn more about important figures in history, politics, business and entertainment. That’s because the best biographies not only reveal what a person did with their life, but what effect it had and, perhaps most importantly, what inspired them to act as they did.

Where both a biography and an autobiography exist, you might be tempted to plump for the latter, assuming you’d get a more accurate and in-depth telling of the subject’s life story. While that may be true, it isn’t always the case. It’s human nature to be vain, and who could blame a celebrity or politician if they covered up their embarrassments and failures when committing their lives to paper? A biographer, so long as they have the proof to back up their claims, may have less incentive to spare their subject’s blushes, and thus produce a more honest account – warts and all.

That said, we’ve steered clear of the sensational in selecting the best biographies for you. Rather, we’ve focused on authoritative accounts of notable names, in each case written some time after their death, when a measured, sober assessment of their actions and impact can be given.

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Best biographies: At a glance

• Best literary biography: Agatha Christie: A Very Elusive Woman by Lucy Worsley | £20
• Best showbiz biography: Let’s Do It: The Authorised Biography of Victoria Wood | £6.78
• Best political biography: Hitler by Ian Kershaw | £14

How to choose the best biography for you

There are so many biographies to choose from that it can be difficult knowing which to choose. This is especially true when there are several competing titles focused on the same subject. Try asking yourself these questions.

Is the author qualified?

Wikipedia contains potted biographies of every notable figure you could ever want to read about. So, if you’re going to spend several hours with a novel-sized profile it must go beyond the basics – and you want to be sure that the author knows what they’re talking about.

That doesn’t mean they need to have been personally acquainted with the subject, as Jasper Rees was with Victoria Wood. Ian Kershaw never met Adolf Hitler (he was, after all, just two years old when Hitler killed himself), but he published his first works on the subject in the late 1980s, has advised on BBC documentaries about the Second World War, and is an acknowledged expert on the Nazi era. It’s no surprise, then, that his biography of the dictator is extensive, comprehensive and acclaimed.

Is there anything new to say?

What inspires someone to write a biography – particularly of someone whose life has already been documented? Sometimes it can be the discovery of new facts, perhaps through the uncovering of previously lost material or the release of papers that had been suppressed on the grounds of national security. But equally, it may be because times have changed so much that the context of previous biographies is no longer relevant. Attitudes, in particular, evolve with time, and what might have been considered appropriate behaviour in the 1950s would today seem discriminatory or shocking. So, an up-to-date biography that places the subject’s actions and motivations within a modern context can make it a worthwhile read, even if you’ve read an earlier work already.

Does it look beyond the subject?

The most comprehensive biographies place their subject in context – and show how that context affected their outlook and actions or is reflected in their work. Lucy Worsley’s new biography of Agatha Christie is a case in point, referencing Christie’s works to show how real life influenced her fiction. Mathew Parker’s Goldeneye does the same for Bond author Ian Fleming – and in doing so, both books enlarge considerably on the biography’s core subject.

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1. Let’s Do It: The Authorised Biography of Victoria Wood by Jasper Rees: Best showbiz biography

Price: £6.78 | Buy now from Amazon

It’s hardly surprising Victoria Wood never got around to writing her own autobiography. Originator of countless sketches, songs, comedy series, films, plays, documentaries and a sitcom, she kept pushing back the mammoth job of chronicling her life until it was too late. Wood’s death in 2016 came as a surprise to many, with the entertainer taking her final bow in private at the end of a battle with cancer she had fought away from the public eye.

In the wake of her death, her estate approached journalist Jasper Rees, who had interviewed her on many occasions, with the idea of writing the story that Wood had not got around to writing herself. With their backing, Rees’ own encounters with Wood, and the comic’s tape-recorded notes to go on, the result is a chunky, in-depth, authoritative account of her life. It seems unlikely that Wood could have written it more accurately – nor more fully – herself.

Looking back, it’s easy to forget that Wood wasn’t a constant feature on British TV screens, that whole years went by when her focus would be on writing or performing on stage, or even that her career had a surprisingly slow start after a lonely childhood in which television was a constant companion. This book reminds us of those facts – and that Wood wasn’t just a talented performer, but a hard worker, too, who put in the hours required to deliver the results.

Let’s Do It, which takes its title from a lyric in one of Wood’s best-known songs, The Ballad of Barry & Freda, is a timely reminder that there are two sides to every famous character: one public and one private. It introduces us to the person behind the personality, and shows how the character behind the characters for which she is best remembered came to be.

Key specs – Length: 592 pages; Publisher: Trapeze; ISBN: 978-1409184119

Let's Do It: The Authorised Biography of Victoria Wood

2. the chief: the life of lord northcliffe, britain’s greatest press baron by andrew roberts: best business biography.

Lord Northcliffe wasn’t afraid of taking risks – many of which paid off handsomely. He founded a small paper called Answers to Correspondents, branched out into comics, and bought a handful of newspapers. Then he founded the Daily Mail, and applied what he’d learned in running his smaller papers on a far grander scale. The world of publishing – in Britain and beyond – was never the same again. The Daily Mail was a huge success, which led to the founding of the Daily Mirror, primarily for women, and his acquisition of the Observer, Times and Sunday Times.

By then, Northcliffe controlled almost half of Britain’s daily newspaper circulation. Nobody before him had ever enjoyed such reach – or such influence over the British public – as he did through his titles. This gave him sufficient political clout to sway the direction of government in such fundamental areas as the establishment of the Irish Free State and conscription in the run-up to the First World War. He was appointed to head up Britain’s propaganda operation during the conflict, and in this position he became a target for assassination, with a German warship shelling his home in Broadstairs. Beyond publishing, he was ahead of many contemporaries in understanding the potential of aviation as a force for good, as a result of which he funded several highly valuable prizes for pioneers in the field.

He achieved much in his 57 years, as evidenced by this biography, but suffered both physical and mental ill health towards the end. The empire that he built may have fragmented since his passing, with the Daily Mirror, Observer, Times and Sunday Times having left the group that he founded, but his influence can still be felt. For anyone who wants to understand how and why titles like the Daily Mail became so successful, The Chief is an essential read.

Key specs – Length: 556 pages; Publisher: Simon & Schuster; ISBN: 978-1398508712

The Chief: The Life of Lord Northcliffe Britain's Greatest Press Baron

3. goldeneye by matthew parker: best biography for cinema fans.

The name Goldeneye is synonymous with James Bond. It was the title of both a film and a video game, a fictional super weapon, a real-life Second World War plan devised by author Ian Fleming, and the name of the Jamaican estate where he wrote one Bond book every year between 1952 and his death in 1964. The Bond film makers acknowledged this in 2021’s No Time To Die, making that estate the home to which James Bond retired, just as his creator had done at the end of the war, 75 years earlier.

Fleming had often talked of his plan to write the spy novel to end all spy novels once the conflict was over, and it’s at Goldeneye that he fulfilled that ambition. Unsurprisingly, many of his experiences there found their way into his prose and the subsequent films, making this biography as much a history of Bond itself as it is a focused retelling of Fleming’s life in Jamaica. It’s here, we learn, that Fleming first drinks a Vesper at a neighbour’s house. Vesper later became a character in Casino Royale and, in the story, Bond devises a drink to fit the name. Fleming frequently ate Ackee fish while in residence; the phonetically identical Aki was an important character in You Only Live Twice.

Parker finds more subtle references, too, observing that anyone who kills a bird or owl in any of the Bond stories suffers the spy’s wrath. This could easily be overlooked, but it’s notable, and logical: Fleming had a love of birds, and Bond himself was named after the ornithologist James Bond, whose book was on Fleming’s shelves at Goldeneye.

So this is as much the biography of a famous fictional character as it is of an author, and of the house that he occupied for several weeks every year. So much of Fleming’s life at Goldeneye influenced his work that this is an essential read for any Bond fan – even if you’ve already read widely on the subject and consider yourself an aficionado. Parker’s approach is unusual, but hugely successful, and the result is an authoritative, wide-ranging biography about one of this country’s best-known authors, his central character, an iconic location and a country in the run-up to – and immediately following – its independence from Britain.

Key specs – Length: 416 pages; Publisher: Windmill Books; ISBN: 978-0099591740

Goldeneye: Where Bond was Born: Ian Fleming's Jamaica

4. hitler by ian kershaw: best political biography.

The latter portion of Adolf Hitler’s life, from his coming to power in 1933 to his suicide in 1945, is minutely documented, and known to a greater or lesser degree by anyone who has passed through secondary education. But what of his earlier years? How did this overlooked art student become one of the most powerful and destructive humans ever to have existed? What were his influences? What was he like?

Kershaw has the answers. This door stopper, which runs to more than 1,000 pages, is an abridged compilation of two earlier works: Hitler 1889 – 1936: Hubris, and Hitler 1936 – 1946: Nemesis. Yet, abridged though it may be, it remains extraordinarily detailed, and the research shines through. Kershaw spends no time warming his engines: Hitler is born by page three, to a social-climbing father who had changed the family name to something less rustic than it had been. As Kershaw points out, “Adolf can be believed when he said that nothing his father had done pleased him so much as to drop the coarsely rustic name of Schicklgruber. ‘Heil Schicklgruber’ would have sounded an unlikely salutation to a national hero.”

There’s no skimping on context, either, with each chapter given space to explore the political, economic and social influences on Hitler’s development and eventual emergence as leader. Kershaw pinpoints 1924 as the year that “can be seen as the time when, like a phoenix arising from the ashes, Hitler could begin his emergence from the ruins of the broken and fragmented volkisch movement to become eventually the absolute leader with total mastery over a reformed, organisationally far stronger, and internally more cohesive Nazi Party”. For much of 1924, Hitler was in jail, working on Mein Kampf and, by the point of his release, the movement to which he had attached himself had been marginalised. Few could have believed that it – and he – would rise again and take over first Germany, then much of Europe. Here, you’ll find out how it happened.

If you’re looking for an authoritative, in-depth biography of one of the most significant figures in modern world history, this is it. Don’t be put off by its length: it’s highly readable, and also available as an audiobook which, although it runs to 44 hours, can be sped up to trim the overall running time.

Key specs – Length: 1,072 pages; Publisher: Penguin; ISBN: 978-0141035888

5. Stalin’s Architect: Power and Survival in Moscow by Deyan Sudjic: Best historical biography

Boris Iofan died in 1976, but his influence can still be felt today – in particular, through the architectural influences evident in many mid-century buildings across Eastern Europe. Born in Odessa in 1891, he trained in architecture and, upon returning to Russia after time spent in Western Europe, gained notoriety for designing the House on the Embankment, a monumental block-wide building containing more than 500 flats, plus the shops and other facilities required to service them.

“Iofan’s early success was based on a sought-after combination of characteristics: he was a member of the Communist Party who was also an accomplished architect capable of winning international attention,” writes biographer Deyan Sudjic. “He occupied a unique position as a bridge between the pre-revolutionary academicians… and the constructivist radicals whom the party saw as bringing much-needed international attention and prestige but never entirely trusted. His biggest role was to give the party leadership a sense of what Soviet architecture could be – not in a theoretical sense or as a drawing, which they would be unlikely to understand, but as a range of built options that they could actually see.”

Having established himself, much of the rest of his life was spent working on his designs for the Palace of the Soviets, which became grander and less practical with every iteration. This wasn’t entirely Iofan’s fault. He had become a favourite of the party elite, and of Stalin himself, who added to the size and ambition of the intended building over the years. Eventually, the statue of Lenin that was destined to stand atop its central tower would have been over 300ft tall, and would have had an outstretched index finger 14ft long. There was a risk that this would freeze in the winter, and the icicles that dropped from it would have been a significant danger to those going into and out of the building below it.

Although construction work began, the Palace of the Soviets was never completed. Many of Iofan’s other buildings remain, though, and his pavilions for the World Expos in Paris and New York are well documented – in this book as well as elsewhere. Lavishly illustrated, it recounts Iofan’s life and examines his work in various stages, from rough outline, through technical drawing, to photographs of completed buildings – where they exist.

Key specs – Length: 320 pages; Publisher: Thames and Hudson; ISBN: 978-0500343555

Stalin's Architect: Power and Survival in Moscow

6. agatha christie: a very elusive woman by lucy worsley: best literary biography.

Agatha Christie died in 1976 but, with more than 70 novels and 150 short stories to her name, she remains one of the best-selling authors of all time. A new biography from historian Lucy Worsley is therefore undoubtedly of interest. It’s comprehensive and highly readable – and opinionated – with short chapters that make it easy to dip into and out of on a break.

Worsley resists the temptation to skip straight to the books. Poirot doesn’t appear until chapter 11 with publication of The Mysterious Affair at Styles, which Christie wrote while working in a Torquay hospital. Today, Poirot is so well known, not only from the books but from depictions in film and television, that it’s easy to overlook how groundbreaking the character was upon his arrival.

As Worsley explains, “by choosing to make Hercule Poirot a foreigner, and a refugee as well, Agatha created the perfect detective for an age when everyone was growing surfeited with soldiers and action heroes. He’s so physically unimpressive that no-one expects Poirot to steal the show. Rather like a stereotypical woman, Poirot cannot rely upon brawn to solve problems, for he has none. He has to use brains instead… There’s even a joke in his name. Hercules, of course, is a muscular classical hero, but Hercule Poirot has a name like himself: diminutive, fussy, camp, and Agatha would show Poirot working in a different way to [Sherlock] Holmes.” Indeed, where Holmes rolls around on the floor picking up cigar ash in his first published case, Poirot, explains Worsley, does not stoop to gather clues: he needs only his little grey cells. Worsley’s approach is thorough and opinionated, and has resulted not only in a biography of Christie herself, but also her greatest creations, which will appeal all the more to the author’s fans.

As with Matthew Parker’s Goldeneye, there’s great insight here into what influenced Christie’s work, and Worsley frequently draws parallels between real life events and episodes, characters or locations in her novels. As a result of her experiences as a medical volunteer during the First World War, for example, during which a rigid hierarchy persisted and the medics behaved shockingly, doctors became the most common culprit in her books; the names of real people found their way into her fiction; and on one occasion Christie assembled what today might be called a focus group to underpin a particular plot point.

Worsley is refreshingly opinionated and, where events in the author’s life take centre stage, doesn’t merely re-state the facts, but investigates Christie’s motivations to draw her own conclusions. This is particularly the case in the chapters examining Christie’s disappearance in 1926, which many previous biographers have portrayed as an attempt to frame her husband for murder. Worsley’s own investigation leads to alternative conclusions, which seem all the more plausible today, when society has a better understanding of – and is more sympathetic towards – the effects of psychological distress.

Key specs – Length: 432 pages; Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton; ISBN: 978-1529303889

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Best Biographies

Discover the lives of remarkable individuals through the best biographies, chosen from a wide array of reputable literary sources and biography enthusiasts. these compelling reads offer intimate portraits and have earned accolades across numerous literary discussions..

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Best Biographies of All Time: Top 20 Most Interesting Reads

Kathy Edens

Have you ever read a biography that was gripping enough to keep you turning pages long after you should’ve been asleep? If not, then maybe you’re not reading the right books.

We culled the best of the best from over a half dozen sources, and still can’t capture all the great biographies worth reading.

Here, in no particular order, are the best biographies that read as good as, if not better than, fiction.

Final Thoughts

1. unbroken: a world war ii story of survival, resilience and redemption by laura hillenbrand.

At once devastating and uplifting, Unbroken is the story of Louis Zamperini, from his incorrigible boyhood actions to the sport that turned him around and led him to the Olympics.

But then WWII came calling, changing Louis and testing his endurance and ingenuity. The story comes full circle when, decades later, Zamperini returns to Japan, not as a POW, but as an honored guest at the Olympics.

2. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

Henrietta herself didn’t lead a glamorous life, but her cells, taken without her knowledge, have led to such ground-breaking accomplishments as the polio vaccine.

These cells, known as HeLa, are one of the most important tools in medicine and have been bought and sold by the billions. They are still alive today, over sixty years after Henrietta’s death.

3. Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt

Fiction couldn’t be as suspenseful and seductive as this real story about a death in one of Savannah’s grandest mansions in 1981. Was it murder or self-defense?

Peeling the curtain back on well-bred society ladies, gigolos, and a Southern belle who epitomizes "the soul of pampered self-absorption," this book has everything from drag queens to a voodoo priestess. You can’t make this stuff up.

4. Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

Imagine a young, well-to-do man who gave away all his money, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, then hitchhiked to Alaska and disappeared into the wilderness.

Four months later, hunters found his decomposed remains. This book tells the story of Christopher Johnson McCandless and his death in the wild.

5. Martin Heidegger: Between Good and Evil by Rüdiger Safranski

Heidegger, a great philosopher without whom there would be no Sartre or Foucault, also had many failures and flaws.

He made a pact with the devil, Adolf Hitler, and teetered between good and evil, brilliance and blindness. This book chronicles his ideas and his personal commitments and betrayals.

6. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

Based on over forty interviews with Jobs and hundreds with family, friends, colleagues, competitors, and adversaries, Walter Isaacson’s biography reads like a roller coaster ride.

This is the unvarnished truth: Jobs cooperated, but had no control over what Isaacson wrote or even the right to read it before publication. Nothing was off-limits.

7. John Adams by David McCullough

John Adams was not just one of the founding fathers; he was a brilliant, fiercely independent, and always honest patriot totally committed to the American Revolution. McCullough intertwines politics, war, and social issues with love, religious faith, virtue, ambition, and betrayal to create one book you can’t put down.

8. Savage Beauty by Nancy Milford

Edna St. Vincent Millay was the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize. She lived a flamboyant life in the Jazz Age alongside other literary heroes like F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Milford goes underneath the dazzling performance Edna puts on for the crowds and uncovers a rich and deep family connection between the three Millay sisters and their mother. One reviewer described it as a little bit Little Women with a touch of Mommy Dearest .

9. The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester

The creation of the Oxford English Dictionary was a thoroughly ambitious project that collected definitions from around the world.

There was one man, Dr. W. C. Minor, who contributed over 10,000, but the overseeing committee was stunned when they tracked him down to honor him. Dr. Minor, an American Civil War veteran, was an inmate at an asylum for the criminally insane.

10. A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar

Another vivid story about a brilliant man teetering between genius and madness, this book reads like a suspense novel but is the true story of John Nash, a mathematical genius who slipped into madness.

Thanks to the support and loyalty of Nash’s admirers, he eventually won a Nobel Prize for triggering the game theory revolution.

11. Will in the World by Stephen Greenblatt

An interesting insight into how a young man from a small provincial town moves to London in the 1500s and becomes the greatest playwright of all time.

Showing Shakespeare as an acutely sensitive and talented boy, Greenblatt helps you see, hear, and feel how he became the world-renowned playwright against the rich backdrop of Elizabethan life.

12. Barracoon by Zora Neale Hurston

Author of Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston tells the gripping and horrifying story of one of the last-known survivors of the Atlantic slave trade.

This is the story of Cudjo Lewis, abducted from Africa and put on the last "Black Cargo" ship to arrive in the United States. Lewis was captured and put in bondage fifty years after the Atlantic slave trade was outlawed in the United States.

13. The Man Who Knew Infinity by Robert Kanigel

In 1913, a young unschooled Indian clerk wrote a letter to G. H. Hardy, a pre-eminent English mathematician, with several ideas about numbers.

Hardy realized the boy’s genius and arranged for Srinivasa Ramanujan to come to England. From the temples and slums of Madras to the courts and chapels of Cambridge University, the story of their journey together is inspiring and magical.

14. Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera

Mexican painter Frida Kahlo was a woman of extreme magnetism and originality thanks to her childhood experiences near Mexico City during the Mexican Revolution.

From a devastating accident that left her crippled and unable to bear children to her tempestuous marriage and intermittent love affairs, this is an extraordinary story of a 20th century woman who has become a legend.

15. Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly

During the Civil Rights Movement, no one knew the story of NASA’s African-American female mathematicians and their role in the space program.

Before Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, this group, called the "Human Computers," calculated the flight paths that would lead to historic achievements.

16. John Brown by W.E.B. Du Bois

A groundbreaking political biography, John Brown moved Du Bois from his comfortable life as an academic to a lifelong career in social activism.

John Brown was the first Caucasian man willing to die for the rights of black people. The narrative Du Bois presents is compelling and one that is rarely presented in our history books.

17. Enrique’s Journey: The Story of a Boy’s Dangerous Odyssey to Reunite With His Mother by Sonia Nazario

Award-winning journalist Nazario tells the vivid and engaging story of a Honduran boy’s unforgettable odyssey to reach his mother in the United States.

He has no money and only a slip of paper with his mother’s US telephone number. Enrique makes the hard and dangerous journey from Mexico the only way he knows how—clinging to the sides and tops of freight trains.

18. Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford

In an interesting twist to the usual depiction of bloodthirsty pillagers, Weatherford shows how Genghis Khan introduced many progressive advancements to the societies he conquered.

Khan abolished torture, brought universal religious freedom, and destroyed feudal systems wherever he went. This is an engaging story of how he helped form the Mongol empire.

19. Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War by Robert Coram

Boyd was a world-class fighter pilot whose machinations changed warfare and strategy not only in the air but on the ground and at sea.

He is the founder of our modern concept of maneuver warfare, and his way of analyzing and solving problems is used today in corporate boardrooms.

20. Eleanor Roosevelt by Blanche Wiesen Cook

Most first ladies didn’t do much beyond party planning, but Eleanor Roosevelt wanted to get things done.

Cook brings Roosevelt to life and shines a light on her political and social acumen in turning a meaningless position into one of power to influence and make change.

We didn’t want to stop here; there are so many more you should read. Let’s get a comprehensive list going in the comments below. What other unforgettable biographies did we miss?

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Kathy Edens is a blogger, a ghost writer, and content master who loves writing about anything and everything. Check out her books The Novel-Writing Training Plan: 17 Steps to Get Your Ideas in Shape for the Marathon of Writing and Creating Legends: How to Craft Characters Readers Adore... or Despise.

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53 Of The Top Biography Books Of All Time (Updated 2022)

Reading nonfiction is a wonderful way to widen your horizons. Biographies offer a unique look at historical and influential figures. They can put famous people into a greater context or share an incredible unknown story.

This list looks to document the best of the biography genre. They cover historical figures, those who made an impact in science or the arts, and a few that are just good storytellers. Each book on the list was selected based on its literary merit as well as the importance or interest of the subject.

Related: 50 Books to Expand Your Worldview

Here are 50 biographies everyone should read:

Table of Contents

American Historical Biographies

John Adams by David McCullough: The second president was a brilliant man who often did not command respect from his colleagues because of his uniquely brash personality. This book chronicles his impact on American governing as well as his love story with his wife Abigail.

Notorious RBG by Irin Carmon and Shana Knizhnik: The title of this book comes from a Tumblr page meant to solidify Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg as the coolest octogenarian in America. The biography is decidedly more serious than the original social media page as it spells out the life of this influential feminist justice.

Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo” by Zora Neale Hurston: Based on interviews conducted in 1927 and 1931, Hurston captures the story of the last living person captured in Africa and then transported and enslaved in America. It is as relevant now as it was almost 100 years ago, as the narrative around America’s entwinement with slavery evolves . 

Thurgood Marshall: American Revolutionary by Juan Williams: Marshall used the justice system to push back against the legality of American racial segregation. He then became the first African-American to serve on the Supreme Court. This biography also dives into his conflicts with other major civil rights leaders and his unique relationship with J. Edgar Hoover. 

Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow: Chernow is considered one of the great American historical biographers and his account of the life of the first president. It’s a huge undertaking that required massive amounts of research and it’s a definitive look at one of the most influential early American leaders.

Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow: This book is best known for being the inspiration for Lin Manuel-Miranda’s broadway musical, Hamilton . The book itself is decidedly less flashy but provides insight into an influential founding father whose legacy, until recently, was defined by his untimely death.

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable: Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little, the son of civil rights activists who would grow up to lead a Black nationalism movement alongside concurrent civil rights campaigns. This 2011 book was also the first to document new information about Malcolm X’s assassination. 

Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter by Kate Clifford Larson: The daughter of Joe and Rose Kennedy, Rosemary had an intellectual disability the family worked hard to hide. Once the family’s rose to prominence and it became increasingly difficult to conceal Rosemary’s disability, her father decided to have her lobotomized at age 23.

Rebel Yell: The Violence, Passion, and Redemption of Stonewall Jackson by S.C. Gwynne: This book is the biography of Stonewall Jackson, the Confederate general often held in high esteem by Southerners trying to change the narrative of the Civil War. It is considered to be the best account of Jackson’s life and military career. It is important to note that some readers have criticized the fact that this book minimizes Jackson’s relationship with slavery, including the fact that he enslaved people and fought to preserve slavery.

His Truth Is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope by Jon Meacham: John Lewis was born on a farm in rural Alabama and became a Civil Rights icon. He went on to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives for many years. This would be an excellent choice to read in 2020 as many reflect upon Lewis’s legacy after his death this year.

The Path to Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson by Robert A. Caro: This is a four-volume biography of President Lyndon Johnson, who was a complex man thrust into the presidency after the assassination of JFK. Johnson’s legacy includes important civil rights legislation, but his life was also defined by his singular ambition to make a mark on America.

The Real Lincoln by Thomas J. Dilorenzo: This biography of a man many consider to be the greatest American president looks to change the narrative about Abraham Lincoln. Instead of painting Lincoln as “the Great Emancipator,” Dilorenzo argues that Lincoln’s motivation for engaging in the Civil War had more to do with his desire to move toward a centralized government. The author’s perspective is not without controversy, so read this biography if you want to consider a unique view of history.

Invisible: The Forgotten Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster by Stephen L. Carter: The provocative title of this book captures the exciting story of Eunice Hunton Carter. Hunton Carter defied racial and gender barriers to take down Lucky Luciano, New York’s infamous Mafia boss. Fun fact: She’s also the grandmother of the author.

Let Us Now Praise Famous Men by James Agee and Walker Evans: In 1936, this reporter-photographer team traveled through the American South to document the lives of sharecroppers during the Great Depression. It’s considered one of the best accounts of American poverty.

American Lion by Jon Meacham: This is the definitive biography of President Andrew Jackson, who simultaneously transformed American democracy while committing atrocities, like the forced removal of Native people from their tribal lands.

World Biographies

The Wives of Henry VIII by Antonia Fraser: Everyone knows the history of the king with six wives, but this book aims to tell the wives’ stories. Each of the women has their story told in this shared biography.

Churchill: A Life by Martin Gilbert: Many have written about the life of Winston Churchill, but historian Martin Gilbert’s work is considered to the best account of the prime minister’s life. This is a single volume edition, condensed from an earlier-published eight volumes. It also includes new information since the original publication.

Catherine the Great by Robert K. Massie: This is part of a four-book series on the Romanovs. It tells the story of how a woman born to a minor German noble family became the empress of Russia. She ruled Russia for 34 years, cementing her legacy forever.

Nicholas and Alexandra: The Classic Account of the Fall of the Romanov Dynasty by Robert K. Massie: Any true Russian history buff will enjoy all of the biographies in Massie’s Romanov series, but the two included on this list are the most commonly recommended. It tells the story of the missteps of two royal leaders that eventually led to their execution in 1918.

The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom and Elizabeth and John Sherrill: This is almost an autobiography, but it’s still worthy of a place on this list. The Sherrills came up with the idea to tell Corrie ten Boom’s story and collaborated on the book. In it, ten Boom shares her experience in the Netherlands during World War II, where she helped hide Jews in her home. She was eventually caught and sent to the Ravensbruck concentration camp and was liberated in 1944. She lived for 39 more years.

Mao: The Unknown Story by Jung Chang: This biography is a fascinating look at the often misunderstood Mao Zedong. It’s a complete history of the Chinese leader and a great introduction for readers who know very little about him.

Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China by Jung Chang: Author Jung Chang captures her own family’s experiences during the twentieth century in China. This is a great companion to Chang’s biography of Mao, but it tells the story of his reign through the eyes of three generations of women in one family.

The Lost City of Z by David Grann: In 1925, British explorer Percy Fawcett traveled to the Amazon jungle and disappeared. In search of a fabled “City of Z,” many have searched for any evidence of Fawcett, with no success. This book explores the mystery of his disappearance. 

Enrique’s Journey by Sonia Nazario: 11 years after his mother left to find work in the United States, Enrique leaves his home in Honduras to find her. It’s a harrowing story of danger and hostility, while also having moments of hope and great courage.

Ghengis Kahn and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford: Khan is the stuff of legends to most Western readers, and this biography captures his unmatched might. Genghis Khan led the Mongol army to capture lands throughout Asia and Europe. 

Related: The Definitive Modern Man’s Library: 33 Essential Keystone Books

Science and Technology Biographies

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot: This book documents the story of a poor Black farmer whose cells were used by scientists to develop vaccines and conduct medical research — all without her consent and many years after her death. Henrietta Lacks’ story illustrates the way Black Americans are used in medical research and Skloot explores the connection between bioethics and racism. 

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson: America has long been fascinated by the Apple founder and tech genius Steve Jobs. Walter Isaacson’s biography is considered the best account of his life and revolutionary career.

Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World by Tracy Kidder: Paul Farmer has spent his career in medicine traveling the world in hopes of bringing medical care to all people. This biography accounts for his career as a Harvard professor as well as his time abroad in places like Haiti, Peru, and Cuba. 

A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar: John Nash was a mathematician who would go on to win a Nobel Prize for his work. He also suffered from mental illness and schizophrenia that almost prevented him from producing his most famous work on game theory. This biography inspired a film starring Russell Crowe.

Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly: This book highlights the achievements of NASA’s “human computers,” many of whom were Black women segregated in a separate space from the white men who received credit for their work. This book inspired a popular film.

The Radium Girls by Kate Moore: In this at times hard-to-read book, Kate Moore describes the terrible health effects of radium and the women who suffered them. In the early 20th century, many women were employed to paint watch faces with radioactive paint, allowing the watches to glow in the dark. But as a result of their exposure to radium, the women developed terrible illnesses. As their bodies were falling apart, the women fought for workers’ rights.

Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges: Alan Turing was a brilliant man who cracked the Nazi code machine and laid the groundwork for the computer. He was also a gay man in Britain at a time when homosexuality was outlawed. Turing was eventually arrested and forced to undergo humiliating treatment, despite his crucial role in the Allies’ World War II victory.

Radioactive: Marie and Paul Curie: A Tale of Love and Fallout by Lauren Redniss: In this biography of Marie Curie, readers can follow a remarkable career of scientific discovery alongside her romance with Paul. Marie Curie was a complex woman and this biography captures her life well.

Best Sports Biographies

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand: This biography covers the life of Louis Zamperini, once a celebrated American Olympic runner who became an airman during World War II. His plane crashed in the Pacific Ocean and he drifted asea until landing at the Marshall Islands and being captured by the Japanese. Zamperini’s survival story is unlikely and inspiring.

King of the World: Muhammad Ali and the Rise of an American Hero by David Remnick: This book is considered the most complete account of Muhammad Ali’s life and his impact on boxing and American racial politics. Ali captivated sports fans with his talent in the ring and challenged Americans to pursue racial justice.

The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown: This is an incredible underdog story about nine working-class rowers from the University of Washington who defeated the elite crew teams from the East Coast and Great Britain. They would then shock the world by defeating the German team in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. 

Tiger Woods by Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian: For those who followed the rise of the young, phenomenal golfer, and then watched him lose it all due to a personal scandal, this book is for you. Published in 2018, it’s the most comprehensive and up-to-date biography of Woods. It’s especially good for those who celebrated Woods’ return to golf and his triumphant 2019 Master’s win.

Andre Agassi’s OPEN is one of the best-selling sports biographies of all-time. Agassi was groomed to become a tennis champion from an early age, but once he achieved success he found his life unfilled. This is a fantastic book.

True Crime and Mystery Biographies

Columbine by Dave Cullen: Though technically an account of the entire Columbine High School shooting, this book serves as a biography of the shooters themselves. Cullen was on the scene in 1999 and spent 10 years working on this book. He successfully challenges misinformation that took hold in American conversations about the shooting and is a great read for anyone who wants to finally learn the facts.

American Predator: The Hunt for the Most Meticulous Serial Killer of the 21st Century by Maureen Callahan: In this 2020 book, Maureen Callahan tells the story of Israel Keyes, a relatively unknown serial murderer who went undetected by law enforcement for years. Keyes was evaded the FBI by hiding “kill kits” in remote locations, leaving them until he decided to return and commit his crimes. This book is great for true crime lovers.

The Stranger in the Woods: The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit by Michael Finkel: Christopher Knight survived in the remote woods of Maine for almost three decades by stealing provisions from locals’ homes. He lived in a tent through the harsh Maine winters and didn’t interact with another human being during his time in the forest. Knight sought solitude and achieved it for almost 30 years until he was arrested for stealing. Then the world finally learned his story.

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer: This is the story of a man who went into the Alaskan wilderness in 1992 without any money or many supplies and was found dead just 4 months later. Krakauer tells the story of Christopher McCandless, a college graduate from a well-to-do family, and what drove him to enter the wild without maps or a plan. 

Blind, Torture, Kill – For over thirty-one years, a murder haunted the community of Wichita, Kansas. This is a thrilling inside story of the BTK Killer (blind torture kill) and how he was able to avoid police for so many years and his media exploits. The killer’s true identity turned out to be a devoted community member, husband, dad, Boy Scout volunteer, and church leader.

I’ll Be Gone In The Dark: One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer   Michelle McNamara dedicated the last part of her life to revealing the story and true identity of the Golden State Killer – an elusive serial rapist turned murderer during the 1970s-80s. The case was finally solved in 2018 after years of cold trails, thanks in part to this book.

Art, Music, and Literature Biographies

Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin: Shirley Jackson is considered a master of the horror genre, best known for the short story “The Lottery” and her novel-turned-Netflix-series, The Haunting of Hill House . This biography tells the story of her difficult life and the inspiration for some of her best work. 

Frida by Hayden Herrera: Mexican painter Frida Kahlo has long been the subject of fascination in the art world and beyond. This biography captures her story. Kahlo suffered a life-altering accident that would inspire her to begin painting. Soon the world would be treated to her wonderful talent. It also covers her fascinating relationship and marriage to artist Diego Rivera.

Last Train to Memphis by Peter Guralnick: The first of two volumes, this book chronicles the early life of Elvis Presley and his rise to rock-and-roll fame. It covers the first 24 years of his life, through the recordings of his first hits, his drafting into the army in 1958, and the death of his mother.

Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder by Caroline Fraser: This book is the first definitive biography of the famed author of the Little House series. Caroline Fraser uses a variety of documents to fill in the gaps in Laura Ingalls Wilder’s life, providing a more complete picture of her experiences growing up on the prairie and her relationship with her only daughter Rose.

Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare by Stephen Greenblatt: William Shakespeare is the most famous writer in history. His prolific work is astonishing. How did he accomplish so much in his life? Greenblatt attempts to answer that question while humanizing the great playwright.

Prince: A Private View by Afshin Shahidi: This is a unique biography of musical genius Prince. It’s foremost a photo collection of images shot by Shahidi himself. Shahidi collaborated with Prince for much of his career. The photos and stories in this book reflect the inside access only Shahidi had.

Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora Neale Hurston by Valerie Boyd: After reading Neale Hurston’s portrait of an enslaved man in  Barracoon,  dive into the life of the woman herself. Zora Neale Hurston was creatively connected to the Harlem Renaissance and inspired countless Black women writers, including Maya Angelou and Toni Morrison.

Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay by Nancy Milford: This is the biography of an influential poet and playwright with a fascinating family life. Edna St. Vincent Millay had a close relationship with her sisters and mother, and it was at times toxic. Those unfamiliar with St. Vincent Millay will enjoy learning about this Pulitzer Prize-winning writer. 

The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester: This is the unbelievable story of the origins of the Oxford English Dictionary and two men who were instrumental in its creation. Professor James Murray led the committee to oversee the collection of definitions. He was shocked to discover a man who had submitted over ten thousand definitions, Dr. W.C. Minor, was also an American Civil War veteran living in an asylum for the criminally insane.

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The Best New Biographies and Memoirs to Read in 2024

This year sees some riveting and remarkable lives—from artist ai weiwei to singer-songwriter joni mitchell—captured on the page..

A life story can be read for escapist pleasure. But at other times, reading a memoir or biography can be an expansive exercise, opening us up to broader truths about our world. Often, it’s an edifying experience that reminds us of our universal human vulnerability and the common quest for purpose in life.

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Biographies and memoirs charting remarkable lives—whether because of fame, fortune or simply fascination—have the power to inspire us for their depth, curiosity or challenges. This year sees a bumper calendar of personal histories enter bookshops, grappling with enigmatic public figures like singer Joni Mitchell and writer Ian Fleming , to nuanced analysis of how motherhood or sociopathy shape our lives—for better and for worse.

Here we compile some of the most rewarding biographies and memoirs out in 2024. There are stories of trauma and recovery, art as politics and politics as art, and sentences as single life lessons spread across books that will make you rethink much about personal life stories. After all, understanding the triumphs and trials of others can help us see how we can change our own lives to create something different or even better.

Zodiac: A Graphic Memoir by Ai Weiwei and illustrated by Gianluca Costantini

Ai Weiwei , the iconoclastic artist and fierce critic of his homeland China, mixes fairy tales with moral lessons to evocatively retrace the story of his life in graphic form. Illustrations are by Italian artist Gianluca Costantini . “Any artist who isn’t an activist is a dead artist,” Weiwei writes in Zodiac , as he embraces everything from animals found in the Chinese zodiac to mystical folklore tales with anamorphic animals to argue the necessity of art as politics incarnate. The meditative exercise uses pithy anecdotes alongside striking visuals to sketch out a remarkable life story marked by struggle. It’s one weaving political manifesto, philosophy and personal memoir to engage readers on the necessity of art and agitation against authority in a world where we sometimes must resist and fight back.

Alphabetical Diaries by Sheila Heti

Already well-known for her experimental writings, Sheila Heti takes a decade of diary entries and maps sentences against the alphabet, from A to Z. The project is a subversive rethink of our relationship to introspection—which often asks for order and clarity, like in diary writing—that maps new patterns and themes in its disjointed form. Heti plays with both her confessionals and her sometimes formulaic writing style (like knowingly using “Of course” in entries) to retrace the changes made (and unmade) across ten years of her life. Alphabetical Diaries is a sometimes demanding book given the incoherence of its entries, but remains an illuminating project in thinking about efforts at self-documentation.

Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story by Leslie Jamison

Unlike her previous work The Empathy Exams , which examined how we relate to one another and on human suffering, writer Leslie Jamison wrestles today with her own failed marriage and the grief of surviving single parenting. After the birth of her daughter, Jamison divorces her partner “C,” traverses the trials and tribulations of rebound relationships (including with “an ex-philosopher”) and confronts unresolved emotional pains born of her own life living under the divorce of her parents. In her intimate retelling—paired with her superb prose—Jamison charts a personal history that acknowledges the unending divide mothers (and others) face dividing themselves between partners, children and their own lives.

Radiant: The Life and Line of Keith Haring by Brad Gooch

Whether dancing figures or a “radiant baby,” the recognizable cartoonish symbols in Keith Haring ’s art endure today as shorthand signs representing both his playfulness and politicking. Haring (1958-1990) is the subject of writer Brad Gooch ’s deft biography, Radiant , a book that mines new material from the archive along with interviews with contemporaries to reappraise the influential quasi-celebrity artist. From rough beginnings tagging graffiti on New York City walls to cavorting with Andy Warhol and Madonna on art pieces, Haring battled everything from claims of selling out to over-simplicity. But he persisted with work that leveraged catchy quotes and colorful imagery to advance unsavory political messages—from AIDS to crack cocaine. A life tragically cut short at 31 is one powerfully celebrated in this new noble portrait.

The House of Hidden Meanings by RuPaul Charles

In The House of Hidden Meaning , celebrated drag queen, RuPaul , reckons with a murky inner world that has shaped—and hindered—a lifetime of gender-bending theatricality. The figurative house at the center of the story is his “ego,” a plaguing barrier that apparently long inhibited the performer from realizing dreams of greatness. Now as the world’s most recognizable drag queen—having popularized the art form for mainstream audiences with the TV show RuPaul’s Drag Race —RuPaul reflects on the power that drag and self-love have long offered across his difficult, and sometimes tortured, life. Readers expecting dishy stories may be disappointed, but the psychological self-assessment in the pages of this memoir is far more edifying than Hollywood gossip could ever be.

Sociopath: A Memoir by Patric Gagne

Patric Gagne is an unlikely subject for a memoir on sociopaths. Especially since she is a former therapist with a doctorate in clinical psychology. Still, Gagne makes the case that after a troubled childhood of antisocial behavior (like stealing trinkets and cursing teachers) and a difficult adulthood (now stealing credit cards and fighting authority figures), she receives a diagnosis of sociopathy. Her memoir recounts many episodes of bad behavior—deeds often marked by a lack of empathy, guilt or even common decency—where her great antipathy mars any ability for her to connect with others. Sociopath is a rewarding personal exposé that demystifies one vilified psychological condition so often seen as entirely untreatable or irreparable. Only now there’s a familiar face and a real story linked to the prognosis.

Ian Fleming: The Complete Man by Nicholas Shakespeare

Nicholas Shakespeare is an acclaimed novelist and an astute biographer, delivering tales that wield a discerning eye to subjects and embrace a robust attention to detail. Ian Fleming (1908-1964), the legendary creator of James Bond, is the latest to receive Shakespeare’s treatment. With access to new family materials from the Fleming estate, the seemingly contradictory Fleming is seen anew as a totally “different person” from his popular image. Taking cues from Fleming’s life story—from a refined upbringing spent in expensive private schools to working for Reuters as a journalist in the Soviet Union—Shakespeare reveals how these experiences shaped the elusive world of espionage and intrigue created in Fleming’s novels. Other insights include how Bond was likely informed by Fleming’s cavalier father, a major who fought in WWI. A martini (shaken, not stirred) is best enjoyed with this bio.

Knife: Meditations after an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie

Salman Rushdie , while giving a rare public lecture in New York in August 2022, was violently stabbed by an assailant brandishing a knife . The attack saw Rushdie lose his left hand and his sight in one eye. Speaking to The New Yorker a year later , he confirmed a memoir was in the works that would confront this harrowing existential experience: “When somebody sticks a knife into you, that’s a first-person story. That’s an ‘I’ story.” Knife: Meditations after an Attempted Murder is promised to be his raw, revelatory and deeply psychological confrontation with the violent incident. Like the sword of Damocles, brutality has long stalked Rushdie ever since the 1989 fatwa issued against the author, following the publication of his controversial novel, The Satanic Verses . The answer to such barbarity, Rushdie is poised to argue, is by finding the strength to stand up again.

The Art of Dying: Writings, 2019–2022 by Peter Schjeldahl (Release: May 14)

Peter Schjeldahl (1942-2022), longstanding art critic of The New Yorker , confronted his mortality when he was diagnosed with incurable lung cancer in 2019. The resulting essay collection he then penned, The Art of Dying , is a masterful meditation on one life preoccupied entirely with aesthetics and criticism. It’s a discursive tactic for a memoir that avoids discussing Schjeldahl’s coming demise while equally confirming its impending visit by avoiding it. Acknowledging that he finds himself “thinking about death less than I used to,” Schjeldahl spends most of the pages revisiting familiar art subjects—from Edward Hopper ’s output to Peter Saul ’s Pop Art—as vehicles to re-examine his own remarkable life. With a life that began in the humble Midwest, Schjeldahl says his birthplace was one that ultimately availed him to write so plainly and cogently on art throughout his career. Such posthumous musings prove illuminating lessons on the potency of American art, with whispered asides on the tragedy of death that will come for all of us.

Traveling: On the Path of Joni Mitchell by Ann Powers (Release: June 11)

Joni Mitchell has enjoyed a remarkable revival recently, even already being one of the most acclaimed and enduring singer/songwriters. After retiring from public appearances for health reasons in the 2010s, Mitchell, 80, has returned to the spotlight with a 2021 Kennedy Centers honor , an appearance accepting the 2023 Gershwin Prize and even a live performance at this year’s Grammy Awards . It’s against this backdrop of public celebration of Mitchell that NPR music critic Ann Powers retraces the life story and musical (re)evolution of the singer, from folk to jazz genres and rock to soul music, across five decades for the American songbook. “What you are about to read is not a standard account of the life and work of Joni Mitchell,” she writes in the introduction. Instead, Powers’ project is one showing how Mitchell’s many journeys—from literal road trips inspiring tracks like “All I Want” to inner probings of Mitchell’s psyche, such as the song “Both Sides Now”—have always inspired Mitchell’s enduring, emotive and palpable output. These travels hold the key, Powers says, to understanding an enigmatic artist.

• SEE ALSO : ‘Under the Bridge’ Review: A Miniseries That Interrogates the True Crime Genre

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100 biographies to read in your lifetime

Whether they provide a glimpse into the past or capture the life of a contemporary icon, biographies and memoirs let us walk in someone else’s shoes.

The Amazon Books editors compiled a list of the 100 biographies and memoires that everyone should read in their lifetime.

A few of the titles are admittedly novels (or " authors shrouding their experiences within the cloak of fiction," as the Amazon editors put it) while others are classic biographies , but all of the books are essential reading on some of the world's most famous politicians, comedians, musicians, chefs, freedom fighters, and artists.

From the autobiographies of Malala Yousafzai and Barak Obama to the storied lives of historical titans like Winston Churchill and Frederick Douglass, keep scrolling to see the 100 biographies you should add to your reading list.

" A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius " by Dave Eggers

" A Long Way Gone " by Ishmael Beah

" A Moveable Feast " by Ernest Hemingway

" A Walk in the Woods " by Bill Bryson 

" American Caesar " by William Manchester

" American Lion " by Jon Meacham

" American Prometheus " by Kai Bird 

" American Sniper " by Chris Kyle

" American Sphinx " by Joseph J. Ellis

" Angela's Ashes " by Frank McCourt 

" Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl " by Anne Frank

" Autobiography of a Face " by Lucy Grealy

" Autobiography of Mark Twain " by Mark Twain

" Ball Four " by Jim Bouton

" Black Boy " by Richard Wright

" Black Like Me " by John Howard Griffin

" Born Standing Up " by Steve Martin

" Born to Run " by Christopher McDougall

" Bossypants " by Tina Fey

" Cash " by Johnny Cash

" Catherine the Great " by Robert K. Massie

" Chronicles " by Bob Dylan

" Churchill: A Life " by Martin Gilbert

" Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice " by Phillip Hoose

" Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness " by William Styron

" De Profundis and Other Prison Writings " by Oscar Wilde

" Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight " by Alexandra Fuller

" Dorothy Parker " by Marion Meade

" Dreams from My Father " by Barack Obama 

" Drinking: A Love Story " by Caroline Knapp

" Dust Tracks on a Road " by Zora Neale Hurston

" E=mc~2 " by David Bodanis

" Eat, Pray, Love " by Elizabeth Gilbert

" Endurance " by Alfred Lansing

" Everybody Was So Young " by Amanda Vaill

" Helen Keller: The Story of My Life " by Helen Keller

" I Am Malala " by Malala Yousafzai 

" I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings " by Maya Angelou

" Into the Wild " by Jon Krakauer

" Just Kids " by Patti Smith

" Kitchen Confidential " by Anthony Bourdain

" Knock Wood " by Candice Bergen 

" Life " by Keith Richards

" Long Walk to Freedom " by Nelson Mandela 

" Meditations " by Marcus Aurelius

" Mortality " by Christopher Hitchens

" My Life in France " by Julia Child 

" Naked " by David Sedaris

" Napoleon " by Andrew Roberts

" Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass " by Frederick Douglass

" Night " by Elie Wiesel

" Notes of a Native Son " by James Baldwin

" On the Road " by Jack Kerouac

" Open " by Andre Agassi

" Out of Africa " by Isak Dinesen

" Personal History " by Katharine Graham

" Robert A. Caro's The Years of Lyndon Johnson " by Robert A. Caro

" Running with Scissors " by Augusten Burroughs

" Savage Beauty " by Nancy Milford

" Seabiscuit: An American Legend " by Laura Hillenbrand 

" Short Nights of the Shadow Catcher " by Timothy Egan 

" Speak, Memory " by Vladimir Nabokov

" Steve Jobs " by Walter Isaacson

" Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! " by Richard P. Feynman

" Tennessee Williams " by John Lahr

" The Agony and the Ecstasy " by Irving Stone

" The Andy Warhol Diaries " by Andy Warhol

" The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas " by Gertrude Stein

" The Autobiography of Malcolm X " by Malcolm X

" The Basketball Diaries " by Jim Carroll

" The Bell Jar " by Sylvia Plath

" The Color of Water " by James McBride

" The Complete Maus " by Art Spiegelman

" The Complete Persepolis " by Marjane Satrapi

" The Diary of Anais Nin " by Anais Nin

" The Diary of Frida Kahlo " by Carlos Fuentes

" The Glass Castle " by Jeannette Walls

" The Gulag Archipelago " by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

" The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks " by Rebecca Skloot

" The Kid Stays in the Picture " by Robert Evans

" The Last Lone Inventor " by Evan I. Schwartz

" The Liars' Club " by Mary Karr

" The Motorcycle Diaries " by Ernesto Che Guevara

" The Professor and the Madman " by Simon Winchester

" The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt " by Edmund Morris

" The Soul of A New Machine " by Tracy Kidder

" The Tender Bar " by J. R. Moehringer

" The Woman Warrior " by Maxine Hong Kingston

" The Year of Magical Thinking " by Joan Didion

" This Boy's Life " by Tobias Wolff

" Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr. " by Ron Chernow

" Touching the Void " by Joe Simpson

" Travels with Charley in Search of America " by John Steinbeck 

" Unbroken " by Laura Hillenbrand

" Under the Tuscan Sun " by Frances Mayes

" Updike " by Adam Begley

" Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov) " by Stacy Schiff

" West with the Night " by Beryl Markham

" Wild Swans " by Jung Chang

" Wild " by Cheryl Strayed

Watch: Learn what all the fuss is about — here's the regular guy's guide to 'Fifty Shades of Grey'

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25 Biographies Every Man Should Read

By The Editors of GQ

KING OF THE WORLD by David Remnick (1998)

The greatest boxer of all time got treatment from a narrative-journalism heavyweight. The Champ had been written about as much as any athlete ever. But David Remnick did more than tell a story narrowly focused on Ali's individual experiences with victory and vice. Rather, he crafted a broad social and political narrative, then placed the boxer within it. It's a biography of a man as much as it is a biography of a myth"an American myth," Remnick writes, "who has come to mean many things to many people: a symbol of faith, a symbol of conviction and defiance, a symbol of beauty and skill and courage, a symbol of racial pride, of wit and love."

OPEN by Andre Agassi (2009)

This is the psychologist-couch confessional (that's really how Agassi and his collaborator, J. R. Moehringer, worked through it) that all great sports books strive to be. The abuse of youth training; the depths of disappointment and heights of ecstasy, recounted with acuity; the comings-clean of celebrity dating and crystal meth. (It will put you at ease that you were never the star athlete you'd hoped you'd be.) This would be a crazy book from any athlete; that it's from one of the most talented and popular tennis players in history makes it all the more irresistible.

SANDY KOUFAX

SANDY KOUFAX: A LEFTY'S LEGACY by Jane Leavy (2002)

It will make you fall back in love with baseball. In addition to being unflappable in demeanor, insurmountable in technical talent, and impenetrable in his personal privacy, Sandy Koufax pitched arguably the greatest game of all time. And it's the interplay of these braided narrativesthe life story of one of the best-ever lefties and the granular ticktock of his perfect outing in September 1965that gives Jane Leavy's bio cinematic lift. Koufax was a model of high-order talent and humility, and this book is a blueprint for living a life driven by both those virtues.

WHEN PRIDE STILL MATTERED by David Maraniss (1999)

He's the best-known football coach of all time. But his brand of leadership transcended his profession. At times he sounded like a general, a lawyer, a priest, and he might've been any of those, too. That universality lifted him to the status of deitythe most quoted and misquoted sports figure ever. This book roots him in his rightful place. Come for the football; stay for the nuanced "everything" that "winning isn't."

By Brett Martin

By Jeremy Freed

By Matthew Roberson

I AM ZLATAN by Zlatan Ibrahimovi (2012)

No book serves as a more efficient gateway drug to soccer fandom than this one. If Andre's is the shrink-couch confessional, Zlatan's is the barstool confessional. Ibrahimovi is one of the world's best soccer playersand easily its most colorful. Born in a Swedish housing project, he's a brutish attacker with unmatched instincts for goal-scoring. As well, he loves fast cars, reggae, body tats, trash-talking, calling things "advanced bullshit," and speaking in the third person. Even more fantastic is the fact that he put out the book when he was mid-career. He divulged all his secrets and burned all his bridges, even though he'd have to cross back over them again. He'd be your favorite athlete if he lived in America (which really could be his next stop).

JOE DiMAGGIO by Richard Ben Cramer (2000)

Joe DiMaggio was the ultimate ballplayer during the two decadesthe '30s and '40swhen the national gravitation toward baseball and the wattage of its stars was greater than the current-day NFL, NBA, and Hollywood combined. (And then he went ahead and married Marilyn Monroe.) It doesn't take an extraordinary writer and researcher to make Joe DiMaggio's crazy mix of public-private come off, but Richard Ben Cramer happens to be one.

EVERY LOVE STORY IS A GHOST STORY by D. T. Max (2012)

More than any other recent writer, DFW will go down as having influenced writers of future generations. As intelligent and inventive as any practitioner of both fiction and non-, he was purposefully enigmatic, some combination of glowing and wounded, prone to both witheringly awkward interviews and fantastic retorts. Wallace wrote about himselfmore than he probably meant tobut he could only stare in the mirror so long before turning away, or worse. D. T. Max, his first of surely many biographers, picked up the pieces and turned the mirror into a window. We'll long be looking through it, seeking a glimpse.

DE KOONING by Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan (2004)

De Kooning's toilsome life defies all the stereotypes of what it means to be a "modern master." Sure, aspects of the Abstract Expressionist's life fit the bill of an artist's biographyhe made the scene at the Cedar Tavern with Rothko, Kline, and Rauschenberg, kept up an intense rivalry with Pollock, drank himself into the gutter, and swapped out lovers like painting aprons. But everything else about his story will force you to revise the way you think genius works. Learn to be great, but mostly learn to be patient. He'd grunt and scrape at his canvases for months at a time, painstakingly inching his way toward immortality.

OUT OF SHEER RAGE by Geoff Dyer (1998)

This is the least conventional biography on the list. It's not really even a bio, is it? A book about the extraordinary English writer D. H. Lawrence, it's as much about Geoff Dyer's inability to write that book. We hear you; that sounds like an abysmal premise. But Dyer is in much greater and fantastically entertaining control than he lets on. What he finds in the gaps between his own life and his subject's yields writing on the kinds of human Q's & A's he (Lawrence) and he (Dyer) share with each other and any reader.

LIFE by Keith Richards (2010)

Keith. Because: the Stones. Because: Mick Charlie Ronnie Brian Bill & Bobby. Because: Smack Jack & Coke. Because: Ronnie Anita & Patti. Because: Altamont Hyde Park & Nellcte. Because: open G tuning & the blues. Because: Two bars of "Malaguea" and you're in. This is the best book ever written about sexdrugsrocknroll. Keith Richards is its Gabriel, because who else could it be?

I DREAMED I WAS A VERY CLEAN TRAMP by Richard Hell (2013

Punk rock was as much an attitude as a musical genre, and Hell was the man who first articulated the look, the sound, and the feel. He was also as good a writer as he was a musicianthe poet laureate of punk, as proven line by line here. If you're interested in the history of rock 'n' roll, or of downtown New York, or of American cool, you need to read this book as much as you need to hear any of his records.

LAST TRAIN TO MEMPHIS by Peter Guralnick (1994) & CARELESS LOVE by Peter Guralnick (1999)

Elvis is among the most American of all Americansup there with Abe Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., and Henry Fordand after this two-volume masterpiece, nobody needs to write his biography ever again. Just be forewarned: It gets dark. Goddamn, does it get dark. But it's a journey worth taking, because you begin to understand that Elvis is basically American Jesusthe sacrificial lamb who lived our national fall from grace. From guffawing mama's boy to pop king, to an inglorious death facedown in vomit beside the crapper at Graceland.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY by Morrissey (2013)

That voicewarbling, wounded, or spitting acid, and often all three at oncetranslates pitch-perfectly to the page, as Moz, in full-throated lyrical melodrama, relives the afflictions that created him: the knuckle-rapping horrors of Dickensian school days in gray Manchester, the elusive sexual promises of '70s glam and punk, the never-good-enough success of the Smiths, and pinch-me solo fame. Around every mundane corner, misery lurks in the form of judges, suits, and so-called friends as life, it seems, conspires to stifle him. Of course, life didn't.

CHRONICLES: VOLUME ONE by Bob Dylan (2004)

The most written-about songwriter of all time put an end to others' attempts by writing the weirdest, most wonderful version himself. Dozens of writers had tried before, but it took Dylan doing Dylan to get to the heart of it: impressionistic line-writing, fractured chronologies, rivers of metaphor, elliptical anecdotes, andfor those looking for a little more grounding than the poetry providescameo-filled set pieces of the most satisfying sort. Rarely is there a moment when we learn how A led directly to B, but there's a concerted effort to relate not how something was but how something felt/seemed/appeared to have transpired. The sensation inside as a song began to blossom, the bite of winter slipping through his Village floorboards, the thinking made possible by a motorcycle ride along the bayouin the present or in the past or whenever, it's hard to tell. We're never quite fixed in one placeit's one man seeing and feeling kaleidoscopically, the clearest sense yet of the life of that man. Better still: Volume two is still on the slate.

DINO by Nick Tosches (1992)

Dino was the first tell-all about this inscrutable starit's also the best. Tosches pulls no punches in this unauthorized biography, which traces the Rat Packer from his early days as Dino Crocetti, a teenage gambler in Ohio, to Dean Martin, a marquee name with a $500 nose job, a cross-media sensation before "cross-media" was a thing. But Tosches is interested in more than fantastic celebrity; in unsparing detail, he traces Dino's sad, slow decline into a twilight of pills and booze. The result is a lesson in what not to do when you reach the end of your prime.

STORIES I ONLY TELL MY FRIENDS by Rob Lowe (2011)

Hardly any actors pull this off. It takes a lot of nerve to overhype your own celebrity memoir by calling it Stories I Only Tell My Friends. But Rob LoweRob Lowe! the Handsome Guy from DirecTV ads! he was in Tommy Boy !delivers on turning the inside way out. Lowe avoids the Chicken Soup sentimentalities that plague so many celeb memoirs and veers toward unflinching self-reflection and a tabloid reporter's eyehis own tabloid moments included. If every famous person told his tales the way Lowe does, the bookstore section with all the famous faces on the covers would be a much more appealing place to get lost.

ALFRED HITCHCOCK: A LIFE IN DARKNESS AND LIGHT by Patrick McGilligan (2003)

He's the most widely examined director of all time, and he's still wildly misunderstood. McGilligan's book is a master course for anyone interested in moviemaking, a boring-down into the relationships with Cary Grant, Grace Kelly, and company, and a more suitably complex building-out of the 2-D perversions (and stalker accusations) that have come to cloud his legacy in recent decades. It's a hugely big book that never feels longthe definitive take on the master.

THE KID STAYS IN THE PICTURE by Robert Evans (1994)

Evans wrote the Great Hollywood Memoir. A "half-assed actor" in the '50s, he became the head of Paramount Pictures. _Rosemary's Baby, Love Story, The Godfather, Chinatown_that sort of rap sheet. He was the consummate Hollywood cadkisser-and-teller of Gardners and MacGraws (he's been married seven times), wheeler-dealer of Marlons and Jacks, and film inspiration for Dustin Hoffman in Wag the Dog. He strove to be an unapologetic original, a true north he followed to heights from which he had a singular view of the industry. Today's straight-shooting, publicity-choked middle ground will make you restless once you've tasted this.**

** Listen to This Life

The Kid Stays in the Picture is the perfect book off which to pivot to mention that many of these biographies and memoirs are also exceptional audiobooks. Especially since actors and musicians very often read their own. ( Life, for example, features Keith Richards, Johnny Depp, and musician Joe Hurley.) Still, Evans is the ultimate. For those who don't know, he's got a voice that sounds like eight-millimeter film, swimming-pool chlorine, starlet perfume, and melted-down Oscar gold rolling around together in a dryer. Reading it with the voice in your head seems criminal by comparison.

BORN STANDING UP by Steve Martin (2007)

Steve Martin wrote it, and Steve Martin knows how to produce a flash bomb of comedy. Read it if you remember Martin's stand-up shtick in the '70s, but especially read it if you don't. Before he was a white-haired eminence who fathered brides and cheap dozens and novels about shopgirls, Martin was a hustler of the rarest qualitya showman who cut his teeth at Disneyland (!), who zagged in the face of every easier zig. Who struggled maniacally to perform with originality. That's always the best part of any movie, anyway, isn't it? The gritty hustle up the mountain. By the time sold-out arenas and Hollywood blockbusters roll around, Martin seems less to bask in his successes than be bored by them. It's a good lesson for a career and for a memoir: Get out while it's hot. Martin jams through his set and then drops the mike.

THEODORE REX by Edmund Morris (2001)

Teddy's life was so grandiose that this book, confined to merely his eight White House years, manages to amaze without even covering many of the hoary Roosevelt legends (cowboy days in the Dakotas, a heroic Rough Riders phase, that time he took a bullet to the chest but gave a speech anyway). America's youngest, most unusual president is 42 when he begins warring against Wall Street monopolies, creating national parks, and stretching a canal across Panama. "Don't fritter away your time" and "Get action," the president barks, heeding his own advice.

MALCOLM X: A LIFE OF REINVENTION by Manning Marable (2011)

America in 2015 looks a hell of a lot more like the dire 1964 that Malcolm described in his landmark "The Ballot or the Bullet" speech than the cuddly future Dr. King put forth in "I Have a Dream." Yet what's so striking about Marable's book is how the supposedly rigid beliefs of Dr. King's fiery militant foil were constantly evolving, and how he came to have no allies, just enemieswhich makes this book as suspenseful as a double-agent spy novel.

ANDREW CARNEGIE by David Nasaw (2006)

Of all the robber barons, Andrew Carnegie feels the most modern. The most likable, toothough that may sell him short (which, at five feet, he was as well). He was born a pauper and became, in the words of financier J. P. Morgan, "the richest man in the world." Sure, Carnegie was no saintin the laissez-faire Gilded Age, righteousness was rarely rewarded. He sold crap-ass securities and used an early railroad gig to ink insider deals that set him up in the steel business. He made his first million by 35 but vowed to die penniless and began funding libraries, museums, concert halls, and collegessetting an example that modern plutocrats like Bill Gates and Warren Buffett aspire to today.

A BEAUTIFUL MIND by Sylvia Nasar (1998)

It is terrifying to imagine the turns a life can take. One minute you're a rising stud of American mathematics, the brash young heir to Einstein, perhaps. The next, you're announcing that you've been appointed Emperor of Antarctica, that powers from outer space are speaking to you in coded messages. In the late 1950s, John Nash fell in a flash from genius to madness. Decades were lost. But the voices quieted; Nash re-emerged, began working again. Then they gave him the goddamn Nobel Prize. Sure, things can get pretty bleak. But they can turn around, too.

STEVE JOBS by Walter Isaacson (2011)

It's so very many things at oncea panoramic tribute to a singular American mind; the definitive portrait of the definitive American company; a playbook for engineers, designers, marketers, and managers in tech and in the wider world of anybody making products and selling them for money; an "Idiot's Guide to '70s Start-ups and '00s Revivals"; a manual for megalomania (and veganism); and a best-seller of such magnitude that it's dumb to opt out. We know it's the only book your less readerly bros have read since collegebut don't let that suggest anything other than the fact that Jobs offers up entry points for countless kinds of men.

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25 Inspiring Biographies Everyone Should Read

By Anca Nicolescu

Published on January 22, 2023

Reading about people’s lives from different generations and backgrounds is always eye-opening. The world has seen some pretty impressive individuals that lead fascinating lives. From Gandhi to Steve Jobs, all of these individuals are noteworthy for contributions they made to the world as we know it today.

These stories are not only entertaining and keep you up wanting for more, but they might also teach you something. At the very least, they are informative.

We cannot talk about every single biography that was ever written, so we narrowed down the list to the ones we consider the most notable at the moment.

Here are 25 inspiring biographies that you will surely enjoy reading, take our word for it. Or don’t, but still grab the ones that capture your interest, you won’t regret it.

• 25. The Crusades of Cesar Chavez: A Biography by Miriam Pawel

One of the best written biographies of all times, this fairly recent work depicts the life of Cesar Chavez, one of the most influential Latinx figures in American history.

The author writes about the man’s journey from migrant worker to his rise as a movement leader. His remarkable mind and life story makes for a great read.

• 24. John Adams by David McCullough

The portrait of the second president of the United States is painted with an in-depth look into Adam’s early life and through his presidency. His marriage to Abigail is also given its own merit, which shifts the bookès focus from being a solely political review.

Their love story was based on loyalty and respect, and the book was made into an HBO series by the same name .

• 23. Gender Outlaws: The Next Generation by Kate Bornstein and S.Bear Bergman

The follow-up to Kate Bornstein’s groundbreaking memoir that talked about her transformation from man to woman, this is a collection of biographies worth a read. The book includes essays and stories of many creatives and artists from across the trans spectrum.

A touching book that is eye-opening and teaches us about gender identity.

• 22. Heartbeat of Struggle: The Revolutionary Life of Yuri Kochiyama by Diane Carol Fujino

We’ve all heard of Malcolm X. But not many heard of Yuri Kochiyama, the woman who was by his side when he was assassinated. Her life story is intriguing, and the author did extensive research that portrays her experiences.

We also learn what led her to become one of the most involved activists that tried to build solidarity between Asian and Black communities in the US.

• 21. John Brown by W.E.B. Du Bois

There’s more to American history than you learn in history class. John Brown was a white activist that fought for black people’s rights and fought against the institution of slavery.

While the book was originally published in 1909, it was ahead of our times. Browne fought to abolish slavery based on his own personal values. An interesting biography worth a read.

20. Notorious RBG : The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsburg by Irin Carmon & Shana Knizhnik

Presented in a different format than your average biography, you get a glimpse of the powerful mind the former US Supreme Court Judge possessed. A well-researched tale, the book contains quotes from one of the best justices the US has ever encountered.

It is not only very informative, but makes a very entertaining read as well.

• 19. Eleanor Roosevelt by Blanche Wiesen Cook

Eleanor Roosevelt was the First Lady who contributed more to the country than party-plan and stood by her man. The book talks about her early years as a child born in a wealthy family that was destroyed by alcoholism and the early death of both her parents.

Her struggles early on in life made her what she became later on. Up to today, she is still considered the greatest First Lady the country has seen.

18. Prince : A Private View by Afshin Shahidi

Written by the superstar’s private photographer after his untimely death back in 2016, this biography is mostly a compilation of the best photographs taken since 2000. Prince’s personality can be noticed through the photographs, which speak a thousand words.

This snapshot of his public and private life is a great book to own, especially if you were a great fan of the artist’s music.

• 17. Diana: Her True Story – In Her Own Words by Andrew Morton

The most controversial and popular member of the British royal family, Princess Diana is the first to openly speak of the British Monarchy. With the cooperation of Andrew Morton, she opened up about her unhappy marriage, her hopes she had going into the royal family, and her unique relationship with the Queen.

If you love anything to do with the most popular family in the world, this book is an eye-opener.

• 16. Alice Walker: A Life by Evelyn C. White

Award-winning author Alice Walker is the first black woman to ever win a Pulitzer Prize in literature for her masterpiece The Color Purple. The biography, written by Evelyn C White, is an extensive description of Walker’s life and her brilliant works.

The author portrays her early years, her struggles as a black woman in a mostly white and male-dominated culture, and the brilliant writer that she became. A must read.

• 15. A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar

If you’re not familiar with the 1998 Pulitzer Prize finalist mathematician John Nash, you should grab this biography and devour it. The movie adaptation with the same name is based on this book, which portrays the man’s prestigious career and his battle with schizophrenia.

Beautifully written, this moving story will show you a glimpse into a mastermind’s interior battles, both professionally and personally.

• 14. Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson

From the author who also wrote Steve Jobs’ biography comes another great read, that of the man behind the genius that was Albert Einstein. The book focuses on the man as a human, not mainly as a physicist, and talks at length about his rocky interpersonal relationships.

It mentions his insolent personality and attitude, which at the time was considered weird, and how he related to his colleagues, friends, and loved ones.

• 13. Gandhi: The Years That Changed The World by Ramachandra Guha

This revolutionary man is somewhat of an enigma to many, even though he did so many amazing things in his life. While we may be aware of his remarkable achievements, it is eye-opening to learn about his personal life.

Historian Ramachandra Guha depicts not only the great man’s life, but also illuminates us on India’s complex social structures we all should learn about. A fascinating read!

• 12. Hidden Figures: The American Dream by Margot Lee Shetterly

The movie based on the group of African American mathematicians that played an important role in Nasa’s history was inspired by this book written by Margot Lee Shetterly.

Before the story was told, not many were aware of the importance these three women played in the space program. They were the ones that calculated the flight paths by hand, which earned them the nickname “The Human Computers”.

• 11. Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov) by Stacy Schiff

Whether you read Lolita or not, you’ve surely heard of the novel that is one of the most controversial books of all time . He became famous because of this book, but what about his wife, the woman behind the famed author?

She is portrayed in this biography as one of the best humored women that was Nabokov’s partner, editor and translator. She played an important role in the writer’s life, as many incredible women behind powerful men are known to be.

• 10. Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand

This is a gripping biography of Olympic runner Louis Zamperini and the ordeal he went through when he was twenty-six. His US Army bomber crashed and burned in the middle of the Pacific ocean.

Along with two other men, he survived the disaster for forty-seven days afloat a raft. After all that, they were captured as prisoners of war by the Japanese Navy and were tortured for over two years. A heart wrenching story, but one that shows his recovery and redemption.

• 9. Napoleon: A life by Andrew Roberts

Napoleon is notorious for being a tyrant, yet this biography is truly fun to read. The author decided to tell the story with deference, so you see a more positive side to him.

As a decorated scholar, Andrew Roberts studied Napoleon’s life extensively, which can be noticed in this work. Napoleon’s confusing and complicated relationship with his wife is something many didn’t learn from history books, but it compliments his sharp and near flawless military instincts.

• 8. Mao: The Unknown Story by Jung Chang

The power-hungry emperor Mao Zedong made history because he founded the People’s Republic of China as we know it today. There’s more to his story than we learned in history books, and this biography depicts the emperor’s desire to preserve communism at all costs.

Although he was also responsible for more than 70 million deaths that occurred during peaceful periods, he also did some good for the country. His ideologies and motivations are explained in a story that is worth a read.

• 7. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

Henrietta Lacks is one of the first African-American women who left an important mark on the modern medical world. Her story is fascinating, and you’ll have a hard time putting the book down.

Her cancer cells were taken without her knowledge by her doctors and used for medical testing. The HeLa cell line research changed the trajectory of modern medicine. It is a very downhearted story that will surely move every reader.

• 6. Frida: A Biography Of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera

One of the most recognizable names in modern art, Frida Kahlo was a brilliant artist who had a pretty hard life. From her accident when she was only 18 years old through the numerous affairs her husband had, her pain is evident.

But that’s only part of her fascinating life. The mark she left due to her artistic brilliance is the main focus of the book. The self-taught artist explored issues of race, gender, and class in Mexican society. A very interesting read, especially if art is one of your favorite subjects.

• 5. Enrique’s Journey by Sonia Nazario

Young boy Enrique marked history with his courage and determination he achieved by following his mother from Honduras to the United States. Although many might have not heard of him, his story is so interesting and captivating.

When he was only five years old, his mother went to the United States in search of a better life for them with the promise she’ll return soon. He was sixteen when he decided to go in search of her.

It is a devastating account of devotion and love that many immigrant families face every day in the United Stated even today.

• 4. Churchill: A Life by Martin Gilbert

The UK’s most popular and greatest prime minister ever was a colorful character, to say the least. Winston Churchill left quite a legacy that up to this day no other prime minister that followed ever measured up.

The book contains in-depth research into his life from the time he led Britain through World War II all the way to his death. A mercurial man, he was one of the most prominent and important men you will enjoy reading about.

• 3. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

The co-founder and CEO of Apple was a creative genius that changed our lives forever. The legend, as many people in the world think of him, was a very flawed man. While extremely intelligent, his social skills left something to be desired.

Isaacson portrayed a true picture of the myth behind the man. From his early days working from his garage to becoming the leader of the largest tech companies in the world, the book is an interesting read.

The author divulges some details of Jobs’ childhood that were previously unknown, which gives readers an insight into the person behind the public eye.

• 2. Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare by Stephen Greenblatt

Shakespeare is a bit of a mystery that not many succeeded in uncovering. Although he is one of the most famous and popular authors to have ever lived, many details of his life are still unknown today.

Stephen Greenblatt made it his life work’s mission to learn as much about the man as possible, and he does an incredible job relating what he’s learned.

From insights on how political and social ideals of the time influenced him to reenactments of his writing process, it is a book anyone should read.

• 1. Elizabeth the Queen: the Life of a Modern Monarch by Sally Bedell Smith

While many believe the Monarchy might not be as great as the media portrays it, Queen Elizabeth’s life as the longest reigning monarch to have ever lived makes for a very interesting read.

The biography is written by Sally Bedell Smith, who already wrote two previous biographies of members of the royal family. Queen Elizabeth II was a legend who was constantly in the public eye.

She was a woman who had one of the most important jobs in the world from a very young age, and that alone is impressive to read about in its own right.

We hope we influenced you to pick up any of these 25 biographies we know you’ll enjoy reading . Which one of these figures are the ones that inspired and intrigued you the most? Let us know in the comments section below.

• 20. Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsburg by Irin Carmon & Shana Knizhnik
• 18. Prince: A Private View by Afshin Shahidi

About Anca Nicolescu

With a bachelor’s degree in Sociology, Anca was always interested in a variety of topics, although she never actually worked in her field. She has a deep love for books and a passion for learning new things and exploring new subjects. Learn more about Luxatic's Editorial Process .

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These autobiographies deliver poignant self-reflection, humor, and even some recipes.

We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back.

As a genre, memoir can be hard to define. It’s meant to be intensely personal and offer some kind of perspective on, or lessons learned from, the past. But by picking up a memoir, you’re guaranteed to learn about someone’s story in their own words.

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I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou (1969)

An American classic, Maya Angelou ’s debut memoir recounts the acclaimed author ’s childhood and adolescence from Arkansas to Missouri to California. She touches on themes of identity and self-acceptance and recounts the abhorrent racism she and her family experienced, as well as the sexual violence she suffered at the hands of her mother’s boyfriend. But there’s great joy here, too, especially when young Angelou learns to come out of her shell through her love of literature.

Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Kitchen Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain (2000)

You’ve probably seen this book on several similar lists, but that’s because it’s endlessly interesting. Bourdain dishes on such a niche culture—that of high-octane kitchens in some of the world’s best restaurants—and doesn’t shy away from some of its ugliest qualities. He gets personal, too, with anecdotes both amusing and somber.

Read More about Anthony Bourdain

Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala (2013)

Sri Lankan writer and economist Sonali Deraniyagala lost her parents, her husband, and her two young sons in the 2004 tsunami that devastated parts of Thailand, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and India. In this relentless memoir, she explores the seemingly bottomless depths of grief and how our power to remember the past can be healing. Readers who love a resolution might look elsewhere, but they’d be missing out on some unflinching, courageous writing.

The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion (2005)

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The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher (2016)

In her final book, actress and writer Carrie Fisher gives fans a peek behind the curtain of her time on set of the first Star Wars movie . She hilariously commentates on excerpts from her diary during that time, recalls her crush on Harrison Ford , and delves into how complicated it can be to navigate the world of celebrity—especially as the face of such an iconic character.

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Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body by Roxane Gay (2017)

Widely recommended as one of the best books of 2017, Hunger is Roxane Gay’s raw and powerful memoir about her own self-image and our society’s obsession with appearance. There’s a reason Gay is such a prolific writer today, whether you follow her musings on Twitter or her New York Times column; she is incredibly inquisitive and can make any reader question the status quo. Hunger is no exception.

Party of One: A Memoir in 21 Songs by Dave Holmes (2016)

We all have songs that can conjure specific memories. Writer, comedian, and TV personality Dave Holmes takes that notion to heart in his memoir, where he writes about growing up Catholic and closeted in Missouri and how he “accidentally” became an MTV VJ. There’s a plethora of references to ʼ80s and ʼ90s music and self-deprecating humor that strikes the perfect balance.

Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong (2020)

There’s no shortage of powerful writing in this book by writer and poet Cathy Park Hong. Throughout the work—about America’s racialized consciousness—she expertly weaves many personal details of her life as the daughter of Korean immigrants with topics like intersectionality and artistic expression. There’s plenty of enlightening history, too, including on activist Yuri Kochiyama . Her writing demonstrates her self-awareness; she even challenges many of her own thoughts. It’s a fascinating, essential read.

How We Fight for Our Lives by Saeed Jones (2019)

Saeed Jones, an award-winning poet, writes with such a distinct style in this searing memoir about coming of age as a young, black, gay man from the South. He writes about grief, about identity in a world that makes it hard to find one, and about acceptance. It’s a short read in length (at 192 pages) but leaves a memorable impression.

Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster by Jon Krakauer (1997)

Writer Jon Krakauer’s infamous retelling of the 1996 Mount Everest expedition that left eight climbers in his party dead is a harrowing read. For those with zero mountaineering experience (like this writer), he makes it easy to visualize what conquering this mountain looks like. There’s also some fascinating insights on the commercialization of Everest. If you’re reading a recently printed version, there’s an interesting postscript that responds to the fairness of his account of events (which was questioned in fellow survivor Anatoli Boukreev’s book The Climb ).

Heavy by Kiese Laymon (2018)

With the deeply moving Heavy , Kiese Laymon shares the trials of his upbringing in Jackson, Mississippi. It’s written in the second person, addressing his mother, and it touches on his relationship to his body and how racism permeated his views of himself and the world around him. This modern memoir should be on every reading list.

In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado (2019)

If you want to read a book that turns the concept of a memoir on its head, pick up Carmen Maria Machado’s In the Dream House . While playing with traditional form, Machado delves into the abuse she suffered in a same-sex relationship. She references horror tropes and fairy tales and gives readers a completely vulnerable (and often terrifying) look into a dark and traumatizing experience. We’ve heard the audio version is just as engrossing.

I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy (2022)

In what was arguably the most talked-about memoir of the past year, actor and writer/director Jennette McCurdy details what went on behind the scenes in her life before, during, and after making the hit Nickelodeon show iCarly . She bears it all—discussing her eating disorder and the toxic relationship she had with her mother—while using pitch perfect humor, in a memoir that’s hard to stomach at times. But it’s worth it to see how she ultimately takes back control of her life.

Know My Name by Chanel Miller (2019)

You might remember Chanel Miller as Emily Doe. After being sexually assaulted by Brock Turner on the Stanford University campus in 2015, she wrote a victim impact statement under this name that reverberated around the world. In this profound memoir, she reclaims her real name and reveals the frustrating truths surrounding victimhood and the criminal justice system. But her writing also divulges her incredible strength—it’s a powerful read that this writer finished in one sitting.

32 Yolks: From My Mother’s Table to Working the Line by Eric Ripert (2016)

Two memoirs on this list from acclaimed chefs? We couldn’t resist. For those who might’ve already enjoyed Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential , might we suggest Eric Ripert’s 32 Yolks . Ripert is, as some will know, the famed French chef behind renowned New York City restaurant Le Bernardin. In this memoir, he chronicles his upbringing in a fractured family in the south of France and how food was always a great comfort. Equal parts fun, infuriating, and awe-inspiring, Ripert includes high-stakes stories from his days in culinary school and working the line at fine dining establishments in Paris.

Taste: My Life Through Food by Stanley Tucci (2021)

Actor Stanley Tucci’s memoir about, well, his life through food is a light read filled with succinct writing, his dry humor, and (of course) hunger-inducing recipes that button each chapter. It’s also very touching and essentially a love letter to his Italian-American parents and how those early meals together around the table shaped the course of his life. Don’t read on an empty stomach.

Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward (2013)

For anyone who loves Jesmyn Ward’s renowned novels like Sing, Unburied, Sing or Salvage the Bones , her memoir should be next on your TBR list. Here, she chronicles her upbringing in rural Mississippi and remembers the five men in her life that she lost in the space of four years to suicide, drugs, and sheer bad luck. The most deeply felt is her brother, who was hit by a drunk driver. With beautiful, introspective prose, Ward delves into masculinity, poverty, survivor’s guilt, and loneliness.

Educated by Tara Westover (2018)

It can be hard at times to read Tara Westover’s bestselling memoir, Educated . Along with her incredible journey to becoming a scholar at Harvard and Cambridge without receiving any kind of formal education, she recounts the psychological and physical abuse she suffered while growing up with her survivalist family in the mountains of Idaho. But it’s an unforgettable story about her will to change the course of her life.

The Wreckage of My Presence by Casey Wilson (2021)

Reading actress and comedian Casey Wilson’s memoir is like sinking into a comfy couch with your favorite beverage, ready to hear all of your best friend’s exploits. You’ll be laughing out loud during some chapters—whether they’re about her affinity for the Real Housewives franchise or behind-the-scenes moments from the (cut much too short) ABC comedy Happy Endings —then shedding tears the next, as she mourns the death of her mother. This is a quippy, heartwarming addition to any bookshelf.

Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner (2021)

Maybe you know Michelle Zauner best as the lead singer of renowned alt-pop group Japanese Breakfast. But here, in this recently penned memoir, she recounts taking care of—and ultimately losing—her mother, who was given a terminal cancer diagnosis when Zauner was 25. It’s a complicated, very moving account of the experience that poetically touches on identity and grief. Interspersed within these memories are mouth-watering descriptions of Korean foods that only make readers more greatly feel both the love and the loss.

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Nathan Tanner

Why you should read biographies (and 10 to add to your reading list).

• September 28, 2016

I recently had the opportunity to grab lunch with a former executive who led HR at several Fortune 500 companies. Midway through lunch, the conversation turned to the importance of gaining experience. He stated:

There’s no substitute for experience. But if you don’t have firsthand experience, the next best thing is to learn from the experiences of others. That’s why I love reading biographies.

Biographies help us gain insight into how successful people handle crises and solve complex problems. They invite us into people’s lives, allowing us to observe them as they grapple with challenges and make important decisions.

In some instances, biographies can stand as a warning, helping us know what pitfalls we should avoid. They open our eyes to the world, allowing us to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes. This ultimately leads to greater understanding and better decision making.

In short, reading biographies will help you whether you’re an experienced executive or just launching your career. Here are my 10 favorites.

10. Michael Jordan: The Life by Roland Lazenby

Talent is critical to success, but it’s not enough. To achieve greatness in any field you need to couple talent with hard work. And Michael Jordan is the epitome of hard work. It’s been a year since I read his biography and I’m still awestruck by Jordan’s competitive drive. He aspired for greatness at a young age, worked his tail off throughout his career, and demanded excellence of everyone around him. It’s hard to study his life and not feel inspired to exert a little more effort in my pursuits.

9. Open: An Autobiography by Andre Agassi

While many celebrity memoirs stay at surface level, Agassi’s bio is different. He is brutally honest with himself. You get to know him at an intimate, personal level. And you find that he, like most of us, is a very complicated person. Agassi’s dad forced him to play tennis at a young age. He required Andre to hit more than 2,500 balls a day and a million balls a year. Agassi grew to despise the sport, yet he still played into his mid-thirties when he no longer needed the money. His life is a paradox. He hates tennis, as he shares repeatedly in the book, yet his identity is integrally tied to the game. I found Agassi’s vulnerability both refreshing and empowering.

8. Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future by Ashlee Vance

Elon Musk has been referred to as the next Steve Jobs, though some argue he’s already surpassed Jobs. Musk is the CEO of two companies—Tesla Motors and SpaceX—that are revolutionizing entirely different industries. He’s stated that the goals of his companies revolve around his vision to change the world and humanity. (How’s that for a big hairy audacious goal.) Musk’s story is far from complete, but this biography provides a well-written account of his life to date and his bold plans for the future.

7. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

This book is the first of Maya Angelou’s five volume autobiography. It starts with her early childhood in rural Arkansas and ends with an unwanted pregnancy that dramatically changed her life. Angelou’s stories are heartbreaking, eye-opening, and inspiring. Her life experiences brought me a different perspective and changed how I see others and the world around me. Angelou teaches that when we know better, we do better. Reading this book helped me to know better. I hope, as she promises, that it will help me to do better.

6. The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown

A multi-level biography that tells the story of University of Washington oarsman Joe Rantz and the other boys who defeated the Nazis at the 1936 Olympics. Rantz was abandoned as a child and endured the hardships that came from living through the Great Depression. His story is inspirational, but even more inspirational is the intense unity created among his teammates as they pursued Olympic gold.

5. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

Isaacson tells an incredible story of a creative, complex, innovative, and enigmatic man who sought to put a dent in the universe. I loved learning about Jobs’ so-called “Reality Distortion Field” that allowed him to bend reality and convince others they could do the impossible. In Isaacson’s words: “[Jobs’] legacy is transforming seven industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, digital publishing, and retail stores. His legacy is creating what became the most valuable company on earth, one that stood at the intersection of the humanities and technology, and is the company most likely still to be doing that a generation from now.”

4. 12 Years a Slave by Solomon Northup

I haven’t seen the movie, so I can’t compare, but this memoir tells a remarkable story. In short, Solomon Northup was a free-born African American from New York who was kidnapped and sold into slavery. For 12 years he suffered the brutality and hardship that came with being a slave. Within a year of gaining freedom, he wrote and published a firsthand account of what he endured. Northup is an incredible example of determination, resilience, and hope.

3. John Adams by David McCullough

John Adams was a polarizing figure throughout the American Revolution and held vicious grudges with several of the Founding Fathers. Despite his many flaws, Adams provided consistent leadership and played a critical role during the founding of the United States. What makes his biography so rich are the letters he and his wife Abigail wrote to each other. They provide a window into the souls of two great people as they fight for independence and build a new government.

2. Man’s Search for Meaning by Victor Frankl

Frankl’s account of life in a concentration camp is both heartbreaking and inspiring. Frankl persuasively argues that all of us are motivated not by pleasure or happiness but meaning. My favorite quote: “Suffering ceases to be suffering the moment it finds a meaning.” I first read this book in 2009 after getting laid off during the financial crisis. Reading it provided perspective on my personal trials and encouraged me to find meaning outside of the workplace.

1. Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand

Louis Zamperini lived an amazing life, and Hillenbrand has penned a wonderful biography. Zamperini was an Olympic athlete who joined the Army Air Corps as a bombardier during World War II. After the engines on his bomber failed, Zamperini found himself stranded at sea for weeks. His story is hard to fathom. Just when you think things can’t get worse, they do. If you haven’t read it yet, you’re missing out. Unbroken is the best book I’ve ever read.

Nothing trumps experience, but reading quality biographies can give you the insight, inspiration and perspective you need to overcome obstacles and take your career to the next level.

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• © 2024 All Rights Reserved.

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Blog • Perfecting your Craft

Posted on Jun 30, 2023

How to Write a Biography: A 7-Step Guide [+Template]

From time to time, nonfiction authors become so captivated by a particular figure from either the present or the past, that they feel compelled to write an entire book about their life. Whether casting them as heroes or villains, there is an interesting quality in their humanity that compels these authors to revisit their life paths and write their story.

However, portraying someone’s life on paper in a comprehensive and engaging way requires solid preparation. If you’re looking to write a biography yourself, in this post we’ll share a step-by-step blueprint that you can follow. 

How to write a biography: 

1. Seek permission when possible 

2. research your subject thoroughly, 3. do interviews and visit locations, 4. organize your findings, 5. identify a central thesis, 6. write it using narrative elements, 7. get feedback and polish the text.

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While you technically don’t need permission to write about public figures (or deceased ones), that doesn't guarantee their legal team won't pursue legal action against you. Author Kitty Kelley was sued by Frank Sinatra before she even started to write His Way , a biography that paints Ol Blue Eyes in a controversial light. (Kelley ended up winning the lawsuit, however).  

Whenever feasible, advise the subject’s representatives of your intentions. If all goes according to plan, you’ll get a green light to proceed, or potentially an offer to collaborate. It's a matter of common sense; if someone were to write a book about you, you would likely want to know about it well prior to publication. So, make a sincere effort to reach out to their PR staff to negotiate an agreement or at least a mutual understanding of the scope of your project. 

At the same time, make sure that you still retain editorial control over the project, and not end up writing a puff piece that treats its protagonist like a saint or hero. No biography can ever be entirely objective, but you should always strive for a portrayal that closely aligns with facts and reality.

If you can’t get an answer from your subject, or you’re asked not to proceed forward, you can still accept the potential repercussions and write an unauthorized biography . The “rebellious act” of publishing without consent indeed makes for great marketing, though it’ll likely bring more headaches with it too. 

✋ Please note that, like other nonfiction books, if you intend to release your biography with a publishing house , you can put together a book proposal to send to them before you even write the book. If they like it enough, they might pay you an advance to write it.  

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Once you’ve settled (or not) the permission part, it’s time to dive deep into your character’s story.  

Deep and thorough research skills are the cornerstone of every biographer worth their salt. To paint a vivid and accurate portrait of someone's life, you’ll have to gather qualitative information from a wide range of reliable sources. 

Start with the information already available, from books on your subject to archival documents, then collect new ones firsthand by interviewing people or traveling to locations. 

Browse the web and library archives

Put your researcher hat on and start consuming any piece on your subject you can find, from their Wikipedia page to news articles, interviews, TV and radio appearances, YouTube videos, podcasts, books, magazines, and any other media outlets they may have been featured in. 

Establish a system to orderly collect the information you find 一 even seemingly insignificant details can prove valuable during the writing process, so be sure to save them. 

Depending on their era, you may find most of the information readily available online, or you may need to search through university libraries for older references. 

For his landmark biography of Alexander Hamilton, Ron Chernow spent untold hours at Columbia University’s library , reading through the Hamilton family papers, visiting the New York Historical Society, as well as interviewing the archivist of the New York Stock Exchange, and so on. The research process took years, but it certainly paid off. Chernow discovered that Hamilton created the first five securities originally traded on Wall Street. This finding, among others, revealed his significant contributions to shaping the current American financial and political systems, a legacy previously often overshadowed by other founding fathers. Today Alexander Hamilton is one of the best-selling biographies of all time, and it has become a cultural phenomenon with its own dedicated musical. 

Besides reading documents about your subject, research can help you understand the world that your subject lived in. 

Try to understand their time and social environment

Many biographies show how their protagonists have had a profound impact on society through their philosophical, artistic, or scientific contributions. But at the same time, it’s worth it as a biographer to make an effort to understand how their societal and historical context influenced their life’s path and work.

An interesting example is Stephen Greenblatt’s Will in the World . Finding himself limited by a lack of verified detail surrounding William Shakespeare's personal life, Greenblatt, instead, employs literary interpretation and imaginative reenactments to transport readers back to the Elizabethan era. The result is a vivid (though speculative) depiction of the playwright's life, enriching our understanding of his world.

Many readers enjoy biographies that transport them to a time and place, so exploring a historical period through the lens of a character can be entertaining in its own right. The Diary of Samuel Pepys became a classic not because people were enthralled by his life as an administrator, but rather from his meticulous and vivid documentation of everyday existence during the Restoration period.

Once you’ve gotten your hands on as many secondary sources as you can find, you’ll want to go hunting for stories first-hand from people who are (or were) close to your subject.

With all the material you’ve been through, by now you should already have a pretty good picture of your protagonist. But you’ll surely have some curiosities and missing dots in their character arc to figure out, which you can only get by interviewing primary sources.

Interview friends and associates

This part is more relevant if your subject is contemporary, and you can actually meet up or call with relatives, friends, colleagues, business partners, neighbors, or any other person related to them. 

In writing the popular biography of Steve Jobs, Walter Isaacson interviewed more than one hundred people, including Jobs’s family, colleagues, former college mates, business rivals, and the man himself.

🔍 Read other biographies to get a sense of what makes a great one. Check out our list of the 30 best biographies of all time , or take our 30-second quiz below for tips on which one you should read next. 

Which biography should you read next?

Discover the perfect biography for you. Takes 30 seconds!

When you conduct your interviews, make sure to record them with high quality audio you can revisit later. Then use tools like Otter.ai or Descript to transcribe them 一 it’ll save you countless hours. 

You can approach the interview with a specific set of questions, or follow your curiosity blindly, trying to uncover revealing stories and anecdotes about your subject. Whatever your method, author and biography editor Tom Bromley suggests that every interviewer arrives prepared, "Show that you’ve done your work. This will help to put the interviewee at ease, and get their best answers.” 

Bromley also places emphasis on the order in which you conduct interviews. “You may want to interview different members of the family or friends first, to get their perspective on something, and then go directly to the main interviewee. You'll be able to use that knowledge to ask sharper, more specific questions.” 

Finally, consider how much time you have with each interviewee. If you only have a 30-minute phone call with an important person, make it count by asking directly the most pressing questions you have. And, if you find a reliable source who is also particularly willing to help, conduct several interviews and ask them, if appropriate, to write a foreword as part of the book’s front matter .

Sometimes an important part of the process is packing your bags, getting on a plane, and personally visiting significant places in your character’s journey.

Visit significant places in their life

A place, whether that’s a city, a rural house, or a bodhi tree, can carry a particular energy that you can only truly experience by being there. In putting the pieces together about someone’s life, it may be useful to go visit where they grew up, or where other significant events of their lives happened. It will be easier to imagine what they experienced, and better tell their story. 

In researching The Lost City of Z , author David Grann embarked on a trek through the Amazon, retracing the steps of British explorer Percy Fawcett. This led Grann to develop new theories about the circumstances surrounding the explorer's disappearance.

Hopefully, you won’t have to deal with jaguars and anacondas to better understand your subject’s environment, but try to walk into their shoes as much as possible. 

Once you’ve researched your character enough, it’s time to put together all the puzzle pieces you collected so far. 

Take the bulk of notes, media, and other documents you’ve collected, and start to give them some order and structure. A simple way to do this is by creating a timeline. 

Create a chronological timeline

It helps to organize your notes chronologically 一 from childhood to the senior years, line up the most significant events of your subject’s life, including dates, places, names and other relevant bits. 

You should be able to divide their life into distinct periods, each with their unique events and significance. Based on that, you can start drafting an outline of the narrative you want to create.  

Draft a story outline 

Since a biography entails writing about a person’s entire life, it will have a beginning, a middle, and an end. You can pick where you want to end the story, depending on how consequential the last years of your subject were. But the nature of the work will give you a starting character arc to work with. 

To outline the story then, you could turn to the popular Three-Act Structure , which divides the narrative in three main parts. In a nutshell, you’ll want to make sure to have the following:

• Act 1. Setup : Introduce the protagonist's background and the turning points that set them on a path to achieve a goal. 
• Act 2. Confrontation : Describe the challenges they encounter, both internal and external, and how they rise to them. Then..
• Act 3. Resolution : Reach a climactic point in their story in which they succeed (or fail), showing how they (and the world around them) have changed as a result. 

Only one question remains before you begin writing: what will be the main focus of your biography?

Think about why you’re so drawn to your subject to dedicate years of your life to recounting their own. What aspect of their life do you want to highlight? Is it their evil nature, artistic genius, or visionary mindset? And what evidence have you got to back that up? Find a central thesis or focus to weave as the main thread throughout your narrative. 

Or find a unique angle

If you don’t have a particular theme to explore, finding a distinct angle on your subject’s story can also help you distinguish your work from other biographies or existing works on the same subject.

Plenty of biographies have been published about The Beatles 一 many of which have different focuses and approaches: 

• Philip Norman's Shout is sometimes regarded as leaning more towards a pro-Lennon and anti-McCartney stance, offering insights into the band's inner dynamics. 
• Ian McDonald's Revolution in the Head closely examines their music track by track, shifting the focus back to McCartney as a primary creative force. 
• Craig Brown's One Two Three Four aims to capture their story through anecdotes, fan letters, diary entries, and interviews. 
• Mark Lewisohn's monumental three-volume biography, Tune In , stands as a testament to over a decade of meticulous research, chronicling every intricate detail of the Beatles' journey.

Finally, consider that biographies are often more than recounting the life of a person. Similar to how Dickens’ Great Expectations is not solely about a boy named Pip (but an examination and critique of Britain’s fickle, unforgiving class system), a biography should strive to illuminate a broader truth — be it social, political, or human — beyond the immediate subject of the book. 

Once you’ve identified your main focus or angle, it’s time to write a great story. 

While biographies are often highly informative, they do not have to be dry and purely expository in nature . You can play with storytelling elements to make it an engaging read. 

You could do that by thoroughly detailing the setting of the story , depicting the people involved in the story as fully-fledged characters , or using rising action and building to a climax when describing a particularly significant milestone of the subject’s life. 

One common way to make a biography interesting to read is starting on a strong foot…

Hook the reader from the start

Just because you're honoring your character's whole life doesn't mean you have to begin when they said their first word. Starting from the middle or end of their life can be more captivating as it introduces conflicts and stakes that shaped their journey.

When he wrote about Christopher McCandless in Into the Wild , author Jon Krakauer didn’t open his subject’s childhood and abusive family environment. Instead, the book begins with McCandless hitchhiking his way into the wilderness, and subsequently being discovered dead in an abandoned bus. By starting in medias res , Krakauer hooks the reader’s interest, before tracing back the causes and motivations that led McCandless to die alone in that bus in the first place.

You can bend the timeline to improve the reader’s reading experience throughout the rest of the story too…

Play with flashback 

While biographies tend to follow a chronological narrative, you can use flashbacks to tell brief stories or anecdotes when appropriate. For example, if you were telling the story of footballer Lionel Messi, before the climax of winning the World Cup with Argentina, you could recall when he was just 13 years old, giving an interview to a local newspaper, expressing his lifelong dream of playing for the national team. 

Used sparsely and intentionally, flashbacks can add more context to the story and keep the narrative interesting. Just like including dialogue does…

Reimagine conversations

Recreating conversations that your subject had with people around them is another effective way to color the story. Dialogue helps the reader imagine the story like a movie, providing a deeper sensory experience. 

One thing is trying to articulate the root of Steve Jobs’ obsession with product design, another would be to quote his father , teaching him how to build a fence when he was young: “You've got to make the back of the fence just as good looking as the front of the fence. Even though nobody will see it, you will know. And that will show that you're dedicated to making something perfect.”

Unlike memoirs and autobiographies, in which the author tells the story from their personal viewpoint and enjoys greater freedom to recall conversations, biographies require a commitment to facts. So, when recreating dialogue, try to quote directly from reliable sources like personal diaries, emails, and text messages. You could also use your interview scripts as an alternative to dialogue. As Tom Bromley suggests, “If you talk with a good amount of people, you can try to tell the story from their perspective, interweaving different segments and quoting the interviewees directly.”

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These are just some of the story elements you can use to make your biography more compelling. Once you’ve finished your manuscript, it’s a good idea to ask for feedback. 

If you’re going to self-publish your biography, you’ll have to polish it to professional standards. After leaving your work to rest for a while, look at it with fresh eyes and self-edit your manuscript eliminating passive voice, filler words, and redundant adverbs. 

Then, have a professional editor give you a general assessment. They’ll look at the structure and shape of your manuscript and tell you which parts need to be expanded on or cut. As someone who edited and commissioned several biographies, Tom Bromley points out that a professional “will look at the sources used and assess whether they back up the points made, or if more are needed. They would also look for context, and whether or not more background information is needed for the reader to understand the story fully. And they might check your facts, too.”  

In addition to structural editing, you may want to have someone copy-edit and proofread your work.

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Importantly, make sure to include a bibliography with a list of all the interviews, documents, and sources used in the writing process. You’ll have to compile it according to a manual of style, but you can easily create one by using tools like EasyBib . Once the text is nicely polished and typeset in your writing software , you can prepare for the publication process.  

In conclusion, by mixing storytelling elements with diligent research, you’ll be able to breathe life into a powerful biography that immerses readers in another individual’s life experience. Whether that’ll spark inspiration or controversy, remember you could have an important role in shaping their legacy 一 and that’s something not to take lightly. 

Continue reading

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11 Reasons to Read Biographies and Autobiographies

Pandemic. Quarantine. Stay at home orders.

You may find yourself in current situations where circumstances have placed you with time on your hands. A profitable way to spend that surplus time is reading. Reading biography and autobiography can be thought of as an investment in self-knowledge. An investment in knowledge pays a high dividend.

People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.

Logan Pearsall Smith

Here are some reasons to keep in mind as you read a biography.

We can role-play our way to a better us.

Welearn by imitation. By borrowing the brain and trying on the exceptional character attributes of others, we can rehearse our own new and improved selves.

In my whole life, I have known no wise people (over a broad subject matter area) who didn’t read all the time — none. Zero.

Charlie Munger

They provide a safe, risk-free playground for learning.

Life is the art of drawing without an eraser. You can’t unring a bell. It’s better t anticipate and avoid self inflicted mistakes.

Winging it can be a high stakes endeavor. Better to work through a simulation first.

You can pound your head against the wall trying to think of original ideas or you can cheat by reading them in books.

If you haven’t read hundreds of books, you are functionally illiterate, and you will be incompetent, because your personal experiences alone aren’t broad enough to sustain you.

General James “Mad Dog” Mattis

Reading the lives of others can provide a playbook for how to deal with all kinds of situations. We can see how their responses panned out.

History doesn’t repeat itself, but it rhymes. We can be pretty sure that we will encounter similar situations. Having thought about them ahead of time can give us an advantage of not being ambushed when the shit hits the fan.

“Only a fool learns from his own mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others.”

― Otto von Bismarck

We can develop a repertoire of actions and responses.

As Norman Douglas said,

“There are some things you can’t learn from others. You have to pass through the fire.”

All other things are best anticipated and prepared for.

Biographies allow us to test our mettle by figuring out how best to navigate and negotiate situations in a risk-free environment. Because human behavior follows relatively predictable patterns, we can learn from other’s circumstances and mistakes. We can unpack complex situations into components for future actionable reference.

They allow us to invert the harsh lessons of experience.

Mental models improve how we think by helping us to simplify complexity and better understand life.

Inversion is one of the most powerful mental models. Invert means to turn upside down. As a thinking tool, inversion helps to identify and eliminate obstacles by tackling them from the opposite end of the natural starting point.

The Cy Young-winning baseball pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates Vernon Sanders Law said, “Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterwards.” I have found that thought a profound expression of the human experience. Yogi Berra isn’t the only sage of baseball.

Have you ever come up with the best response after an event has passed? I bet you have. We all have. I often think of the perfect comeback line or thing I could have done after the moment has passed, and I looked less than brilliant. (more like a complete dumb-ass)

It’s at moments like that I wish I had a time machine and could go back and deliver the coup de grace. Immersing ourselves in other people’s lives is the next best thing to the time machine. We can note how we would best respond to a situation and use it when the situation arises.

Reading biographies allows you to reverse the chronology and absorb the lesson so you can anticipate a better response when you encounter a similar situation.

Mark Twain — ‘The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.’

They help us practice and develop empathy and Emotional Intelligence.

Emotional Intelligence is the capability to recognize your own and other people’s emotions. Reading can help us not only identify but develop the vocabulary to describe and discuss emotional realties. This superpower can help us avoid beaucoup tragic missteps in our lives.

We use emotional information to guide our thinking and behavior. We need to be able to manage and adjust our emotions to adapt to different settings.

To get on in the world and achieve our goals, its crucial to be appropriately social.

Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. Empathy is our ability to project into others’ situations and experience their trials and tribulations as our own.

In reading a biography, we can tend to gloss over the trials and tribulations of the subject. We learn how they were shunned and criticized and ignored or ridiculed; they had diseases and illness, poverty and financial hardship, or surrounded by war and death.

We read these things and put them into the category of the stuff they had to overcome. Because we know the end of the story: that they triumphed either in life or after with fame and glory, we diminish the immediate impact of these things that they must have felt.

In retrospect, the good ending seems inevitable. That was not the lived experience.

Pausing to reflect and feel that impact allows us to develop our capacity for empathy and the understanding of others’ experiences.

They help us see further.

In 1675 Isaac Newton wrote to his good friend and colleague, the great polymath Robert Hooke,

“If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

Reading biographies captures that experience. Biographies allow you to see further by vicariously experiencing what others have gone through and achieved. The practice is an efficient way to gain life lessons.

This idea of standing on the shoulders of giants didn’t originate with Newton. The original attribution of this is from Bernard of Chartres in the early 12th Century as recorded by John of Salisbury:

“Bernard of Chartres used to say that we [the Moderns] are like dwarves perched on the shoulders of giants [the Ancients], and thus we are able to see more and farther than the latter. And this is not at all because of the acuteness of our sight or the stature of our body, but because we are carried aloft and elevated by the magnitude of the giants.”

Newton was an avid reader. Reading is what separates us from other animals. Reading is how we transmit and assimilate the collective Intelligence of humanity. We don’t rely on our innate knowledge and abilities. We can access the hard-won lessons of the wisest and most able.

Biography reminds us of the cyclical nature of events.

The philosopher George Santayana wrote, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” There is not much new under the sun, and we risk repeating mistakes others have made before us if we are not aware of them. If we make ourselves aware, we can hopefully avoid them.

A cautionary tale can help us recognize and avoid potentially bad situations. And biographies allow us to rehearse navigating these challenging situations in a riskless way from the safety and comfort of our armchair while sipping herbal tea.

Knowledge in advance enables us to be prepared. Preparation prevents piss poor performance.

To be forewarned is to be forearmed. This expression originated as a Latin proverb, Praemonitus, praemunitus , which was translated into English by the early 1500s.

But there are caveats. Foresight may help us, but I want to temper this point because sometimes events are outside of our control and may proceed even if we are aware of the probable outcome. It’s like watching an accident unfold in slow motion.

“Those who don’t study history are doomed to repeat it. Yet those who do study history are doomed to stand by helplessly while everyone else repeats it.” When events take this type of turn, it’s probably better to put down the biography and read stoic philosophy and swap the tea for scotch.

They promote and encourage self-discovery.

Biographies are chock full of teachable moments, some positive, inspirational and aspirational, and many that are cautionary. Ideas and approaches to life reveal themselves through biographical narratives.

Experiential learning through stories is more impactful and satisfying, and more memorable than reading a list of normative steps in a textbook.

They help us look at the world from novel angles.

We need a diversity of ideas and experience to break out of our creative ruts. Transformative ideas and revolutionary innovations come from lateral thinking where we transpose a concept from one field to another or combine ideas in new and non-obvious ways. At the very least it will make you more interesting at a dinner party.

Biography is a resource for developing this superpower.

They provide us with world-class mentors.

When you read a biography or autobiography, you get a glimpse into the subject’s mind and gain the advantage of “knowing” them. They become mentors as we ponder about what advice they offer related to the situations we face.

Reading autobiography allows you to borrow someone else’s brain.

Parting thought

“Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers.”

― Charles W. Eliot

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21 LGBT Biographies or Memoirs You Should Read Now

From German counts to Utah cave-dwellers, there's something for every reader on this list.

A sweet and inspiring story about art, love, and gardening, Into the Garden With Charles is set against around the author's noteworthy garden outside his 300-year-old house in the hamlet of Orient on Long Island. In the memoir we meet Wachsberger, a boy in New York City who dreams of storybook gardens and grows into a a middle-aged gay man who has given up on finding the one. Then he meets Charles, an avid gardener, and the two will become life partners and create the wildly gorgeous garden of their dreams. Wachsberger's published books include Daffodil, Rose, Of Leaf and Flower , and Stories and Poems for Gardeners , which he edited with his partner, Charles Dean, and for which his illustrations won the Garden Writers Association award for best book illustration. Into the Garden With Charles, in fact, includes 14 full-color illustrations of the author's paintings, which give this sweet little story the feel of an antique children's book, fitting for a memoir about growing up and falling in love in a storybook setting. ( FSGbooks.com )

German Count Harry Kessler (1868-1937) was born into wealth and lived a life of privilege during the belle epoque, when Kessler was a socialite, book publisher, and cofounder of the avant-garde publication Pan . Kessler rubbed elbows with many of the era's leading artists, performers and writers and his diaries are rich with gossip about those who shaped the times. Kessler was also a prolific journal writer, producing so many diary entries between 1880 and 1918 that the 877 pages included in Journey to the Abyss represent -- according to Laird M. Easton, the editor and translator -- only abou a quarter of his writings. The diaries, which had previously been thought lost, were discovered in 1987 in a safe that had been rented 50 years earlier.

Kessler, who never married, wrote positively about homosexuality, predicting in 1907 that, in a decade or two, "the movement" would achieve "a kind of sexual revolution through which Germany will very quickly ... overtake the lead that France and England have had."

Unlike Kessler's later diaries (1918-1937, previously published as Berlin in Lights ), these entries reveal a man who fails to see the dangerous political aspirations rising in Germany and who still shares his nation's anti-Semitism. The elder Kessler lost his fortune, left Germany forever in 1933, and condemned that year's "abominable Jewish boycott." Kessler died in 1937 in his sister's home in France. ( KnopfDoubleday.com )

In this sequel to an earlier volume of William S. Burroughs's letters (1945-1959), the bulk of the 300 letters collected in Rub Out the Words are directed to Allen Ginsberg, beginning with 1959's classic missive: "Dear Allen, Thanks a million for the mescaline."

While drug use is certainly an important element in their relationship, the two men also shared a love for the creation of fine literature -- but Burroughs's letters to Ginsberg also delve into mundane concerns about doctors and jobs. Readers hoping to learn more about the death of Burroughs's wife, Joan Vollmer -- whom the writer killed in an alcohol-fueled barroom game of William Tell -- and the controversial obscenity trial over Burroughs's famous novel Naked Lunch will be disappointed. If Burroughs wrote about those issues, those letters aren't represented here. Instead, while the Massachusetts Supreme Court decided the fate of Naked Lunch, Burroughs seemed more concerned that Grove Press was mishandling his royalties.

But what it lacks in new revelations about Burroughs's personal life this collection more than makes up for in the sheer joy of devouring Burroughs's command of language and ability to imbue his letters (including riffs on the creative process) with the same literary genius that seared his Beat poems into our collective consciousness. And you'll understand why, 15 years after his death, there's renewed interest from Hollywood in Burroughs and the Beat movement he personified. ( HarperCollins.com )

Thirty-two-year-old Moshe Kasher is a Jewish comedian who has appeared on television shows including Late Night With Jimmy Fallon, Shameless, Chelsea Lately and Whitney . In his hilarious memoir, Kasher in the Ry e , he chronicles a troubled San Francisco childhood, spent in and out of psychoanalysis, mental institutions, drug trips, and rehab. The son of two deaf parents, Kasher was sent to anger therapy when he was just 4 years old, the start of a long journey toward mental health with detours when his self medicating got out of hand. Although he keeps his dark humor throughout, Kasher does share some heartwarming moments as well, as when he signs to his mother while receiving his college diploma.

Although he's straight, Kasher has earned gay-adjacent cred by incorporating a queerish personality into his stand-up routines ("If at any point you do become offended, that's just you being a bitch"), Twitter posts ("If i have a son I will send him to the Boy Scouts so he can learn to tie a knot and to prevent gay people from tying the knot"), and interviews ("What is your least favorite question to answer? 'Why are you such a faggot?'"). ( hachettebookgroup.com )

A coming-of-age story by a transgender man tackles new territory, especially as Sallans (seen in the video below) interlinks his history as body-obsessed kid with an eating disorder that almost killed him. It's a traditional transition narrative but because Sallans is able to focus on very intimate issues that may related to his gender identity and the struggle to become the man he knew he should be, it transcends the ordinary and offers a fascinating look at a the life of a modern trans man. As Sallans says it took him 29 years to find himself, Second Son certainly could help others avoid that very long journey the author took. ( TitleTownPublishing.com )

Italian painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio was born in 1571. By the time he was 6 years old he had lost all of his male relatives to the bubonic plague, and he spent much of his youth on the streets, brawling with a gang of what one early biographer called "painters and swordsmen who lived by the motto nec spe, nec metu , 'without hope, without fear.'" In some way, Caravaggio never really escaped those roots: at 38, he was executed for killing a man.

These sparse facts were nearly all Andrew Graham-Dixon could uncover about the famous painter, even after extensive research and returning to the original Italian source material (mostly criminal records). It's that same dearth of biographical material that led two novelists (Peter Robb and Francine Prose) to previously offer fictional accounts of Caravaggio's personal life. But there remains another source of insight about the artist, the paintings he left behind. Understanding that artists cannot help but to reflect parts of themselves in their work, and knowing Caravaggio frequently utilized his own face in his work, Graham-Dixon interprets truths about the painter's life from the biblical scenes he was commissioned to paint.

In fact, Caravaggio seemed to have a particular need to incorporate the world he knew -- the squalid, violent world of Rome's underclass, populated with unwashed prostitutes, pimps, criminals, beggars, hustlers, and street urchins -- into his portrayals of iconic Bible scenes.

Needless to say, not all of his contemporaries were pleased with Caravaggio's penchant for painting the Madonna with the face of a prostitute or depicting bowls of fruit as rotten and worm-infested, and, during his life, his work was often disparaged. It wasn't until the latter half of the 20th century that Caravaggio's work finally received the recognition it deserved.

Caravaggio's homosexuality is distilled from the numerous naked boys he painted as angels and saints. They are often seated on disheveled beds, explicitly offering (rotten) fruit, wine, and music while implicitly offering their own fruits for the plucking. Graham-Dixon calls the pudginess of these young, feminine boys "the hormonal side effects of castration."

In this illustrated biography (out in hardback now, in paperback in November), Graham-Dixon shows us a painter who may have lived 500 years ago but was in many ways a thoroughly modern artist, willing to portray both the ugliness of superficial beauty and the beauty in gritty, fetid realism. ( wwnorton.com )

Daniel Suelo does not pay taxes, or accept food stamps or welfare. He doesn't have a "job" but he works a great deal -- never accepting money for his contributions. He lives free in the caves of the Utah canyonlands, foraging wild onions and berries, scavenging garbageboms, and grilling up road kill. Why? Suelo gave up money over a decade ago. The story of how this 50-year-old gay man came to live in such a sustainable way, and the spiritual morality that still guides both his environmentalism and his beliefs about volunteerism, is a fascinating page-turner and a veritible Walden for the 21st century. Beautifully subversive and thought-provoking, Suelo's story is really about universal desires and how you strip away what's all artifice and you find what's really important in life, especially at a time when politicians are still debating climate change and sustainable energies. Expect to see this one become a classic environmental text. ( Amazon.com )

Born in England in 1937, David Hockney didn't struggle as an artist, but did struggle with his sexuality. Still, when he found a supportive environment at college, he immediately came out and his art reflected his new identity as a "queer" and "unorthodox lover." In 1961, Hockney traveled to New York and was so moved by both the art and gay scenes that he remained in the U.S., although he was soon drawn to Southern California's endless sun, pools, beaches, and tan boys. Hockney was immortalized in Jack Hazan's biographical film A Bigger Splash , which -- much to Hockney's chagrin -- ended up focusing less on his art and more on the breakup of his five-year relationship with his (much) younger lover, Peter Schlesinger.

This biography of Hockney is full of insiders' anecdotes (the author has known his subject since the 1960s) and includes color reprints of many of his most famous works (including The Rake's Progress and his internationally recognized paintings of Los Angeles pools) as well as photos of Hockney and his lovers. But the book is marred by ending while the Hockney is still in his 30s, with half a career to come. Likely it was rushed to time its publication with the major Hockney retrospective at the British Royal Academy, but many readers will want to continue Hockney's journey a lot longer than Sykes did. ( Powells.com )

Mind Your Own Life: The Journey Back to Love by Aaron Anson (Balboa Press, $19.95)

Aaron Anson is a "largely self-taught" inspirational speaker, consultant, and "New-Thought coach" who chronicles his struggle to overcome his conservative political and religious indoctrination as a devout Christian Southerner and embrace his gay sexuality in this memoir that argues we don't have to be held captive by others' expectations. Certainly a good lesson to embrace. ( BalboaPress.com )

In this self-published but well executed memoir, written in the form of love letter to her daughter, the Dominican-American playwright, director, and producer of the one-woman show I Was Born , Alicia Santos, describes surviving rape and coming out as a lesbian. ( CreateSpace.com )

Butterfly in the Typewriter: The Tragic Life of John Kennedy Toole and the Remarkable Story of A Confederacy of Dunces by Cory MacLauchlin (Da Capo, $26.00)

Chosen as one of Publishers Weekly 's Best Summer Reads of 2012, Cory MacLauchlin's Butterfly in the Typewriter is a thoroughly researched, well-documented, and highly objective biography of John Kennedy Toole, the author of A Confederacy of Dunces .

After Toole's masterpiece was was rejected by publishers he suffered a mental breakdown and took off on a two-month journey across the United States. He returned to his beloved hometown of New Orleans before committing suicide on the side of a road outside nearby Biloxi, Miss., by hooking a hose up to his car's exhaust pipe. Twelve years later his manuscript was finally published -- to critical acclaim. It went on to win a Pulitzer Prize.

MacLauchlin does this tragic story justice, producing a gripping biography worth reading. The only criticism stems from what at first seems a compliment: as Publishers Weekly says, "MacLauchlin does an admirable job distinguishing facts from speculation." But one of those "speculations" has been that Toole was gay or at least bi-curious. To such talk, MacLauchlin replies, "He may have questioned his sexuality, I don't know. I found nothing substantive to indicate he was homosexual. And in the absence of such evidence I think it is irresponsible to speculate."

Not knowing what would constitute substantive indication of someone's homosexual orientation, readers can choose to accept MacLauchlin's determination. And because he chose not to speculate, Butterfly includes not the slightest suggestion that Toole was anything but straight. Is that the truth? Maybe not, but it's a good story nonetheless. ( DaCapoPress.com )

In 1947, when John Hirsch, a Jewish Hungarian orphaned by the Holocaust, first arrived in Winnipeg, Canada, he was just 17 years old and spoke no English. A decade later, he cofounded the Manitoba Theatre Centre, which became a model for regional theaters across North America. He later spent four years at the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. as head of English television drama and then served as artistic director at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival from 1981 to 1985. A gay man known for his fiery temper and budget-blowing sets, Hirsh died of AIDS complications in 1989.

Hirsch's story is intrinsically Canadian, and the authors' not being Canadian themselves may have doomed the biography to being less than it could be (as did, one could argue, their stumbling upon his life story while researching war orphans). That lack of intimate knowledge of the subject, his homeland, and his work resulted in a flawed book with a number of factual errors and notable exclusions. Still, it remains a fair introduction to the life of a fascinating and influential gay man. A Fiery Soul includes black-and-white photos and covers both Hirsch's professional and personal life. ( VehiculePress.com )

Lev Raphael's parents survived the Holocaust and he'd sworn never to set foot in Germany, the land they escaped. Having published 19 books of fiction and prose, Raphael is one of the most prolific writers about the experiences of second-generation Holocaust survivors. When a book tour for his 2003 novel The German Money took him to Germany, he had to face his mixed emotions with visiting locations where his family had lived and died. Raphael's experience is all the more intense as it corresponds with his coming out as a gay man.

This book is part family history and retelling of his mother's experiences in a slave labor camp and part recollections of a childhood where his parents didn't speak of their life-changing experiences. A classic travelogue meets a coming-out story, My Germany takes readers along on Raphael's journey of growth and self-discovery and offers reconciliation with the past. ( UWPress.Wisc.edu )

Derailed: A Memoir by Jerry Tanner (Balboa Press, $17.99)

Jerry Tanner started a $20 million health care company from the ground up. He then took over a bankrupt pharmacy and turned it into a $30 million company within one year. Then when the sons of an evangelical pastor alleged sexual assault, all that changed. In Derailed: A Memoir, Tanner describes how his life was turned upside down when reactions to his sexual orientation morphed into false misconduct allegations and finally a criminal indictment. "American society was founded on the principles of equality and tolerance," says Tanner. "I was a highly successful businessman and I was brought down by mere allegations of misconduct, plus being gay." An incisive coming-of-age story and a reminder that the legal system isn't always fair when you're on the wrong side of what your commuity considers morally right. ( BalboaPress.com )

This long-awaited memoir by the lesbian author of Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit (which became a film, see video below) covers much of the same material as that autobiographical nove, but delves even deeper into her relationship with a religiously zealous adoptive mother who treated her like the spawn of Satan.

"Mrs. Winterson," as Winterson calls her mother in the memoir, was an enormous British woman and "flamboyant depressive... who kept a revolver in the duster drawer, and the bullets in a tin of Pledge." The elder Winterson waited wit h baited anticipation for an imminent biblical apocalypse that would strike down her godless neighbors and deliver her into the rapture her piety must have surely earned her. As must have raising Jeanette and doing her best to wrest the disobedient child into a god-fearing Christian. "The Devil led us to the wrong crib," Mrs. Winterson liked to say. She employed all of her resources in her fight against Satan, sparing neither rod nor scripture. But nothing -- not beatings, shutting the child "in a coal hole," nor routinely locking her out of the house all night -- seemed to work.

Opposed as she was to all forms of intimacy, including [hetero]sexual intercourse, it came as no surprise that Mrs. Winterson did not take kindly to learning of her daughter's lesbianism. But, the author writes, the ensuing three-day exorcism failed to expel her demons. That Winterson survived the torture of her childhood is astonishing. That she did so with her wit and mental faculties intact is inspirational. "The one good thing about being shut in a coal hole is that it prompts reflection," she jokes. In that reflection, Winterson came to recognize that her mother was both her kryptonite and her steel: "What we notice in stories is the nearness of the wound to the gift. My mother was in charge of language."

The author was forbidden to read secular books, but Mrs. Winterson read aloud from the Bible every night and, once a week, would send her daughter to the public library to check out murder mysteries (the one vice to which Mrs. Winterson was addicted). At the library, Winterson discovered a means of escape: "A book is a door. You open it. You step through."

Adah Isaacs Menken (June 15,1835-August 10,1868) was born into a mixed-race Jewish Creole family in antebellum New Orleans. She went on to become a global superstar, internationally known as the "Naked Lady," for "baring all" on stage and film (although in reality she wore a flesh-colored bodystuit).

Remarkably prescient about creating a pre-celebrity public brand, she was adept at utilizing the newly invented mediums of photography and the daily newspaper to promote her performances and herself, allowing her personal life to not only become public but dominate the front-pages of scandal sheets. Menken had five husbands and became the most famous, highly paid actress in the world at the time, working in New York, San Francisco, London, and Paris -- all of this before her mysterious, sudden death at 33. Her influence on artists and literary giants of the time was reflected in the presence of the famous poet Longfellow at her bedside. He composed a farewell love song in her honor.

Like her friend George Sand, Menken "adopted what were considered to be men's dress and habits. They wore pants in public...They smoked cigarettes and sometimes cigars. They chose their careers, earned lots of money, and played a significant part in the events of the day."

But, the Fosters insist, "The lesbian relationship promoted by an American biographer of Sand, Noel Gerson (alias Samuel Edwards) is clumsy fiction. Gerson is the same hack who faked Menken's licentious Havana diary." Although Sand and Menken were photographed with Sand's arm around Menken, and Sand gave Menken's son her last name, the authors insist the two women were just friends. They point to the 30-year age difference and say by that time Sand, "her beauty faded, looked like an older woman," whose face was described as "'mummified.'"

Still, A Dangerous Woman acknowledges Menken's bisexuality and lesbian sexual encounters. The book is an engrossing look at a fully modern woman who presaged everything from femme fatales like Marilyn Monroe to today's international celebrities and our fascination with the details of their lives. ( LyonsPress.com )

Mary Johnson spent two decades as a nun working closely with Mother Teresa, and her memoir provides a frank, unflinching account of that experience and the difficulties she faced. A Texan who was inspired by Mother Teresa, Johnson joined the Missionaries of Charities to help the poor. But her superiors decided her skills would be better employed in a managerial track, so they pulled her from the field and Johnson spent most of her years as a nun in and around Rome doing paperwork and teaching.

That role put her in a position to witness the political machinations and less-than-Christlike behavior of her superiors, and she doesn't hold back on naming names (while using pseudonyms for innocent nuns and priests). Johnson is even willing to bypass the standard portrait of Mother Teresa as a "living saint" and provide a more nuanced description of a flesh-and-blood woman who could be something of a control freak, who deliberately pursued sainthood, and who strictly adhered to biblical and papal edicts even when those teachings kept other women subjugated and powerless.

But it isn't the failings of others that eventually drives Johnson from the Missionaries of Charity, it's her "unquenchable thirst" for emotional and physical intimacy. The order prohibits physical contact, forbidding nuns to even offer each other a friendly hug; but Johnson can't stop herself from going much further, developing sexual relationships with other nuns and having an affair with a priest. Eventually she leaves the order in 1997. The book wraps with a short epilogue that brings readers from 1997 to 2007, when Johnson visits some of the sisters and priests she knew during her years of service. We learn she's married (to a man), that she no longer attends church, that she teaches creative writing and has found a community with women writers, but we're left hoping for a follow-up memoir that details the decade she's glossed over. Hopefully it will be as engaging, frank, and thoughtful as this one. ( RandomHouse.com/spiegelandgrau )

The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, edited by Helena Whitbread (Virago, $14.95)

Previously published in 1988, The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister was re-released to correspond with the airing of BBC's TV movie of the same name. Born in the 1790s, Anne Lister lived during an era when women needed to be attached to a man to survive economically, but she forged her own way. An independent woman, Lister was a British landowner, industrialist, and lesbian who established a liaison with another woman that left them free to live on their own terms. Lister's diaries had been written in a complex code, which was finally cracked by academic Helena Whitbread, who then released the transcribed diaries in two volumes, I Know My Heart (1791-1840) and No Priest But Love (1824-1826). No matter what form they come in, Lister's diaries offer a fascinating look at the intimate lives of 19th-century lesbians and pioneers in the struggle for women's rights and independence. ( Virago.co.uk )

In Every Step You Take , Soto, now teaching at the School of American Ballet, writes about his career, his creative process, his Native American heritage, and his gay identity. Although he isn't as talented a writer as he is a dancer, his overreliance on cliches doesn't prevent this from being an enjoyable and inspirational read. ( HarperCollins.com )

Jim Flint is a gay Chicagoan best known as founder of the Continental Pageant System. After a stint in the Navy, Flint opened the drag club Baton Show Lounge and became known as Felicia, the baton-twirling, roller-skating queen of Chicago. He went on to own the Redoubt leather bar, head the Chicago Knights motorcycle club, found the Windy City Athletic Association, and run (in 1987) for the Cook County Board of Commissioners as an openly gay candidate.

This is the second biography of an icon from Chicago's LGBT community authored by Tracy Baim and Owen Keehnen of the Windy City Times (following Leatherman: The Legend of Chuck Renslow ), a duo who seem to be singlehandedly documenting Chicago's queer history, one book at a time.

The 500-plus pages include 400 photographs and places Flint's life story within the broader historical context of LGBT Chicago. "It was an opportunity to capture a larger history," explains Keehnen. "With Jim, that story includes the trans world, gay sports world, political world, activist world, bar culture, [and] pageantry world." ( Amazon.com )

August Farewell: The Last 16 Days of a 33-Year-Romance by David G. Hallman (Rising Star/iUniverse, $16.95)

After his partner of 33 years was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer, David G. Hallman only had two weeks to say a final farewell to the love of his life. In this moving memoir, Hallman recalls those painful last days and shares anecdotes from the three decades they spent together, traveling internationally and running a bread-and-breakfast in Canada. David Hallman has written six nonfiction books and is the author of the just-released novel Searching For Gilead , which reads as a thinly veiled memoir of his and his partner's time working with the World Council of Churches. This video is all the enticement you need to read both of these very worthy books. ( iUniverse.com )

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Do You Know These Films Based on Great Biographies?

By J. D. Biersdorfer April 22, 2024

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Welcome to Great Adaptations, the Book Review’s regular multiple-choice quiz about literature that has gone on to find new life in the form of movies, television shows, theatrical productions and other formats. This week’s quiz highlights films that were adapted from the biographies or autobiographies of their notable subjects.

Just tap or click your answers to the five questions below. And scroll down after you finish the last question for links to the books and their screen adaptations.

“Oppenheimer,” a film about the man who was instrumental in developing the first nuclear weapons for the United States, won seven Academy Awards earlier this year. The film’s screenplay was adapted from a 2005 biography by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin. What was the main title of the book?

“American Prometheus”

“Burning the Sky”

“A Wing and a Prayer”

The 1972 film “Lady Sings the Blues” was loosely based on which singer’s 1956 autobiography?

Ella Fitzgerald

Bessie Smith

Billie Holiday

Mildred Bailey

“Alan Turing: The Enigma” is Andrew Hodges’ 1983 biography of the gay British mathematician who helped the Allies decipher encrypted Nazi messages during World War II, but was later punished for his sexuality. What was the name of the 2014 film based on the book?

“The Turing Test”

“The Code Breaker”

“The Imitation Game”

“Julie & Julia” is a 2009 film about the chef Julia Child and the blogger Julie Powell, who tried to make all the recipes from one of Child’s cookbooks years later. The screenplay was based on two different books, Powell’s 2005 memoir about the project (and source of the movie’s name) and Julia Child’s posthumously published 2006 autobiography. What was that book’s title?

“Blood, Bones and Butter”

“My Life in France”

“Kitchen Confidential”

“A Year in Provence”

After reading Louis Fischer’s 1950 biography of this global figure, the film director Richard Attenborough spent years trying to make a film about that person’s life. The picture was finally released in 1982 and won eight Academy Awards. Who was the subject of the movie?

Harriet Tubman

J. Edgar Hoover

Mahatma Gandhi

Frida Kahlo

Explore More in Books

Want to know about the best books to read and the latest news start here..

Salman Rushdie’s new memoir, “Knife,” addresses the attack that maimed him  in 2022, and pays tribute to his wife who saw him through .

Recent books by Allen Bratton, Daniel Lefferts and Garrard Conley depict gay Christian characters not usually seen in queer literature.

What can fiction tell us about the apocalypse? The writer Ayana Mathis finds unexpected hope in novels of crisis by Ling Ma, Jenny Offill and Jesmyn Ward .

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Amid a surge in book bans, the most challenged books in the United States in 2023 continued to focus on the experiences of L.G.B.T.Q. people or explore themes of race.

Each week, top authors and critics join the Book Review’s podcast to talk about the latest news in the literary world. Listen here .

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3 smart life insurance moves seniors should make right now

By Matt Richardson

Edited By Angelica Leicht

April 24, 2024 / 11:40 AM EDT / CBS News

When making careful financial considerations, timing plays a key role. This is especially true for insurance protections, whose benefits are heavily dependent on when a policy is purchased. If you buy in too early, you could risk paying for insurance you can't use and don't need. But, if you wait too long, you could wind up losing out on vital financial protection. The timing needs to be just right for each individual.

This importance takes on added weight for seniors , some of whom may be reliant on a limited budget made up of retirement funds and Social Security . With less money to work with, each insurance policy purchased needs to be valuable and cost-effective. And while life insurance is one of the best ways to protect your estate and loved ones in your absence, there are some smart moves to consider making now. 

With inflation still high and the prospect of interest rate cuts dim right now, seniors need to consider making select moves. Below, we'll break down three of the best ones to make.

See how much a robust life insurance policy could cost you here .

3 smart life insurance moves seniors should make now

Here are three strategic life insurance moves seniors should strongly consider right now.

Re-evaluate your needs

Unfortunately, inflation remains an issue for millions of Americans. While significantly cooled from a decades-high in June 2022 , it has steadily risen again this year. This has caused the cost of many items to remain high — and it has left interest rates stuck at their highest point in 23 years, thus causing borrowing costs to remain high as well. 

With these issues in mind, it's important to re-evaluate your financial needs. Do you have enough coverage or do you need to boost your protections? Do you want to add beneficiaries or readjust who your money will eventually go to? And will your current policy be enough to pay for any outstanding debts you ultimately leave? 

You may have purchased a policy in a very different economic climate than today's. So, re-evaluate your needs and adjust your life insurance accordingly.

Get started here today .

Consider term versus whole

Term and whole life insurance policies both offer unique benefits for policyholders. But if you're looking for the most cost-effective option (albeit without the opportunity to cash in a policy while alive ), then consider a term policy right now . These policies are relatively inexpensive (depending on your applicant profile you could pay less than $100 per month for a six-figure coverage amount) and they can still adequately cover many of the items you'd need. 

If you don't already have a policy but know you'll need one now, then a term one may be your best option.

Think about your beneficiaries

If inflation and higher borrowing costs have negatively impacted your financial situation, then it makes sense to consider how they have affected your beneficiaries, as well. The coverage amount you initially had planned for your loved ones may be insufficient now that the cost of living has risen so significantly. 

With interest rates on some borrowing products more than double what they were a few years ago, a six-figure sum may not go nearly as far as you once expected it would. It may be worth sitting down with your beneficiaries, then, to adjust your policy plans.

The bottom line

Life insurance provides vital financial protection for you and your loved ones. However, the benefits of a policy can easily be influenced by factors outside of your control. In the face of stubborn inflation and elevated borrowing costs, seniors should take a closer look at their current policies (or consider buying one now to help loved ones). They should also consider the benefits of term versus whole policies and discuss their plans with beneficiaries to ensure that the policy they're paying for now will be valuable when accessed in the future.

Have more questions? Speak to a life insurance expert who can help here today .

Matt Richardson is the managing editor for the Managing Your Money section for CBSNews.com. He writes and edits content about personal finance ranging from savings to investing to insurance.

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‘stellar blade’ review (ps5): eve protocol uplink in bio.

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Stellar Blade

I’ll admit I did not have all that much interest in Stellar Blade initially, passively observing the butt-focused marketing campaign and the extremely annoying discourse that followed. I didn’t play the demo, but I found myself with a review code, and after putting a frankly absurd amount of time into almost 100%-ing the game, yeah, it’s uh, pretty good after all.

I enjoyed my time with Stellar Blade, a sometimes-linear, sometimes-not actioner that’s more Sekiro than Devil May Cry which does indeed have engaging combat, albeit with perhaps not enough tools in its box. The worldbuilding is better than the script. The character modeling is better than the environment. But there’s a lot to like here, and I think it’s going to do well.

I do not really see the point in dancing around this for twelve paragraphs, so let’s just dive into the Eve of it all, the central heroine who is a member of an elite fighting force sent to help earth defend itself against the monstrous Naytiba who roam the landscape. Think Dead Space’s gangly aliens mixed with Halo’s Flood. Though the exact nature of what the Naytiba is one of the game’s central mysteries. And the same is true of Eve herself.

The driving force of the discourse around this game pre-launch is almost wholly consumed by Eve’s appearance, crafted from scans of a real-life Korean supermodel and given clothes to match. One thing you’ll quickly learn is that Eve is not Bayonetta, exploding out of her clothes for super-moves and oozing sex with each step. Despite her appearance, Eve is not a sexual character in the same sense at all. I am not sure anyone in this game has ever even heard of sex.

As such, Eve’s body and the outfits that show it off are purely for the player. The same is true for voluptuous androids and lingerie wearing city guards. Everyone in this game is either hot, wearing a mask, or has a robot head. Those are your three choices.

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A large part of the pursuit of the game is collecting little outfits for Eve that require somewhat pricey crafting materials, but offer no combat benefit. There are a few dozen of these, and I was actually surprised at the range. Yes, of course there are ultra-revealing ones, but if you want to focus less on Eve’s…attributes, there are more normal clothes as well. A jacket and jeans. A Kill Bill-inspired sweatsuit. There are also glasses, earrings, hairstyles and colors. So Eve is really whatever you want to make of her from a visual perspective. Though again, her hyper-attractive appearance is totally detached from any story components whatsoever. She is hot for its own sake, though I suppose that’s hardly a new concept across the media landscape.

I don’t think this detracts from the game other than some of these outfits being so over the top it’s a bit goofy for cutscenes, but you don’t have to wear them. So, whatever. A longer debate about all this is probably best saved for separate articles. I think the point is that it’s fine for Eve to exist and look like this, but not every woman in a video game needs to, and the overall diversity we’ve seen in character design lately is welcome.

I’d say I only got really interested in the story of Stellar Blade about halfway in, where we get deeper into the “everything is not what it seems” conspiracy, and there are some genuinely interesting reveals by the end. But I don’t think the game does much with character development until perhaps its final moments. Eve is mostly a blank slate and her banter with her two crewmates is overwhelmingly surface level. There are a few compelling sidestories with game-spanning sidequests like a shopkeeper trying to find her sister or a singing android with a partner trying to rebuild her body. But this is hardly a top 10 cyberpunk apocalypse storyline, to be sure. I’m told it pulls way, way too directly from NieR: Automata, but as I haven’t played that, I’ll leave those comparisons to others.

I enjoyed combat and hunting down secrets in the different locales of the game. Yes, the structure here is compared to Sekiro or even (sigh) Dark Souls with “save camps” where death will set you back a ways. But it’s not nearly as difficult as any of those games, particularly if you’re keeping up with massive XP boots that completing sidequests give you, and in death you won’t lose found materials or XP progress. By the end, my Eve was maxed in every way possible, almost overpowered for the final stretch of the game. But I can see how it would be much harder if you didn’t grind all the other content out or explore every nook and cranny like I did, which made for a longer experience, probably pushing 25-30 hours.

I did enjoy “buildcrafting” Eve to a certain extent, even if options are somewhat limited. I went with a whole lot of upgrades to constantly allow me to output beta attacks, special moves that charge on hit or parry, and do the most damage to enemy health bars, shields and stances (erase shields and enemies take more damage, deplete stance charges and enemies will be open for a huge, gutting super attack). Another body upgrade let me increase the timing on my parry windows so they were practically automatic.

Some aspects of combat work less well. You get a gun-like thing at a certain point in the game and it just does not flow when used in combat along with your central sword. It also requires constantly buying ammo, ammo which does not get returned to you if you die, so managing that was just sort of annoying and I rarely used it. Also, I found the game’s “super saiyan" mode it eventually gives you to be less compelling than it could be, and often less useful than my normal parry and strike play as it doesn’t charge your beta attacks while using it.

Eve having essentially just a sword and a not-great gun gets a little repetitive. Almost every fight is just about getting as many perfect parries as you can, whereas perfect dodges are much more annoying to execute and half the time during “dodge window” attacks from bosses, I just found myself sprinting away rather than trying to bother. Combat is fun however, and the things that it gets wrong are overwhelmed by it being quite enjoyable in moment-to-moment play.

Many of the linear sections are pretty good and I enjoyed making my way through them, finding secrets as I went. But these sections don’t have maps, and when you are asked to return to them for sidequests later, re-navigating is irritating. This is in contrast to the open world zones, which are a lot better for exploration (thankfully they have actual maps), but there are only two of those, and both are just Desert 1 and Desert 2, so there’s not a ton of biome diversity there. Still, there are some beautiful sequences in the game, especially toward the end, and as you may have already seen, a ton of work has gone into character modeling here. Both for Eve (outside of what they reveal, her outfits are beautifully crafted), but also with most characters you meet.

I enjoyed my upgrade hunting, buildcrafting, combat, secret-finding and lore unraveling. I didn’t enjoy somewhat limited tools, mostly forgettable characters and a less-than-enthralling script. I liked collecting the little outfits. So sue me.

Stellar Blade is a good game, not a (don’t say stellar) fantastic one. Its peers do a lot of the things it does but better, though that doesn’t mean it’s not enjoyable in its own right. Don’t go in expecting a revolution, but this may be the start of a solid series and could make Eve a Bayonetta/2B-esque star. The ensuing discourse about this game is going to be exhausting, as it has been already, but divorced from that, the game itself is solid, and that’s what matters the most.

Score: 8/10

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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy .

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For Earth Day 2024, experts are spreading optimism – not doom. Here's why.

Climate change may still be an existential threat to humanity, but as Earth Day 2024 rolls around on Monday, some of the people most concerned about the planet aren't peddling doom – they're spreading optimism.

There's plenty to feel good about , they say: Huge strides towards fighting climate change , decades of work that have led to other environmental disasters being averted – and the reality that hope can help fuel the actions needed to keep tackling the climate crisis.

“People assume that in the 50 years since the first Earth Day we’ve made no progress. That we’re in a worse position now than we were in the 1970s, that there’s no point to environmental action,” said Hannah Ritchie, a senior researcher at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom who studies sustainability in relation to climate change.

Quite the opposite is true. Climate-friendly advances that would have seemed impossible even 10 years ago are now commonplace. And three times in the past 50 years humanity has faced – and fixed – massive, man-made global environmental issues.

This Earth Day, some climate scientists think climate change could be added to the list.

That reality is still a long way off , but we've made more progress than you might think. It's as if humanity has to climb the world’s tallest mountain, said Katharine Hayhoe, chief scientist of The Nature Conservancy and a distinguished professor of climate science at Texas Tech University.

Wind and solar power are the cheapest electricity on the planet. Heat pumps come up in most heating and cooling discussions. Electric cars are now mainstream.

Monday brings even more funding for climate-friendly causes, with the Biden administration announcing $7 billion in grants to provide solar power to over 900,000 homes in low-income and disadvantaged communities. The White House said the president’s actions would save more than $350 million in electricity costs annually – roughly $400 per household – over the next 25 years.

“It's like climbing the world's tallest mountain," Hayhoe said. "You walk and walk and you climb and climb and the top seems like it's never getting closer. But when you turn around, you realize how far you've come.”

Even Al Gore , former senator and vice president who famously began warning Americans about global warming in 1981, feels a little positive.

In March, he acknowledged to USA TODAY that things aren’t moving fast enough but said, “We’re gaining on this, we’re gaining momentum and soon we'll be gaining on the crisis itself.”

Three huge climate wins in 50 years

Humanity has already had some amazing wins when it comes to other big, seemingly intractable environmental issues.

Take DDT, a pesticide originally seen as a miracle in the fight against mosquitoes and other vermin when it was first introduced in the 1940s. It wasn't until the late 1950s that scientists connected the dots between declining bird populations and the new wonder chemical. DDT thinned eggshells so that nesting mothers crushed their own babies – leading many species, including the bald eagle , to the brink of extinction.

But DDT was banned in 1972 and by 2007 bald eagles had made such a comeback they were removed from the Endangered Species list.

Or look up at the sky and ponder the ozone layer that protects us from ultraviolet radiation. In the early 1980s scientists first saw that a hole had developed in that critically protective layer of the atmosphere. Without it, fields would burn and the outdoors would be unsurvivable. Despite the costs and the immensity of the problem, nations around the world signed the Montreal Protocol, phasing out the chlorofluorocarbons that caused the hole. Today, the ozone is repairing itself and is expected to return to 1980 levels by 2060.

Then there was acid rain , the byproduct of burning sulfur-laced coal. Beginning in the 1950s, it killed forests and life in lakes and streams across broad swaths of the northeast, with public awareness of its dangers growing in the 1970s. The Clean Air Act of 1990 helped limit sulfur emissions and levels began to fall.

Global CO2 emissions could peak next year

It's important to remember that history when considering the grim news about carbon dioxide levels in Earth's atmosphere, the root cause of global warming.

Last year they hit the highest point in human history, 420 parts per million. That’s up from 280 parts per million before the Industrial Revolution. In that time, global temperatures have risen by about 2 degrees.

But there’s something else happening that doesn’t get as much notice but is very hopeful. Experts – including the International Energy Agency – say that global carbon dioxide emissions will probably peak next year and certainly by 2030, using a scenario based on current policy settings.

That means 2023 was very likely the year with the highest greenhouse gas emissions ever and the numbers will only go down from here.

While that won’t make up for all the CO2 that has been pumped into the Earth’s atmosphere since the mid-1700s, it’s an important milestone and shows how the energy shift is already well underway.

Last year: On Earth Day, scientists tell us what 2050 could be like. Their answers might surprise you.

“The transition to clean energy is happening worldwide and it’s unstoppable,” IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol said last year . “It’s not a question of ‘if’, it’s just a matter of ‘how soon.’”

That said, current emission levels are a third higher than they needed to be to limit global warming to 2.7 degrees . So global per capita emissions still must come down significantly. But progress is being made, progress that's not always apparent to the general public, said Ritchie.

Clean energy is now the cheapest energy

That progress is being aided by more good news. Clean energy, from solar and wind, has gotten very cheap much faster than many climate experts ever hoped.

“The world is fundamentally in a different place from what it was in 1970. Even just a decade ago we were in a completely different position,” said Ritchie, whose book "Not the End of the World: How We Can Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable Planet," came out in January.

Today, solar, wind and battery power are dramatically less expensive than they were even 10 years ago. In 2023, electricity from wind and solar was significantly less expensive than from coal, nuclear and natural gas.

The unsubsidized cost of wind power has dropped  66% since 2009 , while the cost of unsubsidized solar has fallen 84%, according to an analysis by  Lazard , a financial advisory firm that publishes annual estimates of the total cost of producing electricity.

Even five years ago, Ritchie said she was quite pessimistic because the costs for clean energy were so high. That doesn’t worry her anymore.

“We’ve seen this really dramatic change,” she said. “Solar and wind have gone from being the most expensive energy technologies by far to being cheaper than fossil fuels. That’s a fundamental shift and will change the speed at which we move toward low carbon technologies.”

The shift in cost is moving so quickly it’s hard even for experts to keep up.

“If you’re looking at data that even from just a few years ago you’re really behind,” said Ritchie.

These shifts aren’t just happening in the United States, but worldwide. While China is still the largest single global carbon emitter and is still building coal-fired power plants, it’s also moving extremely quickly into renewables.

New solar, wind and hydroelectric power in China accounted for 59% of the world’s new renewable in 2023, according to S&P Global.

“Last year alone, China deployed as much solar as the United States has in its entire history,” said Ritchie.

The International Energy Agency also says demand for oil, coal and gas will peak by 2030 as the number of electric vehicles on the road globally increases and China continues to move towards wind and solar.

That prediction is based on the current policies of the nations of the world.

That’s still too high to keep to the Paris Agreement goal of limiting the rise in average global temperatures.

But Hayhoe points out that when the first National Climate Assessment was issued in 2000, the estimate was that we could be heading to as much as a 7.2 to 9 degree increase by the end of the century. Today, the predictions are that 4.8 degree warmer world by the end of the century. "And that number goes down with every new step we take up the mountain," she said.

There’s hope on the horizon

Ritchie says the work necessary to fix climate change can seem overwhelming but it’s actually not as bad as it might seem. "The solutions overlap, so in tackling one problem you're making others better at the same time," she said.

Keeping this front and center can be hard. The same voices that have been denying climate change for decades now have added what’s known as doomerism to their toolbox – saying it’s too late and there’s no hope.

Even those who are overwhelmed by climate change can be frozen into inaction, said Hayhoe.

“We have people who are so panicked that they descend into this very unhelpful doomerism,” she said.

Meanwhile, Gore is also among those in awe of the progress humanity has made.

“If you had said years ago (that) in the year 2023 80% of all the new electricity generation installed worldwide is going to be solar and wind, I would have said ‘Wow. That's great!’ But that's what happened last year. If somebody had said 20% of all new vehicles sold worldwide would be electric vehicles, wow that's incredible as well,” he told USA TODAY in March .

“I often cite the famous saying from the late economist Rudy Dornbusch who said things take longer ‘than you think they will, but then they happen faster than you thought they could,'” he said.

Contributing: Michael Collins, USA TODAY