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Book reviews and excerpts from exceptional biographies & memoirs

Biography & Memoir

Recommended books found: 479

The Dry Season

A Memoir of Pleasure in a Year Without Sex

by Melissa Febos

Hardcover: Jun 2025 | Paperback: Jun 2026

Critics' Consensus:

From the national bestselling author of Girlhood, an examination of the solitude, freedoms, and feminist heroes Melissa Febos discovered during a year of celibacy. A wise and transformative look at relationships and self-knowledge.

This Is Your Mother

A Memoir

by Erika J. Simpson

Hardcover: May 2025 | Paperback: May 2026

Critics' Consensus:

From "a writer who's absolutely going places" (Roxane Gay), a remarkable, inventive debut memoir about a mother-daughter relationship across cycles of poverty, separation, and illness, exploring how we forge identity in the face of imminent loss.

Hotshot

by River Selby

Hardcover: Aug 2025 | Paperback: May 2026

Critics' Consensus:

The fierce debut memoir of a female firefighter, Hotshot navigates the personal and environmental dangers of wildland firefighting.

Memorial Days

A Memoir

by Geraldine Brooks

Hardcover: Feb 2025 | Paperback: Apr 2026

Critics' Consensus:

A heartrending and beautiful memoir of sudden loss and a journey towards peace, from the bestselling, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Horse.

Adult Braces

Driving Myself Sane

by Lindy West

Hardcover: Mar 2026

Critics' Consensus:

In New York Times bestselling author Lindy West's ambitious memoir, she brings readers along on an uproarious cross-country road trip as she unpacks her last few tumultuous years, rediscovers herself, and reinvents her marriage in the process.

Raising Hare

A Memoir

by Chloe Dalton

Hardcover: Mar 2025 | Paperback: Mar 2026

Critics' Consensus:

A moving and fascinating meditation on freedom, trust, loss, and our relationship with the natural world, explored through the story of one woman's unlikely friendship with a wild hare.

In Sickness and in Health

Love Stories from the Front Lines of America's Caregiving Crisis

by Laura Mauldin

Hardcover: Feb 2026

Critics' Consensus:

An urgent and deeply affecting account of America's failure to provide meaningful support to its chronically ill and disabled citizens and our resulting reliance on the unpaid caregiving labor of spouses and intimate partners.

A Well-Trained Wife

My Escape from Christian Patriarchy

by Tia Levings

Hardcover: Aug 2024 | Paperback: Feb 2026

Critics' Consensus:

"Today it hit me when he hit me, blood shaking in my brain. Maybe there wasn't a savior coming. Maybe it was up to me to save me."

Scale Boy

An African Childhood

by Patrice Nganang

Hardcover: Jan 2026

Critics' Consensus:

An extraordinary chronicle of youth that evokes the paradoxes of modern Africa―complex, contradictory, and full of conflict, tragedy, and joy.

Black Bear

A Story of Siblinghood and Survival

by Trina Moyles

Hardcover: Jan 2026

Critics' Consensus:

A dazzling memoir about one woman's coexistence with bears in the boreal forest and a singular meditation on sibling loss.

A Danger to the Minds of Young Girls

Margaret C. Anderson, Book Bans, and the Fight to Modernize Literature

by Adam Morgan

Hardcover: Dec 2025

Critics' Consensus:

The definitive biography of overlooked queer icon Margaret C. Anderson, whose fight to publish James Joyce's Ulysses led to her arrest and trial for obscenity. Perfect for fans of The Editor and The Book-Makers.

Indignity

A Life Reimagined

by Lea Ypi

Hardcover: Nov 2025 | Paperback: Nov 2026

Critics' Consensus:

The author of Free returns with an extraordinary inquiry into historical injustice, dignity, truth, and imagination.

The reviewer of each book decides which categories it belongs in - but we're only human, mistakes happen. If you see a book that you think is in the wrong place, tell us!

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