Biography & Memoir

A witty introduction to the mind of Goethe, in a new translation for the first time in 150 yearsA Penguin ClassicBy the end of the nineteenth century, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was the world's most celebrated poet, novelist, critic and thinker. Today...

The incredible memoir of Elaine Brown - the first woman leader of the Black Panthers'Here I was, a woman, proclaiming supreme power over the most militant organization in America'In 1974 Elaine Brown became the first woman leader of the Black Panther...

The gripping true story of one man's ten year expedition from a village in West Africa to the Arctic CircleWITH A NEW AFTERWORD BY THE AUTHORScorching heat, rich, fertile soil, and treacherous snakes marked the landscape in which Tete-Michel grew up in...

An elegant and absorbing tour of Tokyo and its residentsFrom 1632 until 1854, Japan’s rulers restricted contact with foreign countries, a near isolation that fostered a remarkable and unique culture that endures to this day. In hypnotic prose and sensual...

“The Godmother [is a] crisply written, dutifully researched book exploring the role of women in the…underbelly of Italian life.”—New York Times Book ReviewThe chilling story of one woman’s rise to prominence in the Italian Mafia, and the as-yet untold...

Paul Craddock's Spare Parts offers an original look at the history of medicine itself through the rich, compelling, and delightfully macabre story of transplant surgery from ancient times to the present day.How did an architect help pioneer blood...

'Neima’s book, impeccably researched and beautifully written, will be an inspiration for anyone looking to an alternative future today.' - Stella Tillyard, author of Aristocrats and The Great Level'Deeply interesting and a pleasure to read, The...

Celebrated military historian James Holland chronicles the experiences in World War II of the legendary tank unit, the Sherwood Rangers In the annals of World War II, certain groups of soldiers stand out, and among the most notable were the Sherwood...

On the 100th anniversary of The Volstead Act taking effect comes the epic, definitive story of the man who cracked the Prohibition system and helped inspire The Great Gatsby.“[Batchelor] makes this flashy bootlegger sound like a folk hero…Behold the king...

(Available after 3-20 days) “True-crime writing at its finest.” —Dean Jobb, author of Empire of Deception A rich and fascinating history of Canada’s first celebrity mobster, Rocco Perri—King of the Bootleggers—and the man who pursued him, Canada’s first...

Never before available, the unexpurgated last interview with James Baldwin“I was not born to be what someone said I was. I was not born to be defined by someone else, but by myself, and myself only.” When, in the fall of 1987, the poet Quincy Troupe...

The story of three generations in twentieth-century China that blends the intimacy of memoir and the panoramic sweep of eyewitness history—a bestselling classic in thirty languages with more than ten million copies sold around the world, now with a new...

(Available after October 30th, 2022)“This is the book Trump fears most.” - Axios“Confidence Man [is] Maggie Haberman’s much anticipated biography of the president she followed more assiduously than any other journalist. No doubt, there are revelations...

(Available after 3-20 days)I’m So Glad You’re Here is the story of a family disrupted by ramifications of a father’s mental illness. The memoir opens with a riveting account of Gay, age eighteen, witnessing her father being bound in a straitjacket and...

Written in Auschwitz itself and translated for the first time ever into English, this one-of-a-kind, minute-by-minute true account is a crucial historical testament to a Holocaust survivor's fight for his life at the largest extermination camp in Nazi...

(Available after 3-20 days)INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER   Former Secretary of Defense Mark T. Esper reveals the shocking details of his tumultuous tenure while serving in the Trump administration. From June of 2019 until his firing by President...

"The rabbit hole gets wrestled here. An old school saying applies: the more you know, the more you don’t know. Dance along this read into the unknown and find out that this book may be the best ever answer to ‘What is soul?'"—Chuck D, rapper and...

“It's a meditative act,” they said. But it was far from meditative for Alexandra when yet another wave slammed into her face. It was survival.When she laced up her shoes in Running Like a Girl, all she had to do was get out there and run. But swimming...

The inspiring, hilarious memoir of a “Bridget Jones-like writer” (The Washington Post) who transforms her life by learning to run, with stories of miserable defeat, complete victory, and learning to choose the right shoes.When Alexandra Heminsley decided...

Scotland Yard had Sherlock Holmes. However, Kate Winkler Dawson shows us in American Sherlock that we, too, had someone who knew all too well about deductive reasoning. Our favorite true crime books read like fiction and emphasize that “truth is...