Best Biography & Memoir Books

The deeply personal memoir of the former First Lady of the United States — from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to the White House and beyond.

The memoir of The Daily Show host Trevor Noah, born in apartheid South Africa to a Black mother and white father — an act that was literally a crime under apartheid law.

The definitive account of the Sackler family, the pharmaceutical dynasty behind OxyContin, and their role in creating and perpetuating the opioid crisis.

Nike founder Phil Knight's memoir of building one of the world's most iconic brands — from $50 borrowed from his father and a handshake deal for Japanese running shoes to a multi-billion dollar empire. Brutally honest and compulsively readable.

The diary kept by a Jewish teenager hiding in a secret annex in Amsterdam during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands — the most widely read personal account of the Holocaust.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Harry S. Truman, one of America's most consequential and underestimated presidents.

A neurosurgeon diagnosed with terminal lung cancer at 36 confronts the questions he spent his career preparing to face — and writes a book about mortality, meaning, and what makes a life worth living.

Tara Westover's memoir of growing up in the mountains of Idaho without formal education, in a survivalist family, and her journey to Cambridge and Harvard.

David McCullough tells the gripping story of two self-taught bicycle mechanics from Dayton who changed the world by inventing powered flight.

The authorised biography of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, based on more than forty interviews with Jobs and over one hundred with family members, friends, adversaries, and colleagues.

Psychiatrist Viktor Frankl's harrowing account of surviving Auschwitz forms the foundation of logotherapy — the idea that the primary human drive is not pleasure but the pursuit of meaning. One of the most important psychological texts of the 20th century.

The story of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, told through the abduction and murder of Jean McConville and the lives of IRA members Dolours Price and Gerry Adams.

The epic story of the Great Migration — the decades-long exodus of six million Black Americans from the Jim Crow South to the cities of the North and West.

A rich biography of history's greatest creative genius, based on Leonardo's notebooks and the latest scholarship, exploring the intersection of art and science that defined his work.

Andre Agassi's remarkably candid memoir about a sporting career built on hating the sport that made him famous — written with J.R. Moehringer.

Part memoir, part writing guide, Stephen King reflects on his life, his near-fatal accident, and the craft principles that have made him one of the most productive writers in American literature.

Robert Caro's Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Robert Moses, the unelected master planner who shaped New York City for four decades and accumulated more power than any other American in the 20th century.

The definitive biography of Alexander Hamilton — orphan immigrant, Revolutionary War hero, first Secretary of the Treasury, and the Founding Father who built the American financial system.

The memoir of Navy SEAL and ultramarathon runner David Goggins — from a traumatic childhood and an overweight, unfulfilled existence to becoming one of the world's elite endurance athletes.

Former child actress Jennette McCurdy's unflinching memoir about her mother's emotional abuse, the exploitation of the child acting industry, and her path to recovery from eating disorders and trauma.

Known publicly as 'Emily Doe,' Chanel Miller reclaims her full identity and tells the complete story of the assault, trial, and aftermath of the Brock Turner case.

Nelson Mandela's autobiography traces his journey from a Transkei village through law, activism, 27 years of imprisonment, and his emergence to lead South Africa's democratic transition.

Doris Kearns Goodwin examines Lincoln's political genius through the lens of the three rivals he defeated for the 1860 Republican nomination — whom he then appointed to his cabinet.

One of the most important American autobiographies ever written, chronicling Malcolm X's transformation from street criminal to international civil rights icon.