Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Best Biographies and Memoirs of 2013

Here we come to the end of another year, and best of year book lists are being announced. As usual, I have combed through the lists to identify biographies and memoirs. What to include is tricky. Some books hang between biography and history. I am lenient and include most, feeling that they can at least be described as biographical, especially if it was important to include a person's name in the title.

As usual, the experts do not agree, which is actually good. There is a great range of biographical reading from which readers may choice with some assurance that someone deemed it worthy to read. In the end, what matters is whether the readers enjoy the books.

If you are like me, your wish list is getting longer every year. I am hoping many of these will be available in audiobooks to help me make my way through my list.

Enjoy 2014 as a great reading year!

Amazon

Biographies

Between Man and Beast: An Unlikely Explorer, the Evolution Debates, and the African Adventure That Took the Victorian World by Storm by Monte Reel

The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Doris Kearnes Goodwin

A Curious Man: The Strange and Brilliant Life of Robert "Believe It or Not!" Ripley by Neal Thompson

Empty Mansions: The Mysterious Life of Huguette Clark and the Spending of a Great American Fortune by Bill Dedman

Lawrence in Arabia: War Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Scott Anderson

Nilsson: The Life of a Singer-Songwriter by Alyn Shipton

Pilgrim's Wilderness: A True Story of Faith and Madness on the Alaskan Frontier by Tom Kizzia

Wheelmen: Lance Armstrong, the Tour de France, and the Greatest Sports Conspiracy Ever by Reed Albergotti

Memoirs

After Visiting Friends: A Son's Story by Michael Hainey

Coming Clean by Kimberly Rae Miller

Detroit: An American Autopsy by Charlie LeDuff

A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story by Qais Akbar Omar

A House in the Sky: A Memoir by Amanda Lindhout

Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg

Mo' Meta Blues: The World According to Questlove by Questlove

Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala



Booklist

Biographies

Beethoven: The Man Revealed by John Suchet

Bolivar: American Liberator by Marie Arana

Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin by Jill Lepore

The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Doris Kearnes Goodwin

Heir Apparent: A Life of Edward VII, the Playboy Prince by Jane Ridley

Jack London: An American Life by Earle Labor

Jim Henson by Brian Jay Jones

Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Scott Anderson

Wilson by A. Scott Berg

Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth by Reza Aslan


Memoirs

Darling: A Spiritual Autobiography by Richard Rodriguez


Kirkus

Biographies

The Battle of Bretton Woods: John Maynard Keyes, Harry Dexter White, and the Making of a New World Order by Benn Steil

Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin by Jill Lepore

The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, allen Dulles, and Their Secret World War by Stephen Kinzer

The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Doris Kearnes Goodwin

Dreadful: The Short Life and Gay Times of John Horne Burns by David Margolick

Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington by Terry Teachout

Fosse by Sam Wasson

The Great Dissent: How Oliver Wendell Holmes Changed His Mind - And Changed the History of Free Speech in America by Thomas Healy

Hammarskjold: A Life by Roger Lipsey

How to Create the Perfect Wife: Britain's Most Ineligible Bachelor and His Enlightened Quest to Train the Ideal Mate by Wendy Moore

JFK's Last Hundred Days: The Transformation of a Man and the Emergence of a Great President by Thurston Clarke

Johnny Cash: The Life by Robert Hilburn

Kansas City Lightning: The Rise and Times of Charlie Parker by Stanley Crouch

The Red Man's Bones: George Catlin, Artist and Showman by Benita Eisler

Robert Oppenheimer: His Life and Mind by Ray Monk

Useful Enemies: John Demjanjuk and America's Open-Door Policy for Nazi War Criminals by Richard Rashke

Memoirs

After Visiting Friends: A Son's Story by Michael Hainey

Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume 2 by Mark Twain

The Book of My Lives by Aleksandar Hemon

A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story by Qais Akbar Omar

Fresh Off the Boat: A Memoir by Eddie Huang

A House in the Sky: A Memoir by Amanda Lindhout

I Dreamed I Was a Very Clean Tramp: An Autobiography by Richard Hell

I Hate to Leave This Beautiful Place by Howard Norman

The Joker: A Memoir by Andrew Hudgins

Men We Reaped: A Memoir by Jesmyn Ward

Mo' Meta Blues: The World According to Questlove by Questlove

My Mistake : A Memoir by Daniel Menaker

Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala

The Wolf and the Watchman: A Father, a Son, and the CIA by Scott C. Johnson

The World Is Moving Around Me: A Memoir of the Haiti Earthquake by Dany Laferriere



Library Journal (Various lists)

Biographies

Francis: A New World Pope by Michel Cool

How to Create the Perfect Wife: Britain's Most Ineligible Bachelor and His Enlightened Quest to Train the Ideal Mate by Wendy Moore

Jack London: An American Life by Earle Labor

Memoirs

Drinking with Men by Rosie Schaap

Her by Christa Parravani

Holding Silvan: A Brief Life by Monica Wesolowska

Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh

I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malal Yousafzai

Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg

My Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor

My Foreign Cities by Elizabeth Scarboro

Playing House: Notes of a Reluctant Mother by Lauren Slater

Son of a Gun by Justin St. Germain

Unremarried Widow by Artis Henderson

Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala


National Public Radio

Biographies

Fosse by Sam Wasson

Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Scott Anderson

Memoirs

After Visiting Friends: A Son's Story by Michael Hainey

Drinking with Men by Rosie Schaap

I Hate to Leave This Beautiful Place by Howard Norman

Men We Reaped: A Memoir by Jesmyn Ward

The Reason I Jump: The Inner Voice of a Thirteen Year Old Boy with Autism by Naoki Higashida

Unknown Pleasures: Inside Joy Division by Peter Hook

You Don't Know Me But You Don't Like Me: Phish, Insane Clown Posse, and My Misadventures with Two of Music's Most Maligned Tribes by Nathan Rabin

Zen Confidential: Confessions of a Wayward Monk by Shozan Jack Haubner


New York Times: 100 Notable Books

Biographies

The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a Forgotten Genocide by Gary J. Bass

Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin by Jill Lepore

The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Doris Kearnes Goodwin

Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House by Peter Baker

Empress Dowager Cixi: The Concubine Who Launched Modern China by Jung Chang

Heir Apparent: A Life of Edward VII, the Playboy Prince by Jane Ridley

Jonathan Swift: His Life and His World by Leo Damrosch

Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Scott Anderson

Manson: The Life and Times of Charles Manson by Jeff Guinn

Margaret Fuller: A New American Life by Megan Marshall

Patrick Leigh Fermor: An Adventure by Artemis Cooper

Those Angry Days: Roosevelt, Lindbergh, and America's Fight Over World War II, 1939-1941 by Lynne Olsomn

Memoirs

The Boy Detective: A New York Childhood by Roger Rosenblatt

Country Girl: A Memoir by Edna O'Brien

A House in the Sky by Amanda Lindhout and Sara Corbett

Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg

Men We Reaped: A Memoir by Jesmyn Ward

My Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor

Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala



Publishers Weekly

Biographies

Fosse by Sam Wasson

Johnny Cash: The Life by Robert Hilburn

Karl Marx: A Nineteenth-Century Life by Jonathan Sperber

The Last Cowboy: A Life of Tom Landry by Mark Ribowsky

Memoirs

For a Song and a Hundred Songs: A Poet's Journey Through a Chinese Prison by Liao Yiwu

A House in the Sky: A Memoir by Amanda Lindhout

Italo Calvino: Letter, 1941-1985 by Italo Calvino

Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking: A Memoir of Food and Longing by Anya von Bremzen

Men We Reaped: A Memoir by Jesmyn Ward

Shocked: My Mother, Schiaparelli, and Me by Patricia Volk


Washington Post

Biographies

Blackett's War: The Men Who Defeated the Nazi U-Boats and Brought Science to the Art of Warfare by Stephen Budiansky

The Blood Telegram: Nixon, Kissinger, and a Forgotten Genocide by Gary J. Bass

Bolivar: American Liberator by Marie Arana

Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin by Jill Lepore

The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Doris Kearnes Goodwin

Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House by Peter Baker

The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon by Brad Stone

Gabriele D'Annunzio: Poet, Seducer and Preacher of War by Lucy Hughes-Hallett

Margaret Thatcher: From Grantham to Falklands by Charles Moore

Norman Mailer: A Double Life by J. Michael Lennon

The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy by David Nasaw

Queen Bee of Tuscany: The Redoubtable Janet Ross by Ben Downing

The Short Strange Life of Herschel Grynszpan: A Boy Avenger, a Nazi Diplomat, and a Murder in Paris by Jonathan Kirsch

Memoirs

The Death of Santini by Pat Conroy

A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story by Qais Akbar Omar

I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban by Malal Yousafzai

Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg

My Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor

The Spark: A Mother's Story of Nurturing Genius by Kristine Barnett

Swimming Studies by Leanne Shapton

The Wolf and the Watchman: A Father, a Son, and the CIA by Scott C. Johnson

The World's Strongest Librarian: A Memoir of Tourette's, Faith, Strength, and the Power of Family by Josh Hanagarne

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