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biographies & memoirs books

The most-recommended biographies & memoirs titles in our index, ranked by how many people recommend each.

91 people
Man's Search for Meaning
Viktor E. Frankl · 2006
91 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
52 people
Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike
Phil Knight · 2016
52 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
29 people
Steve Jobs
Walter Isaacson · 2011
29 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
28 people
Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future
Ashlee Vance · 2015
28 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
26 people
When Breath Becomes Air
Paul Kalanithi · 2016
26 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
25 people
How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence
Michael Pollan · 2018
25 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
24 people
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Malcolm X and assisted by Alex Haley, Laurence Fishburne · 2015
24 recommenders
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24 people
“Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!”: Adventures of a Curious Character
Richard P. Feynman · 2018
24 recommenders
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23 people
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King (2000-10-03)
Stephen King · 2002
23 recommenders
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21 people
Creativity, Inc. (The Expanded Edition): Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration
Ed Catmull · 2014
21 recommenders
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21 people
Educated: A Memoir
Tara Westover · 2018
21 recommenders
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21 people
Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage to the Antarctic
Alfred Lansing · 1999
21 recommenders
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20 people
Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win (New Edition)
Jocko Willink · 2015
20 recommenders
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19 people
Between the World and Me
Ta-Nehisi Coates · 2015
19 recommenders
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19 people
Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder, and One Man's Fight for Justice
Bill Browder · 2015
19 recommenders
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18 people
Leonardo da Vinci
Walter Isaacson · 2017
18 recommenders
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18 people
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Robert M. Pirsig · 2006
18 recommenders
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18 people
The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company
Robert Iger · 2019
18 recommenders
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18 people
Bird by Bird
Anne Lamott · 1995
18 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
17 people
Sam Walton: Made in America
Sam Walton · 1993
17 recommenders
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17 people
Becoming
Michelle Obama · 2018
17 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
17 people
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Maya Angelou (READ: Maya Angelou’s Recommended Reads · 1993
17 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
16 people
Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
Walter Isaacson · 2004
16 recommenders
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16 people
Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman
Yvon Chouinard · 2006
16 recommenders
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16 people
Just Kids
Patti Smith · 2010
16 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
16 people
The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds
Michael Lewis · 2017
16 recommenders
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15 people
The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War
Ben Macintyre · 2018
15 recommenders
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15 people
Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life
Steve Martin · 2007
15 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
15 people
Einstein: His Life and Universe
Walter Isaacson · 2007
15 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
15 people
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption
Bryan Stevenson · 2014
15 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
15 people
Open
Andre Agassi · 2009
15 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
15 people
Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
Ron Chernow · 2004
15 recommenders
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15 people
The Power Broker
Robert A. Caro · 1975
15 recommenders
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14 people
Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead
Sheryl Sandberg · 2013
14 recommenders
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14 people
The Year of Magical Thinking
Joan Didion · 2007
14 recommenders
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14 people
Greenlights
Matthew McConaughey · 2020
14 recommenders
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14 people
Maybe You Should Talk To Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed
Lori Gottlieb · 2019
14 recommenders
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14 people
Can't Hurt Me
David Goggins · 2018
14 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
14 people
The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon
Brad Stone · 2013
14 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
13 people
She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement
Jodi Kantor · 2019
13 recommenders
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13 people
The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life
Alice Schroeder · 2008
13 recommenders
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13 people
Walden
Henry David Thoreau · 2004
13 recommenders
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12 people
Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body
Roxane Gay · 2017
12 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
11 people
The Moment of Lift: How Empowering Women Changes the World
Melinda French Gates · 2019
11 recommenders
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11 people
Autobiography of a Yogi
Paramahansa Yogananda · 2000
11 recommenders
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11 people
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin · 2004
11 recommenders
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11 people
The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution
Gregory Zuckerman · 2019
11 recommenders
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11 people
Mountains Beyond Mountains
Tracy Kidder · 2004
11 recommenders
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11 people
Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture
David Kushner · 2004
11 recommenders
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11 people
Billion Dollar Whale
Tom Wright & Bradley Hope · 2018
11 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
11 people
Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood
Trevor Noah · 2016
11 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
11 people
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World
Jack Weatherford · 2018
11 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
11 people
Invisible Storm: A Soldier's Memoir of Politics and PTSD
Jason Kander · 2022
11 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
10 people
H is for Hawk
Helen Macdonald · 2014
10 recommenders
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10 people
The Fish That Ate the Whale
Rich Cohen · 2012
10 recommenders
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10 people
The Art of Learning
Josh Waitzkin · 2007
10 recommenders
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10 people
One Up On Wall Street
Peter Lynch · 2000
10 recommenders
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10 people
The Founders: The Story of Paypal and the Entrepreneurs Who Shaped Silicon Valley
Jimmy Soni · 2022
10 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
10 people
Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue
Ryan Holiday · 2018
10 recommenders
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9 people
The Fire Next Time (Modern Library)
James Baldwin · 1993
9 recommenders
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9 people
Long Walk to Freedom
Nelson Mandela · 1995
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat
Oliver W. Sacks · 1998
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
A Promised Land
Barack Obama · 2020
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road
Nick Bilton · 2017
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
10% Happier
Dan Harris · 2014
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
A Moveable Feast
Ernest Hemingway · 2012
9 recommenders
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9 people
Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader
Brent Schlender · 2015
9 recommenders
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9 people
Bossypants
Tina Fey · 2011
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty
Patrick Radden Keefe · 2021
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
Homage to Catalonia
George Orwell · 1980
9 recommenders
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9 people
Know My Name: A Memoir
Chanel Miller · 2019
9 recommenders
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9 people
The White Album
Joan Didion · 2009
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
The Wright Brothers
David McCullough · 2015
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
Tiny Beautiful Things
Cheryl Strayed · 2022
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race
Walter Isaacson · 2021
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
9 people
Uncanny Valley: A Memoir
Anna Wiener · 2020
9 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
8 people
On the Origin of Species
Charles Darwin & James Costa · 2009
8 recommenders
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8 people
With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa
Eugene Sledge · 1990
8 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
8 people
Grant
Ron Chernow · 2017
8 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
8 people
How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life
Scott Adams · 2013
8 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
8 people
How to Get Rich
Felix Dennis · 2007
8 recommenders
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8 people
The Argonauts
Maggie Nelson · 2015
8 recommenders
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8 people
Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail
Cheryl Strayed · 2012
8 recommenders
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8 people
Empire Of The Summer Moon
S. C. Gwynne · 2010
8 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
8 people
Bitcoin Billionaires: A True Story of Genius, Betrayal, and Redemption
Ben Mezrich · 2019
8 recommenders
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8 people
Liar’s Poker
Michael Lewis · 2010
8 recommenders
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8 people
A Mind at Play
Jimmy Soni · 2017
8 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
8 people
The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz
Erik Larson · 2020
8 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
8 people
The Glass Castle: A Memoir (Scribner Classics)
Jeannette Walls · 2006
8 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
7 people
From Third World to First: The Singapore Story: 1965-2000
Lee Kuan Yew · 2000
7 recommenders
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7 people
The Elements of Style
William Strunk, Jr., Maira Kalman and E.B. White · 1999
7 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
7 people
Who Is Michael Ovitz?
Michael Ovitz · 2018
7 recommenders
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7 people
Begin Again: James Baldwin's America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own
Eddie S. Glaude Jr. · 2020
7 recommenders
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7 people
Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life
William Finnegan · 2015
7 recommenders
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7 people
Buffett: Making of an American Capitalist
Roger Lowenstein · 2008
7 recommenders
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7 people
A Curious Mind: The Secret to a Bigger Life
Brian Grazer · 2015
7 recommenders
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7 people
Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find Inspiration, and Get to Work
Mason Currey · 2013
7 recommenders
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7 people
The Dream Machine
M. Mitchell Waldrop · 2002
7 recommenders
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7 people
The Worldly Philosophers
Robert L. Heilbroner · 1999
7 recommenders
Amazon Bookshop
7 people
What Becomes a Legend Most: A Biography of Richard Avedon
Philip Gefter · 2020
7 recommenders
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