Best Nonfiction Books of September 2024, as chosen by the Amazon Editors
Every time September rolls around, I get giddy thinking about buying newly-sharpened pencils, crisp notebooks, and fresh folders. I’m ready to learn, to have my mind blown, and to discuss the world with rooms full of scholars. Too bad it’s been a long time since I graduated from school! (Yes, I promise I’m fun at parties.) Luckily, we’ve rounded up a group of fascinating new books that will give you plenty to think about, and are perfect to discuss with friends and family. Be sure to check out our full list of the Best Nonfiction Books of the Month. The Amazon Editors can recommend pageturners for everyone—whether you want to learn, escape, be swept off your feet, or deep in suspense.
Perhaps you’re one of the more than 45 million people who read Yuval Noah Harari’s 2015 blockbuster, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. The history professor and philosopher’s latest book, Nexus, takes an expansive look at AI, the “alien life form” we’ve unleashed on humanity. But this brilliant and thought-provoking read is about so much more than a buzzy technology people are just wrapping their heads around—it’s a much wider look at how humans have leveraged technology to communicate through time, and how that has shaped culture, power, and currency—usually in ways we never could have planned or imagined. Deploying fascinating stories (you’ll never think about the Bible, the US Constitution, or the Roman Empire the same way again), Harari once again draws connections between vast ideas, and reshapes the way we see the world. He asks the questions I never thought to, but that we should all demand answers to. —Lindsay Powers, Amazon Editor
Hope for Cynics—if that’s not a title that stirs, ahem, hope in our beleaguered times, I don’t know what is. Fans of Adam Grant (Think Again, Hidden Potential) will find much to love in Stanford psychologist Jamil Zaki’s accessible, science-backed primer that feels very of-the-moment, given everything going on in the wider world, from wars to the election. (And indeed, Grant gives Zaki a ringing endorsement, calling this book “a ray of light for dark days”). As Zaki explains, cynicism can lead to depression, inequality, and stagnation. Healthy skepticism, though, can lead a person to examination, and action. Just as Martin Luther King Jr., who figures prominently in a compelling anecdote about how his cynicism displayed moral clarity toward social change. Each chapter is narrative, replete with engaging anecdotes—with thoughtful takeaways for all readers to help open ourselves up to hope in a COVID-ravaged world. Resonant. —Lindsay Powers, Amazon Editor
This book is deeply profound from the very first page. It’s hopeful, thoughtful, and mind-expanding: What could we accomplish, what kind of lives could we live, with true freedom? What do we lose when we look to the past instead of the future? Yale historian Timothy Snyder, author of the best-selling On Tyranny, has written a very smart purpose-driven life kind of book, one we wouldn’t be surprised to see among former President Barack Obama’s annual recommended reading list. Regardless of your politics and who you plan to vote for this fall, Snyder’s cerebral prose and thought process will make you pause to think about the lives we’ve settled for, the dreams we let die, and the fights we left unfought. How we move through the world, the communities we align ourselves with, the stories we tell ourselves—the small decisions we make every day have lasting, and outsized, impact. This book may make you reframe history and the present, and envision a more expansive future. —Lindsay Powers, Amazon Editor
I read this on a flight and barely looked up the entire 4 hours. Longtime Dateline correspondent Dan Slepian spent decades investigating the cases of six men in the notorious Sing Sing prison, and the more I read, the more shocked and horrified I became. These men had been not only convicted of a crime they didn’t commit, but had spent decades in prison when they were clearly innocent. And these are only the cases Slepian looked into, in only one prison. Based on what I read here, this is not likely to be a unique or isolated situation, and it's chilling how misconduct by law enforcement and ambitious prosecutors goes unpunished, and how little hope there is for others like these few individuals. The Sing Sing Files is a powerful, moving and important look at our justice system and its failures. —Seira Wilson, Amazon Editor
You’ll want to bring a copy of Marty Makary’s Blind Spots to your next doctor’s appointment. Makary, a Johns Hopkins professor and member of the National Academy of Medicine, reframes the myths about medicine, and explains the nuanced stories and sometimes shocking histories behind clickbait health headlines. Forget the fear mongering around hormone replacement therapy for women going through menopause or the panicky guidelines around infants and peanuts (which have been rolled back after sparking a staggering spike in allergies)—Makary breaks down the science, studies, and his real-life medical experience to offer a more balanced take that will leave readers feeling supported, informed, and more in control of our health. If your copy of Outlive is full of highlighted lines, you’ll devour this even-more-accessible primer. —Lindsay Powers, Amazon Editor
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