Thought-Provoking Nonfiction Books for Book Clubs

Award-winning journalist Dan Slepian delves into America’s criminal justice system in pursuit of the truth in this gripping read. In 2002, Slepian received a tip from a Bronx homicide detective that changed the trajectory of his career. Two men were serving 25 years to life behind bars for a murder the detective knew they didn’t commit. Unable to shake the story, the Dateline producer applied his finely honed investigative skills to crack open the case and help free the innocent men. What followed was a 20-year crusade that took Slepian from the streets of New York City to the corridors of New York State’s Sing Sing prison, eventually leading to the freedom of the two original men as well as four other wrongfully convicted individuals. The Sing Sing Files vividly brings to life Slepian’s dogged investigative odyssey. It’s sure to educate your book club and prompt vital conversations about true justice and the critical flaws in the United States legal system. 

While there are plenty of true crime narratives for your true crime book club to consider, this Edgar Award–winning account by journalist Elon Green stands apart from the rest by prioritizing the voices of the victims and asking difficult questions about how law enforcement and the media treat certain communities. Last Call examines the lesser-known case of the Last Call Killer, a serial murderer who targeted gay men in and around New York City in the 1980s and 1990s, at the height of the AIDS epidemic. Green deftly chronicles the investigation and the years-long search for the killer. Yet he also crafts a vibrant portrait of NYC’s queer community, championing their resiliency and shining a probing light on their ostracization. At a moment when we see so many rights being rolled back and stripped away, Green’s timely true crime book inspires important discussion about the limits of the law and ongoing threats to the LGBTQ+ community. 

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Calling all basketball fans! In Brothers on Three, Abe Streep delivers a slam-dunk work of narrative nonfiction that radiates heart and humanity. The award-winning account follows three promising young basketball players on Montana’s Flathead Indian Reservation as they navigate their final year of high school, the trials and tribulations of a championship season, and their transition into adulthood. A captivating blend of sports, culture, and community, Brothers on Three has something for every member of your book club.

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We wouldn’t be surprised if more than a few of your book club members own a well-worn NPR tote bag, so why not pick up a book written by an esteemed NPR journalist? Named by Library Journal as one of the best books of 2019, Here We Are by Aarti Shahani is a memoir about family and immigration that will inspire conversations about the complexities of both. Shahani chronicles her family’s journey as they emigrated from India to start a new life in Queens, New York, in the 1980s. While young Aarti excels in the classroom at one of Manhattan’s most elite prep schools, her father falls into a nightmarish years-long legal battle after mistakenly selling products to members of a drug cartel. Shahani’s moving narrative reckons with her family’s difficult journey while meticulously explaining the trauma inflicted on them by the U.S. immigration and court systems.

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Looking to delight the mind and your taste buds at your next book club gathering? We have the perfect recipe: Combine chef Erin French’s heartfelt food memoir with a few of her favorite recipes for a joyous literary get-together! In Finding Freedom, French tells how she went from growing up on a farm and working at her dad’s diner to opening The Lost Kitchen, a world-renowned farm-to-table restaurant in Maine. The author faced significant obstacles along the way, from surviving as an out-of-work single mom to her struggles with addiction. Your book club will fall in love with this inspirational story of overcoming the odds and finding solace and community through the power of cooking.

In The Manicurist’s Daughter, Susan Lieu vividly explores family, identity, the mother–daughter bond, and the complex ways we deal with grief. When Lieu was 11 years old, her mother died unexpectedly after botched plastic surgery. Lieu’s memoir seeks to better understand the divergent ways her family dealt with that loss — what was said, what remained unspoken — as well as Lieu’s mother herself, a savvy and resolute woman who led her family out of Vietnam to the United States and operated two thriving nail salons. Lieu’s work began as a one-woman show called 140 LBS: How Beauty Killed My Mother, which is available to rent on demand, so your book club can kick off your discussion by exploring the ways the narratives compare to each other. 

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In his award-winning narrative, LGBTQ scholar and social critic Dr. Steven Thrasher examines the ways viruses spread through different communities to expose the critical rifts, fissures, and shortcomings in our society. Thrasher reveals how social inequality and discrimination exacerbate viral impact, creating a perpetual underclass of individuals who suffer the most from disease and sickness. Deeply researched and bristling with of-the-moment energy, Thrasher’s narrative traces its argument through the lived experiences of everyday people bearing the brunt of illnesses like COVID-19 and HIV and struggling through America’s faulty healthcare system. The Viral Underclass is an “engaging, enraging read” (Boston Globe) that will fuel spirited discussion in book club. 

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Recommended by everyone from President Barack Obama to Bill Gates and recently landing itself on the New York Times Readers’ list of Top 100 Books of the 21st Century, Sapiens is one of those books your club simply needs to read. Renowned historian Dr. Yuval Noah Harari interweaves science with history in an ambitious examination of the evolution of humanity, starting about 70,000 years ago, at the start of our modern understanding of cognition. Answering questions like “What happened to the other species of human beings?” and “How has humanity shaped Earth’s natural ecosystems?” this fascinating narrative will be a hit with any book club that loves to ponder the big questions.

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This acclaimed narrative by Pulitzer Prize–winning author Isabel Wilkerson demands to be read. But don’t take our word for it: Joshunda Sanders at The Boston Globe hails Caste as a “significant work of social science, journalism, and history… [that] should be required reading for generations to come,” while Oprah Winfrey describes it as “required reading for all of humanity.” While the U.S. tends to think of itself as free from a caste system, Wilkerson lays out a deeply researched overview of how caste affects every aspect of American society, from life expectancy and mental health to politics and sports. Wilkerson expertly navigates the entrenched power dynamics undergirding America’s social hierarchies in her sweeping historical narrative, delivering a captivating read that will surely engender discussion among your book club and cause many to reassess their views on life in the United States. 

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Quite likely, the cinephiles in your book club enjoyed Martin Scorsese’s recent adaptation of Killers of the Flower Moon — so why not delve into the award-winning true crime narrative that inspired it?  Written by bestselling author David Grann, Killers of the Flower Moon chronicles the Osage Indian Nation murders of the 1920s and the sprawling conspiracy to swindle members of the tribe out of their oil-rich lands in Oklahoma. A New York Times bestseller that’s packed with shocking twists and turns, Grann’s account is “close to impeccable…. The crime story it tells is appalling, and stocked with authentic heroes and villains. It will make you cringe at man’s inhumanity to man” (The New York Times). 

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For book clubs interested in the environment and unpacking the human causes of climate change, The Sixth Extinction is the perfect choice. Elizabeth Kolbert’s unsparing, yet surprisingly entertaining, Pulitzer Prize–winning account of the mass extinction event we’re currently living through will not only raise critical questions and catalyze conversation but also inspire your book club crew to act. It’s easy to think of mass extinction as something out of a science textbook, an academic term that doesn’t apply to the present day. Kolbert is here to correct that line of thinking, while simultaneously offering a clear-eyed understanding of the current state of ecological collapse so that we can better prioritize fighting for change. 

Bryan Stevenson’s Just Mercy is a deeply personal account of his firsthand experience as a lawyer fighting for marginalized individuals in the criminal justice system. A touching memoir and a devastating indictment of the role racism and poverty play in the courts and policing, Just Mercy will stir discussions among your members about inequality and the mutable state of justice in America. While the 2019 movie version of Just Mercy focuses primarily on Stevenson’s effort to overturn the wrongful murder conviction of a Black man in 1980s Alabama, Stevenson’s book offers an in-depth look at his career fighting for reforms like abolishing mandatory life sentences without parole for minors. 

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Our final pick is very popular with memoir book clubs, and for good reason! In Educated, Tara Westover regales readers with the inspiring true story of how she went from stepping into her first classroom at the age of 17 to earning a PhD from Cambridge. If your book club is like mine, with members who can’t get enough narratives about overcoming fundamentalist upbringings, Westover’s memoir about her childhood spent isolated from mainstream society and later traveling the world in search of knowledge will be a crowd-pleasing choice. Educated is a “heartbreaking, heartwarming, best-in-years memoir about striding beyond the limitations of birth and environment into a better life. Four stars out of four” (USA Today).

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