Fall Preview
22 Nonfiction Books to Read This Fall
Essays by Ta-Nehisi Coates; memoirs by Alexei Navalny, Ina Garten and Cher; and dispatches from the mind of a Nobel laureate are among this season’s most anticipated offerings.
Credit...The New York Times
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By Shreya Chattopadhyay and Miguel Salazar
Published Sept. 2, 2024Updated Sept. 5, 2024
As vacations wrap up and classes resume, trade in those sandy beach reads for more ambitious fare this fall. If you’re desperate for a break from politics — it is an election year, after all — look for dispatches from the mind of Orhan Pamuk, the latest humanistic work from Yuval Noah Harari and tell-alls by Connie Chung, Alex Van Halen and Lisa Marie Presley. If you’d rather lean into the political season, you might pick up biographies of John Lewis and Mitch McConnell or memoirs by Ketanji Brown Jackson, Alexei Navalny and Angela Merkel. Ta-Nehisi Coates returns with an essay collection on collective mythmaking, and an alarming account by Porter Fox warns of coming superstorms. Find these and others among our most anticipated nonfiction books of the fall.
See our fiction and poetry picks.
September
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Lovely One, by Ketanji Brown Jackson
Jackson made history in 2022, when she became the first Black woman on the Supreme Court. Her memoir, named for the English translation of her name, traces not only her personal history but also that of her family, who endured generations of oppression in the segregated South.
Random House, Sept. 3
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Category Five, by Porter Fox
A travel writer whose previous books explored shrinking snowpacks and the United States-Canada border, Fox is also a seasoned sailor. So it makes sense that his new book, which investigates why storms worldwide are becoming increasingly extreme, starts at sea. “A deep ocean storm does not pass overhead,” he writes. “It absorbs everything beneath it: islands, coastlines, boats, the sea itself.”
Little, Brown, Sept. 3
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Who Could Ever Love You, by Mary L. Trump
Lawsuits, notes the clinical psychologist and niece of Donald J. Trump, are “my family’s love language.” In her second memoir about life as a member of the Trump clan, she writes about the fallout from her first book, and reflects on her relationship with her father, Fred Trump Jr., the former president’s older brother who died of a heart attack when Mary was a teenager.
St. Martin’s, Sept. 10
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Nexus, by Yuval Noah Harari
Rather than purely representing reality, information networks create “new realities by tying together disparate things,” writes Harari, the best-selling author of “Sapiens.” He interrogates this phenomenon from the Stone Age onward, tracing the ways information has been concentrated and disseminated over time by people, religions, governments and technology.
Random House, Sept. 10
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Reagan, by Max Boot
Boot, a historian and national security columnist at The Washington Post, draws on hundreds of interviews as well as archival material in this biography of the 40th president of the United States. Highlighting the gulf between Reagan’s public persona and private life, Boot paints a nuanced portrait of the actor-turned-politician as both a staunch conservative and a politically flexible pragmatist.
Liveright, Sept. 10
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Connie, by Connie Chung
Over the course of her life, Chung has transformed from the devastatingly shy 10th child of Chinese immigrants into the first Asian American, and second woman, to anchor a major weekday news program. In her first book, the journalist tells her story — weathering racism and sexism, navigating four decades of marriage with Maury Povich, inspiring a generation of namesakes — in her own words.
Grand Central, Sept. 17
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October
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The Message, by Ta-Nehisi Coates
“If thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought,” George Orwell wrote in “Politics and the English Language.” Inspired by that 1946 essay, Coates set out to write a book about the power of writing. Instead, he found himself preoccupied by the use of language to distort narratives in modern-day political conflicts, from Senegal to South Carolina to Palestine.
One World, Oct. 1
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Be Ready When the Luck Happens, by Ina Garten
The force behind the beloved Food Network show and cookbook series “Barefoot Contessa,” Garten has spent decades teaching Americans to cook onscreen and on paper. In her first memoir, she turns to her own life, recounting her fraught childhood, her serendipitous journey from D.C. bureaucrat to food guru and, of course, her love story with Jeffrey.
Crown, Oct. 1
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The Paranormal Ranger, by Stanley Milford Jr.
Growing up steeped in Navajo and Cherokee culture, Milford thought he knew something about the spirit world. But nothing could prepare him for life as a Navajo Ranger, a job that included no small dose of the supernatural — investigating Bigfoot sightings, paranormal hot spots, U.F.O.s and ghosts, all of which he recounts in thrilling detail.
Morrow, Oct. 1
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John Lewis, by David Greenberg
Greenberg’s new biography, though far from the first about the civil rights leader and politician, makes use of previously untapped F.B.I. documents to underscore not only Lewis’s time as chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, but also his less discussed career in Atlanta politics before serving 17 terms in the House of Representatives.
Simon & Schuster, Oct. 8
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From Here to the Great Unknown, by Lisa Marie Presley and Riley Keough
Before she died in 2023, Presley, the only child of Elvis and Priscilla Presley, recorded hours of tapes about a life marked by grief, addiction and grace. Her daughter, Riley Keough, has lovingly fashioned them into this tell-all, covering Presley’s troubled adolescence in Los Angeles, her father’s death and her marriages, including to Danny Keough and Michael Jackson.
Random House, Oct. 8
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Selling Sexy, by Lauren Sherman and Chantal Fernandez
The ubiquitous American lingerie brand Victoria’s Secret is put under the microscope in this history, which traces the company’s rise from a 1970s cult catalog to a cultural behemoth. Sherman and Fernandez draw on inside sources and industry experts to detail how the retailer capitalized on women’s conceptions of sexuality and body image, and to unpack the controversies that have ensnared it in recent years.
Holt, Oct. 8
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Framed, by John Grisham and Jim McCloskey
Grisham, known for his best-selling legal thrillers, is intimately aware of the trappings and shortcomings of America’s judicial system. This collection, co-written with McCloskey, the founder of Centurion Ministries, shares the stories of wrongfully convicted Americans and their long fights — against racism, corruption, mismanagement and flawed testimony — for exoneration.
Doubleday, Oct. 15
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Dinner for Vampires, by Bethany Joy Lenz
Lenz rose to fame in the 2000s for her portrayal of Haley James Scott on the TV series “One Tree Hill” — while also being trapped, off screen, in a religious cult. The experience of losing her autonomy (and millions of dollars in income) was the “biggest lemon I ever had,” Lenz said last year. It’s made into lemonade in this tart, refreshing book.
Simon & Schuster, Oct. 22
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Patriot, by Alexei Navalny
Part personal narrative, part cri de cœur, Navalny’s posthumous memoir sheds light on the Russian opposition leader’s lifelong fight against corruption. Written largely from captivity, the book details his uphill campaign against President Vladimir V. Putin’s authoritarianism, the many assassination attempts against him and his political imprisonment in an Arctic penal colony, where he died under mysterious circumstances earlier this year.
Knopf, Oct. 22
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Brothers, by Alex Van Halen with Ariel Levy
Offered as a tribute to his late brother, Edward Van Halen (better known as Eddie), Alex Van Halen’s memoir — written with Levy, a New Yorker staff writer — recounts the siblings’ upbringing in the Netherlands and Pasadena, Calif.; their rise to rock ‘n’ roll fame; and the camaraderie that held their band together as they weathered infighting, alcoholism and the politics of the music industry.
Harper, Oct. 22
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The Price of Power, by Michael Tackett
Tackett, a veteran political reporter, combed through thousands of pages of archival materials and interviewed dozens of sources — including McConnell himself — for this portrait of the Republican Senate leader. The result is a close look at McConnell’s emergence as a conservative power broker and his struggles to contain the chaotic influence of Donald Trump.
Simon & Schuster, Oct. 29
November
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Carson the Magnificent, by Bill Zehme with Mike Thomas
When Zehme first profiled Johnny Carson in 2002, he found the legendary host of “The Tonight Show” to be surprisingly “shy, succinct” and reserved. Zehme, who died in 2023, spent years writing this thorough and intimate biography, which sheds light on Carson’s personal life, his youth in Nebraska, his Navy service during World War II and his eventual triumphs as a radio host and television personality.
Simon & Schuster, Nov. 5
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The Serviceberry, by Robin Wall Kimmerer; illustrated by John Burgoyne
In her 2013 best seller, “Braiding Sweetgrass,” Kimmerer, a Potawatomi botanist and author, drew on Indigenous wisdom to examine the reciprocal relationships between humans and the natural world. Here, she reflects on similar themes while harvesting the fruit of the serviceberry tree, which she points to as a sweet reminder of our interdependence: “All flourishing is mutual.”
Scribner, Nov. 19
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Cher, by Cher
Musical juggernaut, fashion icon, star of the big and small screen: How does one sum up the life of a woman so iconic she needs no last name? Apparently, it takes more than one book: This memoir is just the first part of Cher’s story, with a second volume to follow next year.
Dey Street, Nov. 19
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Memories of Distant Mountains, by Orhan Pamuk; translated by Ekin Oklap
Have you ever wondered what it’s like inside the mind of a Nobel laureate? This collection of observations and drawings offers a peek. Culled from 13 years of Pamuk’s notes, it offers early versions of the Turkish author’s characters and novels along with meditations on travel, writing, family and nationalism.
Knopf, Nov. 26
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Freedom, by Angela Merkel
Merkel, who led Germany as its first female chancellor from 2005 to 2021, raises the curtain on her arduous political life in this memoir. Highlights include reflections on her life in East Germany before the fall of the Berlin Wall, details from high-profile encounters with other world leaders, the rationales behind her responses to major global crises and her thoughts on the mechanics of power in Europe.
St. Martin’s, Nov. 26
