Best books I read in 2024
Did I read any books I don’t recommend? No. If I don’t like a book I don’t make it past the first chapter.
The nonfiction books I read this year and recommend:
Isaac’s Storm by Erik Larson
Hitler’s People by Richard Evans
A Fever in the Heartland by Timothy Egan
Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson
Material World by Ed Conway
The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory by Tim Alberta
The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams by Stacy Schiff
Reading the Constitution by Stephen Breyers
Hitler’s American Gamble by Brendan Simms
Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics by Richard Thaler
A Man of Iron: The Turbulent Life and Improbable Presidency of Grover Cleveland by Troy Senik
Oath and Honor by Liz Cheney
The Mystery of Capital by Hernando de Soto
How Today’s Biggest Trends Will Collide and Reshape the Future by Mauro F. Guillen
Also, Moral Man Immoral Society by Reinhold Niebuhr is a tough slog but contains keen insights. The Statesman as Thinker by Daniel Mahoney could have been better but it’s a fast read.
The fiction books I read and recommend:
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
The 19th Wife by David Ebershoff
and all the mystery books by Jane Harper and those of James Lee.