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Modern Library 100 Best Nonfiction Books

Rank Title Author Added

1

A Room of One's Own

by Virginia Woolf

14,074 members

203 reviews

4.1

4 Members: peach3009, Kristelh, Bretzky1, ManWithAnAgenda

2

The Elements of Style

by William Strunk

21,783 members

206 reviews

4.1

5 Members: deldevries, peach3009, Kristelh, Bretzky1, ManWithAnAgenda,aulsmith ,ibarrobo
Explanations: aulsmith : There was much in this book to like, but I've found other books on writing just as helpful, if not more so.

3

by Truman Capote

26,948 members

515 reviews

4.1

4 Members: deldevries, peach3009, Kristelh, ManWithAnAgenda

4

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

by Thomas S. Kuhn

9,038 members

96 reviews

4

3 Members: aulsmith, deldevries, peach3009
Explanations: aulsmith: But read it carefully. It's not as post-modern as some people think

5

Notes of a Native Son

by James Baldwin

2,485 members

34 reviews

4.2

3 Members: aulsmith, peach3009, kara.shamy

6

The Souls of Black Folk

by W. E. B. Du Bois

6,195 members

73 reviews

4.2

3 Members: peach3009, Kristelh, kara.shamy

7

The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA

by James D. Watson

3,293 members

50 reviews

3.8

2 Members: peach3009, ibarrobo

8

The Proper Study of Mankind: An Anthology of Essays

by Isaiah Berlin

783 members

5 reviews

4.2

2 Members: aulsmith, peach3009
Explanations: aulsmith: Berlin is great, never satisfied with easy answers (or some times any answer)

9

Selected Essays

425 members

4.1

2 Members: peach3009, kara.shamy

10

Up from Slavery

by Booker T. Washington

5,022 members

44 reviews

4

2 Members: deldevries, peach3009

11

Aspects of the Novel

by E. M. Forster

2,538 members

44 reviews

3.8

2 Members: aulsmith, peach3009

12

by Richard Ellmann

1,454 members

12 reviews

½ 4.4

2 Members: peach3009, kara.shamy

13

The Right Stuff

5,157 members

80 reviews

4.2

3 Members: deldevries, peach3009, ManWithAnAgenda,aulsmith
Explanations: aulsmith : This was an interesting book, but too cynical for my taste.

14

The Guns of August

by Barbara Tuchman

7,558 members

143 reviews

½ 4.3

2 Members: peach3009, kara.shamy

15

Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do

by Studs Terkel

2,347 members

24 reviews

4.2

2 Members: deldevries, peach3009

16

The Civil War (complete 14 volumes)

by Shelby Foote

24 members

2 Members: deldevries, peach3009

17

by Isak Dinesen

5,792 members

111 reviews

3.9

2 Members: peach3009, Kristelh

18

The Education of Henry Adams

3,069 members

47 reviews

3.8

Member: peach3009

19

The Journalist and the Murderer

by Janet Malcolm

780 members

14 reviews

3.9

2 Members: deldevries, peach3009

20

Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness

by William Styron

3,340 members

86 reviews

3.9

2 Members: peach3009, kara.shamy

21

The Autobiography of Malcolm X

11,357 members

144 reviews

½ 4.3

2 Members: peach3009, kara.shamy

22

This Boy's Life: A Memoir

by Tobias Wolff

3,237 members

50 reviews

3.9

2 Members: peach3009, kara.shamy

23

The Varieties of Religious Experience

by William James

5,842 members

44 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

24

by Rachel Carson

7,691 members

119 reviews

4

2 Members: peach3009, ManWithAnAgenda,aulsmith
Explanations: aulsmith : This is getting very dated. A silent spring is certainly not our greatest ecological worry.

25

Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisited

by Vladimir Nabokov

4,033 members

48 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009

26

The American Language: An Inquiry into the Development of English in the United States

by H. L. Mencken

761 members

3 reviews

½ 4.3

Member: peach3009

27

The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money

by John Maynard Keynes

1,985 members

12 reviews

½ 3.6

Member: peach3009

28

The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher

by Lewis Thomas

2,259 members

32 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

29

The Frontier in American History

by Frederick Jackson Turner

557 members

8 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

30

by Richard Wright

5,873 members

73 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

31

The Nature and Destiny of Man: A Christian Interpretation

by Reinhold Niebuhr

568 members

2 reviews

½ 3.7

Member: peach3009

32

The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas

by Gertrude Stein

3,054 members

46 reviews

½ 3.6

Member: peach3009

33

An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy. 2-volume set

by Gunnar Myrdal

143 members

2 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

34

Principia Mathematica (3-volume set)

by Alfred North Whitehead

94 members

1 review

4.1

Member: peach3009

35

The Mismeasure of Man [Revised & Expanded]

by Stephen Jay Gould

2,017 members

20 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

36

The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic Theory and the Critical Tradition

by Meyer H. Abrams

638 members

6 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

37

The Art of the Soluble: Creativity and Originality in Science

by P. B. Medawar

77 members

2 reviews

½ 4.3

Member: peach3009

38

by Bert Hölldobler

398 members

2 reviews

½ 4.4

Member: peach3009

39

A Theory of Justice

3,514 members

28 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

40

Art and Illusion: A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation

by Ernst Gombrich

1,209 members

6 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

41

The Making of the English Working Class

by E. P. Thompson

2,010 members

11 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

42

Principia Ethica

753 members

3 reviews

3.8

Member: peach3009

43

Philosophy and Civilization

35 members

3

Member: peach3009

44

On Growth and Form

by D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson

358 members

2 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009

45

Ideas and Opinions

by Albert Einstein

2,174 members

10 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

46

The Age of Jackson

by Arthur M. Schlesinger

982 members

12 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

47

The Making of the Atomic Bomb

by Richard Rhodes

4,070 members

59 reviews

½ 4.5

Member: peach3009

48

Black Lamb and Grey Falcon: A Journey through Yugoslavia

by Rebecca West

1,925 members

28 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

49

Autobiography of William Butler Yeats

by William Butler Yeats

276 members

2 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

50

Science and Civilization in China

by Joseph Needham

16 members

½ 4.5

Member: peach3009

51

Goodbye to All That

by Robert Graves

4,159 members

74 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

52

Homage to Catalonia

by George Orwell

7,085 members

129 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

53

The Autobiography of Mark Twain

1,001 members

9 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

54

Children of Crisis: A Study of Courage and Fear

by Robert Coles

162 members

½ 4.5

Member: peach3009

55

A study of history

by Arnold Joseph Toynbee

290 members

2 reviews

3.1

Member: peach3009

56

The Affluent Society

by John Kenneth Galbraith

1,924 members

15 reviews

3.8

Member: peach3009

57

Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department

by Dean Acheson

518 members

5 reviews

½ 3.7

Member: peach3009

58

The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge

by David McCullough

3,093 members

65 reviews

½ 4.3

Member: peach3009

59

Patriotic Gore: Studies in the Literature of the American Civil War

by Edmund Wilson

439 members

6 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

60

by W. Jackson Bate

432 members

5 reviews

½ 4.4

Member: peach3009

61

Eminent Victorians

by Lytton Strachey

1,947 members

33 reviews

½ 3.7

Member: peach3009

62

The Liberal Imagination

by Lionel Trilling

589 members

5 reviews

3.8

Member: peach3009

63

The Second World War {complete}

by Winston S. Churchill

1,705 members

12 reviews

½ 4.3

Member: peach3009

64

Jefferson and His Time (6 Volume Set)

by Dumas Malone

305 members

3 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009

65

In the American Grain

by William Carlos Williams

577 members

4 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

66

Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water

by Marc Reisner

2,008 members

39 reviews

½ 4.3

Member: peach3009

67

The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance

1,671 members

19 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

68

The Open Society and Its Enemies

1,083 members

15 reviews

½ 4.4

Member: peach3009

69

The Art of Memory

by Frances A. Yates

1,661 members

19 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

70

Religion and the Rise of Capitalism: A Historical Study

by R. H. Tawney

871 members

4 reviews

½ 3.7

Member: peach3009

71

A Preface to Morals

by Walter Lippmann

408 members

1 review

3.8

Member: peach3009

72

The Gate of Heavenly Peace: The Chinese and Their Revolution

by Jonathan D. Spence

475 members

3 reviews

½ 3.6

Member: peach3009

73

The Strange Career of Jim Crow

by C. Vann Woodward

1,201 members

7 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

74

The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community

by William H. McNeill

792 members

9 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009

75

The Gnostic Gospels

by Elaine Pagels

5,452 members

56 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

76

Florence Nightingale

by Cecil Woodham-Smith

335 members

4 reviews

½ 3.7

Member: peach3009

77

The Great War and Modern Memory

by Paul Fussell

2,295 members

30 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009

78

Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era

by James M. McPherson

6,124 members

84 reviews

½ 4.4

Member: peach3009

79

Why We Can't Wait

by Martin Luther King, Jr.

1,752 members

8 reviews

½ 4.4

Member: peach3009

80

The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt

by Edmund Morris

4,627 members

58 reviews

½ 4.4

Member: peach3009

81

Studies in Iconology: Humanistic Themes in the Art of the Renaissance

by Erwin Panofsky

509 members

1 review

4.2

Member: peach3009

82

The Face of Battle: A Study of Agincourt, Waterloo, and the Somme

3,049 members

32 reviews

4

Member: peach3009

83

The Strange Death of Liberal England

by George Dangerfield

479 members

6 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

84

by Lawrence Gowing

84 members

1 review

½ 3.6

Member: peach3009

85

A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam

by Neil Sheehan

2,435 members

35 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009

86

West with the Night

by Beryl Markham

3,995 members

141 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

87

A Mathematician's Apology

1,556 members

29 reviews

3.8

Member: peach3009

88

Six Easy Pieces: Essentials of Physics Explained by Its Most Brilliant Teacher

by Richard Feynman

4,480 members

45 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

89

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

by Annie Dillard

6,203 members

121 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009

90

by Ralph Ellison

479 members

1 review

4

Member: peach3009

91

The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York

by Robert A. Caro

3,720 members

66 reviews

½ 4.5

Member: peach3009

92

The American Political Tradition and the Men Who Made it

by Richard Hofstadter

1,370 members

15 reviews

3.9

Member: peach3009

93

The Contours of American History

by William Appleman Williams

161 members

1 review

3.8

Member: peach3009

94

The Promise of American Life

by Herbert Croly

149 members

½ 2.7

Member: peach3009

95

The Taming of Chance

280 members

2 reviews

3.8

Member: peach3009

96

Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year

1,804 members

34 reviews

4.1

Member: peach3009

97

The Young Melbourne

65 members

2

Member: peach3009

98

The Sweet Science

by A. J. Liebling

285 members

7 reviews

3.8

Member: peach3009,aulsmith
Explanations: aulsmith : I love Liebling's writing, but even he couldn't get me to read about boxing.

99

The City in History: Its Origins, Its Transformations, and Its Prospects

by Lewis Mumford

1,565 members

9 reviews

4.2

Member: peach3009,aulsmith
Explanations: aulsmith : This has really been out-dated by more modern archeology.

100

The Golden Bough [set - 15 volumes]

by James George Frazer

21 members

Member: peach3009,aulsmith
Explanations: aulsmith : Even the abridged version is more than most people want to know.

About This List

Started: peach3009
May 2015
Type: Numbered and unnumbered, Adding restricted

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