Memoir Essays

Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung contains the wild and brilliant writings of Lester Bangs—the most outrageous and popular rock critic of the 1970s—edited and with an introduction by the reigning dean of rock critics, Greil Marcus.

In this hilariously revealing debut memoir, comedian Sarah Cooper charts her rise from lip-synching in church to lip-synching the president, and all the dad issues she collected along the way. As the youngest of four in a tight-knit Jamaican family, Cooper cut her teeth in the mean cornfields of...

"Colorful, vivid storytelling.... for anyone looking for a road to reinvention." —Kristin Newman A soul-stirring memoir from Colombian immigrant and travel journalist Nikki Vargas, whisking us through the countries that brought her new love, self-discovery, and the inspiration to launch the...

From Frederick Forsyth, the grand master of international suspense, comes his most intriguing story ever—his own. For more than forty years, Frederick Forsyth has been writing extraordinary real-world novels of intrigue, from the groundbreaking The Day of the Jackal to the prescient The...

Contrairement aux histoires imaginées par Arthur Conan Doyle, les douze enquêtes racontées par David Grann sont bien réelles. Que l'auteur se penche sur l'infiltration d'un gang de détenus dans le système carcéral américain ou la traque de l'un des grands imposteurs du XXe siècle, affabulateur caméléon aux multiples identités, qu'il retrace la folle cavale d'un vieux braqueur de banque, le démantèlement d'un empire mafieux dans une cité de l'Ohio surnommé "Crimetown"....

When Peter Schjeldahl, The New Yorker’s art critic and the leading art writer of his generation, published his eye-opening autobiographical essay, “The Art of Dying,” in December 2019, he reported that he had lung cancer and had been given six months of life. Fortunately, his treatment was showing some improvement, and so, he wrote, “These extra months are a luxury that I hope to have put to good use.”

From the author of the popular newsletter That’s What She Said, Nobody Cares is a frank, funny personal essay collection about work, failure, friendship, and the messy business of being alive in your 20s and 30s. As she shares her hard-won insights from screwing up, growing up, and trying to find her own path, Anne T. Donahue’s debut book offers all the honesty, laughs, and reassurance of a late-night phone call with your best friend.

Own it, snowflakes: you've lost everything you claim to hold dear. White is Bret Easton Ellis's first work of nonfiction. Already the bad boy of American literature, from Less Than Zero to American Psycho, Ellis has also earned the wrath of right-thinking people everywhere with his...

A pioneering neuroscientist shares his story of growing up in one of Miami's toughest neighborhoods and how it led him to his groundbreaking work in drug addiction. As a youth, Carl Hart didn't realize the value of school; he studied just enough to stay on the basketball team. At the same time...

Pop Song is a book about love and about falling in love - with a place, or a painting, or a person - and the joy and terror inherent in the experience of that love. Plumbing the well of culture for clues and patterns about love and loss - from Agnes Martin's abstract paintings to James Turrell's transcendent light works, and Anne Carson's Eros the Bittersweet to Frank Ocean's Blonde - Larissa Pham writes of her youthful attempts to find meaning in travel, sex, drugs, and art, before sensing that she might need to turn her gaze upon herself.

A moving, laugh-out-loud memoir from one of today’s best-loved British actors, whose credits include Downton Abbey, Notting Hill, and Paddington. From getting his big break as Third Shepherd in the school nativity play, to mistaking a Hollywood star for an estate agent, Hugh Bonneville creates...

The New York Times bestseller, now available in paperback—“Half memoir, half polemic, and entirely necessary,” (Elle UK) Caitlin Moran’s debut—an instant runaway bestseller in the UK—puts a new face on feminism, cutting to the heart of issues with an irreverent, transcendent, and...

In arguably his most personal and lasting book, America's most daringly original and controversial critic gives us brief, luminous readings of more than eighty texts by canonical authors-- texts he has had by heart since childhood. Gone are the polemics. Here, instead, in a memoir of sorts--an...

Named a Best Memoir of 2025 (So Far) by BookPage and Real Simple * “A beautiful story about an extraordinary mother’s gift of love and hope.” —Jeannette Walls, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Glass Castle * “Candid...Heartbreaking...Illuminating.” —Oprah Daily From “a...

Viewed as too libelous to print in England until 1968, the title essay in this collection reveals the abuse Orwell experienced as a child at an expensive and snobbish boarding school and offers insights into his lifelong concern for the oppressed. "Why I Write" describes Orwell's sense of political purpose, and the classic essay "Politics and the English Language" insists on clarity and precision in communication in order to avoid the Newspeak later described in 1984.

WINNER OF THE NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD A beautifully written memoir-in-essays on fairy tales and their surprising relevance to modern life, from a Jewish woman raising Black children in the American South—based on her acclaimed Paris Review column “Happily” “One of the most...

The Indignities of Coach Class, the Torments of Low Thread Count, the Never-Ending Quest for Artisanal Olive Oil, and Other First World Problems David Rakoff’s collection of autobiographical essays, Fraud, established him as one of our funniest, most insightful writers. In Don’t Get Too...

“Still Writing offers up a cornucopia of wisdom, insights, and practical lessons gleaned from Dani Shapiro's long experience as a celebrated writer and teacher of writing. The beneficiaries are beginning writers, veteran writers and everyone in between.” —Jennifer Egan From Dani Shapiro...

Today, Gigi Gorgeous is beloved for her critically-acclaimed documentary, her outrageous sense of humor, her no-holds-barred honesty, and her glam Hollywood lifestyle. Ten years ago, she was a gawky Canadian teen named Gregory. In He Said, She Said, Gigi brings us on her personal journey from...

“I am fat,” begins Judith Moore’s unflinching account of her life. As she describes her obsessions with food, struggles with self image and troubled relationships, she refuses to become an object of pity. Moore is the recipient of two NEA grants and a Guggenheim fellowship. Her previous book, also a memoir, was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year.