A detailed biography of Alexander von Humboldt that follows his formative years, major expeditions—especially in Latin America—and his intellectual effort to present nature as an interconnected system.

An ethnographic study of matsutake mushrooms and the people and places shaped by their global trade. The author follows harvesters, middlemen, buyers, and landscapes to show how a single wild commodity links local ecological disturbance, precarious livelihoods, and transnational markets.

A book-length series of linked essays that record extended, close observations of the natural world around a creek and turn those observations into philosophical and lyrical reflections on life, perception, and the human place in nature.

A first-person memoir that follows the author's experience growing up as the child of an incarcerated parent and the personal consequences that unfolded in family life, identity, and adulthood. The book situates intimate recollection alongside social context to reckon with shame, longing, and the search for belonging.

A first-person memoir of growing up and working in colonial East Africa, told through episodic accounts of life on farms, training racehorses, and learning to fly.

Set in an early 20th-century Brooklyn neighborhood, the novel follows a young girl growing up amid economic hardship and complex family dynamics. It traces the pressures of poverty, education, and personal ambition as the child negotiates loyalty to family and the desire for a different future.

A first-person memoir that looks closely at a relationship Machado calls the Dream House and how that relationship involved psychological abuse.

A first-person memoir by Chanel Miller recounting her sexual assault at Stanford in 2015 and the consequences that followed, including the legal case People v. Turner. The book traces the personal aftermath, public attention, and interactions with the justice system as the author reclaims voice and identity.

A narrative investigation into how animal infections jump into humans and create new epidemics, built from scientific case studies, interviews with researchers, and on-the-ground reportage.

A long-form investigation into how island size, isolation, and landscape change shape species distributions and drive extinctions.

A data-driven account of how rising global temperatures could reshape life on Earth, surveying a range of warming scenarios and their likely consequences across environments, health, food systems, and geopolitics.

A guided tour of nonhuman perception: the book documents how different animals experience the world through vision, smell, hearing, electroreception and other senses, and shows how those sensory systems reveal distinct "realms".

A scientist's wide-angle account of how species have originated, diversified, and occupied Earth’s ecosystems, paired with a diagnosis of contemporary biodiversity decline.

An author convalescing with a chronic illness observes and cares for a wild snail that becomes a daily companion. The book records close, patient attention to the snail’s behavior and anatomy while using that relationship to reflect on bodily experience, time, and recovery.

Journalistic nonfiction that documents a contemporary, human-caused mass extinction by surveying past mass die-offs, profiling particular species losses, and reporting from scientific sites and researchers.

A first-person account by a clinician-scholar describing living with schizophrenia while pursuing an academic career. The book presents personal episodes of illness and recovery alongside reflections on diagnosis, treatment, and maintaining work in higher education.

A Moveable Feast is Ernest Hemingway’s memoir of his years as a young expatriate writer in Paris during the 1920s. The book collects episodic recollections—personal scenes, interactions, and snapshots of everyday life—anchored around his marriage at the time and his early literary friendships and work habits.

A linked collection of personal essays in which the author describes living with schizophrenia and related diagnoses, linking firsthand memoir to discussion of clinical diagnosis, treatment, and the social realities of mental illness.

A series of personal essays by George M. Johnson that trace growing up as a Black queer youth in the U.S., linking autobiographical scenes to direct address to younger Black queer readers.

A compact memoir in essay form that traces the author's coming-of-age moments, friendships, and cultural touchstones while reflecting on identity and belonging.

A narrative history of the Great Migration, tracing the movement of Black Americans out of the U.S. South into northern, midwestern, and western cities across much of the twentieth century.

Jacqueline Woodson's Brown Girl Dreaming is a verse memoir that records her early childhood and adolescent memories growing up African American in the 1960s.

Two linked essays presented as letters that question the place of race and religion in American life.

A critique of prevailing mid-20th-century urban planning that argues neighborhoods thrive when everyday street life, local commerce, and diverse uses are preserved.