Book Category: Essential
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The MANIAC by Benjamin Labatut
This book is readable, compelling and full of ideas that will follow you around long after you finish it. It’s absolutely riveting.
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Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by Neil Postman
This book holds up extremely well. I stopped several times to re-read sections, blown away at how relevant they still are.
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The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
One of the hardest-hitting nonfiction books I’ve ever read. It should be required reading by anyone who considers themself a public intellectual on matters of race or criminal justice.
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Your Face Belongs to Us by Kashmir Hill
It’s extremely of-the-moment, and the author gives not just a clear, technical understanding of the Clearview tech, she documents the history of face recognition starting in the 1960s.
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Blood in the Machine by Brian Merchant
Merchant writes about the beginning of the Industrial Revolution with incredible detail, balancing very dense storytelling with short, focused chapters to keep it from overwhelming.
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Limbo by Alfred Lubrano
Not since Susan Cain’s Quiet have I read a book that felt so specifically written about me and the people I know.
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Number Go Up by Zeke Faux
Engaging writing, a fun subject and wild characters that exemplify a moment in time, and a writer who not only is waist-deep in the culture he’s writing about, but incredibly lucky.
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The Code: Silicon Valley and the Remaking of America by Margaret O’Mara
It’s an excellent, readable history of the tech industry, but also comes from an unusual angle that will appeal to politics and history junkies as well.
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Out of Sight by Elmore Leonard
Leonard was the master. This book is an all-timer.
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Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind
It read like a fairy tale, and also like a waking nightmare. Each sentence was perfect, but as a whole the thing will scar you for life.