What’s the best non fiction book you’ve read ?

[Dayrider]

In the last year and/or ever?
Looking for inspiration

Probably 80% of what I read is non-fiction.

Anything by Bill Bryson, especially A Walk in the Woods and A Short History of Nearly Everything
If This Is A Man and The Drowned and the Saved by Primo Levi
Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond
The Culture Clash by Jean Donaldson
Into Thin Air and Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
The Psychopath Test, Them and So You've Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson
Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari
Animals in Translation by Temple Grandin
The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs by Stephen L Brusatte
Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
The Tent, The Bucket and Me by Emma Kennedy
Gulag by Anne Applebaum
Men Explain Things to Me by Rebecca Solnit
Alone on the Wall by Alex Honnold

@Chocolatebuttercream Wow! Thanks for the recommendation - I've just downloaded it!

Letter to Louis by Alison White. A really beautiful and gripping memoir.

The Discovery of the Titanic by Robert Ballard

-The Anarchy by William Dalrymple. It’s about the British East India Company.

• Any travel book by Paul Theroux.

Which reminds me- I want to read his ex-wife’s book about what a bad husband he was.

• Anything by Mary Beard.

Has anyone mentioned Pete Paphides’ book Broken Greek? If you love music and grew up in that era it is fantastic on the detail.

Catch me if you can

Lots of great recommendations, thanks!! To whoever said Bill Bryson A Walk in the Woods, I'm currently re-reading (again) and dreaming of a long hike in the wilderness with BB for company.

I don't have one favourite, but here are a few that I would recommend:

Gloria Steinem - My Life on the Road. Not just a chronological autobiography, but peppered with cool stories and observations from an incredible life.

Francesca Martinez - What the Fuck is Normal. Another amazing woman, and so funny. She talks about getting into comedy and how her disability shaped her.

Victor Frenkl - Man's Search For Meaning. Short but really inspirational. I thought about this book for ages after reading it.

Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods, or Notes from a Small Island. Or any of his travel books really. I love his writing style and usually very funny.

Dr. Marie Cassidy - Beyond the Tape. If you're interested in Forensic Pathology this is a great one, she is the former Irish State Pathologist and talks about how she forged her career and different cases she had to deal with, pretty fascinating job.

Mark Bowden - Killing Pablo. The story of how they brought down Pablo Escobar. I read it a few years ago, was really good.

I'm not sure about best but these are some of the books I've most enjoyed. Apologies for the very long list.

Stasiland-Anna Funder
The Radium Girls-Kate Moore
First Bite: How We Learn to Eat-Bee Wilson
The World I Fell Out Of-Melanie Reid
First They Killed My Father-Loung Ung
We Have all been harmonised-Kai Strittmater
The Wonders-John Woolf
With The End In Mind-Kathryn Mannix
The Unthinkable: Who survives when disaster strikes and why by Amanda Ripley
War Doctor-David Nott
Ghosts of Spain-Giles Tremlett
Another Day In The Death of America-Gary Younge
Go down Together:The True Untold Story of Bonnie and Clyde-Jeff Guinn
Just Mercy-Brian Stevenson
Killers of the flower moon-David Grann
The Royal Art of Poison-Eleanor Herman
Pale rider-Laura Spinney
The war on women-Sue Lloyd Roberts
Reaching Down The Rabbit Hole-Alan Ropper & B.D Burrell
I'll Be Gone In The Dark-Michelle McNamara
Giants: The Dwarfs of Auschwitz
Scapegoat-Katharine Quarmby
A Life In Death-Richard Venables
Leonardo da Vinci-The Flights of The Mind-Charles Nichol
The Man Who Invented The Twentieth Century-Robert Lomas
Beyond The Pale-Emily Urquhart
From Victim to Hero: The Untold Story of Steven Stayner-Jim Laughter
When Science Goes Wrong-Simon Levay

The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich.

Not remotely my sort of thing at all as a rule, but I couldn’t put it down.

It was by an American journalist called William L Shirer, who was present during a lot of the ‘rise’ in the 1930s - I had read his Berlin Diary many years previously - it was equally gripping.

Forgot 'East West Street' - brilliant book!

Do they hear you when you cry. By Fauzia Kassindja (I think that's how to spell it)

It totally changed my teenage opinions on immigration.

Very rarely read non fiction but thoroughly enjoyed Tim Peake -Limitless , it was very motivational.

War Doctor by David Nott. It's brilliant but unsurprisingly it's also a harrowing read at times.
Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez.
Do No Harm by Dr Henry Marsh. It completely blew my mind.

Far From The Tree by Andrew Solomon - really fascinating book about families where the children have a different "identity" to their parents - like deaf/hearing etc.

I also loved Robert Massy's life of Peter the Great

Loads of good recommendations here.

Primo Levi's If this is a man as the most memorable of the ones mentioned so far, and will also second
Do No Harm
An Evil Cradling (better than Some Other Rainbow)
Touching the Void

I will add
Penelope Lively- Ammonites and Leaping Fish
Lauren Bacall's autobiography - By Myself and then some- was good too.

The Holocaust by Martin Gilbert

The Demon Haunted World by Carl Sagan

Experience by Martin Amis

Love All The People by Bill Hicks

Wild Swans by Jung Chang

Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond
Nothing to Envy
Primo Levi

I second or third all of these.

Favourites from the last couple if years:
The body keeps the score - Bessel Van Der kolk (re trauma, phenomenal book)
Permanent record by Edward snowden (fascinating on the surveillance state and also as a bio of the first generation of computer nerds).
Educated by Tara Westover - growing up in and leaving a survivalist cult
I am an island - Tamsin calidas (learning to love nature and solitude, overcoming loss and hardship)
The salt path -raynor Winn. Journey from and through homelessness, Cornwall.
Trans - Helen Joyce - very readable overview of gender identity ideology.

Wow such a great response! Thank you all for your input, I’ve ordered sapiens as I planned to read this but forgot about.
So many here to check on, Will save this thread

War Doctor - David Nott
When Breath Becomes Air - Paul Kalanithi
Driving Over Lemons - Chris Stewart

Friday Night Lights
The Five

The choice by Edith Eger

I’ve just remembered another I really enjoyed - The Boys in the Boat - about the American rowing team that made it to the Berlin olympics.
I have zero interest in rowing but I really liked that book.

Also "Becoming" by Michelle Obama. So honest and real. Also inspirational.