The Best (and Most Anticipated) Nonfiction Books of 2024, So Far

"Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through these links."

Truth-swallowing can too often taste of forced medicine. Where the most successful nonfiction triumphs is in its ability to instruct, encourage, and demand without spoon-feeding. Getting to read and reward this year’s best nonfiction, then, is as much a treat as a lesson. I can’t pretend to be as intelligent, empathetic, self-knowledgeable, or even as well-read as many of the authors on this list. But appreciating the results of their labors is a more-than-sufficient consolation.

Below, you’ll discover the exceptional nonfiction we recommend for the first few months of 2024. As with ELLE.com’s other “best of 2024” books lists (including literary fiction; fantasy and sci-fi; romance; and mystery and thrillers), we’ll be updating this list each quarter throughout the year. Each time, we’ll add new forthcoming titles and make space for those that initially missed our radar. For the moment, here’s what essay collections, memoirs, histories, and topical deep dives the months of January through March have for our TBR.

Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture by Kyle Chayka

Out now.

There’s a lot to ponder in the latest project from New Yorker writer Kyle Chayka, who elegantly argues that algorithms have eroded—if not erased—the essential development of personal taste. As Chayka puts forth in Filterworld, the age of flawed-but-fulfilling human cultural curation has given way to the sanitization of Spotify’s so-called “Discover” playlists, or of Netflix’s Emily in Paris, or of subway tile and shiplap. There’s perhaps an old-school sanctimony to this criticism that some readers might chafe against. But there’s also a very real and alarming truth to Chayka’s insights, assembled alongside interviews and examples that span decades, mediums, and genres under the giant umbrella we call “culture.” Filterworld is the kind of book worth wrestling with, critiquing, and absorbing deeply—the antithesis of mindless consumption.

American Girls: One Woman's Journey Into the Islamic State and Her Sister's Fight to Bring Her Home by Jessica Roy

Out now.

In 2019, former ELLE digital director Jessica Roy published a story about the Sally sisters, two American women who grew up in the same Jehovah’s Witness family and married a pair of brothers—but only one of those sisters ended up in Syria, her husband fighting on behalf of ISIS. American Girls, Roy’s nonfiction debut, expands upon that story of sibling love, sibling rivalry, abuse and extremism, adding reams of reporting to create a riveting tale that treats its subjects with true empathy while never flinching from the reality of their choices.

Leonor: The Story of a Lost Childhood by Paula Delgado-Kling

Out now.

In this small but gutting work of memoir-meets-biography, Colombian journalist Paula Delgado-King chronicles two lives that intersect in violence: hers, and that of Leonor, a Colombian child solider who was beckoned into the guerilla Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) only to endure years of death and abuse. Over the course of 19 years, Delgago-King followed Leonor through her recruitment into FARC; her sexual slavery to a man decades her senior; her eventual escape; and her rehabilitation. The author’s resulting account is visceral, a clear-eyed account of the utterly human impact wrought by war.

Madness: Race and Insanity in a Jim Crow Asylum by Antonia Hylton

Out now.

A meticulous work of research and commitment, Antonia Hylton’s Madness takes readers deep inside the nearly century-old history of Maryland’s Crownsville State Hospital, one of the only segregated mental asylums with records—and a campus—that remain to this day. Featuring interviews with both former Crownsville staff and family members of those who lived there, Madness is a radically complex work of historical study, etching the intersections of race, mental health, criminal justice, public health, memory, and the essential quest for human dignity.

Come Together: The Science (and Art!) of Creating Lasting Sexual Connections by Emily Nagoski

Out January 30.

Emily Nagoski’s bestselling Come As You Are opened up a generations-wide conversation about women and their relationship with sex: why some love it, why some hate it, and why it can feel so impossible to find help or answers in either camp. In Come Together, Nagoski returns to the subject with a renewed focus on pleasure—and why it is ultimately so much more pivotal for long-term sexual relationships than spontaneity or frequency. This is not only an accessible, gentle-hearted guide to a still-taboo topic; it’s a fascinating exploration of how our most intimate connections can not just endure but thrive.

Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here: The United States, Central America, and the Making of a Crisis by Jonathan Blitzer

Out January 30.

A remarkable volume—its 500-page length itself underscoring the author’s commitment to the complexity of the problem—Jonathan Blitzer’s Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here tracks the history of the migrant crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border through the intimate accounts of those who’ve lived it. In painstaking detail, Blitzer compiles the history of the U.S.’s involvement in Central America, and illustrates how foreign and immigration policies have irrevocably altered human lives—as well as tying them to one another. “Immigrants have a way of changing two places at once: their new homes and their old ones,” Blitzer writes. “Rather than cleaving apart the worlds of the U.S., El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, the Americans were irrevocably binding them together.”

How to Live Free in a Dangerous World: A Decolonial Memoir by Shayla Lawson

Out February 6.

“I used to say taking a trip was just a coping mechanism,” writes Shayla Lawson in their travel-memoir-in-essays How to Live Free in a Dangerous World. “I know better now; it’s my way of mapping the Earth, so I know there’s something to come back to.” In stream-of-consciousness prose, the This Is Major author guides the reader through an enthralling journey across Zimbabwe, Japan, the Netherlands, France, Spain, Italy, Mexico, Bermuda, and beyond, using each location as the touchstone for their essays exploring how (and why) race, gender, grief, sexuality, beauty, and autonomy impact their experience of a land and its people. There’s a real courage and generosity to Lawson’s work; readers will find much here to embolden their own self-exploration.

Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey Among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See by Bianca Bosker

Out February 6.

There’s no end to the arguments for “why art matters,” but in our era of ephemeral imagery and mass-produced decor, there is enormous wisdom to be gleaned from Get the Picture, Bianca Bosker’s insider account of art-world infatuation. In this new work of nonfiction, readers have the pleasure of following the Cork Dork author as she embeds herself amongst the gallerists, collectors, painters, critics, and performers who fill today’s contemporary scene. There, they teach her (and us) what makes art art—and why that question’s worth asking in an increasingly fractured world.

Alphabetical Diaries by Sheila Heti

Out February 6.

A profoundly unusual, experimental, yet engrossing work of not-quite-memoir, Sheila Heti’s Alphabetical Diaries is exactly what its title promises: The book comprises a decade of the author’s personal diaries, the sentences copied and pasted into alphabetical order. Each chapter begins with a new letter, all the accumulated sentences starting with “A”, then “B,” and so forth. The resulting effect is all but certain to repel some readers who crave a more linear storyline, but for those who can understand her ambition beyond the form, settling into the rhythm of Heti’s poetic observations gives way to a rich narrative reward.

Slow Noodles: A Cambodian Memoir of Love, Loss, and Family Recipes by Chantha Nguon

Out February 20.

“Even now, I can taste my own history,” writes Chantha Nguon in her gorgeous Slow Noodles. “One occupying force tried to erase it all.” In this deeply personal memoir, Nguon guides us through her life as a Cambodian refugee from the Khmer Rouge; her escapes to Vietnam and Thailand; the loss of all those she loved and held dear; and the foods that kept her heritage—and her story—ultimately intact. Interwoven with recipes and lists of ingredients, Nguon’s heart-rending writing reinforces the joy and agony of her core thesis: “The past never goes away.”

Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story by Leslie Jamison

Out February 20.

The first time I stumbled upon a Leslie Jamison essay on (the platform formerly known as) Twitter, I was transfixed; I stayed in bed late into the morning as I clicked through her work, swallowing paragraphs like Skittles. But, of course, Jamison’s work is so much more satisfying than candy, and her new memoir, Splinters, is Jamison operating at the height of her talents. A tale of Jamison’s early motherhood and the end of her marriage, the book is unshrinking, nuanced, radiant, and so wondrously honest—a referendum on the splintered identities that complicate and comprise the artist, the wife, the mother, the woman.

The Great Wave: The Era of Radical Disruption and the Rise of the Outsider by Michiko Kakutani

Out February 20.

The former chief book critic of the New York Times, Michiko Kakutani is not only an invaluable literary denizen, but also a brilliant observer of how politics and culture disrupt the mechanics of power and influence. In The Great Wave, she turns our attention toward global instability as epitomized by figures such as Donald Trump and watershed moments such as the creation of AI. In the midst of these numerous case studies, she argues for how our deeply interconnected world might better weather the competing crises that threaten to submerge us, should we not choose to better understand them.

Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection by Charles Duhigg

Out February 20.

From the author of the now-ubiquitous The Power of Habit arrives Supercommunicators, a head-first study of the tools that make conversations actually work. Charles Duhigg makes the case that every chat is really about one of three inquiries (“What’s this about?” “How do we feel?” or “Who are we?”) and knowing one from another is the key to real connection. Executives and professional-speaker types are sure to glom on to this sort of work, but my hope is that other, less business-oriented motives might be satisfied by the logic this volume imbues.

Whiskey Tender by Deborah Jackson Taffa

Out February 27.

“Tell me your favorite childhood memory, and I’ll tell you who you are,” or so writes Deborah Jackson Taffa in Whiskey Tender, her memoir of assimilation and separation as a mixed-tribe Native woman raised in the shadow of a specific portrait of the American Dream. As a descendant of the Quechan (Yuma) Nation and Laguna Pueblo tribe, Taffa illustrates her childhood in New Mexico while threading through the histories of her parents and grandparents, themselves forever altered by Indian boarding schools, government relocation, prison systems, and the “erasure of [our] own people.” Taffa’s is a story of immense and reverent heart, told with precise and pure skill.

Grief Is for People by Sloane Crosley

Out February 27.

With its chapters organized by their position in the infamous five stages of grief, Sloane Crosley’s Grief is For People is at times bracingly funny, then abruptly sober. The effect is less like whiplash than recognition; anyone who has lost or grieved understands the way these emotions crash into each other without warning. Crosley makes excellent use of this reality in Grief is For People, as she weaves between two wrenching losses in her own life: the death of her dear friend Russell Perreault, and the robbery of her apartment. Crosley’s resulting story—short but powerful—is as difficult and precious and singular as grief itself.

American Negra by Natasha S. Alford

Out February 27.

In American Negra, theGrio and CNN journalist Natasha S. Alford turns toward her own story, tracing the contours of her childhood in Syracuse, New York, as she came to understand the ways her Afro-Latino background built her—and set her apart. As the memoir follows Alford’s coming-of-age from Syracuse to Harvard University, then abroad and, later, across the U.S., the author highlights how she learned to embrace the cornerstones of intersectionality, in spite of her country’s many efforts to encourage the opposite.

The House of Hidden Meanings by RuPaul

Out March 5.

A raw and assured account by one of the most famous queer icons of our era, RuPaul’s memoir, The House of Hidden Meanings, promises readers arms-wide-open access to the drag queen before Drag Race. Detailing his childhood in California, his come-up in the drag scene, his own intimate love story, and his quest for living proudly in the face of unceasing condemnation, The House of Hidden Meanings is easily one of the most intriguing celebrity projects of the year.

Here After by Amy Lin

Out March 5.

Here After reads like poetry: Its tiny, mere-sentences-long chapters only serve to strengthen its elegiac, ferocious impact. I was sobbing within minutes of opening this book. But I implore readers not to avoid the heavy subject matter; they will find in Amy Lin’s memoir such a profound and complex gift: the truth of her devotion to her husband, Kurtis, and the reality of her pain when he died suddenly, with neither platitudes nor hyperbole. This book is a little wonder—a clear, utterly courageous act of love.

Thunder Song by Sasha taqʷšəblu LaPointe

Out March 5.

Red Paint author and poet Sasha taqʷšəblu LaPointe returns this spring with a rhythmic memoir-in-essays called Thunder Song, following the beats of her upbringing as a queer Coast Salish woman entrenched in communities—the punk and music scenes, in particular—that did not always reflect or respect her. Blending beautiful family history with her own personal memories, LaPointe’s writing is a ballad against amnesia, and a call to action for healing, for decolonization, for hope.

Lessons for Survival: Mothering Against "The Apocalypse" by Emily Raboteau

Out March 12.

In Emily Raboteau’s Lessons For Survival, the author (and novelist, essayist, professor, and street photographer) tells us her framework for the book is modeled loosely after one of her mother’s quilts: “pieced together out of love by a parent who wants her children to inherit a world where life is sustainable.” The essays that follow are meditations and reports on motherhood in the midst of compounding crises, whether climate change or war or racism or mental health. Through stories and photographs drawn from her own life and her studies abroad, Raboteau grounds the audience in the beauty—and resilience—of nature.

You Get What You Pay for by Morgan Parker

Out March 12.

In her eagerly anticipated debut essay collection, celebrated writer Morgan Parker ventures boldly inward, illuminating her psyche through the lens of the forces that define and delineate modern Black womanhood. As much a portrait of her own mental health struggles as an penetrating study of American cultural icons, Parker’s You Get What You Pay For is the kind of perceptive work that understands how—and why—the two were never unrelated.

How to Be Old: Lessons in Living Boldly from the Accidental Icon by Lyn Slater

Out March 12.

It is difficult, gazing upon the portrait of Lyn Slater that covers her new book, How to Be Old, not to want to become her: to wear those (literally) rose-tinted glasses; to try that shade of fuchsia lipstick; to age with such obvious elegance. But as the model, influencer, writer, and former professor herself tells us, “How old I am is hands down the most boring fact about me.” In How to Be Old, Slater goes on to illustrate the truth of that declaration, chronicling her sexagenarian years as Instagram’s “Accidental Icon”—along with the wisdom (and, yes, clothes) acquired along the way. A fun but discerning romp through an era of dramatic change.

The Manicurist's Daughter by Susan Lieu

Out March 12.

When Susan Lieu was 11 years old, her mother—the owner of two successful nail salons, and a Vietnamese refugee who’d brought Susan’s family to California in the ’80s—went in for plastic surgery. She “figured she would be home the next day with her beautiful new body,” Lieu writes. Instead, she died from a tragically botched surgery, which would one day lead Lieu to track down answers: What happened between the doctor and her mother? Why did she want surgery in the first place? What did she leave behind in Vietnam? What did “living the American Dream” mean to her, and why? Lieu’s resulting memoir is a stunning feat of investigation, introspection, wit and candor; it braids together family history, grief, body image, food, class, race, and resilience for insight that must not be missed.

The Black Box: Writing the Race by Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

Out March 19.

The Black Box, by award-winning scholar, professor, journalist, critic, and filmmaker Henry Louis Gates, Jr., is an absolute tour de force. Developed from the author’s introductory African American studies course at Harvard University, the book is a study in the art, intellect, and inherent contradictions that define the making of a people. As Gates, Jr. writes, “For me, the black box is a powerful metaphor for the circumscribed universe of being within which people of African descent were forced to attempt to construct a new identity after emerging on this side of the Atlantic after the horrors of the Middle Passage... But it is also a resonant metaphor for the social and cultural world that they created within this circumscribed space.”

Who‘s Afraid of Gender? by Judith Butler

Out March 19.

Dedicated to “the young people who still teach me,” Judith Butler’s Who’s Afraid of Gender? brings together the philosopher’s arguments on “anti-gender ideology”—how and why the obfuscation of gender has become a tool through which authoritarian movements grow. Dense and convicting, Butler’s latest is itself an act of resistance, and a necessary tool for those seeking a deeper understanding of gender identity’s nuances amidst political turmoil.

Mother Island: A Daughter Claims Puerto Rico by Jamie Figueroa

Out March 19.

With a mosaic approach keenly represented by its cover, Jamie Figueroa’s Mother Island is a story of self-creation, epitomized by one of Figueroa’s earliest lines in the book: “I wished locating myself were as easy as looking at these maps.” Seeking a deeper connection to the Puerto Rican roots that felt so distant in her childhood home of Ohio, the Brother, Sister, Mother, Explorer author embarks on a journey to “claim Puerto Rico,” and to make sense of the long, tangled family lineage that complicates her own past. This book is valiant work of cultural excavation, and a deft guide to understanding the narratives that shape us all.

No Judgment by Lauren Oyler

Out March 19.

“To admit that the best revenge is patient, quiet, clever, and untraceable would mean admitting not only that we care about what other people think but also that maybe, sometimes, we should.” So begins the critic and novelist Lauren Oyler in the introduction of her essay collection No Judgment, which argues for the necessity of criticism itself in an era obsessed with the “discursive shield” of “no judgment.” Employing her signature take-no-prisoners approach, Oyler’s latest is as acerbic and astute as her fans (and critics) have come to expect.

Rabbit Heart: A Mother‘s Murder, a Daughter‘s Story by Kristine S. Ervin

Out March 26.

Rabbit Heart is an aching account of a daughter’s devotion and the incomprehensible crime that stole her mother from her. When author Kristine S. Ervin was only 8 years old, two men abducted her mother in an Oklahoma parking lot and killed her. In the years that followed, Kristine sought to understand the mother she did not get to grow up with, and—eventually—to learn the truth of her death. This graceful resulting memoir wrestles with failures of justice; the nuances of gendered violence; and the difficulty of making do when we are not whole.

There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension by Hanif Abdurraqib

Out March 26.

Late last year, a dear friend pressed one of Hanif Abdurraqib’s books into my hands with something like prescience. It was as if she knew I’d need it, this essay collection about Serena Williams and Chance the Rapper and Fall Out Boy. And she was right: I needed to be prepared for this March, when Abdurraqib’s latest is finally arriving. Called There’s Always This Year, it’s a memoir about the author’s lifelong relationship with basketball (also one of my first loves), but really about who gets to be champions, what it truly means to love the game, and—well, the state of Ohio. I simply can’t wait to devour this book.

You Might Also Like

• The 15 Best Organic And Clean Shampoos For Any And All Hair Types

• 100 Gifts That Are $50 Or Under (And Look Way More Expensive Than They Actually Are)