Hello! I’ve been a long time book lover since I was a child, in my early twenties I began to move from YA books to adult fiction (fantasy, sci-fi, horror, graphic novels.. genre didn’t matter as long as the book was interesting) and now that I’m approaching my 30s I’m becoming curious about non-fiction books . I love learning and am genuinely interested in history and the world around me but the few non-fiction books I’ve picked up I found to be boring, even in subjects I thought would’ve been most interesting to me. I think it comes down to the writing style and how “dense” a book is.
So my ask is for a non-fiction book, could be about anything, that would be a good “starter” book for someone new to the genre. Probably a book that isn’t too long – and while no topic is off-limits I’m not that interested in reading about war (unless it’s a small part of a larger history discussed in the book). Basically I feel my learning has become stagnant in the last few years and would like to work on that!
Thank you!
by EllaDorado
1 Comment
Some less dense nonfiction books that I have liked:
* The Ghost Map by Steven Johnson, about a historical cholera outbreak in London that led to the discovery of waterborne disease and the beginning of modern epidemiology.
* Darwin Comes to Town by Menno Schilthuizen, about urban wildlife and how animals are adapting to human environments.
* The author Mary Roach writes a lot of nonfiction on different topics. I have only read her book Stiff, which is about what happens to human bodies after death (forensics, decomposition, what happens when you donate your body to science, etc.) but I see her books recommended in this subreddit a lot.
* Big Chicken by Maryn McKenna, about antibiotic use in the history of agriculture. This is a topic I have a lot of background knowledge in so I can’t be certain it is truly entry level, but I think it does a good job of explaining things.
* A City on Mars by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith. This book is on my to-read list, but I haven’t read it myself yet.