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Biography and Memoir July 2026 |
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| True Crime by Patricia CornwellKay Scarpetta series author Patricia Cornwell’s autobiography reads like a gritty, dramatic backstory for one of her characters. She talks plainly but captivatingly about her dysfunctional childhood, the multiple incidents of sexual violence she endured, her early journalism career, and the real-life female medical examiner who served as inspiration for Scarpetta. This chatty, candid memoir has “more action and drama than many novels” (Kirkus Reviews). |
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| Backtalker: An American Memoir by Kimberlé Williams CrenshawLegal scholar Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw has put rigorous research behind her coined concept of “intersectionality” -- a term describing the experience of more than one socially marginalized identity. But her own experiences as a Black girl and woman provided her with ample source material, which she relates in an impassioned, straightforward memoir that “vibrates with authority” (Publishers Weekly). For fans of: Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot by Mikki Kendall. |
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Experienced: On the Road with Jimi Hendrix and Beyond
by Eric Barrett
As Jimi Hendrix's road manager, Eric Barrett was there when the amps blew in Milan, when Hendrix set Woodstock ablaze, when paranoia crackled through the Toronto airport, when his music electrified a sea of 600,000 at the Isle of Wight, and in the quiet hours backstage when Hendrix revealed the insecurities behind his genius. Hendrix confided in few people. Barrett was one of them. No one was closer to Hendrix's supernatural talent--or his demons. Experienced is Barrett's long-awaited, unflinching memoir: the definitive inside account of Hendrix as friend, bandleader, and phenomenon. It strips away the mythology to reveal the man in all his musical wizardry and human contradictions. It reveals Hendrix as volatile, generous, insecure, incandescently creative, and always in pursuit of the next sound. While his journey with Hendrix provides the book's spine, Barrett's decades on tour with David Bowie, Madonna, George Michael, and others add depth, parallels, and a sweeping sense of how Hendrix's short life set the template for rock 'n' roll excess--and survival--through the decades. The result is not just another rock memoir but a oncein-a-lifetime backstage history of music's most transformative years, told through the prism of Barrett's ride on Hendrix's feedback-fueled rise and tragic fall.
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| Monster of a Land: On the Road in Search of Modern America by Lauren HoughMemoirist Lauren Hough hits the road with her dog, Woody, in an American travelogue inspired by John Steinbeck’s Travels with Charley. As she traverses the states, Hough alternates road anecdotes with scenes from her life -- pondering friendship cut short by death and taking stock of modern life’s compromises and indignities; yet she somehow mines hopeful conclusions in a book that’s “as much of a journey inward as it is outward” (Library Journal). For fans of: The 10: A Memoir of Family and the Open Road by E. A. Hanks. |
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| The Sane One: A Memoir by the Co-Creator of Pen15 by Anna KonkleActor and television writer Anna Konkle’s debut memoir explores her adolescent years with the same awkward, cringey humor that characterizes Pen15, the Hulu series that she co-created with Maya Erskine. But Konkle also shows her somber side by candidly addressing her extremely strained relationship with her divorced father (thankfully mended by the time the latter passed away from cancer). For another funny yet moving life story, try Joyful Recollections of Trauma by Paul Scheer. |
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| Checkmate: Genius, Lies, Ambition, and the Biggest Scandal in Chess by Ben MezrichIn September 2022, 19-year-old chess competitor Hans Niemann toppled grandmaster Magnus Carlsen in a face-to-face match, stunning the chess world. Carlsen accused Niemann of cheating shortly afterwards, and author Ben Mezrich (Breaking Twitter) revisits the resulting scandal. The back-and-forth recriminations, intensified by the involvement of the popular gaming site Chess.com, would turn this high-drama feud into the stuff of legends. Try this next: Rebel Queen: The Cold War, Misogyny, and the Making of a Grandmaster by Susan Polgar. |
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From Typewriter to Takeoff: The Life of Journalist and Aviatrix Harriet Quimby
by Norman Tyler
Before Amelia Earhart, there was Harriet Quimby--the daring journalist turned aviatrix who conquered the skies. Harriet Quimby was once one of the best-known women of the early twentieth century. An international celebrity, she achieved many firsts during her life--the first New York journalist to capture the world with a camera; an early woman driver capable of serving as mechanic for her 1905 Cadillac Runabout; one of the first silent-film actresses, who authored screenplays for director D.W. Griffith; the nation's first woman to earn a pilot's license; the first woman to fly solo over Mexico and across the English Channel; and a celebrity paid a handsome fee of $100,000 to be the featured flier in the 1912 Boston Air Show. Amelia Earhart said of her predecessor, To cross the English Channel in 1912 required more bravery and skill than to cross the Atlantic today. . . . We must remember that, in thinking of America's first great woman flier's accomplishment. Harriet was clearly a risk-taker in all aspects of her life and career: a gutsy, passionate, woman with fire in her eyes and unwavering resolve, living in a man's world and loving every minute of it while keeping her striking femininity smartly intact. The tragedy of her all-too-brief life encompasses much of historical interest and mirrors one of the most interesting eras of American history.
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| Something We Said: Richard Pryor, a Notorious Word, and Me by Elizabeth Stordeur PryorThe inspiration for history professor Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor’s memoir began with a tense moment in class when a student casually dropped the same racial epithet that her father, the late comedian Richard Pryor, had used countless times in his stage shows as a storytelling device and a totem of Black identity. Pryor recalls treasured moments with her father while considering the complicated multiple meanings of a charged part of our lexicon. |
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Behind the Desk at the Main: A Librarian's Memoir
by Dorothy Lazard
From a celebrated librarian and public historian, a memoir about the promise of public libraries in a fractured world. When Dorothy Lazard became a public librarian, she returned to the building that had shaped her life from childhood. At the flagship branch (the Main) of the Oakland Public Library, she connected with her hometown to a degree that few people experience. Helping her fellow community members and ultimately becoming the keeper of Oakland's public history archives, she witnessed the joys and dilemmas that shape one of the most diverse cities in the US. In Behind the Desk at the Main, Lazard takes readers through the day-to-day life of library work with love, wit, and candor. As the cracks in American society grow and our public institutions are strained to the breaking point, libraries remain the cherished containers of our ideals: They are places of curiosity, imagination, memory, and togetherness. Lazard reveals the pressures that library workers face--from economic crises to book bans and political upheaval--as they uphold these ideals in a fractured world. Filled with humor and urgency, Behind the Desk at the Main is a testament to the power of books and community in a time of division.
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| Malcolm in the Desert: Wisdom from the Spiritual Transformation of Malcolm X by Ilyasah ShabazzActivist Ilyasah Shabazz, the daughter of civil rights leader Malcolm X, reflects on the significance of her father’s 1964 spiritual pilgrimage to Mecca, when he was still finding his theological footing after his ouster from the Nation of Islam. Interestingly, she frames the biography as a step-by-step guide which mirrors the stages of X’s transition from a separatist ideology to an embracing of connection with Muslims of every color. Shabazz's unconventional take on her father’s journey will inspire readers seeking enlightenment and liberation. |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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Carrollton Public Library 1700 Keller Springs Road, Carrollton Texas 75006 4220 North Josey Lane, Carrollton Texas 75010 |
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