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Biography and Memoir December 2025 |
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| Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts by Margaret AtwoodIn Book of Lives, Canadian author Margaret Atwood brings readers a long-awaited, “marvelously witty” (Kirkus Reviews) memoir. Writing as much about her craft as her life story, Atwood reveals how both have influenced one another, for instance explaining how the dystopian setting for The Handmaid’s Tale was in part inspired by a stint in 1980s Berlin. For another memoir that ruminates on the writing life, try Novelist as a Vocation by Haruki Murakami. |
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| The Uncool by Cameron CroweIn the 1970s, writer/director Cameron Crowe was an up-and-coming teenaged rock journalist, writing for Rolling Stone and touring with the likes of Led Zeppelin and the Allman Brothers. Although peppered with upbeat road stories, Crowe’s memoir seamlessly weaves in more emotional passages about close relationships, his older sister’s suicide, and his later fame as a filmmaker. For fans of: Going into the City: Portrait of a Critic as a Young Man by Robert Christgau; the Crowe-directed film Almost Famous. |
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Bread of Angels: A Memoir by Patti SmithThe most intimate of Smith's memoirs, Bread of Angels takes us through her teenage years when the first glimmers of art and romance take hold. Arthur Rimbaud and Bob Dylan emerge as creative heroes and role models as Smith starts to write poetry, then lyrics, merging both into the iconic recordings and songs such as Horses and Easter, 'Dancing Barefoot' and 'Because the Night.' She leaves it all behind to marry her one true love, Fred 'Sonic' Smith, with whom she creates a life of devotion and adventure on a canal in St. Clair Shores, Michigan. As Smith suffers profound losses, grief and gratitude are braided through years of caring for her children, rebuilding her life, and, finally, writing again. For further reading: Patti Smith's Just Kids.
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| We Did OK, Kid by Anthony HopkinsOscar-winning actor Anthony Hopkins delights with a memoir that is “quiet and restrained but with some darker stuff going on underneath” (Booklist). The introverted only son of working-class Welsh parents who worried about his apparent aimlessness, Hopkins eventually found his way to amateur theater and then the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, all to his own great surprise. For such a venerated artist, his writing is as humble, candid, and thoughtful as the book’s title would suggest. Try this next: The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man by Paul Newman. |
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Tenderheaded: A Memoir by Michaela angela DavisTenderheaded is the coming-of-age story of a stylist and editor who hustled during the golden age of the downtown NYC scene of the '80s, established a career through the hip-hop-fueled '90s, and reckoned with the media industry in the post-racial Obama years while being in service to Black women every step of the way. With a life and career as complex and textured as her hair, Davis has written more than a memoir. A tribute to Black girls and women everywhere, Tenderheaded is a cultural manifesto that reckons with the role media and American history play in the fascinating and chaotic shaping of a collective identity. Try this next: More Than Enough by Elaine Welteroth.
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| The Man of Many Fathers: Life Lessons Disguised as a Memoir by Roy Wood, Jr.Comedian and television personality Roy Wood, Jr.’s memoir is filled with lessons he learned the hard way from various “father” figures, including his real father, who played a peripatetic but influential role in his son’s life. Some of these figures offered Wood wisdom and advice, while others gave him examples not to follow, but they all made enough of an impression to become comedy gold in a debut that is also “refreshingly earnest” (Kirkus Reviews). If you like this, check out Being Henry: The Fonz…and Beyond by Henry Winkler. |
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Next of Kin: A Memoir by Gabrielle HamiltonIn her long-awaited new memoir, New York Times bestselling author and James Beard Award winner tells the raw and darkly humorous (People) story of her family's unexpected dissolution. Hamilton offers a keen and compassionate portrait of the people she grew up with and the prevailing but soon-to-falter ethos of the era that produced them. A personal account of one family's disintegration, Next of Kin is also a universal story of the emotional clarity that comes from scrutinizing our family mythologies and seeing through to the other side. For further reading check out Hamilton's previous biography, Blood, Bones & Butter.
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Biographies You Might Have Missed
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Mainline Mama
by Keeonna Harris
PEN America Writing for Justice Fellow Keeonna Harris debuts with a searing account of her experiences navigating the prison industrial complex after her partner was sentenced to 22 years in prison following their son's birth. Try this next: Somebody's Daughter by Ashley C. Ford.
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Articulate: A Deaf Memoir of Voice by Rachel KolbRachel Kolb was born profoundly deaf the same year that the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed, and she grew up as part of the first generation of deaf people with legal rights to accessibility services. In Articulate, Kolb blends personal narrative with cultural commentary to explore the different layers of deafness, language, and voice. She deconstructs multisensory experiences of language, examining the cultural importance hearing people attach to sound, the inner labyrinths of speech therapy, the murkiness of lipreading, and her lifelong intimacy with written English. Try this next: But You Look So Normal: Lost And Found in a Hearing World by Claudia Marseille.
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Mike Campbell's Heartbreaker is part rags-to-riches story and part raucous, seat-of-the-pants adventure, recounting Campbell's life and times as lead guitarist of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Brilliant, soft-spoken and intensely private, Campbell opens up within these pages for the first time, revealing himself to be an astute observer of triumphs, tragedies and absurdities alike, with a songwriter's eye for the telling detail and a voice as direct and unpretentious as his music. Try this next: Still Alright by Kenny Loggins. |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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Forsyth County Public Library
660 W. Fifth St., Winston-Salem, NC 27101
336-703-2665forsythlibrary.org |
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