Biography and Memoir
June 2026

Rasputin: The Downfall of the Romanovs
by Antony Beevor

Russian peasant turned mystic Grigori Rasputin was surrounded by dark rumors while serving the court of Nicholas II and Alexandra in pre-revolution St. Petersburg. People whispered that he had superhuman healing powers and conducted orgies with women of the court. Historian Antony Beevor separates myth from fact, concluding that Rasputin’s abuse of the Tsar’s trust coupled with his well-known corruption and lechery likely helped undermine public faith in the Russian royal house, eventually leading to his murder.
Labor: One Woman's Work
by Dr. Mary Fariba Afsari

Mary Farib Afsari is an Iranian American OB/GYN physician who practices out of an RV, partly so that she can bring her services to transgender patients and others who have justified fears of coming to hospitals and medical offices. Afsari movingly tells the story of her Iranian grandmother, whose preventable death during pregnancy played a major role in motivating Mary to go into reproductive care. 
American Rambler: Walking the Trail of Johnny Appleseed
by Isaac Fitzgerald

Memoirist Isaac Fitzgerald (Dirtbag, Massachusetts) combines a love of walking and a fascination with pioneer Johnny Appleseed (aka John Chapman) in his traveling tale, in which he attempts to walk along Chapman’s historic route from Massachusetts to Indiana. Along his journey, Fitzgerald shares his curiosity about the Appleseed legend, myth-making, his own history, and small-town America in a “stirring, singular” (Publishers Weekly) memoir. 
On Eating: The Making and Unmaking of My Appetites by Alicia Kennedy
On Eating: The Making and Unmaking of My Appetites
by Alicia Kennedy

With lush prose and evocative storytelling, Alicia Kennedy shares her journey from eater to cook, exploring how we can eat for both joy and justice in a warming, overworked, and globalized world. 
I Belong to Me: A Survivor's Guide to Recovery and Hope After Religious Trauma by Tia Levings
I Belong to Me: A Survivor's Guide to Recovery and Hope After Religious Trauma
by Tia Levings

What does it mean to heal from trauma caused by the people, beliefs, and practices of your faith? And to rebuild a sense of self, when high-control religion said you shouldn't have one? Indoctrinated from early childhood to obey, conform, and want what others wanted for her, Tia Levings learned love and acceptance meant being someone other than herself. After years of abuse in a violent marriage and high-control religion, Tia Levings escaped with her children (a story told in her memoir, A Well-Trained Wife) and thought the hardest was behind her. But leaving was just the beginning. 
Selling Opportunity: The Story of Mary Kay
by Mary Lisa Gavenas

Mary Kay Ash, born Mary Kathlyn Wagner, was married with children by age sixteen, and began selling goods to housewives door-to-door to help make ends meet in Depression-era Texas. Decades later, she founded Mary Kay Cosmetics and recruited a sales army of her own. Former Glamour editor Mary Lisa Gavenas reveals the key to Ash’s success: selling the idea of financial independence to ambitious American women like herself. Read-alike: Becoming Elizabeth Arden: The Woman Behind the Global Beauty Empire by Stacy A. Cordery.
This Is Me: A Reckoning by Hayden Panettiere
This Is Me: A Reckoning
by Hayden Panettiere

Heroes and Nashville star Hayden Panettiere reclaims her story in a remarkably candid memoir. Hayden Panettiere's career in entertainment began before she was old enough to walk. From early commercials to film and television roles in hits like Remember the Titans, her career unfolded in the public eye, resulting in tremendous success by her early teens. She had become a fixture of early-2000s pop culture, earning acclaim for performances in Heroes, Nashville (which earned her two Golden Globe nominations), and beyond--while quietly carrying the weight of expectations that came with being Hollywood's It girl. 
Say It in Letters
While collections of personal letters aren’t technically biographies, letters written by (and to) famous people can be a wellspring of primary source material that biographers use to study their subjects. Indeed, people often reveal sides of themselves in the letters they write that they wouldn’t to the rest of the world! Enjoy these titles that feature interesting people’s collections of correspondence.
 
 
Notes to John
by Joan Didion

After author Joan Didion died in 2021, a journal was found among her papers addressed to her husband John Gregory Dunne, written in the early 2000s and concerning psychotherapy treatment that she received at the behest of her daughter, Quintana Roo Dunne. Readers will empathize with Didion as she gives a detailed account of these intimate but painful talk-therapy sessions, which cover fraught family dynamics, alcoholism, guilt, and emotional distance. 
Letters
by Oliver Sacks; edited by Kate Edgar

In this highly readable collection of letters from neurologist Oliver Sacks (The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat), readers are treated to the author’s familiar charm, curiosity, and warmth, whether he is communicating with colleagues about innovative forms of therapy or pleading with the California DMV not to suspend his driver’s license. These “very enjoyable” (Kirkus Reviews) selections were compiled by Sacks’ longtime assistant, Kate Edgar. 
Too L.A.: Letters Never Sent (But Some Were) by Eve Babitz
Too L.A.: Letters Never Sent (But Some Were)
by Eve Babitz

Pore over the letters of Eve Babitz--queen of the witty, gossipy, and thoroughly engrossing missive. Joan Didion, Joseph Heller, Annie Leibovitz, Paul Ruscha, Anne Rice, Steve Martin, and many others appear in this first-of-its-kind collection. 
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