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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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Gino: The Fighting Spirit of Gino Odjick
by Patrick Johnston
When hard-hitting Vancouver Canucks player Gino Odjick emerged in the early 1990s, he quickly became one of the game's most feared enforcers and revered teammates, a sign of a new era for the team. Gino is a moving tribute to a beloved hockey legend.
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| The Royal We by Roddy BottumGay punk rocker Roddy Bottum, famous as the keyboardist for Faith No More, offers a lively memoir about discovering music, queer culture, and high-energy night life in '80s and '90s San Francisco. Self-destructiveness notwithstanding (the author has had his share of risky sex and hard drug abuse), Bottum survived and owns it all, with no regrets and plenty of loopy anecdotes to boot. For more punk-tinged reminiscences, check out Rebel Girl: My Life as a Feminist Punk by Kathleen Hanna. |
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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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| Coyote: The Dramatic Lives of Sam Shepard by Robert M. DowlingRobert M. Dowling’s well-researched biography of actor, playwright, and filmmaker Sam Shepard is an ode to restlessness. Dowling mines gossipy details from Shepard’s gritty, colorful, adventurous life while divulging the angst, trauma, and addiction that goaded him, keeping this creative, troubled soul from ever sitting still for long. For another haunting performing arts biography, try William J. Mann’s The Contender: The Story of Marlon Brando. |
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We Survived the Night
by Julian Brave Noisecat
Born to a Secwepemc father and Jewish-Irish mother, Julian Brave NoiseCat's childhood was full of contradictions. Despite living in the urban Native community of Oakland, California, he was raised primarily by his white mother. He was a competitive powwow dancer, but asked his father to cut his hair short, fearing that his white classmates would call him a girl if he kept it long. When his father, tormented by an abusive and impoverished rez upbringing, eventually left the family, NoiseCat was left to make sense of his Indigenous heritage and identity on his own. Now, decades later, Noisecat has set across the country to correct the erasure, invisibility, and misconceptions surrounding this nation's First Peoples, as he develops his voice as a storyteller and artist in his own right.
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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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Simply More: A Book for Anyone Who Has Been Told They're Too Much
by Cynthia Erivo
Cynthia Erivo learned the music to Wicked a decade before she needed it, not knowing those same lyrics would change her life. Now she has performed those songs on the world stage, showing us there is always time to keep discovering ourselves. And to illustrate that it's often the parts of ourselves we are told to bury that make us shine. In a series of powerful, personal vignettes, Cynthia reflects on the ways she has grown as an actor and human and the practices she's learned over years of performing and reminds us all we are capable of so much more than we think.
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| Racebook: A Personal History of the Internet by Tochi OnyebuchiSci-fi and fantasy author Tochi Onyebuchi, in a series of autobiographical sketches, conjures memories of growing up as a Black American in the internet age, and where these experiences find him today. Dropping references ranging from literature to video games, Onyebuchi yearns for the early years of internet streaming before online culture became rampantly toxic, and offers readers food for thought on topics like racial violence, multiple realities, and how online identities shape our selves. For fans of: the anthology Black Futures, edited by Kimberly Drew and Jenna Wortham. |
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Joan Crawford: A Woman's Face
by Scott Eyman
Joan Crawford burst out of her poverty-stricken youth to become a bright young movie star in the 1920's, drawing the admiration of F. Scott Fitzgerald and the attention of audiences worldwide. She flourished for decades, working for multiple studios in every genre from romance to westerns ( Mildred Pierce, Johnny Guitar), musicals to noir (Torch Song, A Woman's Face), and being directed by a young Steven Spielberg in one of her last appearances. Along the way she accumulated four husbands, an Academy Award for Best Actress, and the undeniable status of a legend. Joan Crawford: A Woman's Face looks at the reality of this remarkable woman through the prism of groundbreaking primary research, interviews with friends and relatives, and with the same insightful analysis of character and motive that author Scott Eyman brought to John Wayne and Cary Grant, among others.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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