As I wrote in Part One, with a list of fiction titles, reading about others coping with their own isolation and restrictions can help us gain perspective. Through books read in my lifetime or with my book club, today I provide four nonfiction options.

The books are not new releases so you might get them used on ABEBooks or as e-book rentals from libraries. Links to purchase the recommendations are also here on my BookShop list, Karen’s Reads & Book Club Picks.

Karen’s Four Nonfiction Reads

Talking to Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell

I know this seems like an odd title to include when we’re not talking to strangers much these days, but Gladwell is a nonfiction genius and always worth reading. I loved his startling look at how often we encounter new people, label them as good or bad, and we get it totally wrong. Using cases of Cuban CIA operatives, television sitcom faces, Amanda Knox, Sandra Bland, Sylvia Plath, and more, the data in this book will help you rexamine your interactions with strangers as truly strange indeed. Buy the book.

The Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela

I read this years ago, but his story has long stuck with me because it is told in his own words, and Mandela has an unforgettably indomitable and resilient spirit. I am saddened that the long walk for so many people is still uphill, but words from Mandela give me hope for humanity. “I could not imagine that the future I was walking toward could compare in any way to the past that I was leaving behind.” Buy the book.

Educated by Tara Westover

One of the finest examples of how education can release a person from the prison imposed upon their mind by those who are supposed to love them the most. Through a quest for knowledge, Westover writes a memoir so in-the-moment that we feel trapped in her survivalist family with her. I felt equally nervous and naïve when she stepped into the classroom for the first time at age seventeen. She makes an education seem within reach to all—even those with nothing but a desire for something other than the oppressive life into which they are born …Buy the Book.

Bossypants by Tina Fey

I love this woman and her comedy is indeed whip-smart. Why is her book on this list? First, we need to laugh and, without doubt, my other recommendations do not really include many chuckles. But it’s also because Tina was a woman who rose through a world of comedy that was too-long deemed “male only.” Saturday Night Live had never had a female head writer until Tina Fey. (Hence the hairy man-arms on a book cover that makes her look at ease for breaking into a boys club.) Her way of looking at the world is not too dissimilar to the way many of us see it now. Odd and absurd but still worth navigating. Buy the book.

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Reader Insights: So many nonfiction American Revolution titles were a part of the research to help me build Carrying Independence. For a list of some of those titles check out my Pinterest Carrying Independence Research page or visit my Chasing Histories Bookstore Page. Carrying Independence is available as an ebook and in print.

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