Originally a journalist, Jean-Dominique Bauby became a quadriplegic after a massive stroke.  His memoir, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, centers on the author’s life and thoughts while suffering from locked-in-syndrome, where a patient is able to move only their eyes.  Thus, Bauby wrote The Diving Bell and the Butterfly entirely through the interpretation of his blinks, a testament to his tenacity and will to continue sharing stories with others despite his debilitating physical condition.

Bauby’s chronicles not only include snippets of his experiences in the hospital, but express the vivid imagery which he envisions during the day.  The contrast between these affairs is striking: while Bauby recounts the challenges of accomplishing basic human needs such as nutrition, he also fantasizes about a great feast.  Hence, Bauby’s reality weighs him down as if he is trapped inside a diving bell, while his imagination, like a butterfly, acts as his only path to freedom.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly serves as a poignant insight into the mind of a man in a helpless situation.  Despite Bauby’s passing two days after the publication of the novel, his legacy persists through the novel’s contents and its profound emotional impact.  Readers who enjoy new perspectives and wish to delve simultaneously into the cognition and fantasy of a humorous, imaginative man will have much to take away.  

Kirk Wallace Johnson

On a quiet night in 2009, in a seemingly random town in England, a college student breaks into a museum and steals 299 dead bird specimens. This bizarre story raises a million questions in the reader's mind. Who’s this kid who stole them? Why’d he do it? Why are there so many bird corpses in a random museum? Kirk Wallace Johnson had all of these questions and more when he first heard this strange anecdote. This book, The Feather Thief, is the result of the truly gigantic amount of research he did to answer all of these questions.

The Feather Thief is not just an explanation of a strange heist, it's a story of mankind’s obsession with the beauty of the natural world. Johnson manages to lay out a full chronology of everything having to do with the feathers that college student, Edwin Rist, stole that night in 2009. He begins with the little-known story of the self-made naturalist who first observed the Birds of Paradise, famous for their incredible plumage, and from there moves on to talk about the various individuals, including Rist, that grew obsessed with the otherworldly beauty of these “divine birds.” Johnson’s story at times feels like a nature documentary, at other times a biography or a heist movie or a law drama, and it succeeds at all of these. This book contains stories about malaria fever dreams, golden flutes, and Sacha Baron-Cohen’s cousin, but on every single beat Johnson manages to keep the reader engaged and focused. He creates a sprawling narrative about just how far humans will go for beauty while driving home the real, heartbreaking cost of this endless, and sometimes incredibly stupid, pursuit.

Praised by not just the film, the novel Just Mercy was awarded the 2015 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction, given annually by the American Library Association. The book was also awarded the 2015 Dayton Literary Peace Prize for Nonfiction and the 2015 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work in Nonfiction. In the novel, non-profit lawyer Bryan Stevenson shares powerful true stories as he fights through injustices, representing individuals on death row. The story demonstrates the extent to which brutality, unfairness, and racial bias continue to infect criminal law in the United States. Even though Stevenson was against tremendous odds, his persistence and determination to free scores of people from unjust or excessive punishments never let it stop him. Every page is a call for action, a refusal to just watch innocent lives evaporate away due to a corrupt system. While there were some pages that made you shead handfuls of tears, others gave hope and rage. Reading inhumane practices that completely destroy the poor and disadvantaged inform the reader about practices one would never believe were still occurring just a few years ago. Just Mercy should be read by people of conscience in every civilized country in the world to discover what happens when revenge and retribution replace justice and mercy. This novel is hands down one of the best and most compelling stories i've laid my eyes on. 

Written by the astrophysicist John Gribbin, The Scientists provides readers with a comprehensive, compelling, and engaging history of science by chronicling the lives of the most famous and influential scientists from the age of the Renaissance to the modern era. In addition to enjoying the rich biographical and scientific lives of luminaries such as Isaac Newton, Galileo Galilei, Michael Faraday, and Albert Einstein, readers will gain several valuable life lessons.

In its opening chapters, The Scientists highlights the importance of independent thinking, rather than accepting received wisdom uncritically. Rapid scientific progress in Europe during the Enlightenment only began with the rejection of scientific wisdom that had been accepted as true for more than a millennium. For example, Nicolaus Copernicus's proposal of the heliocentric model of the universe, later confirmed by the astronomical observations of Galileo Galilei, upended the previously accepted geocentric model of the universe. Similarly, Galileo's discovery that all objects fall to the ground at the same speed disproved Aristotle's assertion that heavier objects fall at faster speeds.

Additionally, The Scientists presents the theme that, with adequate passion and determination, one can overcome all obstacles. The life of Michael Faraday represents this truth. In an age when university education was standard for all aspiring scientists, Faraday, living in poverty with little formal education during his childhood, seemed to have little hope of achieving his ambition of becoming a great scientist. However, the young Faraday's curiosity and inquisitive nature impressed the local bookbinder George Riebau, who offered him an apprenticeship at his bookshop, which Faraday accepted. During his apprenticeship, Faraday showed his curiosity and enthusiasm for science by keeping books with detailed notes for his scientific experiments, impressing a man with connections to Humphry Davy, one of the most eminent scientists of the era. This man later offered Faraday the opportunity to attend one of Davy's famous scientific lectures. In quick succession, Faraday attended one of Davy's lectures, became Davy's assistant, and eventually discovered electromagnetic induction, earning the reputation as one of the greatest experimental scientists in history.

Overall, The Scientists, with the highly-applicable life lessons it presents, is a phenomenal book for any reader interested in science, technology, history, or self-improvement.

          How far would you go for education? For the right to privilege? For the right to be free. Patillo Beals perfectly answers these questions in her memoir, Warriors Don’t Cry. Published in 1994, Warriors Don’t Cry tells the story of one of the members of the Little Rock Nine as she traverses the plains of the unknown during the famous integration of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas in the year 1957. 

This book is a modern classic not because it runs on fiction or tells a complex story by adding developed grammar and structure but it rather touches on the real-world situation involving race, gender, and their rights to school. Pattillo Beals recaps her days at Central High as she is transported by US army officers to each of her classes. She deals with the struggle of severe bullying from the Central High students as well as the discrimination from teachers and staff members that treat her much differently than the others. In one instance, Pattillo Beals sees herself running and failing to escape attacking students, who abuse her. Pattillo Beals transports readers into the position of a black girl during the effects of the Brown v. Board of Education act. Readers are able to sympathize with the author as she balances her difficult school life with her even more difficult home life as a result of her actions. She is constantly attacked from every corner and even her family becomes pitied by readers as Melba weighs her life-altering decision on her head. Although the book is spectacular on many fronts, it does fail the test of time as explanations of events become harder and harder to understand with emerging modern audiences. However, the good outweighs the bad in this situation and Pattillo Beals’ novel about growth and resilience is certainly a story that will resonate feelings with readers, even if they wouldn’t understand.