The best books of 2024

This list is part of the best books of 2024.

Join 856 readers and share your 3 favorite reads of the year.

My favorite read in 2024

Book cover of Super-Infinite: The Transformations of John Donne

Ben Orlin ❤️ loved this book because...

We don't really *know* that much about Donne, beyond his texts. But Rundell has a delicate touch, and turns these fragile materials into a vivid portrait.

  • Loved Most

    🥇 Thoughts 🥈 Writing
  • Writing style

    ❤️ Loved it
  • Pace

    🐕 Good, steady pace

By Katherine Rundell,

Why should I read it?

4 authors picked Super-Infinite as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

**A Sunday Times top ten bestseller**
**Shortlisted for the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award 2023**
**Shortlisted for the Duff Cooper Prize for Non-Fiction 2023**
**Shortlisted for the Slightly Foxed First Biography Prize 2023**

'Masterly.' Observer
'Wonderful, joyous.' Maggie O'Farrell
'Frankly brilliant.' Sunday Times
'Unmissable.' Simon Jenkins
'Every page sparkles.' Claire Tomalin
'A triumph.' Matt Haig
'Stylish, scholarly and gripping.' Rose Tremain

John Donne lived myriad lives. Sometime religious outsider and social disaster, sometime celebrity preacher and establishment darling, Donne was incapable of being just one thing.

He was a scholar of law, a sea adventurer, an MP,…


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My 2nd favorite read in 2024

Book cover of 84, Charing Cross Road

Ben Orlin ❤️ loved this book because...

It's a painfully charming collection of letters. And, as in all the best such books, there's a sense of melancholy beneath the humor (or vice versa).

  • Loved Most

    🥇 Thoughts 🥈 Writing
  • Writing style

    ❤️ Loved it
  • Pace

    🐇 I couldn't put it down

By Helene Hanff,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked 84, Charing Cross Road as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Those who have read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, a novel comprised of only letters between the characters, will see how much that best-seller owes 84, Charing Cross Road." -- Medium.com

A heartwarming love story about people who love books for readers who love books

This funny, poignant, classic love story unfolds through a series of letters between Helene Hanff, a freelance writer living in New York City, and a used-book dealer in London at 84, Charing Cross Road. Through the years, though never meeting and separated both geographically and culturally, they share a charming, sentimental friendship…


My 3rd favorite read in 2024

Book cover of And How Are You, Dr. Sacks? A Biographical Memoir of Oliver Sacks

Ben Orlin ❤️ loved this book because...

Weschler isn't just the rare writer who could match Sack's skill. He was also a friend, who saw every facet of Sack's extraordinary character.

  • Loved Most

    🥇 Thoughts 🥈 Character(s)
  • Writing style

    ❤️ Loved it
  • Pace

    🐌 It was slow at times

By Lawrence Weschler,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked And How Are You, Dr. Sacks? A Biographical Memoir of Oliver Sacks as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The author Lawrence Weschler began spending time with Oliver Sacks in the early 1980s, when he set out to profile the neurologist for his own new employer, The New Yorker. Almost a decade earlier, Dr. Sacks had published his masterpiece Awakenings - the account of his long-dormant patients miraculous but troubling return to life in a Bronx hospital ward. But the book had hardly been an immediate success, and the rumpled clinician was still largely unknown. Over the ensuing four years, the two men worked closely together until, for wracking personal reasons, Sacks asked Weschler to abandon the profile, a…


Don‘t forget about my book 😀

Math for English Majors: A Human Take on the Universal Language

By Ben Orlin,

Book cover of Math for English Majors: A Human Take on the Universal Language

What is my book about?

This book plumbs the depths of mathematical language, from the peculiar abstract nouns known as "numbers" to the intricate truth-generating grammar we call "algebra."