The most recommended books on malaria

Who picked these books? Meet our 17 experts.

17 authors created a book list connected to malaria, and here are their favorite malaria books.
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Book cover of The Life You Can Save: How to Do Your Part to End World Poverty

William MacAskill Author Of What We Owe the Future

From my list on doing good.

Why am I passionate about this?

William MacAskill is an associate professor in philosophy at the University of Oxford. At the time of his appointment, he was the youngest associate professor of philosophy in the world. He cofounded the nonprofits Giving What We Can, the Centre for Effective Altruism, and Y Combinator–backed 80,000 Hours, which together have moved over $300 million to effective charities. He is the author of Doing Good Better and What We Owe The Future.

William's book list on doing good

William MacAskill Why did William love this book?

In The Life You Can Save, Peter Singer makes the case that we can do a tremendous amount of good by donating to high-impact charities. Every year, hundreds of thousands of children die from preventable diseases, and at little cost to ourselves, we can make an enormous positive difference by giving to organizations like the Against Malaria Foundation. 

By Peter Singer,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Life You Can Save as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

For the first time in history, eradicating world poverty is within our reach. Yet around the world, a billion people struggle to live each day on less than many of us pay for bottled water.

In The Life You Can Save, Peter Singer uses ethical arguments, illuminating examples, and case studies of charitable giving to show that our current response to world poverty is not only insufficient but morally indefensible. The Life You Can Save teaches us to be a part of the solution, helping others as we help ourselves.

'A persuasive and inspiring work that will change the way…


Book cover of Legacy of Hunger

Jason Pere Author Of Calling the Reaper: First Book of Purgatory

From my list on fantasy not afraid of a bittersweet ending.

Why am I passionate about this?

I currently reside in my home state of Connecticut with my darling wife and a duo of sweet cuddly dogs. I am a renaissance man having dabbled in Acting for Film and Theater, Fencing and Mixed Martial Arts, Professional Dorkary, and a bevy of other passions before coming to land on writing. Having stepped into numerous fantasy worlds over the years I have had the chance to sample many different flavors of imagination and developed a refined taste for all things dark, mystical, and tragic. 

Jason's book list on fantasy not afraid of a bittersweet ending

Jason Pere Why did Jason love this book?

Despite being a work of fantasy the level of research and authenticity has to be gravely respected. The storytelling is organic and feels effortlessly natural while still delivering a compelling mix of action and intrigue. Students of Celtic history will eat up the genuine feel that Nicholas is able to produce in her work from cover to cover.

By Christy Nicholas,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Legacy of Hunger as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

When the magical secrets of The Emerald Isle beckon, will she survive answering the call?

Pittsburgh, 1846. Valentia McDowell wishes she could rest. Plagued by nightmares of her grandmother’s mysterious brooch lost in Ireland, the well-off woman grows more troubled when a fire ravages her family’s business. But as she buries herself in the rebuilding efforts, she can’t shake the sense that a powerful inheritance awaits her across the ocean… if she can weather the treacherous journey.

Horrified when the voyage claims her brother’s life and afflicts her with malaria, Valentia believes her grief will be for nothing if she…


Book cover of Doctors and Distillers: The Remarkable Medicinal History of Beer, Wine, Spirits, and Cocktails

Lou Bustamante Author Of The Complete Cocktail Manual: Recipes and Tricks of the Trade for Modern Mixologists

From my list on the future of cocktails by SF Bay Area writers.

Why am I passionate about this?

While the Bay Area’s impact on the way we eat as a country, being at the forefront of the farm-to-table and seasonal produce movement, cocktails are being equal consideration. Why not? Distilled spirits are agricultural products, the same way wine and beer are, and so it reasons that we would worry about how they are made, their history, and the future. Can cocktails be made in a more sustainable way? Can I use beets in my cocktail? Do spirits have a sense of place? And will applying beer to a wound help it heal (note: it won’t)? Here’s a selection of books that explore the past, present, and possible future of how you drink.

Lou's book list on the future of cocktails by SF Bay Area writers

Lou Bustamante Why did Lou love this book?

A fun read that explores the surprising history of alcohol used to treat medical maladies, from the Carthusian monks creating herbal elixirs, to the invention of tonic water to cure malaria.

English winds though the various maladies like wounds to worms to snakebites, and all the questionable, but delicious prescriptions, from gin and tonics to bourbon whiskey.

By Camper English,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Doctors and Distillers as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

“At last, a definitive guide to the medicinal origins of every bottle behind the bar! This is the cocktail book of the year, if not the decade.” —Amy Stewart, author of The Drunken Botanist and Wicked Plants

“A fascinating book that makes a brilliant historical case for what I’ve been saying all along: alcohol is good for you…okay maybe it’s not technically good for you, but [English] shows that through most of human history, it’s sure beat the heck out of water.” —Alton Brown, creator of Good Eats

Beer-based wound care, deworming with wine, whiskey for snakebites, and medicinal mixers…


Book cover of Malaria Dreams: An African Adventure

Alex Finley Author Of Victor in the Rubble

From my list on adventures in Africa.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have traveled throughout Africa and had the great opportunity to live in West Africa for two years, while I was working for the CIA. That experience was wild and challenging, but also transforming. West Africa became the setting for my first novel, Victor in the Rubble, because I loved the absurdity and adventure I experienced there, where nothing is logical but everything makes sense. I have read a number of novels that take place in different parts of Africa, as well as a wide array of nonfiction books about various African countries, their history, and their leaders. There are so many great stories there that pique my interest and inspire me.

Alex's book list on adventures in Africa

Alex Finley Why did Alex love this book?

This is one of the funniest books I have ever read.

As the author attempts to drive from Central Africa to France, he captures the joys and thrills of traveling in Africa, along with the many challenges. I loved and recognized the litany of charming and fun characters he encounters who bring so many of Africa’s wonderful absurdities to life.

This book was a major inspiration for me as I wrote my book and it still makes me laugh, years later.

By Stuart Stevens,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Malaria Dreams as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

While attempting to transfer a friend's Land Rover from the Central African republic to Europe, two travel companions experience various adventures and hijinks in such locales as Lake Chad, Timbuktu, and the Sahara


Book cover of Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire

Tim Schwab Author Of The Bill Gates Problem: Reckoning with the Myth of the Good Billionaire

From my list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'.

Why am I passionate about this?

My writing career has been organized around the old-school journalistic mission to ‘afflict the comforted and comfort the afflicted.’ Often, I take on big targets that other journalists have missed—a case in point being Bill Gates. News outlets have published thousands of one-sided stories about Gates’s philanthropic goals and gifts but seldom interrogate the Gates Foundation for what it is: an unaccountable, undemocratic structure of power. My investigation of Bill Gates, of course, stands on the shoulders of giants. The five books I recommend here paved the way for me to break new ground, expand the story, and hopefully spark a bigger public debate.

Tim's book list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'

Tim Schwab Why did Tim love this book?

If you want to understand the man who runs the Gates Foundation, you must understand the man who ran Microsoft. For this, there is no better text than Hard Drive, the highly readable, magisterial biography of Gates published in 1993.

Reading the book today, the throughlines between Gates’s two careers, as a businessman and philanthropist, are unmistakable: the desire to win at any cost, the questions surrounding his treatment of women, the explosive temper tantrums, and the incredible hubris that drives Gates—that makes him believe he is right and righteous in everything he does, whether he is trying to dominate software markets or malaria research.

By James Wallace, Jim Erickson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Hard Drive as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The true story behind the rise of a tyrannical genius, how he
transformed an industry, and why everyone is out to get him.In this fascinating exposé, two investigative reporters trace the hugely successful career of Microsoft founder Bill Gates. Part entrepreneur, part enfant terrible, Gates has become the most powerful -- and feared -- player in the computer industry, and arguably the richest man in America. In Hard Drive, investigative reporters Wallace and Erickson follow Gates from his days as an unkempt thirteen-year-old computer hacker to his present-day status as a ruthless billionaire CEO. More than simply a "revenge of…


Book cover of The Calcutta Chromosome: A Novel of Fevers, Delirium & Discovery

Tom Vater Author Of Kolkata Noir

From my list on Kolkata (Calcutta India).

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm a writer and journalist with an eye on South and Southeast Asia. I first visited Kolkata, or Calcutta as the city was known back then, in 1995 and fell in love with its spirit, culture, architecture, politics, and decrepitude. I have been back regularly reporting on the city’s cultural life for media like CNN and Nikkei Asia. In 2019, I was selected as artist-in-residence for the Indo-European Art Residency by the Goethe Institute and spent 10 weeks writing a crime fiction set in the Bengali capital. Kolkata is, hands down, my favorite city in the world – despite its poverty, systemic injustice, and political cruelty, there is an energy in the place that is hard to beat.

Tom's book list on Kolkata (Calcutta India)

Tom Vater Why did Tom love this book?

The Calcutta Chromosome is part thriller, part science investigation, part cult conspiracy, and part homage to the West Bengal Capital. Set across several time periods, the novel explores how Malaria was first linked to the mosquito and how this discovery by the Britisher Ronald Ross may have been manipulated by a shadowy movement invested in immortality. Not Gosh’s best, but his evocation of Calcutta is fantastic.

By Amitav Ghosh,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Calcutta Chromosome as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In this extraordinary novel, Amitav Ghosh navigates through time and genres to present a unique tale. Beginning at an unspecified time in the future and ranging back to the late nineteenth century, the reader follows the adventures of the enigmatic L. Murugan. An authority on the Nobel Prize-winning scientist Sir Ronald Ross, who solved the malaria puzzle in Calcutta in 1898, Murugan is in search of the elusive 'Calcutta Chromosome'.

With its astonishing range of characters, advanced computer science, religious cults and wonderful portraits of Victorian and contemporary India, The Calcutta Chromosome expands the scope of the novel as we…


Book cover of Ask More: The Power of Questions to Open Doors, Uncover Solutions, and Spark Change

Lyle Greenfield Author Of Uniting the States of America: A Self-Care Plan for a Wounded Nation

From my list on restoring your belief in human possibility.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always been fascinated by group dynamics, large and small. Why things functioned well, why they didn’t. It’s possible my ability to empathize and use humor as a consensus-builder is the reason I was elected president of a homeowners association, a music production association, and even an agricultural group. Books were not particularly involved in this fascination! But in recent years, experiencing the breakdown of civility and trust in our political and cultural discourse, I’ve taken a more analytical view of the dynamics. These books, in their very different ways, have taught me lessons about life, understanding those with different beliefs, and finding ways to connect and move forward. 

Lyle's book list on restoring your belief in human possibility

Lyle Greenfield Why did Lyle love this book?

This book was like a light bulb switched on suddenly in my brain. Free-floating feelings of uncertainty and anxiety about the decisions I was making and the inexplicable state of our world were literally keeping me up at night. Questions I’d been asking of myself, and of no one in particular, amounted to general complaints: ‘Why is this happening?’ ‘Where is all the anger coming from?’ ‘When will things get better?’

What I learned was the importance of going deeper and asking questions that might actually lead to answers. Or at least to gain an understanding of someone else’s perspective. And definitely to have a clearer insight into my own beliefs and motivations. I learned that asking more resulted in replacing my perpetual sense of uncertainty with something more useful and actionable.

By Frank Sesno,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Ask More as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

What hidden skill links successful people in all walks of life--across cultures, industries, generations . . . all of time? The answer is surprisingly simple: they know how to ask the right questions at the right time. Questions help us break down barriers, discover secrets, solve puzzles, and imagine new ways of doing things. The right question can provide for us not only the answer we need right then but also the ones we'll need tomorrow. Emmy award-winning journalist and media expert Frank Sesno wants to teach you how to question others in a methodical, intentional way so that you…


Book cover of Quinine: Malaria and the Quest for a Cure That Changed the World

John Gaudet Author Of Papyrus: The Plant that Changed the World: From Ancient Egypt to Today's Water Wars

From my list on plants that changed the world.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm a writer, lecturer, biologist, ecologist, and two-time Fulbright Scholar (to India and Malaysia). I'm now a fiction writer, but basically I’ve always been a storyteller who writes in a historical framework. While I feel an almost compulsive obligation to keep faith with the facts, my main objective is to tell a story—as dramatically and suspensefully and entertainingly as I can. My first non-fiction book, Papyrus: the Plant that Changed the World, tells the story of a plant that still evokes the mysteries of the ancient world while holding the key to the world’s wetlands and atmospheric stability. It changed the world as did all five of the plants on my list below. 

John's book list on plants that changed the world

John Gaudet Why did John love this book?

Rocco is the great-granddaughter of Phillipe Bunau-Varilla, a soldier, engineer, and former Panamanian ambassador to the United States.

A genius in the art of lobbyist statecraft, he has been referred to as the “Inventor of Panama.” He, like Rocco, survived malaria, so she knows about malaria and quinine from street level. From its discovery in the 17th Cent. by Jesuit missionaries in Peru to its use by expanding European colonial powers and its role in the development of modern anti-malaria pills, quinine proves to be a real factor in the history of the modern world.

The Jesuits learned of the bark of the cinchona tree, which was used by Andean natives to cure shivering, at a time when malaria, then known as Roman ague or marsh fever, was devastating southern Europe. They eagerly began the distribution of the curative bark, which also helped European explorers and missionaries survive the disease…

By Fiammetta Rocco,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Quinine as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 14, 15, 16, and 17.

What is this book about?

The fascinating story of the intensive search to discover and possess quininethe only known cure for malaria Malaria kills someone every 12 minutes in Africa. Now known mostly as a disease of the tropics, malaria led to the demise of the Roman Empire 2,000 years ago and ravaged Europe for years afterwards. At the start of the 17th century, Jesuit priests developed quinine, an alkaloid made out of the bitter red bark of the cinchona tree from the Andes. When quinine arrived in Europe, the Protestant powers resisted the medicine fearing that it was a Popish poison. Quinines reputation improved,…


Book cover of Travels in the Interior Districts of Africa: Performed Under the Direction and Patronage of the African Association, in the Years 1795, 1796, and 1797

Alan Huffman Author Of Here I Am: The Story of Tim Hetherington, War Photographer

From my list on traveling to dangerous places.

Why am I passionate about this?

I started out like most travelers, attracted to new places and to meeting people whose worlds were different from my own. Typically, this meant tried-and-true destinations in Europe until a book project required me to visit an utterly daunting place, the West African nation of Liberia during a civil war. I was in no way prepared for the experience and it changed everything. Seeing how people behave when faced with extreme circumstances profoundly altered my view of the world. Everything was magnified. Though I still enjoy a cup of espresso on the Piazza Navona, there is nothing like traveling to a forbidden zone and meeting someone destined to be a lifelong friend on the roof of a bombed-out building. It opens the world in ways that are challenging and scary, but also incomparably rewarding. 

Alan's book list on traveling to dangerous places

Alan Huffman Why did Alan love this book?

Beyond the occasional adrenaline rush, one of the chief attractions of risky travel is that it enables us to see how we and others behave under challenging circumstances. For readers whose exposure typically comes from UNILAD Adventure posts or edgy Bruce Chatwin travelogues, this book is refreshingly unself-conscious and uniquely terrifying.

In his quest to locate the legendary Niger River as a potential trade route during the late 18th century, when most of Africa was still unmapped, Park, at 24, set off with two days’ worth of provisions and a few strategic supplies (including an umbrella – he was Scottish), relying upon his wits and native guides to complete an epic journey in which he suffered bouts of malaria, nearly starved, was held captive by Moors, got repeatedly robbed and at one point had to bang on a village gate to escape being eaten by lions.

Given modern sensibilities,…

By Mungo Park,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Travels in the Interior Districts of Africa as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The 18th century was a wealth of knowledge, exploration and rapidly growing technology and expanding record-keeping made possible by advances in the printing press. In its determination to preserve the century of revolution, Gale initiated a revolution of its own: digitization of epic proportions to preserve these invaluable works in the largest archive of its kind. Now for the first time these high-quality digital copies of original 18th century manuscripts are available in print, making them highly accessible to libraries, undergraduate students, and independent scholars.
Delve into what it was like to live during the eighteenth century by reading the…


Book cover of Mosquito Empires: Ecology and War in the Greater Caribbean, 1620–1914

Carol R. Byerly Author Of Fever of War: The Influenza Epidemic in the U.S. Army During World War I

From my list on how diseases shape society.

Why am I passionate about this?

Carol R. Byerly is a historian specializing in the history of military medicine. She has taught American history and the history of medicine history at the University of Colorado, Boulder, was a contract historian for the U.S. Army Office of the Surgeon General, Office of History, and has also worked for the U.S. Congress and the American Red Cross. Byerly’s publications include Fever of War: The Influenza Epidemic in the U.S. Army during World War I and Good Tuberculosis Men: The Army Medical Department’s Struggle with Tuberculosis. She is currently working on a biography of Army medical officer William C. Gorgas, (1854-1920), whose public health measures, including clearing yellow fever from Panama, enabled the United States to construct the canal across the Isthmus.

Carol's book list on how diseases shape society

Carol R. Byerly Why did Carol love this book?

McNeill, William McNeill’s son, examines the intersection of disease, ecology, race, and international politics to show how infectious disease shaped the fortunes of colonial empires in the Caribbean. In the wake of the encounter between Europeans and the New World which destroyed up to 90 percent of the Amerindian population, European empires restructured the region into a colonial economy of sugar and slavery. Mosquitos bearing malaria and yellow fever flourished in this environment and McNeill shows how anyone seeking power in the region had to reckon with both them and disease.

By J.R. McNeill,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Mosquito Empires as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This book explores the links among ecology, disease, and international politics in the context of the Greater Caribbean - the landscapes lying between Surinam and the Chesapeake - in the seventeenth through early twentieth centuries. Ecological changes made these landscapes especially suitable for the vector mosquitoes of yellow fever and malaria, and these diseases wrought systematic havoc among armies and would-be settlers. Because yellow fever confers immunity on survivors of the disease, and because malaria confers resistance, these diseases played partisan roles in the struggles for empire and revolution, attacking some populations more severely than others. In particular, yellow fever…


Book cover of The Life You Can Save: How to Do Your Part to End World Poverty
Book cover of Legacy of Hunger
Book cover of Doctors and Distillers: The Remarkable Medicinal History of Beer, Wine, Spirits, and Cocktails

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