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    Life meanders like a path through the woods. We have seasons when we flourish and seasons when the leaves fall from us, revealing our bare bones. Given time, they grow again.

    Katherine May, Wintering

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    Real life stories have a power and depth like no other. We publish a rich collection of memoir and biographies that span everything from celebrity, sports and political memoirs to the very best in the royal biographies genre. From the long-awaited Spare by Prince Harry, to The Light We Carry by Michelle Obama, our list is full of change-makers and trailblazers alongside much-loved personalities in the entertainment world. These compellingly written and beautifully told human stories make great Christmas gifts to leave under the tree.

    The 30 Best Biographies of All Time

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    Blog – Posted on Monday, Jan 21

    Biographer Richard Holmes once wrote that his work was “a kind of pursuit
 writing about the pursuit of that fleeting figure, in such a way as to bring them alive in the present.”

    At the risk of sounding clichĂ©, the best biographies do exactly this: bring their subjects to life. A great biography isn’t just a laundry list of events that happened to someone. Rather, it should weave a narrative and tell a story in almost the same way a novel does. In this way, biography differs from the rest of nonfiction.

    All the biographies on this list are just as captivating as excellent novels, if not more so. With that, please enjoy the 30 best biographies of all time — some historical, some recent, but all remarkable, life-giving tributes to their subjects.

    If you're feeling overwhelmed by the number of great biographies out there, you can also take our second quiz below to narrow it down quickly and get a personalized biography recommendation 😉

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    1. A Beautiful Mind by Sylvia Nasar

    This biography of esteemed mathematician John Nash was both a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the basis for the award-winning film of the same name. Nasar thoroughly explores Nash’s prestigious career, from his beginnings at MIT to his work at the RAND Corporation — as well the internal battle he waged against schizophrenia, a disorder that nearly derailed his life.

    2. Alan Turing: The Enigma: The Book That Inspired the Film The Imitation Game - Updated Edition by Andrew Hodges

    Hodges’ biography of Alan Turing sheds light on the inner workings of this brilliant mathematician, cryptologist, and computer pioneer. Indeed, despite the title (a nod to his work during WWII), a

    The 50 Best Biographies of All Time

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    Crown The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal, and the Real Count of Monte Cristo, by Tom Reiss

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    You’re probably familiar with The Count of Monte Cristo, the revenge novel by Alexandre Dumas. But did you know it was based on the life of Dumas’s father, the mixed-race General Thomas-Alexandre Dumas, son of a French nobleman and a Haitian slave? Thanks to Reiss’s masterful pacing and plotting, this rip-roaring biography of Thomas-Alexandre reads more like an adventure novel than a work of nonfiction. The Black Count won the Pulitzer Prize for Biography in , and it’s only a matter of time before a filmmaker turns it into a big-screen blockbuster.

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    Farrar, Straus and Giroux Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret, by Craig Brown

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    Few biographies are as genuinely fun to read as this barnburner from the irreverent English critic Craig Brown. Princess Margaret may have been everyone’s favorite character from Netflix’s The Crown, but Brown’s eye for ostentatious details and revelatory insights will help you see why everyone in the s—from Pablo Picasso and Gore Vidal to Peter Sellers and Andy Warhol—was obsessed with her. When book critic Parul Sehgal says that she “ripped through the book with the avidity of Margaret attacking her morning vodka and orange juice,” you know you’re in for a treat.

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    Inventor of the Future: The Visionary Life of Buckminster Fuller, by Alec Nevala-Lee

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