If You Only Read Five (non-fiction) Books in 2025...
An annual list of recommended books based on what I read last year — Part 2
Reading time: About 8 minutes
This is part two of my annual book blog. Check out part one to read my reviews of the best-of-the-best fiction I read in 2024.
Without further ado, here are my top picks of all the non-fiction and memoir I read last year.
May you find at least one book you want to read on this list.
Memoir
Thinning Blood: A memoir of family, myth and identity by Leah Myers
From the opening essay of this book, I knew it would be a bit painful but also extremely powerful to read. I am the last in my lineage to be able to qualify for Métis status and much of my practice is grappling with the tension of being white and wanting to reclaim what was stolen by the Canadian government’s genocidal policies towards Indigenous people.
I recommend this book for anyone who is ambiguously mixed, who is not quite not-white but not quite entirely white either, or who is working on rediscovering and reclaiming aspects of their ancestry lost to them.
This American Ex-Wife: How I ended my marriage and started my life by Lyz Lenz
Lenz’s latest book was one of my most anticipated reads for 2024 and it did not disappoint. Think a memoir accompaniment The Tragedy of Heterosexuality.1 This is an incredibly readable memoir that solidly presents why divorce need not be seen as a sign of failure, but instead as a sign of self-recognition and choosing happiness over societal expectations.
This is a great read for anyone working to challenge heterosexism, and particularly helpful if you are married to someone who just voted for a party that believes women and trans people don’t have a right to make decisions about their own healthcare.
All the Things They Said We Couldn’t Have: Stories of trans joy by T.C. Oakes-Monger
My wonderful QILT2BAG+ kin, this book is a gift. This book will bring you joy. This book is heartwarming and affirming and validating and oh my goodness: You deserve to be loved, to experience joy, to be celebrated in big and small ways, and to thrive.
I recommend this one for every trans and gender-non-conforming person.
A Mind Spread Out on the Ground by Alicia Elliot
Similar to Thinning Blood, this is a book about ancestry and identity, belonging and racial categories, and what it is to not quite fit into any of them. Some of this book was starkly painful to read, but at the same time, it was relatable and affirming. I am grateful to see more writing by mixed ancestry Indigenous folks reckoning with being the very embodiment of what genocidal policies in both the U.S. And Canada were aiming for.
Another great read for those of us reclaiming out connections to ancestors erased or ignored by colonization.
Frighten the Horses by Oliver Radclyffe
This was another long anticipated memoir and one that absolutely delivered. Radclyffe’s extended coming out narrative takes us through his journey of first coming out as a lesbian, and then as a trans man.
I enjoyed reading this memoir but offer it with a grain of salt: Radclyffe’s ex-husband is a…piece of work…to put it as kindly as I can. I may have periodically shouted about him while reading, alarming my wife and cat. But sometimes you just have to pause and yell, “What a piece of shit!!” because someone it being really awful.
If you enjoy memoir, this is a great asset to the genre. It’s also going to be an interesting read if you want to better understand trans experiences, or if you are an older trans individual unsure about coming out and transitioning. It is never, ever too late.
General Non-fiction
Grieving While Black: An antiracist take on oppression and sorrow by Breeshia Wade
This is a book about how to grieve for what is taken or denied by oppressive systems. While Wade frames this book around the experience of Blackness, and to a certain extent, queerness, it is easily applicable to any ‘othered’ experience in society, including other non-white experiences and being disabled.
I found this book heartening and validating and recommend it for anyone struggling in the face of violent, hateful legislation and dehumanizing laws.
Monsters: A Fan’s Dilemma by Claire Dederer
I am so appreciative of Dederer for writing this book. In its pages she grapples with the difficulty of the question: Can you separate the art from the artist, especially when the artist has done monstrous things? Ultimately, she arrives at the same conclusion I myself arrived at many years ago when one of my childhood heroes was exposed as sexual offender: We must each for ourselves decide how to relate to the art and the artist, knowing they can never be entirely separated and that to be human is to be as capable of creating beautiful art as it is of causing immense, irreparable harm.
I recommend this for pretty much anyone, but particularly if you wrestle with the question of whether the art can be separated from the artist.2
Be a Revolution: How everyday people are fighting oppression by Ijeoma Oluo
Once again, Oluo has delivered a book that is a great resource of our time. I found this compilation of community organizing stories affirming and bolstering. This collection of case-studies is a reminder that what we do does matter, always, and that we are capable of incredible change, particularly when we start where we are with those we know best.
If you are building community or want to get involved in grassroots organizing, this is a must-have resource.
Nice White Ladies: The truth about white supremacy, our role in it, and how we can help dismantle it by Jessie Daniels
A thorough look at the role white women play in upholding and maintaining white supremacy through white feminism, as well as a guide for how to challenge and divest from the system.
This is a particularly good resource for middle-class white women committed to or curious about anti-racism
Life is Hard: How philosophy can help us find our way by Kieran Setiya
The podcast the Philosopher’s Zone had Kieran Setiya on as a guest to talk about his latest book. It felt so apt for me and where I was, I put it on hold at the library immediately after finishing the episode.
In a year of heightened anxiety, live-streamed footage of genocide, and wildly inflated cost, this is a guidebook a lot of folks would find great support in.
Night Vision: Seeing ourselves through dark moods by Mariana Alessandri
Another book I discovered thanks to Philosopher’s Zone, which means, if you don’t fancy reading the book, you can listen to the conversation with Alessandri instead. The key message of this book is that no one is broken or messing up because they feel anger, depression, anxiety, grief or sadness. The secondary message is one of how we can stay present with these feelings in both ourselves and others. Reading it really took me back to my time studying and practicing with the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying and the five Buddha families. This is a secular guide for the same approach of learning from difficult emotions, rather than rejecting them or believing them to be a sign of some essential…fuckedupness.
A great read if you have been struggling with intense emotions that society generally labels as bad and need some affirmations that you are human and not bad for feeling bad.
You can see my full 2024 reading list on GoodReads.
Let me know in the comments what books you enjoyed in 2024!
Read Part One…
Read my recommendations for 2024…
Reviewed and recommended in my 2024 book blog.
It can’t!