People will always be the most fascinating subject to read about, and here at the library we love a good memoir. There’s something about reading the story of people’s lives in their own words that is particularly enlightening. While we have plenty of memoirs available for you to choose from, here are five recommendations to get you started.
Musical Chairs: a 76-Year-Old’s Quest to Learn Every Instrument in the Orchestra by James Mitchell
Is it possible for a non-musician to learn to play every instrument in an orchestra? What else might one learn along the way? Find out in this new release.
If You Ask Me (And Of Course You Won’t) by Betty White
Get Betty White’s take on her own life, in her own words. There’s nothing else we need to say.
Wild Life: Dispatches from a Childhood of Baboons and Button-Downs by Keena Roberts
When you spend most of the year with your primatologist parents in Botswana, but part of the year in a private school in Philadelphia, you have some wild stories to tell, which Keena Roberts does using prose, photographs, childhood journal entries, and even old homework assignments.
Blood: a Memoir by Allison Moorer
Acclaimed musician Allison Moorer shares the story of her abusive childhood, her father’s murder-suicide of her mother, and the ways all these events shaped who she is. (Trigger warning: abuse, violence)
Wild Heart: A True Story of Hippies, Healers, and Harleys by Stacey Marie Kerr, MD
What better way to play it safe after an osteoporosis diagnosis than to purchase a Harley? Dr. Stacey Kerr uses her motorcycle tours as a framework for exploring her own past, starting with an authoritarian childhood, to a commune, then to medical school and beyond.