History or Culture

Thomas Ashbridge

1. The Crusades

Christopher R. Browning

1. Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Batallion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland

Joan Didion

1. Slouching Towards Bethlehem

2. The White Album

Bret Easton Ellis

1. White 1

Edward Gibbon

1. History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire – Books 1-6

Yuval Noah Harari

1. Sapiens

David Immerwehr

1. How to Hide an Empire

Terence McKenna

1. Food of the Gods

George Orwell

1. Essays

Richard Lloyd Parry

1. People Who Eat Darkness

Serhil Plokhy

1. Chornobyl: The History of a Nuclear Catastrophe

Bonnie Tsui

1. Why We Swim

JD Vance

1. Hillbilly Elegy

David Foster Wallace

1. This Is Water

2. Consider the Lobster

3. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again

4. In His Own Words

Michael Wallis

1. The Best Land Under Heaven: The Donner Party in the Age of Manifest Destiny

Science or Technology

Anthony Aguirre

1. Cosmological Koans

Leopold Aschenbrenner

1. Situational Awareness

Nick Bostrom

1. Superintelligence

David J. Chalmers

1. Reality+

Nicholas Christakis, MD, PhD

1. Apollo's Arrow

Randall Munroe

1. What If?

Michael Pollen

1. Caffeine

Carl Sagan

1. Billions and Billions

Paul J. Steinhardt

1. The Second Kind of Impossible

Ed Yong

1. I Contain Multitudes

Various Authors

1. Possible Minds – John Brochmann, Editor

Biography or Memoir

Jean-Dominique Bauby

1. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly - Jeremy Leggatt, Translator

Joan Didion

1. The Year of Magical Thinking

Lindsey Fitzharris

1. The Butchering Art

Adrian Goldsworthy

1. Augustus - First Emperor of Rome

Stephen King

1. On Writing

Matthew Polly

1. Bruce Lee: A Life

David Roberts

1. Into the Great Emptiness

Wright Thompson

1. Pappyland

Jack Weatherford

1. Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World

Politics or Social Science

Albert Camus

1. The Rebel – Anthony Bower, Translator

Anne Hellen Petersen

1. The Burnout Generation

Steven Pinker

1. Enlightenment Now!

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

1. The Black Swan

Andrew Yang

1. The War on Normal People

Philosophy

Jorge Luis Borges

1. Labyrinths

Albert Camus

1. The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays – Justin O'Brien, Translator

Arthur C. Danto

1. The Transfiguration of the Commonplace

David Deutsch

1. The Beginning of Infinity

René Descartes

1. Meditations of First Philosophy – Elizabeth S. Haldane, and G.R.T. Ross, Translators

Philip Goff

1. Galileo’s Error

Annaka Harris

1. Conscious

Sam Harris

1. The Moral Landscape

2. Making Sense

Friedrich Nietzsche

1. Beyond Good and Evil – Walter Kaufmann, Translator

Plato

1. The Socratic Dialogues, Early Period: Volume One - The Apology, Crito, Charmides, Laches, Lysis, Euthyphro, Menexemus, Ion

2. Meno

3. Republic

Sun Tzu

1. The Art of War – Unknown Translator

Ludwig Wittgenstein

1. Philosophical Investigations – G. E. M. Anscombe, Translator

Religion, Spirituality, or Esoterica

Richard Dawkins

1. The God Delusion

Thích Nhất Hạnh

1. Old Path White Clouds

2. The Art of Living

Wumen Huikai, or Mu-mon Ekai

1. The Gateless Gate – Paul Reps, Nyogen Senzaki, and Koun Yamada - Translators or Transcribers

Sam Harris

1. Waking Up 1

Eugen Harrigel

1. Zen in the Art of Archery

Aldous Huxley

1. The Doors of Perception

Sri M

1. Apprenticed to a Himalayan Master: A Yogi’s Autobiography

Alan Watts

1. Four Ways to the Center

Lawrence Wright

1. Going Clear

Dōgen Zenji

1. The Essential Dogen – Peter Levitt and Kazuaki TanaHashi - Editors and Translators

Various or Unknown Authors

1. The Iron Flute – A collection of Zenkoans originally compiled by Genrō Ōryū. Translated into English by Nyogen Senzaki and Ruth Strout McCandless with commentary by Nyogen Senzaki, Genrō Ōryū , and Genrō’s disciple,’Fugai.

2. Zen Flesh, Zen Bones – A collection of zen and pre-zen writings compiled by Paul Reps. The collection includescomplete versions or portions of 101 Zen Stories—a collection of Zen koans compiled by Nyogen Senzaki —a translation of Shasekishu, a compilation by Zen master Muū—The Gateless Gate,a compilation of Zen koans by Zen master Wumen Huikai—10 Bulls, a short collection of Zen koans, poems, and drawings—and the Hindu text, Centering or Vijñāna Bhairava Tantra.

Psychology or Sociology

Paul Bloom

1. The Sweet Spot

Brian Christian

1. The Alignment Problem: Machine Learning and Human Values

Jonathan Haidt

1. The Happiness Hypothesis

B. F. Skinner

1. Walden Two

Mary Trump, PhD

1. Too Much and Never Enough

Primary Sources

Thomas Jefferson

1. The United States Declaration of Independence

James Madison

1. The Constitution of the United States

The Great Courses

Art, Music, or Literature

1. Great Masters: Mozart - His Life and Music - Robert Greenberg

History

1. The American Revolution – Allen C. Guelzo

2. Ancient Cultures of North America – Edwin Barnhart

3. Ancient Mesopotamia - Life in the Cradle of Civilization – AmandaH. Podany

4. Cities of the Ancient World - Steven L. Tuck

5. Food: A Cultural Culinary History - Ken Albala

6. From Jesus to Constantine: A Brief History of Early Christianity -Bart D. Ehrman

7. Great Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt - Bob Brier

8. The History of Ancient Rome - Garrett G. Fagan

9. History’s Great Military Blunders and the Lessons They Teach -–Gregory S. Aldretr

10. Law School for Everyone: Constitutional Law - Eric Berger

11. The Medieval World - Dorsey Armstrong

12. The Story of Medieval England – Jennifer Paxton

13. Turning Points in Middle Eastern History – Eamonn Gearon

Philosophy

1. Exploring Metaphysics – David K. Johnson

2. The Great Ideas in Philosophy, 2nd Edition –Daniel N. Robinson

Religion

1. Buddhism – Malcolm David Eckel

2. Great Mythologies of the World – Julius H. Bailey, Robert André LaFleur, Kathryn McClymond, and Grant L. Voth

3. The History of the Bible: The Making of the New Testament Canon – Bart D. Ehrman

4. How Jesus Became God – Bart D. Ehrman

5. The New Testment - Bart D. Ehrman

6. The Pagan World: Ancient Religions Before Christianity - Hans-Friedrich Mueller

Science

1. Behavioral Economics: When Psychology and Economics Meet - Scott Huetel

2. How the Earth Works – Michael Wysession

3. Plant Science: An Introduction to Botany – Catherine Kleier

4. The Nature of Matter: Understanding the Physical World – David W. Ball

5. Redefining Reality: Thr Intellectual Implications of Modern Science - Steven Gimbel

6. The Theory of Everything: The Quest to Explain All Reality – Don Lincoln

7. Understanding Complexity – Scott Page