Biography

A biography (from the Greek words bios meaning "life", and graphos meaning "write") is a non-fictional account of a person's life. Biographies are written by an author who is not the subject/focus of the book.

See also:
Autobiography
Memoir ...more

New Releases Tagged "Biography"

Cleavage: Men, Women, and the Space Between Us

Jane Austen's Bookshelf: A Rare Book Collector's Quest to Find the Women Writers Who Shaped a Legend

Lorne: The Man Who Invented Saturday Night Live

Seeking Shelter: A Working Mother, Her Children, and a Story of Homelessness in America

Wages for Housework: The Feminist Fight Against Unpaid Labor

Secret Servants of the Crown: The Forgotten Women of British Intelligence

Eternal Flame: The Authorized Biography of The Bangles

Son of Southtown: My Life Between Two Worlds

A Matter of Complexion: The Life and Fictions of Charles W. Chesnutt

Woody Allen: A Travesty of a Mockery of a Sham

More new releases tagged "biography"...

Giveaways

Jane Austen's Bookshelf by Rebecca Romney

Jane Austen's Bookshelf: A Rare Book Collector's Quest to Find the Women Writers Who Shaped a Legend

Rebecca Romney (Goodreads Author)

Release date: Feb 18, 2025

From rare book dealer and guest star of the hit show Pawn Stars, a page-turning literary adventure that introduces readers to the women writers who in From rare book dealer and guest star of the hit show Pawn Stars, a page-turning literary adventure that introduces readers to the women writers who inspired Jane Austen—and investigates why their books have disappeared from our shelves.

Long before she was a rare book dealer, Rebecca Romney was a devoted reader of Jane Austen. She loved that Austen’s books took the lives of women seriously, explored relationships with wit and confidence, and always, allowed for the possibility of a happy ending. She read and reread them, often wishing Austen wrote just one more.

But Austen wasn’t a lone genius. She wrote at a time of great experimentation for women writers—and clues about those women, and the exceptional books they wrote, are sprinkled like breadcrumbs throughout Austen’s work. Every character in Northanger Abbey who isn’t a boor sings the praises of Ann Radcliffe. The play that causes such a stir in Mansfield Park is a real one by the playwright Elizabeth Inchbald. In fact, the phrase “pride and prejudice” came from Frances Burney’s second novel Cecilia. The women that populated Jane Austen’s bookshelf profoundly influenced her work; Austen looked up to them, passionately discussed their books with her friends, and used an appreciation of their books as a litmus test for whether someone had good taste. So where had these women gone? Why hadn’t Romney—despite her training—ever read them? Or, in some cases, even heard of them? And why were they no longer embraced as part of the wider literary canon?

Jane Austen’s Bookshelf investigates the disappearance of Austen’s heroes—women writers who were erased from the Western canon—to reveal who they were, what they meant to Austen, and how they were forgotten. Each chapter profiles a different writer including Frances Burney, Ann Radcliffe, Charlotte Lennox, Charlotte Smith, Hannah More, Elizabeth Inchbald, Hester Lynch Thrale Piozzi, and Maria Edgeworth—and recounts Romney’s experience reading them, finding rare copies of their works, and drawing on connections between their words and Austen’s. Romney collects the once-famed works of these forgotten writers, physically recreating Austen’s bookshelf and making a convincing case for why these books should be placed back on the to-be-read pile of all book lovers today. Jane Austen’s Bookshelf will encourage you to look beyond assigned reading lists, question who decides what belongs there, and build your very own collection of favorite novels. ...more
View Details »

Enter Giveaway

Format: Print book

Giveaway ends in: a

Availability: 100 copies available, 5490 people requesting

Giveaway dates: Mar 03 - Mar 24, 2025

Countries available: U.S.

The Stowaway in First Class: A True Story of an Unforgettable Quest to Come to America

Anthony DeSantis

Release date: Mar 12, 2025

A family’s legacy is forever changed in this true story of ransom notes, stowaways, and mobsters.

View Details »

Enter Giveaway

Format: Kindle book

Giveaway ends in: a

Availability: 20 copies available, 1706 people requesting

Giveaway dates: Feb 26 - Mar 25, 2025

Countries available: U.S.

Crockett: The Real-Life Adventures of the Frontier Legend

Buddy Levy (Goodreads Author)

Release date: Mar 11, 2025

“A great myth-busting story, written in a taut narrative style that is guaranteed to keep the reader up all hours turning the pages.”
—Martin Dugard, ...more
View Details »

Enter Giveaway

Format: Kindle book

Giveaway ends in: a

Availability: 100 copies available, 715 people requesting

Giveaway dates: Mar 14 - Mar 26, 2025

Countries available: U.S.

More book giveaways...

Most Read This Week

The Queen of Sugar Hill: A Novel of Hattie McDaniel

»Mama, bitte lern Deutsch«: Unser Eingliederungsversuch in eine geschlossene Gesellschaft

On the Hippie Trail: Istanbul to Kathmandu and the Making of a Travel Writer

Et j'ai cessé de t'appeler papa : Quand la soumission chimique frappe une famille

All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me

This Far: My Story of Love, Loss, and Embracing the Light

Lists

Best Biographies

1,625 books — 2,789 voters

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

Best 21st Century Non-Fiction

1,874 books — 1,130 voters

Best Memoir / Biography / Autobiography

5,673 books — 6,119 voters

100 Biographies & Memoirs to Read in a Lifetime: Readers' Picks

1,837 books — 1,673 voters

Best Woman-Authored Books

7,953 books — 4,980 voters

Interesting and Readable Nonfiction

3,833 books — 1,810 voters

Biography Books

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption

Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood

I Am Malala: The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban

More biography books...

Related Genres

Nonfiction
Memoir
Autobiography
Adventurers
Music Biography

Related News

192 Nonfiction Books to Read This Women's History Month

Here’s some trivia for your next book club gathering: Women’s History Month, celebrated in March in the U.S., originally began as Women’s...

Quotes Tagged “Biography”

“ Where you are depends on how you get there. ”
― Robert Munsch

73 likes

“ Imagine your worst day, multiply it by a hundred, and pray to your God that you never experience what some of the people in this war zone go through, everyday, without any hope of it getting better. Ever. Compared to these people, every day, no matter how bad, is the best day ever. I know nothing about pain, nothing about suffering and hopefully never will. ”
― Hendri Coetzee, Living the Best Day Ever

204 likes

More quotes...