Narrative Nonfiction You'll Love This Summer

In this collection of essays, philosopher David Bentley Hart turns his attention to everything from literature and music to baseball and tortoises. Shifting between serious reflections and playful observations, his essays wander freely through culture, art, and everyday life, united by a sharp wit and enduring curiosity. 

Through short notes and longer meditations, Hart celebrates the pleasures of observation, thought, and language. The result is a book that reminds readers why getting lost in words remains one of life's simplest joys.

Born in Germany in 1932, Renate Belczyk spent her childhood exploring the outdoors with her adventurous friend Sigrid. After attending a talk by author Heinrich Böll, who encouraged young people to travel and build friendships across borders to help prevent future wars, the pair set out to see the world. 

Beginning in 1955, they spent three years journeying through thirteen countries across Europe, Asia, and North America. Our Trip Around the World is an intimate portrait of the postwar era, capturing a time when adventure travel was opening new horizons, and two young women traveling alone was nearly revolutionary. 

Bestselling children's author Mac Barnett makes a spirited case for the power of storytelling in this thoughtful exploration of children's literature. Blending humor with literary insight, Barnett argues that books for young readers are not only worthy of serious artistic criticism but also offer a unique window into how children experience the world. 

Make Believe is both a celebration of imagination and a compelling defense of why children's books matter.

You may know Lena Dunham from her hit series Girls, which she wrote, directed, produced, and starred in, or from her bestselling memoir Not That Kind of Girl. In Famesick, Dunham reflects on the physical and emotional toll of creative ambition, chronic illness, and life in the public eye. 

From vomiting in a bathroom before meeting Oprah to navigating visits to the White House and the Golden Globes, she reflects on the highs and lows of success while questioning what it ultimately cost her. 

What emerges is a candid memoir about fame, identity, and the wisdom gained through resilience. 

From her small farm in the Missouri Ozarks, Sue Hubbell chronicles the rewarding and demanding work of beekeeping. With three hundred hives to tend year-round, she guides readers through the rhythms of harvesting honey while reflecting on rural life, solitude, and humanity's relationship with nature. Both educational and deeply engaging, A Book of Bees weaves together observations of her hives with life on the farm, revealing the remarkable world that exists right in her backyard.

Inspired by the Japanese art of kintsugi, the practice of repairing broken pottery with gold lacquer, poet and ecologist Katherine Larson explores the beauty that can emerge from fracture and uncertainty. 

Blending reflections on motherhood, nature, and the climate crisis with meditations on literature and Japanese culture, Larson searches for unexpected connections in a changing world. 

Wedding of the Foxes is a thoughtful collection of lyric essays that embraces resilience, mindfulness, and the possibility of finding meaning in life's broken pieces.