Bill Gates is a very busy man, but as his admirers know, he makes time to read. The Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist regularly reviews books on his website and formulates lists of his favorite books of the year, or the best ones on a given subject. Here is every book he’s ever recommended on his website, from highly academic texts to The Hunger Games.
Note: In the assorted reviews category, we left off books that had been included in other lists — but when the same book appeared on multiple reading lists, we allowed the repetition.
String Theory by David Foster Wallace
Shoe Dog by Phil Knight
The Gene by Siddhartha Mukherjee
The Myth of the Strong Leader by Archie Brown
The Grid by Gretchen Bakke
5 Books to Read This Summer, 2016
Seveneves by Neal Stephenson
How Not to be Wrong by Jordan Ellenberg
The Vital Question by Nick Lane
The Power to Compete by Ryoichi Mikitani and Hiroshi Mikitani
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Noah Yuval Harari
The Road to Character by David Brooks
Thing Explainer: Complicated Stuff in Simple Words by Randall Munroe
Being Nixon: A Man Divided by Evan Thomas
Sustainable Materials With Both Eyes Open by Julian M. Allwood, Jonathan M. Cullen, et al.
Eradication: Ridding the World of Diseases Forever? by Nancy Leys Stepan
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck
The Vital Question by Nick Lane
Beach Reading (and More), 2015
Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh
The Magic of Reality by Richard Dawkins
What If? by Randall Munroe
XKCD by Randall Munroe
On Immunity by Eula Biss
How to Lie With Statistics by Darrell Huff
Should We Eat Meat? by Vaclav Smil
6 Books I Recommended for TED 2015
Business Adventures by John Brooks
The Bully Pulpit by Doris Kearns Goodwin
On Immunity by Eula Biss
Making the Modern World by Vaclav Smil
How Asia Works by Joe Studwell
How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff
Business Adventures by John Brooks
Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas Piketty
How Asia Works by Joe Studwell
The Rosie Effect by Graeme Simsion
Making the Modern World: Materials and Dematerialization by Vaclav Smil
The Fever: How Malaria Has Ruled Humankind for 500,000 Years by Sonia Shah
House on Fire: The Fight to Eradicate Smallpox by William H. Foege
Smallpox: The Death of a Disease by D.A. Henderson
Infections and Inequalities: The Modern Plagues by Paul Farmer
Business Adventures by John Brooks
Stress Test by Timothy F. Geithner
The Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of Journalism by Doris Kearns Goodwin
(Bonus: Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin)
The Rosie Project: A Novel by Graeme Simsion
The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History by Elizabeth Kolbert
Reinventing American Health Care: How the Affordable Care Act Will Improve Our Terribly Complex, Blatantly Unjust, Outrageously Expensive, Grossly Inefficient, Error Prone System by Ezekiel J. Emanuel
10 Books Melinda and I Recommended to the TED Crowd, 2014
The Better Angels of Our Nature by Steven Pinker
Getting Better by Charles Kenny
Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
The Man Who Fed the World by Leon Hesser
Energy Myths and Realities by Vaclav Smil
The Last Hunger Season by Roger Thurow
However Long the Night by Aimee Molloy
In the Company of the Poor by Paul Farmer and Gustavo Gutierrez
Change by Design by Tim Brown
Mighty Be Our Powers by Leymah Gbowee
The Box by Marc Levinson
The Most Powerful Idea in the World by William Rosen
Harvesting the Biosphere by Vaclav Smil
The World Until Yesterday by Jared Diamond
Poor Numbers by Morten Jerven
Why Does College Cost So Much? by Robert B. Archibald and David H. Feldman
The Bet by Paul Sabin
Bonuses:
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart
The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies? by Jared Diamond
(Bonus: Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond)
The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger by Marc Levinson
However Long the Night: Molly Melching’s Journey to Help Millions of African Women and Girls by Aimee Molloy
How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character by Paul Tough
Japan’s Dietary Transition and Its Impacts (Food, Health, and the Environment) by Vaclav Smil and Kazuhiko Kobayashi
Made in the USA: The Rise and Retreat of American Manufacturing by Vaclav Smil
Whistling Vivaldi: How Stereotypes Affect Us and What We Can Do (Issues of Our Time) by Claude Steele
Patriot and Assassin by Robert Cook
Great Books on Science and Innovation, 2013
Smallpox: The Death of a Disease by D. A. Henderson
The Man Who Fed the World: Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Norman Borlaug and His Battle to End World Hunger by Leon Hesser (Book Review)
House on Fire: The Fight to Eradicate Smallpox by William H. Foege
Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson (Book Review)
For the Love of Physics by Walter Lewin (Book Review)
Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol. 1: Mainly Mechanics, Radiation, and Heat by Richard P. Feynman, Robert B. Leighton and Matthew Sands
Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol 2: Mainly Electromagnetism and Matter by Richard P. Feynman, Robert B. Leighton and Matthew Sands
Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol 3: Quantum Mechanics by Richard P. Feynman, Robert B. Leighton and Matthew Sands
Harvesting the Biosphere by Vaclav Smil
Energy Myths and Realities by Vaclav Smil (Book Review)
The New Science of Strong Materials by J.E. Gordon (Book Review)
The Hair of the Dog and other Scientific Surprises by Karl Sabbagh
13 Things That Don’t Make Sense by Michael Brooks
The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail—but Some Don’t by Nate Silver
The Price of Inequality: How Today’s Divided Society Endangers Our Future by Joseph E. Stiglitz
Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson
The Most Powerful Idea in the World: A Story of Steam, Industry and Invention by William Rosen
Tap Dancing to Work: Warren Buffett on Practically Everything, 1966-2013 by Carol J. Loomis
The Better Angels of our Nature: Why Violence has Declined by Steven Pinker
Deng Xiaoping by Ezra Vogel
The Quest by Daniel Yergin
Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer
Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
One Billion Hungry: Can We Feed the World? by Gordon Conway
A World-Class Education by Vivien Stewart
Academically Adrift by Richard Arum & Joshipa Roksa
This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly by Carmen Reinhart & Kenneth Rogoff
The City That Became Safe: New York’s Lessons for Urban Crime and Its Control by Franklin Zimring
Books I Read this Summer, 2012
A Nation of Wusses: How America’s Leaders Lost the Guts to Make Us Great by Ed Rendel
The Art of Being Unreasonable: Lessons in Unconventional Thinking by Eli Broad
Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer
Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses by Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa
Awakening Joy: 10 Steps That Will Put You on the Road to Real Happiness by James Baraz and Shoshana Alexander
More Great Summer Reading, 2012
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
The Art of War by Sun Tzu
Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
Think & Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
The Grand Design by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
A New Kind of Science by Stephen Wolfram
A Rogue’s Guide to Acquisition by Ranak Jones, Jayesh Mehta, Anish Sikri
The Alchemist by Paul Coelho
The Better Angels of our Nature Steven Pinker
The Quest by Daniel Yergin
Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China by Ezra Vogel
The Cost of Hope by Amanda Bennett
Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update by Donella Meadows
Abundance: The Future is Better Than You Think by Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
The Man Who Stayed Behind by Amanda Bennett
Assorted book reviews:
When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
The Rise and Fall of American Growth by Robert J. Gordon
Epic Measures: One Doctor. Seven Billion Patients by Jeremy Smith
Stuff Matters: Exploring the Marvelous Materials That Shape Our Man-Made World by Mark Miodownik
The Idealist: Jeffrey Sachs and the Quest to End Poverty by Nina Munk
The Great Escape: Health, Wealth and the Origins of Inequality by Angus Deaton
The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal by David McCullough
Value-Added Measures in Education: What Every Educator Needs to Know by Douglas N. Harris
Interventions: A Life in War and Peace by Kofi Annan
Reinventing Fire: Bold Business Solutions for the New Energy Era by Amory Lovins
Science Business: The Promise, the Reality, and the Future of Biotech by Gary P. Pisano
The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande
Unlocking Energy Innovation: How America Can Build a Low-Cost, Low-Carbon Energy System by Richard K. Lester and David M. Hart
The Cat’s Table by Michael Ondaatje
Titan II: A History of a Cold War Missile Program by David Stumpf
Why Don’t Students Like School?: A Cognitive Scientist Answers Questions About How the Mind Works and What It Means for the Classroom by Daniel T. Willingham
That Used to Be Us: How America Fell Behind in the World It Invented and How We Can Come Back by Thomas L. Friedman and Michael Mandelbaum
Change.edu: Rebooting for the New Talent Economy by Andrew S. Rosen
The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee
World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse by Lester R. Brown
Global Health: An Introductory Textbook by Ann Lindstrand et al
Unlocking the Gates: How and Why Leading Universities Are Opening Up Access to Their Courses by Taylor Walsh
How to Spend $50 Billion to Make the World a Better Place ed. Bjørn Lomborg
Global Warming: The Complete Briefing by John Houghton
Frank Stewart’s Bridge Club by Frank Stewart
Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty by Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo
Prime Movers of Globalization: The History and Impact of Diesel Engines and Gas Turbines by Vaclav Smil
Modernist Cuisine by Nathan Myhrvold
A Champion’s Mind: Lessons From a Life in Tennis by Pete Sampras
Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell
Class Warfare: Inside the Fight to Fix America’s Schools by Steven Brill
Health Care Will Not Reform Itself: A User’s Guide to Refocusing and Reforming American Health Care by George C. Halvorson
Beyond Smoke and Mirrors: Mexican Immigration in an Era of Economic Integration by Douglas S. Massey, Jorge Durand and Nolan L. Malone
Dirt and Disease: Polio Before FDR by Naomi Rogers
The Grid: A Journey Through the Heart of Our Electrified World by Phillip F. Schewe
Beyond the Crash: Overcoming the First Crisis of Globalization by Gordon Brown
The Foundation: A Great American Secret; How Private Wealth is Changing the World by Joel L. Fleishman
Who’s Teaching Your Children?: Why the Teacher Crisis Is Worse Than You Think and What Can Be Done About It by Vivian Troen and Katherine C. Boles
The Making of a Tropical Disease: A Short History of Malaria by Randall M. Packard
Priorities in Health by Dean T. Jamison et al
Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger ed. Peter D. Kaufman
Too Big to Fail: The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System — and Themselves by Andrew Ross Sorkin
The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century by Thomas L. Friedman
Showing Up for Life: Thoughts on the Gifts of a Lifetime by Bill Gates Sr.
Open: An Autobiography by Andre Agassi
Give Smart: Philanthropy that Gets Results by Thomas J. Tierney and Joel L. Fleishman
Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson
Creating the Twentieth Century: Technical Innovations of 1867-1914 and Their Lasting Impact by Vaclav Smil
Broken Genius: The Rise and Fall of William Shockley, Creator of the Electronic Age by Joel N. Shurkin
A Separate Peace by John Knowles
Vaccine: The Controversial Story of Medicine’s Greatest Lifesaver by Arthur Allen
Tropical Infectious Diseases: Principles, Pathogens and Practice by Richard L. Guerrant, David H. Walker and Peter F. Weller
Smallpox: The Death of a Disease – The Inside Story of Eradicating a Worldwide Killer by D.A. Henderson
Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World by Tracy Kidder
The Earth’s Biosphere: Evolution, Dynamics, and Change by Vaclav Smil
Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution – and How It Can Renew America by Thomas L. Friedman
Energy at the Crossroads: Global Perspectives and Uncertainties by Vaclav Smil
Energies: An Illustrated Guide to the Biosphere and Civilization by Vaclav Smil
Big History: From the Big Bang to the Present by Cynthia Stokes Brown
The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time by Jeffrey Sachs
Global Catastrophes and Trends: The Next Fifty Years by Vaclav Smil
Enriching the Earth: Fritz Haber, Carl Bosch, and the Transformation of World Food Production by Vaclav Smil
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed: Revised Edition by Jared Diamond
Polio: An American Story by David M. Oshinsky
Stretching the School Dollar: How Schools and Districts Can Save Money While Serving Students Best, ed. Frederick M. Hess and Eric Osberg
Educational Economics: Where Do School Funds Go? by Marguerite Roza
Jim Grant: UNICEF Visionary, ed. Richard Jolly
The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves by Matt Ridley
Why America Is Not a New Rome by Vaclav Smil
Energy Transitions: History, Requirements, Prospects by Vaclav Smil
Liberating Learning: Technology, Politics, and the Future of American Education by Terry M. Moe and John E. Chubb
Life Is What You Make It: Find Your Own Path to Fulfillment by Peter Buffet
Tomorrow’s Table: Organic Farming, Genetics, and the Future of Food by Pamela C. Ronald and Raoul W. Adamchak
In FED We Trust: Ben Bernanke’s War on the Great Panic by David Wessel
SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
Work Hard. Be Nice.: How Two Inspired Teachers Created the Most Promising Schools in America by Jay Mathews
Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air by David JC Mackay
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