Lifestyle
10 biographies and memoirs for the nonfiction reader in your life
There’s one in every family — that uncle or sister-in-law who only reads nonfiction. As you seek out the perfect read for your loved ones this year, we can help you find beautifully told true stories. There are more than 50 biographies and memoirs featured in Books We Love, NPR’s annual year-end reading guide. Check them all out here, or browse a sampling, below.
Consent: A Memoir by Jill Ciment
After the death of her husband of nearly 50 years, Jill Ciment reconsiders their relationship, which began when she was 17 and he was her much older, married drawing instructor. She first wrote about their early years together in Half a Life, when she was in her 40s and he was in his 70s. In Consent, she scrutinizes and amplifies that account in light of the #MeToo movement and changing social attitudes. Did she have the agency to consent? Was he a letch? Was she a vixen? How could she have known as a teenager that he was the love of her life? — Heller McAlpin, book critic
A Fatal Inheritance: How a Family Misfortune Revealed a Deadly Medical Mystery by Lawrence Ingrassia
In 1968, when journalist Lawrence Ingrassia was 15, his mother died of breast cancer at age 42. “It was tragic, but what was there to say?” he writes. Ingrassia couldn’t know then that in the decades to come, his three siblings would each die from a different kind of cancer and that a nephew would too. In A Fatal Inheritance, Ingrassia movingly intertwines his family’s oncological experiences with the winding story of how researchers worked to uncover the roles that heritable genetic mutations play in cancer risk. — Kristin Martin, book critic
Gather Me: A Memoir in Praise of the Books That Saved Me by Glory Edim
Tenderly written, Glory Edim’s Gather Me is a beautiful memoir that serves as a powerful testament to resilience. It pays tribute to the art of community building from someone whose career and identity are deeply rooted in literature. Edim, founder of Well-Read Black Girl, thoughtfully navigates her emotionally complex life, highlighting the books and authors that have shaped her journey. The chapter about Nikki Giovanni’s work – Edim’s spiritual exploration through it and the solace it brought her – is particularly poignant. Overall, it is an emotional narrative about family bonds and a meaningful gift to her community. — Keishel Williams, book critic
Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie
For much of his adult life, Salman Rushdie has lived beneath a shadow – he’s as famous for his novels as he is for being the target of a fatwa. But in 2022, that threat went from theoretical to very real when Rushdie was stabbed repeatedly at a literary conference. That attack resulted in multiple long-term health issues, including blindness in his right eye. You might expect Rushdie’s memoir detailing the attack and its aftermath to be somewhat grim. And it is. But it’s also in turn warm, vulnerable, acerbic and, surprisingly, very funny. — Leah Donnella, senior editor, Code Switch
Life After Power: Seven Presidents and Their Search for Purpose Beyond the White House by Jared Cohen
The American presidency is viewed as the most powerful position in the world. What happens when the job ends? History is often surprising. Not everyone found the role to be the most fulfilling one they ever had. Jared Cohen looks at some fascinating case studies that back that up. John Quincy Adams and William Howard Taft found greater joy in other branches of government: Congress and the Supreme Court. George Bush enjoys his private life and art studio. Life after power can be much more rewarding. — Edith Chapin, senior vice president and editor in chief
Little, Brown and Company
The Mango Tree: A Memoir of Fruit, Florida, and Felony by Annabelle Tometich
This family memoir begins with a courtroom scene like no other. After a night in jail, Annabelle Tometich’s mom is charged with firing at a man who, she says, was stealing mangoes from the tree in her front yard. Tometich then hits rewind, taking readers back through her Fort Myers, Fla., childhood – with her Filipino American mom and white dad, a couple whose personality differences do not make them stronger together. The writing is both jewel-like and effortless, and Tometich’s memories – some mundane, some extraordinary – are mesmerizing. — Shannon Rhoades, senior editor, Weekend Edition
Little, Brown and Company
My Beloved Monster: Masha, the Half-Wild Rescue Cat Who Rescued Me by Caleb Carr
This unusual and beautiful “meow-moir” by The Alienist author and military historian Caleb Carr – the last book he wrote before dying of cancer at age 68 this year – explores the author’s lifelong affinity for cats and his particular relationship with one enormous, fluffy Siberian named Masha. Masha and the writer enjoyed 17 years of adventures together, mostly in and around their rugged rural home in upstate New York. The book chronicles their mutual zest for life and their struggles through illness and financial woes. Even though this is a book for cat lovers, it’s really for everyone: It explores, with somber pathos and wry humor, how we form attachments in life and how they keep us going through it all. — Chloe Veltman, correspondent, Culture Desk
Past Tense: Facing Family Secrets and Finding Myself in Therapy by Sacha Mardou
British cartoonist Sacha Mardou began posting her highly readable comics – about her experiences going to therapy when her daughter was young – on social media. Past Tense chronicles this story – the many steps that led Mardou to an earnest bridging of the past, her family’s history, into the present. Somewhere between Allie Brosh’s Hyperbole and a Half and Stephanie Foo’s What My Bones Know, Mardou’s brightly tinted, clear-eyed comics reveal how active self-reflection – combined with art, storytelling and professional supports – can powerfully reshape a person’s sense of self and community. — Tahneer Oksman, writer, professor and cultural critic
Patriot: A Memoir by Alexei Navalny
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny died in an Arctic Russian penal colony in February. But even in death, he continues his fight against President Vladimir Putin. This posthumous memoir has two sections: The first half is a traditional narrative, beginning with a true crime story when Navalny is poisoned with a nerve agent on a flight from Siberia in 2020. Halfway through, the book pivots to become his prison diary. Through even the darkest episodes, Navalny’s sunniness and humor shine through – whether he’s describing an episode of Rick and Morty that he left unfinished when he collapsed on that flight, or taking joy in the indulgence of bread and butter that he only ate on Sunday mornings behind bars. — Ari Shapiro, host, All Things Considered
In straightforward and affecting prose, Deborah Jackson Taffa writes about being brought up by a Quechan (Yuma) and Laguna Pueblo father and a Catholic Latina mother, both on and off the Yuma reservation. Although her parents were united in their approach to maintaining a family, their attitudes toward the world diverged in other ways, and Taffa received mixed messages about her Indigeneity, her proximity to whiteness and how she was meant to carry herself. As a teenager, she began to experience anger at the injustices her people were subjected to and, at the same time, began to learn that all change is sacred. — Ilana Masadbook, critic and author of All My Mother’s Lovers
This is just a fraction of the 350+ titles we included in Books We Love this year. Click here to check out this year’s titles, or browse nearly 4,000 books from the last 12 years.
Entrepreneur David Huang tests out a VR headset while conducting demonstrations of the social dance lesson app Dance Guru at the Augmented World Expo in Long Beach, Calif., June 17, 2026.
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Wedding season is in full swing, bringing with it a familiar sense of dread for anyone who fears the dance floor.
But relief may finally be at hand with the help of a new app, Dance Guru, and a virtual reality (VR) headset.
The social dance instruction app transports users to a spacious, digital dance studio. Waiting inside is a computer-generated coach: a handsome, male avatar wearing a shirt open to his navel. He speaks with a slightly gravelly English accent.
“Watch me now,” he instructs at the start of a waltz lesson — which NPR tried out at the Augmented World Expo in Long Beach, Calif., an annual conference showcasing the latest developments in virtual and augmented reality.
The avatar then demonstrates a basic box step.
From there, the lesson becomes interactive. The coach tells the user to hold his hand while an electric pinging sound tracks the student’s foot placement.
“One, two, three, four, five, six,” the virtual teacher counts down.
When the user stumbles, he remains remarkably patient. “Do not worry, foundations take time. Let’s try that again. Work on grounding your steps more intentionally.”
Solving the beginner’s dilemma
Dance Guru creator David Huang said he came up with the idea for the app a couple of years ago out of frustration.
“I always wanted to learn to dance and I was always terrible at it,” Huang said. “And I always ended up stopping midway through the lessons.”
He soon realized that many beginners hit the exact same roadblocks.
“Private lessons are too expensive, and you feel like you’re always forgetting the dance steps,” Huang said. “You cannot find a partner to dance with. So I figured maybe I can create something like this.”
The Dance Guru platform currently offers tutorials in salsa, bachata, waltz, and cha-cha, in both lead and follow modes. To make the digital instruction feel authentic, Huang used motion-capture technology to record the movements of real-life dance teachers — with their permission.
Building on the legacy of online tutorials and video games
Dance Guru belongs to a small but growing wave of apps using VR to demystify social dance. At a nearby booth, conference attendee Victor Chen is testing out a competing app called Trip the Light. It currently offers salsa lessons, as well as freestyle options, where a user can dance with a partner without having to learn specific steps.
Trip the Light’s booth at the Augmented World Expo included posters of the app’s virtual instructors. Real-life performers, who gave Trip the Light permission to motion capture their movements, were used as a basis for these avatars.
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“A lot of times when you’re trying to learn a choreography, it’s watching a YouTube video and you have to pause it, rewind, and play it,” Chen said. “If you were to have a virtual avatar dancing in front of you and correcting for any parts that you missed, it might be a lot easier.”
Interactive video games like Dance Dance Revolution and Just Dance, and YouTube tutorials have been helping people improve their skills in private for years. But those games are mostly aimed at solo players. Unlike the new generation of immersive VR apps, they cannot simulate the mechanics or confidence required for partner dancing on a live dance floor.
The reality check
But this kind of app won’t work for every dancer.
“Everyone learns a little bit differently. And so unless you have a game that has lots of different ways of teaching, you’re going to have things that work for some people and don’t work for others,” said Ariana Katana, a trained contemporary dancer and dance content creator who’s active on YouTube, Twitch and other platforms. “Also, it’s hard to dance with a headset on.”
And then there’s the issue of not being able to physically feel a virtual partner’s hand or shoulder while dancing with them. Patrick Ascolese, the creator of Trip the Light, said the experience could become more tactile in the future. “Haptic suits and wearables will be coming, but I think we’re a little away from that,” he said.
Ascolese said even with their limitations, immersive tools like Trip the Light have immense potential as judgment-free training grounds — giving reluctant dancers the baseline confidence they need to eventually step onto the dance floor with real partners in the real world, including at weddings.
“Just like anything else, practice makes perfect,” said Ascolese. “So the more time you spend in VR with a virtual partner, it works towards helping you get over that social hurdle. We are teaching you the moves that you have to do in order to go out and have fun.”
Jennifer Vanasco edited the broadcast and digital versions of this story. Chloee Weiner mixed the audio.
For half a century, Deidre Hall has taken on every kind of disaster in the drama-packed town of Salem, Ill., as a star of “Days of Our Lives.”
There was the time — actually, it happened twice — when her character, Dr. Marlena Evans, was famously possessed by the devil and even levitated.
In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.
Or the time a serial killer, who was actually Marlena under hypnosis, seemed to kill several beloved characters. The long-running show’s storylines have become legendary, and in March, while promoting “Hail Mary,” actor Ryan Gosling even gave Hall a shout-out, admitting he was a fan, praising the hard work of soap opera actors and calling her an “OG acting inspiration.”
But Hall’s real life in Santa Monica is much quieter than her character’s, and she likes it that way.
“When I bought my house in Santa Monica, I didn’t realize how great it would be to live near Montana Avenue,” says Hall, 78, about the popular shopping spot. Every day, she walks to the main street with her golden retriever, Riley, and enjoys Pilates, art and good food along the way. “The owners of the Farms Market even keep dog biscuits, so guess where the dog wants to go every time we walk — the Farms, of course,” she says, laughing.
When she isn’t filming the daily soap opera, which airs on Peacock, Hall enjoys raising monarch butterflies, exploring the shops and restaurants on Montana, and hosting movie nights at home with her two sons.
Here’s what a perfect day in L.A. looks like for her.
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for length and clarity.
7 a.m.: Breakfast and dog walk
I usually kick off my day with a protein shake, feed our golden retriever and take her out for a walk. She’s a phenomenal girl. When we adopted her, her name was Riley, but I did think about naming her after Mrs. Hughes from “Downton Abbey.”
10 a.m.: Church and garden time
After I walk the dog and go to church, I like to spend some time in my yard. I’m not a natural gardener, but I really enjoy it. I started raising monarch butterflies because my identical twin sister, who played my twin on the show, planted a butterfly garden. Monarchs are amazing because they are transitional. Every year, they travel from Mexico to southern New England, but it’s getting harder for them. Their numbers have dropped by about 80%. To help, I plant milkweed, which is what they need to survive. I buy my milkweed from the Staghorn Garden on Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica. Julie, who owns the nursery, is delightful and has a wide variety of milkweed. The monarchs always seem to find my garden. Julie was raising some caterpillars too, and she cared a lot about them. We talked about how important it is to help the butterflies. That’s why I do this. Sometimes I get milkweed with eggs already on it, and Julie knows her butterflies are going to a good home.
1 p.m.: Walk to Montana Avenue for some lunch
I live near Montana and love taking long walks, going to Pilates and trying out the great restaurants nearby, like R+D Kitchen and La La Land. I’m a big fan of the waffles at the Courtyard Kitchen. Just a few days ago, I had a chicken salad on raisin bread with an Arnold Palmer, and it was delicious. It is right on Montana and has a nice outdoor seating area. It’s one of my favorite spots. La La Land always has a long line in the morning, which is perfect if you want coffee. They serve coffee, doughnuts, croissants and avocado toast. There’s plenty of outdoor seating, and you can even bring your dog.
2 p.m.: Peek inside a clock shop
There’s a small clock shop on Montana Avenue that’s closed on Sundays, but if you walk by, you’ll see all kinds of clocks — standing, table and wall clocks. The owner is great at fixing them. Once, I bought a wall clock from MacKenzie-Childs, but it didn’t work. And I was really upset because it matched everything else on my countertop. I brought it to the owner and said, “I love this, but I can’t make it work.” He fixed it right away. His name is John, but I call him Geppetto. And we all know why. He really does have a magic touch.
2:30 p.m.: Visit a neighborhood art gallery
Ten Women Gallery is run by 10 artists, all of whom show their work there. I was drawn to some watercolors there, bought a few cards and spoke with one of the artists. She told me, “You seem to love watercolors,” and mentioned that the artist who painted them, Pamela Harnois, lives in Los Angeles and teaches nearby. I got Pamela’s name and found out she taught at the Brentwood Art School. I was so inspired by her gift that I started taking private lessons with her on Saturdays. That gallery is where I discovered my love for watercolor painting.
3 p.m.: Grab some ice cream at Rori’s
The other day, my longtime girlfriend wanted to get ice cream and told me, “We are walking to Rori’s Artisanal Creamery.” It’s a small shop on Montana near Lincoln. They make everything themselves, using local ingredients from grass-fed cows with no added hormones. The place is family-owned and probably has the healthiest ice cream you’ll find. They switch up their flavors often, but my favorite is the salted caramel.
6 p.m.: Family dinner and movie night at home
R+D Kitchen is always packed, so my sons, who are 31 and 33, do the cooking. They come over, and together we make salads and cook dinner. There’s a neighborhood grocery store called the Farms, off Montana, a small family-run place that has everything we need. Everyone knows each other there, and people bring their dogs. We try to have movie night every Sunday. Sometimes the day changes, but we always make sure to have one night a week where we cook a meal and sit down as a family. Keeping that tradition has become really important to us. My sons are great cooks, which is funny because they definitely didn’t get that from me. [Laughs]
9 p.m.: Take Riley for one last walk and visit neighbors
After dinner, I take my dog for a walk. It’s a great way to meet neighbors. We always go around the same block. We’ve met so many people, and since she’s a golden retriever, she loves meeting everyone.
10 p.m.: News, knitting and bedtime
I am a news junkie, so I usually watch whatever is on the news before I go to bed. I have a long-standing passion for knitting. Lately, though, the news would make me drop a stitch.
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