Social Science bestsellers

Braiding Sweetgrass

Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants

By: Robin Wall Kimmerer
Narrated by: Robin Wall Kimmerer
Length: 16 hours 44 minutes

As a botanist and professor of plant ecology, Robin Wall Kimmerer has spent a career learning how to ask questions of nature using the tools of science. As a Potawatomi woman, she learned from elders, family, and history that the Potawatomi, as well as a majority of other cultures indigenous to this land, consider plants and animals to be our... Read more

Cultish

The Language of Fanaticism

By: Amanda Montell
Narrated by: Ann Marie Gideon
Length: 8 hours 21 minutes

“The Manson family, Scientology, Crossfit, and Mary Kay all have something in common. They all use language and rhetoric found in cults. The world cult is tossed around so lightly and Cultish is here to show you why. This book defines and explains the power of emphatic language and how companies and cults use it at others detriment. It also has a... Read more

The Anthropocene Reviewed

Essays on a Human-Centered Planet

By: John Green
Narrated by: John Green
Length: 10 hours 42 minutes

“A lovely lovely listen read by the author. This is the perfect book to take on a long walk or drive that will make you look at the world in a fresh way. Drawing on personal anecdotes, history, literature and science, Green embraces both small and big ideas and makes you grateful for things you might have once overlooked. 5/5 stars for this... Read more

Poverty, by America

By: Matthew Desmond
Narrated by: Dion Graham
Length: 5 hours 40 minutes

“Desmond challenges readers to recognize how they benefit from poverty through low cost goods, services, and systemic structures that benefit those who already have resources (no surprise - they also have roots in racism and misogyny!). He reminds us that both the rich and poor benefit from government assistance, but only programs for the poor... Read more

How to Be an Antiracist

By: Ibram X. Kendi
Narrated by: Ibram X. Kendi
Length: 10 hours 29 minutes

“Among the multi-faceted array of antiracist literature newly published in the last two years, Ibram X. Kendi’s How To Be an Antiracist stands alone as a definitive source of history and socio-political critique, while offering a new paradigm of thought aimed at paving the way for correcting centuries of social injustice. Hearing this visionary... Read more

"You Just Need to Lose Weight"

And 19 Other Myths About Fat People

Myths Made in America

By: Aubrey Gordon
Narrated by: Aubrey Gordon
Length: 7 hours 10 minutes

“I am so onboard with everything about this book, and I wish everyone would read it. It has been impeccably researched, yet is presented in an incredibly approachable volume. Fat activist Aubrey Gordon discusses things like the intersections of fatness and desirability politics and why 'fatphobia' isn’t the best word to describe the oppression of... Read more

Opinions

A Decade of Arguments, Criticism, and Minding Other People’s Business

By: Roxane Gay
Narrated by: Roxane Gay
Length: 9 hours 58 minutes

From beloved and bestselling author Roxane Gay, “a strikingly fresh cultural critic” (Washington Post) comes an exhilarating collection of her essays on culture, politics, and everything in between. Since the publication of the groundbreaking Bad Feminist and Hunger, Roxane Gay has continued to tackle big issues embroiling... Read more

Talking to Strangers

What We Should Know about the People We Don't Know

By: Malcolm Gladwell
Narrated by: Malcolm Gladwell
Length: 8 hours 57 minutes

“Fascinating! How and why we so frequently misinterpret the words, intentions, and sincerity of strangers. Computers, analyzing only information, are far better at judging someone’s guilt or innocence (and future behavior) than judges, psychologists, and witnesses. Based on our preconceptions of how people should behave in certain situations, the... Read more

The Dawn of Everything

A New History of Humanity

By: David Graeber & David Wengrow
Narrated by: Mark Williams
Length: 24 hours 13 minutes

“In this brilliant and sometimes funny reexamination of human history, the authors argue that we are less free than our ancestors, and that it was not inevitable "progress" that brought us here. Using evidence from the last few decades of archeology, the authors contend that the centralization of power in the hands of a few was often avoided in... Read more

Freedom is a Constant Struggle

Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement

By: Angela Y. Davis
Narrated by: Angela Y. Davis & Coleen Marlo
Length: 5 hours 47 minutes

In these newly collected essays, interviews, and speeches, world-renowned activist and scholar Angela Y. Davis illuminates the connections between struggles against state violence and oppression throughout history and around the world.

Reflecting on the importance of black feminism, intersectionality, and prison abolitionism for today's... Read more

How to Know a Person

The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen

By: David Brooks
Narrated by: David Brooks
Length: 7 hours 27 minutes

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A practical, heartfelt guide to the art of truly knowing another person in order to foster deeper connections at home, at work, and throughout our lives—from the author of The Road to Character and The Second Mountain

As David Brooks observes, “There is one skill that lies at the heart of any healthy person, family,... Read more

Doppelganger

A Trip into the Mirror World

By: Naomi Klein
Narrated by: Naomi Klein
Length: 14 hours 47 minutes

This program is read by the author.

“If ever a book was necessary, it’s this one.” —Bill McKibben

“Thoughtful and honest . . . Incisive . . . Klein moves her reader toward the truer grounds of solidarity in these times.” —Judith Butler

What if you woke up one morning and found you’d acquired another self—a double who was almost you and yet not you... Read more

Caste (Oprah's Book Club)

The Origins of Our Discontents

By: Isabel Wilkerson
Narrated by: Robin Miles
Length: 15 hours 10 minutes

“Possibly one of the most important books I've read in the last decade. Caste examines the unspoken caste system that has shaped America. Wondering how America came to this? This book has brutal, unflinching answers. Read more

The Warmth of Other Suns

The Epic Story of America's Great Migration

By: Isabel Wilkerson
Narrated by: Robin Miles
Length: 22 hours 40 minutes

“I'm sorry I hadn't gotten to this sooner. Wilkerson pulls together so much of what I already knew about the US but not necessarily why... a great audiobook, too. Read more

The 1619 Project

A New Origin Story

By: Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman & Jake Silverstein
Narrated by: Nikole Hannah-Jones & Full Cast
Length: 18 hours 56 minutes

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A dramatic expansion of a groundbreaking work of journalism, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story offers a profoundly revealing vision of the American past and present.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Washington Post • NPR • Marie Claire
 
In late August 1619, a ship arrived in the British colony of... Read more

Come As You Are: Revised and Updated

The Surprising New Science That Will Transform Your Sex Life

By: Emily Nagoski
Narrated by: Emily Nagoski
Length: 11 hours 29 minutes

A revised and updated edition of Emily Nagoski’s game-changing New York Times bestseller Come As You Are, featuring new information and research on mindfulness, desire, and pleasure that will radically transform your sex life.

For much of the 20th and 21st centuries, women’s sexuality was an uncharted territory in science, studied far less... Read more

The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory

American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism

By: Tim Alberta
Narrated by: Tim Alberta
Length: 18 hours 15 minutes

The award-winning journalist and staff writer for The Atlantic follows up his New York Times bestseller American Carnage with this timely, rigorously reported, and deeply personal examination of the divisions that threaten to destroy the American evangelical movement.Evangelical Christians are perhaps the most polarizing—and least... Read more

Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You

A Remix of the National Book Award-winning Stamped from the Beginning

By: Jason Reynolds & Ibram X. Kendi
Narrated by: Jason Reynolds
Length: 4 hours 11 minutes

“What an amazing, passionate and fast-paced take on Kendi’s original Stamped from the Beginning! It takes you on a journey of racist ideas from then to now, the how and why it still lingers on. Reynolds’s engaging way with words will connect with young adults, and everyone else too. This is a book for everyone to read, so that we all can do... Read more

Me and White Supremacy

Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor

By: Layla F. Saad
Narrated by: Layla F. Saad
Length: 5 hours 19 minutes

“Want to learn how to be a good ancestor? Need to address your privilege and feel uncomfortable about talking about racism? You need to read and work through Me and White Supremacy. Read more

The Comfort Book

By: Matt Haig
Narrated by: Matt Haig
Length: 3 hours 9 minutes

“A wonderful listen read by the author that is both reassuring and inspiring. If you loved Matt Haig's Reasons To Stay Alive, this is the perfect follow-up listen. I particularly love Haig's lists of music, art, film lists to reference after reading. Read more

Unmasking Autism

Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity

By: Devon Price, PhD
Narrated by: Devon Price, PhD
Length: 9 hours 51 minutes

A deep dive into the spectrum of Autistic experience and the phenomenon of masked Autism, giving individuals the tools to safely uncover their true selves while broadening society’s narrow understanding of neurodiversity

“A remarkable work that will stand at the forefront of the neurodiversity movement.”—Barry M. Prizant, PhD, CCC-SLP,author of... Read more

On Our Best Behavior

The Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to Be Good

By: Elise Loehnen
Narrated by: Elise Loehnen
Length: 11 hours 54 minutes

“Whether you identify as a Christian or not, you will be persuaded by Loehnen's argument that the centuries old Seven Deadly Sins continue to exert harmful power over the behavior and lives of women causing us to suppress our healthy desires for agency, autonomy and personal power. Read more

Rest Is Resistance

A Manifesto

By: Tricia Hersey
Narrated by: Tricia Hersey
Length: 5 hours 26 minutes

Disrupt and push back against capitalism and white supremacy by connecting to the liberating power of rest, daydreaming, and naps as a foundation for healing and justice. Tricia Hersey, aka The Nap Bishop, encourages us to elevate rest as a form of resistance and a divine human right.

What would it be like to live in a well-rested world? Far too... Read more

Fire Weather

A True Story from a Hotter World

By: John Vaillant
Narrated by: Alan Carlson
Length: 14 hours 17 minutes

A stunning account of a colossal wildfire and a panoramic exploration of the rapidly changing relationship between fire and humankind from the award-winning, best-selling author of The Tiger and The Golden Spruce

“Riveting, spellbinding, astounding on every page…Captures the majesty and horror of one of [our] great disasters.” —David... Read more

Between Two Kingdoms

A Memoir of a Life Interrupted

By: Suleika Jaouad
Narrated by: Suleika Jaouad
Length: 13 hours 2 minutes

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A deeply moving memoir of illness and recovery that traces one young woman’s journey from diagnosis to remission to re-entry into “normal” life—from the founder of The Isolation Journals and a subject of the Netflix documentary American Symphony

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, The... Read more

So You Want to Talk about Race

By: Ijeoma Oluo
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 7 hours 41 minutes

In this #1 New York Times bestseller, Ijeoma Oluo offers a revelatory examination of race in AmericaA current, constructive, and actionable exploration of today’s racial landscape, offering straightforward clarity that readers of all races need to contribute to the dismantling of the racial divideIn So You Want to Talk about Race,... Read more

White Fragility

Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism

By: Dr. Robin DiAngelo
Narrated by: Amy Landon
Length: 6 hours 20 minutes

The New York Times best-selling book exploring the counterproductive reactions white people have when their assumptions about race are challenged, and how these reactions maintain racial inequality.

In this “vital, necessary, and beautiful book” (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white... Read more

The Gifts of Imperfection: 10th Anniversary Edition

Features a new foreword

By: Brené Brown
Narrated by: Brené Brown
Length: 4 hours 31 minutes

“When I first heard of this book, I waved it off. I was 30, and the title sounded too self-helpy and didn't seem relevant to my life. By the time I reached the ripe old age of 40, the book was about to hit its tenth anniversary and Brené Brown was not just a household name but someone whose books, podcast, and talks have influenced me and... Read more

Class

A Memoir

By: Stephanie Land
Narrated by: Stephanie Land
Length: 8 hours 31 minutes

A Good Morning America Book Club Pick • New York Times Most Anticipated Books of Fall

“Raw and inspiring.” —People

“Land is not just exploring her own story, but also the larger implications of what it means to fall between the cracks of American capitalism.” —The New York Times

From the New York Times bestselling author who inspired the hit... Read more

South to America

A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation

By: Imani Perry
Narrated by: Imani Perry
Length: 16 hours 32 minutes

“An elegant meditation on the complexities of the American South—and thus of America—by an esteemed daughter of the South and one of the great intellectuals of our time. An inspiration.” —Isabel Wilkerson, New York Times bestselling author of The Warmth of Other Suns and Caste: The Origins of Our DiscontentsAn essential, surprising journey... Read more

Raw Dog

The Naked Truth About Hot Dogs

By: Jamie Loftus
Narrated by: Jamie Loftus
Length: 9 hours 38 minutes

“This book is a freaking wild ride, which I recommend you get on. Yes, there is hot dog information between the unfiltered commentary from the author, who reminds me of a young Anthony Bourdain, while they wander along the road searching for this iconic food. Read more

Notes on a Nervous Planet

By: Matt Haig
Narrated by: Matt Haig
Length: 5 hours 13 minutes

“This should be required reading for any anxious person in 2021. Whether it’s doomscrolling on Twitter, watching other people’s highlight reels on Instagram, the creeping dread of your email inbox, or the constant inundation with news headlines that’s stressing you out, Matt Haig’s lighthearted and authentic approach to mental health will, if... Read more

Hood Feminism

Notes from the Women that a Movement Forgot

By: Mikki Kendall
Narrated by: Mikki Kendall
Length: 6 hours 57 minutes

“Powerful. Important. Compulsively readable. Kendall’s narrative style is top notch - riveting and un-put-down-able. Not only is this a must read, it's a must pay attention. It's a must revisit and keep learning kind of book. Kendall dives deep and doesn't pull punches, but she doesn't seek to shame either. This is necessary reading for anyone... Read more

How the Word Is Passed

A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America

By: Clint Smith
Narrated by: Clint Smith
Length: 10 hours 6 minutes

“From plantation to Angola Prison. From Blandford Cemetery in Petersburg, VA to the African Burial Ground in New York City. From Île de Gorée to Whitney Plantation. From the Emancipation Proclamation to Juneteenth. Clint Smith takes us on an unforgettable journey through the history of slavery in the United States, revealing many truths we’ve... Read more

A Day in the Life of Abed Salama

Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy

By: Nathan Thrall
Narrated by: Peter Ganim
Length: 6 hours 44 minutes

Immersive and gripping, an intimate story of a deadly accident outside Jerusalem that unravels a tangle of lives, loves, enmities, and histories over the course of one revealing, heartbreaking day.

Five-year-old Milad Salama is excited for a school trip to a theme park on the outskirts of Jerusalem. On the way, his bus collides with a... Read more

90s Bitch

Media, Culture, and the Failed Promise of Gender Equality

By: Allison Yarrow
Narrated by: Allison Yarrow
Length: 11 hours 33 minutes

Finalist for the Los Angeles Press Club Book Award, muse to a Givenchy fashion collection, and recommended by the The New York Times, The Skimm, US Weekly, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Refinery 29, Book Riot, Bitch Media, and more. "Yarrow’s biting autopsy of the decade scrutinizes the way society reduced — or “bitchified” — women at... Read more

Black AF History

The Un-Whitewashed Story of America

By: Michael Harriot
Narrated by: Michael Harriot
Length: 15 hours 42 minutes

From acclaimed columnist and political commentator Michael Harriot, a searingly smart and bitingly hilarious retelling of American history that corrects the record and showcases the perspectives and experiences of Black Americans.America’s backstory is a whitewashed mythology implanted in our collective memory. It is the story of the pilgrims on... Read more

Stamped from the Beginning: A Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America

By: Ibram X. Kendi
Narrated by: Christopher Dontrell Piper
Length: 18 hours 32 minutes

WINNER OF THE 2016 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR NONFICTION
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER IN RACE AND CIVIL RIGHTS
FINALIST FOR THE 2016 NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FOR NONFICTION
THE MOST AMBITIOUS BOOK OF 2016 —The Washington Post
A BOSTON GLOBE BEST BOOK OF 2016
A WASHINGTON POST NOTABLE BOOK OF 2016
A CHICAGO REVIEW OF BOOKS BEST NONFICTION BOOK OF... Read more

The Trial of Henry Kissinger

By: Christopher Hitchens
Narrated by: Simon Prebble
Length: 6 hours 16 minutes

"If the courts and lawyers of this country will not do their duty, we shall watch as the victims and survivors of this man pursue justice and vindication in their own dignified and painstaking way, and at their own expense, and we shall be put to shame."

Forget Pinochet, Milosevic, Hussein, Kim Jong-il, or Gaddafi: America need look no further... Read more

How to Say Babylon

A Memoir

By: Safiya Sinclair
Narrated by: Safiya Sinclair
Length: 16 hours 46 minutes

A New York Times Notable Book
A Read with Jenna Today Show Book Club Pick!

With echoes of Educated and Born a Crime, How to Say Babylon is the stunning story of the author’s struggle to break free of her rigid Rastafarian upbringing, ruled by her father’s strict patriarchal views and repressive control of her childhood, to find her own voice as... Read more

The United States of Cryptids

A Tour of American Myths and Monsters

By: J. W. Ocker
Narrated by: Mark Sanderlin
Length: 6 hours 55 minutes

Come and meet the monsters in our midst, from bigfoot to batsquatch and beyond!Welcome to the United States of Cryptids, where mysterious monsters lurk in the dark forests, deep lakes, and sticky swamps of all fifty states. From the infamous Jersey Devil to the obscure Snallygaster, travel writer and chronicler of the strange J. W. Ocker not... Read more

Extremely Online

The Untold Story of Fame, Influence, and Power on the Internet

By: Taylor Lorenz
Narrated by: Emily Tremaine
Length: 10 hours 26 minutes

NATIONAL BESTSELLER
Acclaimed Washington Post reporter Taylor Lorenz presents a groundbreaking social history of the internet, revealing how online influence and the creators who amass it have reshaped our world, online and off—“terrific,” as the New York Times calls it, “Lorenz…is a knowledgeable, opinionated guide to the ways internet fame has... Read more

All About Love

New Visions

By: bell hooks
Narrated by: January LaVoy
Length: 6 hours 9 minutes

A New York Times bestseller and enduring classic, All About Love is the acclaimed first volume in feminist icon bell hooks' "Love Song to the Nation" trilogy.  All About Love reveals what causes a polarized society, and how to heal the divisions that cause suffering. Here is the truth about love, and inspiration to help us instill caring,... Read more

Eve

How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution

By: Cat Bohannon
Narrated by: Cat Bohannon
Length: 15 hours 54 minutes

An ambitious, eye-opening, myth-busting, and groundbreaking history of the evolution of the female body, by a brilliant new researcher and writer

Why do women live longer than men? Why do women have menopause? Why are women more likely to get Alzheimer’s? Why do girls score better at every academic subject than boys until puberty, when suddenly... Read more

Wandering in Strange Lands

A Daughter of the Great Migration Reclaims Her Roots

By: Morgan Jerkins
Narrated by: Morgan Jerkins
Length: 8 hours 3 minutes

“In Wandering in Strange Lands, Morgan Jerkins brings us along on her journey to learn about her ancestors and herself. This fascinating ethnography leads Jerkins down paths she anticipated and, perhaps most interestingly, down unexpected ones. As she learns more about where and whom she came from, she confronts her image of herself and grapples... Read more

Know My Name

A Memoir

By: Chanel Miller
Narrated by: Chanel Miller
Length: 15 hours 24 minutes

“Wow! Everybody should read this book. A stunning memoir about a devastating subject. It was eye opening, gut wrenching, powerful and brave. Chanel Miller writes with such honesty and vulnerability–I immediately felt that I knew her and she had me walking in her shoes throughout the entire book. I’m still reeling from the roller coaster of... Read more

What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat

By: Aubrey Gordon
Narrated by: Samara Naeymi
Length: 7 hours 21 minutes

From the creator of Your Fat Friend and co-host of the Maintenance Phase podcast, an explosive indictment of the systemic and cultural bias facing plus-size people.

Anti-fatness is everywhere. In What We Don’t Talk About When We Talk About Fat, Aubrey Gordon unearths the cultural attitudes and social systems that have led to people being denied... Read more

Stolen Focus

Why You Can't Pay Attention--and How to Think Deeply Again

By: Johann Hari
Narrated by: Johann Hari
Length: 10 hours 21 minutes

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Our ability to pay attention is collapsing. From the author of Chasing the Scream and Lost Connections comes a groundbreaking examination of why this is happening—and how to get our attention back.

“The book the world needs in order to win the war on distraction.”—Adam Grant, author of Think Again

“Read this book to... Read more

Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century

Unabridged Selections

By: Alice Wong
Narrated by: Alejandra Ospina & Alice Wong
Length: 8 hours 1 minute

“Containing dozens of personal stories, this is an absolute must-read for anyone looking to learn about the breadth, diversity, and history of disabled experience(s) from disabled folks themselves. Read more

Stay True

A Memoir

By: Hua Hsu
Narrated by: Hua Hsu
Length: 5 hours 28 minutes

“Stay True is a beautiful memoir and tribute to Hua Hsu's late friend, Ken. I listened to this memoir as an audiobook and I loved hearing Hsu narrate his own story. His accounts of friendship and loss are raw and emotional, taking the reader on a journey with Hsu as he processes his grief and finds hope in writing and art. Read more