On Failing to Craft a Liberal Arts Curriculum From My Audiobook Collection

Would you be willing to engage with me in a thought experiment?

Take your book collection. Try to categorize your books by academic discipline. (To make this doable, let’s stick with our nonfiction books).

Does your book collection a liberal arts curriculum make?

I tried this experiment with my Audible audiobook collection. The last 7 years of my life have been my audiobook years. I’ve listened to lots of audiobooks - and a record of my reading is preserved on Audible.com

Figuring out how to categorize my audiobooks by academic discipline proved surprisingly difficult. Sociology / Anthropology became somewhat of a catchall category. Many of my books are cross-disciplinary. Some books don’t fit into academic disciplines at all - they are undisciplined.

Still, it was fun to go through 7 years of book listening. I love these books. Taken together, these books have built my understanding of the world.

Do I have enough books, and the right books, to construct an education around? 

My sense is that this would be an impoverished education in the extreme.  

Mostly, I’m struck by how limited the knowledge that is represented in my audiobook collection.  

The social sciences over-represented, the arts and the humanities (as well as most of the life and physical sciences) go begging. 

The lack of intellectual diversity as represented in my audiobook collection is frankly depressing.  

Perhaps we read what we like, and like what we know.  

I invite you to join me in this exercise. We promise not to judge (too harshly).

Business:

• The Fourth Transformation: How Augmented Reality & Artificial Intelligence Will Change Everything
• The Content Trap: A Strategist's Guide to Digital Change
• Platform Revolution: How Networked Markets Are Transforming the Economy - and How to Make Them Work for You
• Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble
• Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt
• Competing Against Luck: The Story of Innovation and Customer Choice
• The Search: How Google & Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business & Transformed Our Culture
• Googled: The End of the World as We Know It
• Working With You Is Killing Me: Freeing Yourself from Emotional Traps at Work
• The Wal-Mart Effect
• DisneyWar
• The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More
• Go Put Your Strengths to Work: 6 Powerful Steps to Achieve Outstanding Performance
• The Perfect Thing: How the iPod Shuffles Commerce, Culture, and Coolness
• ZOOM: The Global Race to Fuel the Car of the Future
• Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley
• Under New Management: How Leading Organizations Are Upending Business as Usual
• The Great Fragmentation: And Why the Future of All Business Is Small
• Move: Putting America's Infrastructure Back in the Lead
• Leading Change
• The Seventh Sense: Power, Fortune, and Survival in the Age of Networks
• Buying In: The Secret Dialogue Between What We Buy and Who We Are
• The Smartest Places on Earth: Why Rustbelts Are the Emerging Hotspots of Global Innovation
• The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations
• Buyology: Truth and Lies About Why We Buy
• Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies
• Appetite for Self-Destruction: The Spectacular Crash of the Record Industry in the Digital Age
• The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century
• The 4-Hour Work Week: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
• Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?
• Trade-Off: Why Some Things Catch On, and Others Don't
• Rework
• Sonic Boom: Globalization at Mach Speed
• Steve Jobs
• Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power
• Big Bang Disruption: Strategy in the Age of Devastating Innovation
• Blockbusters: Hit-making, Risk-taking, and the Big Business of Entertainment
• Thanks for the Feedback: The Science and Art of Receiving Feedback Well
• What Stays in Vegas: The World of Personal Data - Lifeblood of Big Business - and the End of Privacy as We Know It
• Dataclysm: Who We Are (When We Think No One's Looking)
• Meatball Sundae

Economics:

• An Extraordinary Time: The End of the Postwar Boom and the Return of the Ordinary Economy
• The Wealth of Humans: Work, Power, and Status in the Twenty-first Century Work, Power, and Status in the Twenty-first Century
• Age of Discovery: Navigating the Risks and Rewards of Our New Renaissance
• Keynes Hayek: The Clash That Defined Modern Economics
• Capital in the Twenty-First Century
• Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future
• Machines of Loving Grace: The Quest for Common Ground Between Humans and Robots
• Humans Need Not Apply: A Guide to Wealth and Work in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
• The End of Average: How We Succeed in a World That Values Sameness
• American Amnesia: How the War on Government Led Us to Forget What Made America Rich
• Popular Economics: What the Rolling Stones, Downton Abbey, and LeBron James Can Teach You About Economics
• The Industries of the Future
• Big Picture Economics: How to Navigate the New Global Economy
• The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon, and Our Gamble over Earth's Future
• Narconomics: How to Run a Drug Cartel
• Why We Work
• The Boom: How Fracking Ignited the American Energy Revolution and Changed the World
• The End of Normal: The Great Crisis and the Future of Growth
• The Glass Cage: Automation and Us
• The Undercover Economist Strikes Back: How to Run - or Ruin - an Economy
• How Music Got Free: The End of an Industry, the Turn of the Century, and the Patient Zero of Piracy
• The Age of Oversupply: Overcoming the Greatest Challenge to the Global Economy
• The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies
• Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics
• The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires
• The Misfit Economy: Lessons in Creativity from Pirates, Hackers, Gangsters, and Other Informal Entrepreneurs
• Who Gets What - And Why: The New Economics of Matchmaking and Market Design
• Average is Over: Powering America Beyond the Age of the Great Stagnation
• No Ordinary Disruption: The Four Global Forces Breaking All the Trends
• Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else
• Resource Revolution: How to Capture the Biggest Business Opportunity in a Century
• The Haves and the Have Nots: A Brief and Idiosyncratic History of Global Inequality
• The Price of Inequality: How Today's Divided Society Endangers Our Future
• The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves
• Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
• SuperFreakonomics
• Think Like a Freak: The Authors of Freakonomics Offer to Retrain Your Brain
• The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse
• The New American Workplace
• Zillow Talk: Rewriting the Rules of Real Estate
• On the Wealth of Nations: Books That Changed the World
• Richistan: A Journey Through the American Wealth Boom and the Lives of the New Rich
• Connected: 24 Hours in the Global Economy
• Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything
• The Big Con: How Washington Got Hoodwinked and Hijacked by Crackpot Economics
• Discover Your Inner Economist
• The Logic of Life: The Rational Economics of an Irrational World
• Crunch
• Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution - and How It Can Renew America
• Create Your Own Economy: The Path to Prosperity in a Disordered World
• Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture
• The Art of Making Money: The Story of a Master Counterfeiter
• FREE: The Future of a Radical Price
• Animal Spirits: How Human Psychology Drives the Economy, and Why It Matters for Global Capitalism
• Slackonomics: Generation X in the Age of Creative Destruction
• The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine
• In Cheap We Trust: The Story of a Misunderstood American Virtue
• Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism
• False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World
• The Great Reset: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity
• Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future
• Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation
• Spousonomics: Using Economics to Master Love, Marriage, and Dirty Dishes
• Grand Pursuit: The Story of Economic Genius
• The High-beta Rich: How the Manic Wealthy Will Take Us to the Next Boom, Bubble, and Bust
• Stealth of Nations: The Global Rise of the Informal Economy
• The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World
• Time to Start Thinking: America in the Age of Descent
• End This Depression Now!
• What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets
• The End of Money: Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers--and the Coming Cashless Society
• The Growth Map: Economic Opportunity in the BRICs and Beyond
• Breakout Nations: In Pursuit of the Next Economic Miracles
• Future Perfect: The Case for Progress in a Networked Age
• Naked Statistics: Stripping the Dread from the Data
• The Why Axis: Hidden Motives and the Undiscovered Economics of Everyday Life
• A History of Future Cities
• Unleashing the Second American Century: Four Forces for Economic Dominance
• The Myth of America's Decline: Politics, Economics, and a Half Century of False Prophecies

History:

• White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America
• The Rise and Fall of American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living Since the Civil War
• The Road Taken: The History and Future of America's Infrastructure
• The Shape of the New: Four Big Ideas and How They Made the Modern World
• Empire of Things: How We Became a World of Consumers, from the Fifteenth Century to the Twenty-First
• Empire of Cotton: A Global History
• The Taste of Conquest: The Rise and Fall of the Three Great Cities of Spice
• SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome
• The Age of Edison: Electric Light and the Invention of Modern America
• The Race Underground: Boston, New York, and the Incredible Rivalry That Built America's First Subway
• Time Travel: A History
• How the West Won: The Neglected Story of the Triumph of Modernity
• One Summer: America, 1927
• The Dawn of Innovation: The First American Industrial Revolution
• Engines of Change: A History of the American Dream in Fifteen Cars
• A History of the World in 6 Glasses
• 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created
• Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier
• Paper: Paging Through History
• American Colossus: The Triumph of Capitalism, 1865-1900
• The Untold History of the Potato
• An Edible History of Humanity
• The Invention of Air
• The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World
• Lafayette in the Somewhat United States
• The Partly Cloudy Patriot
• The Wordy Shipmates
• Worlds at War: The 2,500-Year Struggle Between East and West
• A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World
• America, 1908: The Making of a Modern Nation
• The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World Was Created
• Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation
• Alexander Hamilton
• How to Be a Tudor: A Dawn-to-Dusk Guide to Tudor Life
• The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin
• A Thread Across the Ocean
• 1776
• The Devil in the White City
• Undaunted Courage
• The Company: A Short History of a Revolutionary Idea
• The Lost Painting: The Quest for a Caravaggio Masterpiece
• Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time
• Imperial Grunts: The American Military on the Ground
• Library: An Unquiet History
• Andrew Jackson: His Life and Times
• Noble Obsession: The Race to Unlock the Greatest Industrial Secret of the 19th Century
• The Age of Napoleon 
• The Age of Shakespeare
• Ponzi's Scheme: The True Story of a Financial Legend
• Stealing God's Thunder: Benjamin Franklin's Lightning Rod and the Invention of America
• The Americas: A Hemispheric History 
• People and Empires: A Short History of European Migration, Exploration, and Conquest, from Greece to the Present 
• The Triumph of the West: The Origin, Rise, and Legacy of Western Civilization
• The Immortal Game
• The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell
• Marie Antoinette: The Journey
• An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793
• Mysteries of the Middle Ages
• Pistol: The Life of Pete Maravich
• Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
• Higher: A Historic Race to the Sky and the Making of a City
• Justinian's Flea: Plague, Empire, and the Birth of Europe
• Shakespeare: The World as Stage
• Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War
• A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World
• Angels and Ages: A Short Book About Darwin, Lincoln, and Modern Life
• The Evolution of God
• The Illustrious Dead: Napoleon, Typhus, and the Dream of World Conquest
• The American Future: A History
• Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea
• Crash Course: The American Automobile Industry's Road from Glory to Disaster
• The Bagel: The Surprising History of a Modest Bread
• Hamburger: A History
• The Yugo: The Rise and Fall of the Worst Car in History
• The Most Powerful Idea in the World: A Story of Steam, Industry, and Invention
• Interstate 69: The Unfinished History of the Last Great American Highway
• At Home: A Short History of Private Life
• Why the West Rules - for Now: The Patterns of History, and What They Reveal About the Future
• Unfamiliar Fishes
• The Man Who Loved Books Too Much: The True Story of a Thief, a Detective, and a World of Literary Obsession
• The Company Town: The Industrial Edens and Satanic Mills that Shaped the American Economy
• In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin
• Civilization: The West and the Rest
• The Big Roads: The Untold Story of the Engineers, Visionaries, and Trailblazers Who Created the American Superhighways
• Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln

Political Science:

• This Brave New World: India, China and the United States
• The Fix: How Nations Survive and Thrive in a World in Decline
• The Quest: Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World
• The Price of Prosperity: Why Rich Nations Fail and How to Renew Them
• This Town: Two Parties and a Funeral - Plus, Plenty of Valet Parking! - in America's Gilded Capital
• Game Change: Obama and the Clintons, McCain and Palin, and the Race of a Lifetime
• Dreams and Shadows: The Future of the Middle East
• The Rise and Fall of Nations: Forces of Change in the Post-Crisis World
• Holy Cow!: An Indian Adventure
• The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century
• Chatter: Dispatches from the Secret World of Global Eavesdropping
• Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War
• China, Inc.
• America's Bitter Pill: Money, Politics, Backroom Deals, and the Fight to Fix Our Broken Healthcare System
• Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq
• Brazil: The Troubled Rise of a Global Power
• The Places in Between
• Planet India: How the Fastest Growing Democracy Is Transforming America and the World
• Brazillionaires
• Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations
• The Elephant and the Dragon: The Rise of India and China, and What It Means for All of Us
• Ask a Mexican
• Spook Country
• The Atomic Bazaar: The Rise of the Nuclear Poor
• China Road: A Journey into the Future of a Rising Power
• Hog Pilots, Blue Water Grunts
• Imperial Life in the Emerald City
• The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America
• Social Security Works!: Why Social Security Isn't Going Broke and How Expanding It Will Help Us All
• Gomorrah: A Personal Journey into the Violent International Empire of Naples' Organized Crime System
• McMafia: A Journey Through the Global Criminal Underworld
• The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court
• Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China
• Out of Mao's Shadow: The Struggle for the Soul of a New China
• The Gamble
• A Brief History of France: Brief Histories
• France on the Brink, Second Edition
• The Fourth Star: Four Generals and the Epic Struggle for the Future of the United States Army
• Crude World: The Violent Twilight of Oil
• The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific
• Our Patchwork Nation: The Surprising Truth about the 'Real' America
• Travels in Siberia
• The Big Thirst: The Secret Life and Turbulent Future of Water
• Made in Britain: How the Nation Earns Its Living
• Boomerang: Travels in the New Third World
• Pity the Billionaire: The Unexpected Resurgence of the American Right
• Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty
• Little America: The War within the War for Afghanistan
• Red Ink: Inside the High-Stakes Politics of the Federal Budget
• Borderless Economics: Chinese Sea Turtles, Indian Fridges, and the New Fruits of Global Capitalism
• Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety
• Double Down: Game Change 2012
• American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America
• The Upside of Down: Why the Rise of the Rest is Good for the West

Psychology, Cognitive Science, and Behavioral Economics:

• How We Learn: The Surprising Truth About When, Where, and Why It Happens
• Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning
• Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness
• Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions
• Invisible Influence: The Hidden Forces That Shape Behavior
• The Gift of Failure: How the Best Parents Learn to Let Go So Their Children Can Succeed
• Red Team: How to Succeed by Thinking Like the Enemy
• Messy: The Power of Disorder to Transform Our Lives
• Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking
• Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges
• Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age
• Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy
• How to Raise an Adult: Break Free of the Overparenting Trap and Prepare Your Kid for Success
• Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business
• Blindspot
• Superforecasting: The Art and Science of Prediction
• Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World
• The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload
• Foolproof: Why Safety Can Be Dangerous and How Danger Makes Us Safe
• Beyond Measure: The Big Impact of Small Changes
• Influence: Science and Practice
• Kidding Ourselves: The Hidden Power of Self-Deception
• Humans Are Underrated: What High Achievers Know That Brilliant Machines Never Will
• The Up Side of Down: Why Failing Well Is the Key to Success
• The Norm Chronicles: Stories and Numbers About Danger and Death
• The Small Big: Small Changes That Spark Big Influence
• The Impulse Society: America in the Age of Instant Gratification
• David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants
• Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It
• The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail - but Some Don't
• The Tastemakers: Why We’re Crazy for Cupcakes but Fed Up with Fondue (Plus Baconomics, Superfoods, and Other Secrets from the World of Food Trends)
• You're Wearing That?: Understanding Mothers and Daughters in Conversation
• Stumbling on Happiness
• Mommies Who Drink: Sex, Drugs, and Other Distant Memories of an Ordinary Mom
• Mindset: The New Psychology of Success
• Sidetracked: Why Our Decisions Get Derailed, and How We Can Stick to the Plan
• Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships
• The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives
• Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior
• Outliers: The Story of Success
• The Impulse Factor: The Hidden Force Behind the Choices We Make
• Why We Make Mistakes
• Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure
• The Survivors Club: The Secrets and Science that Could Save Your Life
• How We Decide
• Do Gentlemen Really Prefer Blondes?: Bodies, Brains, and Behavior---The Science Behind Sex, Love and Attraction
• The Science of Fear: Why We Fear the Things We Should Not - and Put Ourselves in Great Danger
• What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures
• Teacher Man
• Mind Wide Open: Your Brain and the Neuroscience of Everyday Life
• On Intelligence
• The Female Brain
• Super Crunchers
• The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature
• Kluge: The Haphazard Construction of the Human Mind
• Gut Feelings: The Intelligence of the Unconscious
• The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything
• Black Box Thinking: Why Most People Never Learn from Their Mistakes - But Some Do
• Invisibles: The Power of Anonymous Work in an Age of Relentless Self-Promotion
• Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School
• Welcome to Your Brain: Why You Lose Your Car Keys but Never Forget How to Drive and Other Puzzles of Everyday Life
• Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
• The Male Brain: A Breakthrough Understanding of How Men and Boys Think
• Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard
• The Brain That Changes Itself: Personal Triumphs from the Frontiers of Brain Science
• Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age
• Click: The Magic of Instant Connections
• The Genius in All of Us: Why Everything You've Been Told about Genetics, Talent and IQ is Wrong
• Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error
• The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home
• The Power of Pull: How Small Moves, Smartly Made, Can Set Big Things in Motion
• Overwhelmed: Work, Love, and Play When No One Has the Time
• How Pleasure Works: The New Science of Why We Like What We Like
• The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain: The Surprising Talents of the Middle-Aged Mind
• Why We Buy
• The Art of Choosing
• The Invisible Gorilla: And Other Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us
• On Second Thought: Outsmarting Your Mind's Hard-Wired Habits
• Blunder: Why Smart People Make Bad Decisions
• The Price of Everything: Solving the Mystery of Why We Pay What We Do
• The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood
• Everything Is Obvious: Once You Know the Answer
• The Man Who Lied to his Laptop: What Machines Teach Us About Human Relationships
• The Optimism Bias: A Tour of the Irrationally Positive Brain
• Now You See It: How the Brain Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, and Learn
• The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined
• Too Big To Know: Rethinking Knowledge Now That the Facts Aren't the Facts, Experts Are Everywhere, and the Smartest Person in the Room Is the Room
• Situations Matter: Understanding How Context Transforms Your World
• Imagine: How Creativity Works
• The Honest Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone - Especially Ourselves
• Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength
• Monkey Mind: A Memoir of Anxiety
• The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business
• Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior
• Redirect: The Surprising New Science of Psychological Change
• What Makes Your Brain Happy and Why You Should Do the Opposite
• To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth about Moving Others
• On Looking: Eleven Walks with Expert Eyes
• Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find - and Keep - Love
• Teaching Minds: How Cognitive Science Can Save Our Schools
• Decisive: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work
• Contagious: Why Things Catch On

Science and Technology

• The Gene: An Intimate History
• The Powerhouse: Inside the Invention of a Battery to Save the World
• Stuff Matters: Exploring the Marvelous Materials That Shape Our Man-Made World
• Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet
• The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer
• What Technology Wants
• The Well-Dressed Ape: A Natural History of Myself
• The World Without Us
• Why Do Men Have Nipples?
• The Evolution of Everything: How New Ideas Emerge
• What Should We Be Worried About?: Real Scenarios That Keep Scientists Up at Night
• Consider the Fork: A History of How We Cook and Eat
• Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior
• The Ghost Map
• The Family That Couldn't Sleep: A Medical Mystery
• The Demon Under The Microscope
• Scourge: The Once and Future Threat of Smallpox
• Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters
• Proust Was a Neuroscientist
• Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex
• Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body
• Animals Make Us Human
• Inside of a Dog: What Dogs See, Smell, and Know
• Fly by Wire: The Geese, the Glide, the Miracle on the Hudson
• E=mc2: A Biography of the World's Most Famous Equation
• Electric Universe: The Shocking True Story of Electricity
• The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science
• Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock That Shaped the World
• Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void
• Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food
• The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements
• Plastic: A Toxic Love Story
• Wicked Bugs: The Louse That Conquered Napoleon’s Army and Other Diabolical Insects
• The Violinist's Thumb: And Other Lost Tales of Love, War, and Genius, as Written by Our Genetic Code
• Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal
• Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us
• What's a Dog For?: The Surprising History, Science, Philosophy, and Politics of Man's Best Friend
• Why Did the Chicken Cross the World?: The Epic Saga of the Bird That Powers Civilization

Sociology / Anthropology:

• There Is Life After College: What Parents and Students Should Know About Navigating School to Prepare for the Jobs of Tomorrow
• College (Un)Bound: The Future of Higher Education and What It Means for Students
• Higher Education in America
• Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life
• The End of College: Creating the Future of Learning and the University of Everywhere
• Revolution in Higher Education: How a Small Band of Innovators Will Make College Accessible and Affordable
• Will College Pay Off?: A Guide to the Most Important Financial Decision You'll Ever Make
• Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America
• Thank You for Being Late: An Optimist's Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations
• Whiplash: How to Survive Our Faster Future
• Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City
• Rethink: The Surprising History of New Ideas
• The Revenge of Analog: Real Things and Why They Matter
• The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds
• Oh, Florida!: How America's Weirdest State Influences the Rest of the Country
• The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity
• The Attention Merchants: The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads
• Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus: How Growth Became the Enemy of Prosperity
• The Great Acceleration
• The Grid: The Fraying Wires Between Americans and Our Energy Future
• All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation
• The New Better Off: Reinventing the American Dream
• Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy
• A Truck Full of Money: One Man's Quest to Recover from Great Success
• The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future
• Most Likely to Succeed: Preparing Our Kids for the New Innovation Era
• The Teacher Wars: A History of America’s Most Embattled Profession
• Overcomplicated: Technology at the Limits of Comprehension
• The Geography of Genius: A Search for the World's Most Creative Places from Ancient Athens to Silicon Valley
• Little Rice: Smartphones, Xiaomi, and the Chinese Dream
• Door to Door: The Magnificent, Maddening, Mysterious World of Transportation
• What to Expect When No One's Expecting: America's Coming Demographic Disaste
• The Future of Work: Attract New Talent, Build Better Leaders, and Create a Competitive Organization
• Marriage Markets: How Inequality is Remaking the American Family
• The End of Power: From Boardrooms to Battlefields and Churches to States, Why Being in Charge Isn't What It Used to Be
• Song Machine: Inside the Hit Factory
• The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap
• Data and Goliath: The Hidden Battles to Capture Your Data and Control Your World
• Social Physics: How Good Ideas Spread - The Lessons from a New Science
• All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood
• The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution
• Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion-Dollar Trash Trade
• The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America
• Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now
• The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That Way
• The End of the Suburbs: Where the American Dream is Moving
• Going Solo: The Extraordinary Rise and Surprising Appeal of Living Alone
• Methland: The Death and Life of an American Small Town
• Elsewhere, U.S.A.: How We Got From the Affluent Society to the Home Office
• Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do (and What It Says About Us)
• The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable
• Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes to the Streets
• Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
• The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few
• The Ape in the Corner Office: Understanding the Workplace Beast in All of Us
• The Genius Factory: The Curious History of the Nobel Prize Sperm Bank
• Our Inner Ape: A Leading Primatologist Explains Why We Are Who We Are
• The City of Falling Angels
• The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World
• A Death in Belmont
• Treasure Hunt: Inside the Mind of the New Consumer
• The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals
• Candyfreak: A Journey Through the Chocolate Underbelly of America
• The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game
• The Real Animal House
• The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid
• Heat
• Cubed: A Secret History of the Workplace
• Microtrends: The Small Forces Behind Tomorrow's Big Changes
• House Lust: America's Obsession with Our Homes
• Storming Las Vegas: How a Cuban-Born, Soviet-Trained Commando Took Down the Strip
• The Fruit Hunters: A Story of Nature, Adventure, Commerce, and Obsession
• Snoop: What Your Stuff Says About You
• The Way We'll Be: The Zogby Report on the Transformation of the American Dream
• The Numerati
• Television Is the New Television: The Unexpected Triumph of Old Media in the Digital Age
• Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us
• A Few Seconds of Panic: A 170-Pound, 43-Year-Old Sportswriter Plays in the NFL
• Hella Nation
• True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society
• Good Book: Things I Learned When I Read Every Single Word of the Bible
• Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives
• Caught in the Middle: America's Heartland in the Age of Globalism
• Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan
• Manhood for Amateurs: The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father, and Son
• This Book Is Overdue!: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All
• I Live in the Future & Here's How It Works: Why Your World, Work, and Brain Are Being Creatively Disrupted
• Shock of Gray: The Aging of the World's Population and How It Pits Young Against Old, Child Against Parent, Worker Against Boss
• My Korean Deli: Risking It All for a Convenience Store
• Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef
• Keep the Change: A Clueless Tipper's Quest to Become the Guru of the Gratuity
• The Italians
• The Story of Sushi: An Unlikely Saga of Raw Fish and Rice
• American Desperado: My Life - From Mafia Soldier to Cocaine Cowboy to Secret Government Asset
• Always On: How the iPhone Unlocked the Anything-Anytime-Anywhere Future - and Locked Us In
• Detroit: A Biography
• Twilight of the Elites: America after Meritocracy
• Hidden America: From Coal Miners to Cowboys, an Extraordinary Exploration of the Unseen People Who Make This Country Work
• Heads in Beds: A Reckless Memoir of Hotels, Hustles, and So-Called Hospitality
• Against Security: How We Go Wrong at Airports, Subways, and Other Sites of Ambiguous Danger
• Overbooked
• Cockpit Confidential: Everything You Need to Know About Air Travel: Questions, Answers, and Reflections
• Full Upright and Locked Position: Not-So-Comfortable Truths About Air Travel Today
• Back of the House: The Secret Life of a Restaurant
• Detroit: An American Autopsy
• Collision Low Crossers: A Year Inside the Turbulent World of NFL Football
• Slow Getting Up: A Story of NFL Survival from the Bottom of the Pile
• Difficult Men: Behind the Scenes of a Creative Revolution: From The Sopranos and The Wire to Mad Men and Breaking Bad
• Blood Will Out: The True Story of a Murder, a Mystery, and a Masquerade
• Train: Riding the Rails That Created the Modern World - from the Trans-Siberian to the Southwest Chief
• Tomorrowland: Our Journey From Science Fiction to Science Fact
• Scribe: My Life in Sports
• A Burglar's Guide to the City
• You May Also Like: Taste in an Age of Endless Choice
• Junk: Digging Through America's Love Affair with Stuff
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