September’s Best Biographies and Memoirs

In Pieces, by Sally Field
For the first time, and with impressive literary style, Field reflects on a career that began with sitcoms in the ’60s and developed in movies like Sybil, Norma Rae, and Lincoln. She talks of the highs and lows of her impressive career, as well as about the troubled relationships and insecurities that have challenged her even as they helped to make her into the inspiring figure she has become.

Every Day Is Extra, by John Kerry
John Kerry appeared on the American stage more than 50 years ago, returning from Vietnam to testify before Congress about the state of affairs for soldiers on the ground. Since then, he’s been a prosecutor, a lieutenant governor, a senator, a presidential nominee, and secretary of state. Kerry’s memoir covers the entirety of his public life, offering reminiscences of some of the figures he’s worked with and his own feelings about our our modern way of politics.

Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth, by Sarah Smarsh
Who better to tell the story of America’s working poor than a fifth-generation Kansas wheat farmer whose childhood during the 1980s didn’t see her family break a cycle of generations of poverty, but instead saw forces beyond their control lock them into their social class and economic status? Sarah Smarsh approaches the topic of poverty in America as both memoir and astute analysis, bringing her own experience to bear on an incisive cultural commentary.

The Truth About Aaron: My Journey to Understand My Brother, by Jonathan Hernandez
Just two seasons into what looked to be an incredibly promising football career, Aaron Hernandez was arrested for the murder of linebacker Odin Lloyd and subsequently sentenced to life in prison without parole. Just two years after that, he was found dead by his own hand in his prison cell. Aaron’s brother has penned this unvarnished memoir of his life with his infamous sibling, presenting Aaron as neither a victim nor a tragic figure, but as one who succumbed to rage and violence.

The Fabulous Bouvier Sisters: The Tragic and Glamorous Lives of Jackie and Lee, by Sam Kashner and Nancy Schoenberger
Decades after her death, Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis continues to fascinate, but the story of the Bouvier family as a whole is as interesting as that of the Kennedys, if less well known. Drawing on new interviews with Jackie’s still-living younger sister, Lee Radziwill, Kashner and Schoenberger chronicle the close, complicated, and sometimes rocky legacy of the glamorous socialite siblings.

The Good Neighbor: The Life and Work of Fred Rogers, by Maxwell King
Mr. Rogers is having a moment, and is it any wonder? His lessons about the virtues of curiosity, honesty, play, and simple compassion are evergreen, and we seem to need them now more than ever. Arriving in the wake of the blockbuster documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor? King’s new work is the first full-length print biography of the icon, and it’s no shocking tell-all: by all accounts, the Mr. Rogers we saw on TV wasn’t that far removed from the real-life figure. What does come to light are the struggles of his own childhood, as well as the savvy behind-the-scenes decision making that made his show a beloved staple for generations of kids.
Whose story inspires you?