Books like The Light We Carry

01

Becoming

Michelle Obama · Memoir

Becoming is Michelle Obama's account of how a girl from a modest house on Chicago's South Side became one of the most recognized people in the world — and what that journey cost and revealed.

Shares resilience and identity with The Light We Carry.

02

Daring Greatly

Brené Brown · Health

Daring Greatly is Brené Brown's argument, drawn from twelve years of qualitative research on shame and vulnerability, that the willingness to show up without guarantees — to be seen, to risk failure, to remain open in the presence of uncertainty — is not weakness but the foundation of courage, connection, and meaningful achievement.

A kindred memoir read.

03

Man's Search for Meaning

Viktor E. Frankl · Psychology

Man's Search for Meaning is Viktor Frankl's account of his years as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps, including Auschwitz, and the psychological theory he developed from that experience.

Both dig into resilience.

04

When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times

Pema Chödrön · Religion & Spirituality

When Things Fall Apart is a collection of talks and essays by Pema Chödrön, an American Buddhist nun in the Tibetan tradition, addressing how to work with difficulty, loss, and uncertainty rather than escape them.

A kindred memoir read.

05

Finding Me: A Memoir

Viola Davis · Memoir

Finding Me is Viola Davis's account of her childhood in extreme poverty in Central Falls, Rhode Island, and her path from that starting point to becoming one of the most decorated actors in the history of American theater and film.

Shares resilience and identity with The Light We Carry.

06

Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream

H. G. Bissinger · Memoir

Friday Night Lights is H.

Shares identity and community with The Light We Carry.

07

Greenlights

Matthew McConaughey · Memoir

Greenlights is Matthew McConaughey's memoir-philosophy hybrid, built around decades of journals he kept starting in his teens.

Shares resilience and identity with The Light We Carry.

08

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Maya Angelou · Memoir

Maya Angelou's first volume of autobiography covers her childhood and adolescence in Stamps, Arkansas and San Francisco during the 1930s and 1940s, ending with the birth of her son at age sixteen.

Shares resilience and identity with The Light We Carry.

09

Know My Name: A Memoir

Chanel Miller · Memoir

Know My Name is Chanel Miller's memoir of being sexually assaulted behind a dumpster at Stanford University in 2015, being identified publicly as only "Emily Doe" throughout the subsequent trial, and the experience of navigating a legal process while the perpetrator — Stanford swimmer Brock Turner — became the more visible subject of the story.

Shares resilience and identity with The Light We Carry.

10

Lucky Man: A Memoir

Michael J. Fox · Memoir

Michael J.

Shares resilience and identity with The Light We Carry.

11

My Own Country: A Doctor's Story

Abraham Verghese · Memoir

My Own Country is Abraham Verghese's account of his years as an infectious disease specialist in Johnson City, Tennessee, during the early years of the AIDS epidemic.

Shares identity and community with The Light We Carry.

12

The Glass Castle: A Memoir

Jeannette Walls · Memoir

The Glass Castle is Jeannette Walls's memoir about growing up as the second of four children in a family that moved constantly across the American Southwest and West Virginia, rarely had enough to eat, and existed almost entirely outside conventional institutions.

Shares resilience and identity with The Light We Carry.