Books like The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration into the Wonder of Consciousness

01

Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness

Peter Godfrey-Smith · Science

Peter Godfrey-Smith is a philosopher of science and a scuba diver who began spending time with octopuses off the coast of Sydney, and Other Minds is the result of that dual perspective.

A kindred science read.

02

Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?

Frans de Waal · Science

Frans de Waal's central argument is that we've spent most of the last century asking the wrong questions about animal intelligence.

A kindred science read.

03

The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History

Elizabeth Kolbert · Science

The Sixth Extinction is Elizabeth Kolbert's account of the mass extinction event currently underway — the sixth in Earth's history, and the first caused by a single species.

A kindred science read.

04

The Omnivore's Dilemma

Michael Pollan · Health

The Omnivore's Dilemma is Michael Pollan's investigation into four food chains — industrial, industrial organic, local pastoral, and hunted-and-gathered — organized around the question of what we should eat.

A kindred science read.

05

Seven Brief Lessons on Physics

Carlo Rovelli · Science

Carlo Rovelli, a theoretical physicist best known for his work on loop quantum gravity, wrote this book originally as a series of essays for an Italian Sunday newspaper.

Both dig into wonder.

06

The Pleasure of Finding Things Out

Richard P. Feynman · Science

Richard Feynman died in 1988, but he gave talks, interviews, and lectures throughout his career that were preserved in recordings and transcripts.

Both dig into wonder.

07

A Moveable Feast

Ernest Hemingway · Memoir

A Moveable Feast is Hemingway's posthumously published account of his years in Paris during the 1920s, when he and his first wife Hadley lived cheaply in Montparnasse while he apprenticed himself to the work of becoming a writer.

Both dig into friendship.

08

God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism

Abraham Joshua Heschel · Religion & Spirituality

God in Search of Man is Abraham Joshua Heschel's systematic philosophy of Judaism, published in 1955 as the companion to Man Is Not Alone.

Both dig into wonder.

09

Just Kids

Patti Smith · Memoir

Just Kids is Patti Smith's National Book Award-winning memoir of her relationship with the photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, from their first meeting in New York in 1967 through their years of shared poverty, artistic development, and eventual celebrity, to Mapplethorpe's death from AIDS in 1989.

Both dig into friendship.

10

Lab Girl

Hope Jahren · Memoir

Lab Girl is Hope Jahren's memoir of becoming a scientist, told alongside a parallel account of plant biology that is one of the most original structural decisions in recent nonfiction.

Both dig into friendship.

11

Letters from a Stoic

Seneca · Philosophy

Letters from a Stoic collects a selection of 124 letters that Seneca wrote to his friend Lucilius in the final years of his life, around 65 AD.

Both dig into friendship.

12

Life

Keith Richards · Memoir

Keith Richards's Life was written with journalist James Fox and published when Richards was 66, after more than fifty years with the Rolling Stones.

Both dig into friendship.