Books like Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith

01

Into the Wild

Jon Krakauer · Biography

Into the Wild is Jon Krakauer's account of Christopher McCandless, a twenty-four-year-old who graduated from Emory University in 1990, gave his savings to charity, abandoned his car and possessions, and spent two years drifting through the American West before hitchhiking into the Alaskan wilderness in April 1992.

A kindred memoir read.

02

Into Thin Air

Jon Krakauer · Memoir

Into Thin Air is Jon Krakauer's firsthand account of the May 1996 Everest expedition that killed eight climbers in a single afternoon.

A kindred memoir read.

03

The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason

Sam Harris · Religion & Spirituality

The End of Faith was written in the weeks following the September 11 attacks and published in 2004.

Both dig into religion.

04

The God Delusion

Richard Dawkins · Religion & Spirituality

The God Delusion is Richard Dawkins' comprehensive case against religious belief, published in 2006 as the most high-profile work of the New Atheist movement.

Both dig into religion.

05

Educated: A Memoir

Tara Westover · Memoir

Educated is Tara Westover's memoir about growing up in a survivalist family in rural Idaho and eventually earning a PhD in history from Cambridge University.

A kindred memoir read.

06

The Executioner's Song

Norman Mailer · Memoir

The Executioner's Song is Norman Mailer's Pulitzer Prize-winning account of Gary Gilmore, the convicted murderer who in 1977 became the first person executed in the United States after the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty.

Shares violence and american west with Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith.

07

The Battle for God

Karen Armstrong · Religion & Spirituality

The Battle for God is Karen Armstrong's history of religious fundamentalism across Judaism, Christianity, and Islam from the early modern period to the late twentieth century.

Shares religion and fundamentalism with Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith.

08

Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World

René Girard · Philosophy

Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World is René Girard's most comprehensive and ambitious work, presenting the full scope of his mimetic theory in a series of extended dialogues with two psychiatrists, Jean-Michel Oughourlian and Guy Lefort.

Shares religion and violence with Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith.

09

Boy Erased: A Memoir

Garrard Conley · Memoir

Boy Erased is Garrard Conley's memoir of attending Love in Action, a conversion therapy program in Memphis, Tennessee, in the early 2000s.

Both dig into religion.

10

Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders

Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry · Memoir

Helter Skelter is the account of the Tate-LaBianca murders of August 1969 written by Vincent Bugliosi, the Los Angeles deputy district attorney who prosecuted Charles Manson, with journalist Curt Gentry.

Both dig into violence.

11

In Cold Blood

Truman Capote · Memoir

Truman Capote's account of the 1959 murders of the Clutter family in Holcomb, Kansas — and of the investigation, capture, trial, and execution of the killers Perry Smith and Richard Hickock — is the founding document of the true crime genre and one of the most admired works of American nonfiction of the twentieth century.

Both dig into violence.

12

The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Malcolm X and Alex Haley · Memoir

The Autobiography of Malcolm X was assembled from a series of conversations between Malcolm X and the journalist Alex Haley, conducted over two years before Malcolm's assassination in February 1965.

Both dig into religion.