<p>Lots of great suggestions. But, if you need more, if you look at the entering student’s common reads for some of colleges over the past few years…there will be some good suggestions that are designed to appeal to 18 year olds…</p>
<p>Mountains beyond Mountains (another Tracy Kidder book)
Nickel and Dimed (Barbara Ehrenreich)
Things I overheard while talking to myself (Alan Alda) includes a few of his commencement addresses…actually a good graduation gift book</p>
<p>If you have a dog or if your D is interested in dogs, Cesar Millan’s books are all very interesting. His first one tells how he came to the U.S. with no money, no job, and no English.</p>
<p>My D liked The Glass Castle.</p>
<p>The common book idea is excellent. Here’s a big list:</p>
<p>[One</a> Book, One College](<a href=“http://homepages.gac.edu/~fister/onebook.html]One”>One Book, One College)</p>
<p>So many books…so little time…</p>
<p>Atul Gawande is my new hero! </p>
<p>I am actually NOT much of a non-fiction reader when it comes to books (although I like it in magazines, and especially newspapers). So my non-fiction tastes may be colored by a fiction sensibility. </p>
<p>Anyway, the class of highly literate, beautifully written nonfiction certainly includes Jon Krakauer’s books, which many people have mentioned, and Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, also mentioned by many. To those I would add:</p>
<p>A book I’m currently reading, Barbara Demick, Nothing To Envy (contemporary North Korea)</p>
<p>Neil Sheehan, A Bright And Shining Lie (Vietnam War history)</p>
<p>Anything by Jonathan Spence (history of China)</p>
<p>Dava Sobel, Longitude (science history)</p>
<p>Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff (history of space program)</p>
<p>Claude Levi-Strauss, Tristes Tropiques (anthropology)</p>
<p>The Diary of Anne Frank (you know . . . ; get a recent edition, though)</p>
<p>Tracy Kidder, The Soul Of A New Machine (business, technology)</p>
<p>Melissa Greene, Praying For Sheetrock (civil rights, poverty)</p>
<p>Alex Kotlowitz, There Are No Children Here (poverty, race, education)</p>
<p>Herodotus, Histories
Thucydides, The Peloponnesian Wars (can’t beat 'em, really)</p>
<p>Then, a few books which, while not necessarily beautifully written or full of narrative, are full of powerful ideas:</p>
<p>Hernando de Soto, The Other Path (third-world economic development)</p>
<p>Fernand Braudel, The Mediterranean In The Age Of Phillip II (European history)</p>
<p>Roger Fisher et al., Getting To Yes (negotiation bible)</p>
<p>Edward Wilson, Sociobiology</p>
<p>My son also really loves Simon Singh’s books (but has never gotten me to read them) – essentially math history.</p>
<p>I have nothing new to add, but I wanted to second Nickle and Dimed, The Children’s Blizzard, and books by Bill Bryson (In A Sunburned Country and I’m a Stranger Here Myself are my favorites).</p>
<p>^JHS, try Big Bang, it’s very readable and fascinating. I don’t remember any math to speak of.</p>
<p>Another vote for Sarah Vowell. She is very witty.</p>
<p>My daughter got a book on Meyers-Briggs (in the job-hunting section) for Christmas and loves it. For a student who can do anything, sometimes the process of chosing is overwhelming. Although she is only a college freshman, the book reinforces some of the choices she is making. I second Bill Bryson’s books and the Feynman books.</p>