The 19 Best Memoirs to Curl Up With on the Couch This Fall

"Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through these links."

There’s nothing like digging into a good memoir and immersing yourself in someone else’s story. Memoirs are a slightly different genre than autobiographies, which often span an entire life—instead, they build the narrative around a specific moment or series of defining events in the writer's life. And while some of our favorites in these genres are by writers who aren't household names, it's always fun to curl up with the recollections of a celebrity A-lister, especially if they happen to be Hollywood royalty, such as the sublime Finding Me (an OBC pick), by Viola Davis.

In full appreciation of the genre, we’ve curated a list of a few recent releases intermixed with titles that have already established themselves in years past. Crying in H Mart is a must-read—it's like nothing else in the category. If you missed it during its first wave of attention, what are you waiting for? Another essential is Born a Crime, from 2016, by Trevor Noah. Yes, it's got Noah's signature hilariousness (snark aplenty!), but mostly it's an ode to his mother and an exploration of what it was like to grow up in South Africa in apartheid's twilight.

The very best memoirs will leave you feeling deeply connected with the author, even if your own coming-of-age story was completely different from theirs. That's because these writers have delved deeply into their hearts and experiences to untangle the riddles of their childhoods and generously share those learnings with us. The very best memoirs feature prose that sings and lifts us into worlds that feel intimate and familiar, that we can relate to no matter the geography, ethnicity, or gender.

Angela's Ashes, by Frank McCourt

There's a chance this lauded 1996 memoir was on your high school reading list, and even so, it deserves a reread and a spot on your bookshelf. Frank McCourt and his Irish-Catholic clan bounce between Depression-era Brooklyn, New York, and Limerick, Ireland, throughout his childhood, living in poverty (the kids wore rags for diapers and gathered coal from roadsides to light fires) but finding joy in small moments—not to mention loads of black humor. Throughout his father's struggle with alcoholism and his mother's experience with depression and grief, McCourt somehow grows up to be a role model for his younger siblings, a beloved teacher, and later a #1 bestselling author and Pulitzer Prize winner. At the time, one reviewer described it this way: "Angela's Ashes is a chronicle of grown-ups at the mercy of life and children at the mercy of grown-ups."

Autobiography of a Face, by Lucy Grealy

Poet Lucy Grealy, a survivor of Ewing's sarcoma, a rare but serious form of jaw cancer, narrates the story of her diagnosis and the resulting disfigurement of her face from a series of surgeries. She was in fourth grade at the time, with many years of school, crushes, and social events ahead of her. It wasn't until she indulged her passion for poetry in college that she came closer to self-love and was able to embrace the challenges of opening up to the possibility of love with others. A brave and beautiful classic.

Daughter of the Queen of Sheba, by Jacki Lyden

We've come a long way in regard to how we discuss mental health, which might inspire you to go back and read this 1997 memoir with fresh eyes. Jacki Lyden describes her mother's experience with what we now know as bipolar disorder. During manic episodes, Dolores transformed into iconic historical figures like Marie Antoinette and the Queen of Sheba in her mind. Lyden had to find a way to coexist with these delusions and not be frightened by them, which was even more difficult in their small Midwestern town, where Dolores was considered "crazy." Over time, Lyden came to see the episodes as aspects of her mother's extraordinary energy and creativity, and as a signal that she, too, could transcend her circumstances and aim high. Lyden suggests that her unpredictable childhood may have prepared her to later thrive as a war correspondent for NPR.

The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls

In 2005's The Glass Castle—a modern class—Jeannette Walls unflinchingly recalls the nitty-gritty of her traumatic childhood. Her father was an alcoholic dreamer who couldn't hold a job. Her mother was a wannabe artist who conveniently believed kids were better off largely unattended. Walls and her three siblings paid for her parents' neglect and dysfunction: At 3, Jeanette was cooking her own hot dogs and was so badly burned she had to be taken to the hospital, but because her father wanted to dodge the medical bills, he "rescued" her in the midst of her treatment. They moved from "home" to home, including to what Walls's dad termed the "glass castle," though in truth it was no more than an unfinished shack.

Ultimately, Walls and her sisters and brother do escape, finding a fresh start in New York City, where Walls, for one, becomes a writer for New York Magazine. Every now and then, though, she spots her parents, also now in New York, living on the streets.

Blood, Bones & Butter, by Gabrielle Hamilton

Warning: This gorgeously written memoir might make you hungry. You'll go on a culinary adventure with Chef Gabrielle Hamilton, whose mother first turned her on to a love of French food in her childhood kitchen, and who got her first restaurant job at age 12 by lying about her age. She eventually opens an award-winning restaurant in New York City, Prune, and gives you a peek into some of the less glamourous aspects of being a NYC restauranteur.

And yes, while Hamilton does wax poetic about food (yum!) she also opens up about her idyllic childhood, which implodes after her parents separate. She is traumatized but also resilient, finding ways, despite her youth, to collect a paycheck and continue her culinary education. Hamilton earned an MFA in fiction writing, which may in part explain the luminous beauty of her prose.

Lost & Found, by Kathryn Schulz

This 2022 memoir from a Pulitzer Prize–winning New Yorker staff writer captures the nuance of loss and discovery. A year and a half before Schulz's father dies, she meets the woman who would become her wife. Amid grief, there is love. This humane, wondrous rumination on all the people and things we lose, yet unexpected joy seeps in anyway, offers a balm in times of darkness, and a companion in times when we just want to be grateful.

All That She Carried, by Tiya Miles

The story centers around a small sack containing simple possessions that main character Ashley receives from her enslaved mother, Rose, when she is sold into slavery at age 9. Ashley continues to pass the keepsakes down to future generations of Black women, including her granddaughter Ruth, who embroiders "It be filled with my love always" on the bag.

From those seven words, historian Tiya Miles weaves the memoir around the journeys of her subjects, with information drawn largely from the archives of the historical period of slavery and onward, starting from the 1850s, but also supplemented by Miles's thoughtful and informed conjecture. In her intro she writes: "This is not a traditional history. It leans toward evocation rather than argumentation, and is rather more meditation than monograph."

Miles, who specializes in the history of African Americans, Native Americans, and women, has written a triumphant and compassionate ode to a modest cotton sack containing the remarkable story of how generations of women survived chattel slavery and...persisted.

Rough Draft, by Katy Tur

You may know her as the NBC News correspondent and MSNBC anchor who Donald Trump openly criticized on the 2016 campaign trail. But in her 2022 memoir—revelatory, surprising, and altogether delightful—Katy Tur opens up about the wild ride that was her childhood. Her helicopter-journalist parents were adrenaline junkies who responded at all hours to breaking news, regularly pulling their small kids out of bed to chase down a story. Those experiences were alternately entrancing and terrifying to Tur and her brother, who were also witness to the dangerously volatile dynamic between their parents. Despite it all, including the rift that developed between Tur and her dad after he transitioned, it's clear that her passion for reporting is a family legacy, and that clear-as-a-bell truth-telling is among the virtues she wants to pass down to her young children.

Know My Name, by Chanel Miller

This is one of the most moving, immersive memoirs you will ever read. Chanel Miller (formerly referred to as Emily Doe) revealed her identity right before her book was published in 2019, reclaiming her name and her strength by offering her own account of her sexual assault while unconscious by Brock Turner on the grounds of Stanford University, as well as its devastating aftermath. You’ll hear about Miller’s relationship with her family before and after the trial, her survival of another tragedy in her college days, and the mental health effects she suffered. But what makes this work a standout is how we witness Miller taking back her power, even as the judge in charge of her case deems the perpetrator's life more potentially impacted by his crime than Miller's, and gives him a light sentence. In response, Miller wrote, in part: "I want the judge to know that he ignited a tiny fire. If anything, this is a reason for all of us to speak even louder." Amen.

Pro tip: Listen to this as an audiobook if you can. Miller reading her testimony will give you full-body chills on your morning commute.

Crying in H Mart, by Michelle Zauner

This multitalented author is also a singer and guitarist of the musical project Japanese Breakfast, and her literary debut has been flying off shelves ever since its release in 2021. The book expands on a heartrending piece Zauner wrote for The New Yorker in 2018, in which she mourns the death of her Korean mother and relates that grief to her with memories of Korean food as a kind of defining principle. She writes: "Every time I remember that my mother is dead, if feels like I'm colliding into a wall that won't give." She doesn't sugarcoat the loss: She writes that the "immutable reality" is that "I will never see her again." If you missed this book when it first took the book world by storm, now's the time!

The Beauty in Breaking, by Michele Harper

As an emergency room physician, Michele Harper has some tales to tell. It's a gift to us that she has written a remarkable book detailing her ER experiences with patients, especially the marginalized, which she blends with a chronicle of her father's domestic abuse, and later, her own divorce. We can feel the pulse of the ER and its "quiet" and "chaos," and how the patients Harper encounters help nurture her own healing. And by the way, we could all use this reminder that healthcare workers are our heroes.

This Will All Be Over Soon, by Cecily Strong

Cecily Strong exhibits a different side of herself than we're used to seeing in her SNL sketches in this reflective, ruminative, and yes, often funny memoir. At its center is the loss of Strong's cousin, Owen, early in 2020 to brain cancer, and how, in the depths of the pandemic, the comedian processes her grief over her cousin's death along with the strangeness of the Covid era. A powerful meditation filled with life lessons and a splash of humor.

Unbound, by Tarana Burke

Activist and #MeToo founder Tarana Burke's memoir is a haunting story of liberation. Attacked as a child, she grappled with self-blame and fear of damaging her family. Here, in her memoir, she highlights her journey of healing in supporting marginalized women and her realization of the need to confront her own past trauma to effectively help others. Burke's courage and self-empathy culminated in the powerful #MeToo movement. Unbound is not only about her resiliency and quest for healing but also a beacon of empathy, power, and leadership, inviting all to embark on their own paths of healing.

Somebody's Daughter, by Ashley C. Ford

Ford's radiant coming-of-age memoir highlights something that's touched so many Black families: the impact of incarceration on the people outside prison's walls. As a 4-year-old living with her mother, brother, and grandfather, Ford recalls missing her father, who's been in prison for her entire life, though she doesn't know what his crime was. Her mother is a tower of strength but not always a nurturer. Ford dreams of reuniting with her dad but must later come to terms with the fact that what he was convicted of was the rape of two women. And Ford bravely reveals her own rape.

By sharing her story—even the most difficult, intimate parts—Ford emerges transcendent, and gives us permission to also be courageous about telling our own truths.

Finding Me, by Viola Davis

In 2022, Oprah named this powerful and empowering memoir an Oprah's Book Club pick, at the time saying, "There are so many lessons to be learned from this breathtaking memoir about triumphing over adversity and trauma. Viola Davis leaves it all on the page...."

And she does. The first Black actor to earn the so-called Triple Crown of Acting—an Oscar, a Tony, and an Emmy—describes a childhood in which extreme poverty, violence, racism were ever-present. And yet, Davis triumphed...and then some. We bow down to The Woman King.

Untamed, by Glennon Doyle

Have you ever felt like you were too much for someone else, either too strong, too loud, or too much of a presence? In Glennon Doyle's Untamed, she'll help you banish those thoughts and convince you of exactly why you should embrace your inner "untamed, wild cheetah." The supernova literary and podcast star, who's also author of Love Warrior, an Oprah's Book Club pick, offers a glimpse into how she fell in love with the fierce U.S. Women's National Team soccer player Abby Wambach, how she and her family came to terms and came to embrace this new chapter, as well as what pushed her to get involved with racial justice activism and other urgent issues, often breaking with Christian tradition to do so. Untamed is a memoir/manifesto with the power to set you free.

Born a Crime, by Trevor Noah

The late-night host known for his witty political quips has a whole backstory you need to read about. Trevor Noah, from apartheid era South Africa, details that his very existence, as the product of an interracial relationship between his Black mother and white father, was illegal at the time. His family spent years essentially hiding him in order to not be found out, and you'll read story after story about how the tenacity of Noah's mother formed him into a public figure who's very much not hidden away.

Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, by Lori Gottlieb

Psychotherapist Lori Gottlieb is both doctor and patient in this singular memoir about what people talk about when they take the couch. Gottlieb describes the moment she decided to seek therapy (the guy she was crazy about and thought she'd marry suddenly breaks it off) and interweaves that journey with those of her clients (names and identities altered for privacy). And one of the book's great attractions is that the reader gets to be voyeur, sitting in on sessions as some of her stickier patients insist on presenting versions of themselves that are clearly only a small part of the whole picture. But she's onto them. It's also apparent that Gottlieb knows a little something about plot as a former television writer: The windows we get into her psyche and those of her clients are unexpectedly thrilling, as well as illuminating.

Eat, Pray, Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert

The 2006 book that put its author on the map is a wondrous tale of turning lemons into lemonade. When Elizabeth Gilbert's marriage breaks up, she responds not by pulling the covers over her head, but by setting out to see the world. Her travels and learnings make for one of the most beloved memoirs of modern times. The perfect hint of escapism for an ongoing pandemic, Eat Pray Love is bound to reactivate the wanderlust you may have lost these past few years. The vicarious thrills are many: pasta in Italy, meditation in India, and yes, nirvana aka Bali, Indonesia (and love!). And if your book club is having a movie night, there’s a 2010 film to accompany the book.

You Might Also Like

• Watch Oprah Talk About Longevity with Dr. Peter Attia

• Why Are Americans So Bad at Getting Old?

• Yes, You Really Can Make Your Skin Cells Younger