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2024 has been a great year for nonfiction, with plenty of big, buzzy releases. I am still thinking about There’s Always This Year by Hanif Abdurraqib and I’m very eager to get my hands on Ta-Nehisi Coates’s newest, The Message. But 2024 has also been an incredible year for small press nonfiction, including a whole lot of amazing books you might have missed because they have not gotten the same marketing budgets and press attention.
Happily, I’m always up for championing lesser-known books, and this is a truly fantastic list of 2024 releases that are well worth your time. I have focused especially on the kinds of nonfiction that sometimes get overlooked, such as YA history and interviews. But there’s something here for everyone: graphic nonfiction about parenting, several memoirs, a unique biography, a photography/oral history book focused on rural queer life, and more. These authors think and write about the world in such different ways, but they all do so with curiosity and insight. Whether you are looking to learn something new, dig into history, or have a good heartfelt cry, any one of these books would make an excellent pick to round out your Nonfiction November TBR stack.
Nonfiction You Might Have Missed for Nonfiction November
Namesake by N. S. Nuseibeh
In this collection of linked essays, Nuseibeh explores what it means to be an Arab woman today through the lens of her namesake Nusayba bint Ka’ab al Khazrajia, who lived alongside the Prophet Muhammad. Through Nusayba’s stories and their ongoing legacy, she connects the past, present, and future, reflecting on feminism, courage, borders, identity, religion, belonging, and more.
Special Topics in Being a Parent by S. Bear Bergman & Saul Freedman-Lawson
I love Bergman’s nonfiction for its warmth, generosity, and down-to-earthness. His parenting advice is thoughtful, expansive, and nonjudgmental, and Freedman-Lawson’s wonderful illustrations add lots of charm and humor. This is a parenting book for everyone who feels like parenting books aren’t for them—and I promise you don’t even have to be a parent to enjoy and appreciate this work of graphic nonfiction.
Another Word for Love by Carvell Wallace
This beautiful memoir turns the whole concept of “the trauma memoir” on its head. Wallace does write, briefly, about the traumas he experienced as a Black queer kid—and then he writes about healing. These essays are about the places, relationships, moments, realizations, and actions that have been a part of his healing (both collective and individual). In other words: they’re about all the kinds of love that have made his life possible.
Survival Is a Promise: The Eternal Life of Audre Lorde by Alexis Pauline Gumbs
If you’re looking for a dry, birth-to-death, “here’s an accounting of the events of this person’s life” biography, this book is not for you. If you’re looking for a biographical poem, a multilayered close read of Audre Lorde’s poetry, a book that centers her relationships, an exploration of the ongoing legacy of her liberation work, an ode to complexity and nuance—then you’re going to want to run to this astounding, prismatic work of nonfiction.
Opacities by Sofia Samatar
Sofia Samatar’s books often blend and explode genre in the most delicious ways, and her newest is no exception. It’s a blend of short prose pieces, letter fragments, and notes about the works of literature that have shaped her. At heart, this is a book about what it means to be a writer today, especially a writer of color. But it’s also about the act of art-making, the business of publishing, creativity, friendship, and the many kinds of intimacy that come alive through writing.
Flamboyants by George M. Johnson
In this gorgeous combination of short essays and illustrations, George M. Johnson celebrates the lives of Black Queer artists, activists, and writers from the Harlem Renaissance. These essays are like exciting, accessible portals into the sometimes-forgotten histories that have shaped our present day, from art and pop culture to how we think about queerness. Though aimed at young adult readers, this is a book that everyone should read. It’s joyful, exuberant, and hopeful.
By the Fire We Carry by Rebecca Nagle
In this work of narrative journalism and history, Cherokee author and activist Rebecca Nagle recounts the forced removal of Indigenous people from their lands throughout American history and the Supreme Court case that has anchored the contemporary movement for nation(s) sovereignty and Native land rights. She focuses on the Muscogee land in Oklahoma at the center of the case, but ultimately tells a much broader story about Indigenous resistance past, present, and future.
Country Queers by Rae Garringer
I feel like I’ve been waiting for this celebration of rural queer lives for my whole life! Blending photography, oral history, and memoir, this gorgeous book documents Garringer’s travels throughout rural America and their conversations with queer and trans people all over the country. It’s a beautiful testament to the oft-ignored truth that queer people have always lived—and thrived—in rural places and small towns, on farms and in the woods.
Looking to bulk up your nonfiction TBR for Nonfiction November? Check out the best nonfiction new releases from July, August, and September!
