Finding nonfiction novels that read like a story but keep the scholarship front and center is the great white whale hunt for bookish adventurers. Countless authors attempt this feat, but it’s rare to find a book that showcases not only a fresh voice but also a fresh perspective.
scientific American The staff read some truly exceptional non-fiction books in 2025, looking for interesting stories, strong reporting and extraordinary voices. is below scientific AmericanThe Best Nonfiction of 2025, culminating a year of reading and adding new books to the top shelf.
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Empire of AI
By Karen Hao
Penguin Press
Tags: AI, sleuth
This is one of the most entertaining non-fiction books I have ever read, it keeps you hanging with the cliff-hangers that envelop its dramatic characters, sometimes brave and often cowardly people hired and fired by the artificial intelligence company OpenAI. One of the few journalists invited to interview OpenAI staff, Hao’s expertise is visible on every page, and his dozens of pages of notes and quotes support it. She doesn’t hold back when she unveils the ivory towers and moneyed meetings promoting AI, as well as the unrecognized workers around the world sacrificing their mental health to make it safe. -Brian Kane, Associate Editor/Books & Rights Manager
Are any rivers alive?
by Robert McFarlane
WW Norton
Tags: environment, history
Does nature have inherent rights – to be respected and to be protected and restored from harm? To find the answer, nature writer Robert MacFarlane traveled to three different rivers in Ecuador, India, and eastern Canada. His keen observational vision and evocative prose highlight the majesty of many degraded rivers around the world. -Andrea Gorilewski, Chief Newsletter Editor
replaceable you
by Mary Roach
WW Norton
Tags: medical science, humor
Roach has knocked it out of the park again. We follow her around the world as she sniffs out the most curious, novel, and extraordinary science happening in the amorphous realm of human enrichment. In the beginning of her many adventures in this short book, she interviews people who have decided to have their organs removed, meets scientists studying pig organs and spends some time in an iron lung to see what it feels like. Roach’s writing is on full display in these pages. She’s brilliant, but also friendly and fun – a dream dinner guest in your pocket. ,Brian Kane, Associate Editor/Books & Rights Manager
everything is tuberculosis
by John Green
crash course books
Tags: medical science, history
everything is tuberculosis This breaks the misconception of the disease which is considered to be cured very easily. In this urgent and compassionate work, John Green shows how this disease is still the world’s deadliest infectious disease, and he does it with incisive reporting and deeply emotional storytelling. His voice resonates with clarity and conviction. This book combines history and science to make the troubling case that tuberculosis is nothing but a social issue rooted in inequality. Eye-opening and unsettling, it’s a call to action against inequality worth remembering in non-fiction stories. ,Isabella Bruni, digital producer
feather spy
by Chris Sweeney
Avid Reader Press
Tags: true crime, bird books
In 1960, a commercial flight taking off from Boston Logan International Airport struck a flock of birds and plunged into nearby Winthrop Bay, killing 62 of the 72 people on board. Investigators sent the remains of the birds trapped in the wreck to the Smithsonian Institution, which became the first forensic case for Roxy Laybourne, an up-and-coming taxidermist at the institution at the time and the wonderful protagonist of this compelling, novel-like account. Journalist Chris Sweeney traces Laybourne’s becoming a renowned forensic ornithologist, identifying the remains of more than 10,000 airplane-hit birds in his career. ,Andrea Gorilewski, Chief Newsletter Editor
it’s for everyone
By Tim Berners-Lee
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Tags: technology, history
It may be the first celebrity memoir I’ve ever read, inspired by my former colleague Hector Coronado’s promise of “Rebecca Solnit-esque optimism” and an introduction to the technology behind the World Wide Web that non-techies can understand. It’s a lighthearted journey into the life of Berners-Lee, the inventor of the web, taking in the major technological developments and social challenges of the web, interspersed with occasional encounters with Bono or the Queen of England. Most powerful is Berners-Lee’s dedication to his vision of how great the Web, specifically, and the Internet can be,even though the rich and powerful have spent decades manipulating it for their own purposes. ,Meghan Bartels, Senior Reporter
human nature
by kate marvel
ekko
Tags: climate change, history
Marvel is a huge figure in the world of climate science and her book provides a fascinating introduction to the science of how our planet is changing. But this fascinating book does much more. Each chapter explores an emotion that climate change can inspire in us. Marvel argues that sitting with these feelings is not a distraction from the work that needs to be done. Instead, feeling deeply about our world and the threats it faces – anger, fear and sadness, but also wonder and awe and hope – is a necessary step towards healing our planet. ,Meghan Bartels, Senior Reporter
take to the trees
by Marguerite Holloway
WW Norton
Tags: memoir, nature
Holloway, a journalism professor at Columbia University, leads us to a new understanding of the trials and tribulations of ecology, contrasting the planet’s environmental crisis with her personal stories of survival. She climbs Great Hemlock with a women’s mountaineering group to overcome motherhood and her fear of heights due to losing her brother and mother. We learn to appreciate along with him the details of the endangered trees so lovingly and painstakingly described. Ellen Wiener’s spatial depictions of leaves, bark, roots and seeds added to our enjoyment. (Full disclosure: Holloway and I were colleagues scientific American For many years, and I had the privilege of watching his journalism career flourish.) –Maria-Christina Keller, Copy Director
they poisoned the world
by Maria Blake
Crown
Tags: true crime, history
An epic of science writing, for which Blake conducted more than 600 interviews, they poisoned the world Brings readers to Hoosick Falls, NY, where the townspeople keep falling ill and dying for mysterious reasons. Meanwhile, local factories producing Teflon pump pollutants into local water supplies. For decades, the dangers of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, known as forever chemicals, have come to light despite efforts by manufacturers to avoid responsibility. This book will probably make you horrified and angry. But accepting the truth – no matter how difficult – is the first step towards justice. ,Andrea Gorilewski, Chief Newsletter Editor
raise the hare
by chloe dalton
pantheon
Tags: memoir, nature
If “Cosy” Feelings Were a Book, It Would Be Chloe Dalton’s Memoir raise the hareShe tells her story as a working urban slacker who starts living in a cottage in the English countryside during the peak of the pandemic, One day while out on a walk he comes across an abandoned newborn rabbit, After thinking about it, she brings it home with her, Determined to maintain a kind of wild existence for the animal, she rearranges her life to care for the beloved creature, Along the way, Dalton discovers a new interest in the natural world and draws attention to how commercial farming practices harm wild animals, This book may appeal especially to animal lovers, but it will warm all hearts, ,Andrea Gorilewski, Chief Newsletter Editor
