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Gripping and moving, heartbreaking and hopeful, this memoir is a must-listen. Child star Alyson Stoner details their life from childhood in Ohio to a move to Hollywood at age 7 to chase a dream of stardom. From a breakthrough performance as a dancer in Missy Elliot's "Work It" music video to a host of Disney Channel appearances and one of the Baker children in the Cheaper By the Dozen remakes, Alyson was a familiar face in the early 2000s.

I especially enjoy true crime books with a local connection, so I knew I needed to get on the wait list for Something Big: The True Story of the Brown’s Chicken Massacre (2025) by Patrick Wohl. This horrific crime occurred in January 1993, in Palatine, a northwestern suburb of Cook County.

The Data Detective: Ten Easy Rules to Make Sense of Statistics (2020), by Tim Harford, is a fascinating look at statistics and how they have been regularly used and mis-used around the world and throughout history.

If you were riveted by The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks (2010), read Madness: Race and Insanity in a Jim Crow Asylum (2024).

John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs (2025), by Ian Leslie, draws on a wealth of material, including footage from the recent Get Back film, to present a new portrait of this complex songwriting pair.

The Man in the Rockefeller Suit: The Astonishing Rise and Fall of a Serial Impostor (2011), by Mark Seal, tells the unbelievable story of German con man Christian Gerhartsreiter. At age seventeen, Hollywood-obsessed Christian achieved his childhood dream of moving to the United States.

In Mo Rocca and Jonathan Greenberg’s latest collective biography (after Mobituaries, 2019), Rocca turns his gaze to people (and animals) who accomplished great things after they reached a certain age.

Raised by a Serial Killer (2024) by April Balascio is a memoir by the daughter of Edward Wayne Edwards, whose crimes went unpunished for decades until April, who long suspected that her father was a murderer, called a cold case line in 2009, and helped finally bring her father to justice.

I really enjoyed The Official Stardew Valley Cookbook by ConcernedApe!

I thoroughly enjoyed John Green’s The Anthropocene Reviewed (2021). He can take the most obscure topic (Diet Dr. Pepper) and make it so interesting and relevant, and, very often, humorous. Also, he has the most beautiful prose – I just love listening to him.  

Sharon McMahon, host of the podcast Here’s Where It Gets Interesting, debuts with a compelling blend of biography and history that sheds light on little known figures who made a difference. The Small and the Mighty: Twelve Unsung Americans Who Changed the Course of History, from the Foun

American Sherlock: Murder, Forensics, and the Birth of American CSI (2020) by Kate Winkler Dawson recounts the life and career of Edward Oscar Heinrich (1881-1953), one of the founding fathers of forensic science in the United States.