As authorities continue to promote social distancing and shelter in place, our online community is finding a way to make time at home both productive and enriching. One activity the CDC recommends to reduce secondary traumatic stress, is to spend time reading a good book.  

As the community shares their bookshelves and reading lists online, we pulled over 20 tweets and threads of book suggestions from writers, entrepreneurs, authors, designers, and everyday people.

Here is a master list of 100 books to read in quarantine:

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NON-FICTION

Biography

1. Shoe Dog by. Phil Knight

2. Elon Musk by. Ashlee Vance

3. The Everything Store by. Brad Stone

4. Fighting for Space by. Amy Shira Teitel

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5. The Right Stuff by. Tom Wolfe

6. Becoming by. Michelle Obama

7. Mamba Mentality by. Kobe Bryant

8. Born a Crime by. Trevor Noah

9. Rise of the Rocket Girls by. Nathalia Holt

10. The Glass Universe by. Dava Sobel

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Business

11. The Success Equation by. Michael J. Mauboussin

12. Driving Digital Strategy by. Sunil Gupta

13. Perspective on McKinsey & Company by. Marvin Bower

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14. How to Win Friends and Influence People by. Dale Carnegie

15. Start with Why by. Simon Sinek

16. Emotional Intelligence by. Daniel Goleman

17. The Intelligent Investor by. Benjamin Graham

18. Zero to One by. Peter Thiel

19. The Lean Startup by. Eric Ries

20. Superforecasting by. Philip E. Tetlock

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Science & Technology

21. Sapiens by. Yuval Noah Harari

22. The Fabric of Reality by. David Deutsch

23. The Inevitable by. Kevin Kelly

24. The Beginning of Infinity by. David Deutsch

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25. Dawn of the Code War by. John P. Carlin

26. Cult of the Dead Cow by. Joseph Menn

27. The Hacker and the State by. Ben Buchanan

28. A Short History of Nearly Everything by. Bill Bryson

29. Packing for Mars by. Mary Roach

30. The Grand Design by. Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow

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Self-help

31. The Power of Habit by. Charles Duhigg

32. The Art of Gathering by. Bernadette Dunne

33. Reboot by. Jerry Colonna

34. The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A F*ck by. Mark Manson

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35. Atomic Habits by. James Clear

36. 12 Rules for Life by. Jordan B. Peterson

37. Stillness Is the Key by. Ryan Holiday

38. The Obstacle Is the Way by. Ryan Holiday

39. GRIT by. Angela Duckworth

40. The Power of Now by. Eckhart Tolle

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Philosophy

41. Man’s Search For Meaning by. Viktor E. Frankl

42. The Consolations of Philosophy by. Alain De Botton

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43. The Essential Plato by. Plato

44. Tyranny of Virtue by. Robert Boyers

45. Striking Thoughts by. Bruce Lee

46. Letters From a Stoic by. Lucius Annaeus Seneca

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47. Beyond Good and Evil by. Friedrich Nietzsche

48. Seeking Wisdom: From Darwin to Munger by. Peter Bevelin

49. Siddhartha by. Hermann Hesse

50. Awareness by. Anthony De Mello

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‍Design

51. The Creative Habit by. Twyla Tharp

52. Proust was a Neuroscientist by. Jonah Lehrer

53. The Reflective Practitioner by. Donald A. Schon

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54. Where Good Ideas Come From by. Steven Johnson

55. Metaphors We Live By by. George Lakoff

56. The Accidental Creative by. Todd Henry

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57. Creative Confidence by. Tom Kelley and David Kelley

58. Thinking Fast and Slow by. Daniel Kahneman

59. Design of Everyday Things by. Don Norman

60. Don’t Make Me Think by. Steve Krug

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FICTION

Science

61. The Fated Sky by. Mary Robinette Kowal

62. The Calculating Stars by. Mary Robinette Kowal

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63. Delta-V by. Daniel Suarez

64. 1984 by. George Orwell

65. Machines Like Me by. Ian McEwan

66. Red Moon by. Kim Stanley Robinson

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67. Light From Other Stars by. Erika Swyler

68. The City in the Middle of the Night by. Charlie Jane Anders

69. The Light Brigade by. Kameron Hurley

70. Recursion by. Blake Crouch

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Fantasy

71. The Alchemist by. Paulo Coelho

72. The Starless Sea by. Erin Morgenstern

73. Middle Game by. Seanan McGuire

74. Ninth House by. Leigh Bardugo

75. The Winter of the Witch by. Katherine Arden

76. Black Leopard, Red Wolf by. Marlon James

77. Magic for Liars by. Sarah Gailey

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78. Descent Into Madness by. Sean R. Frazier

79. The Call of Chaos by. Sean R. Frazier

80. The Coming Storm by. Sean R. Frazier

Thriller

81. My Dark Vanessa by. Kate Elizabeth Russell

82. The Silent Patient by. Alex Michaelides

83. My Lovely Wife by. Samantha Downing

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84. The Kill Club by. Wendy Heard

85. The Lost Man by. Jane Harper

86. The Whisper Man by. Alex North

87. An Anonymous Girl by. Greer Hendricks

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88. Curious Toys by. Elizabeth Hand

89. The Chain by. Adrian McKinty

90. My Sister, the Serial Killer by. Oyinkan Braithwaite

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Romance

91. Call Me By Your Name by. André Aciman

92. Love Her or Lose Her by. Tessa Bailey

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93. The Wedding Date by. Jasmine Guillory

94. Red, White, & Royal Blue by. Casey McQuiston

95. Get a Life, Chloe Brown by. Talia Hibbert

Historical 

96. The Night Tiger by. Yangsze Choo

97. The Mercies by. Kiran Millwood Hargrave

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98. All the Light We Cannot See by. Anthony Doerr

99. The Last Days of Pompeii by. Edward Bulwer Lytton

100. Daisy Jones and the Six by. Taylor Jenkins Reid

Peering into someone’s bookshelf is like getting a glimpse into the inner workings of their mind. The books someone cites as their favorites can say a lot about who they are. “A New Earth” by Eckhart Tolle? You’re spiritual and introspective. “The Rational Optimist” by Matt Ridley? Analytical and business minded. “Bossypants” by Tina Fey? You don’t take yourself too seriously.

Famous entrepreneurs and thought leaders in particular, often regard reading as an essential habit to success. Founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates, read 50 books a year, while Elon Musk, founder and CEO of Tesla, read at least 10 hours a day. 

To take a peek into their brilliant minds, here are the bookshelves and favorite books of 10 famously successful individuals.

Elon Musk‍

Originally from South Africa, Elon Musk is a serial inventor and entrepreneur. Notable companies he has founded include PayPal, Tesla, and SpaceX. His reading habits are slightly unusual: he says that he prefers to read books on his iPhone.

His favorite books are:

The Lord of the Rings by. J.R.R. Tolkien

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by. Douglas Adams

Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by. Walter Isaacson

Einstein: His Life and Universe by. Walter Isaacson

Structures: Or Why Things Don’t Fall Down by. J.E. Gordon

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Mark Zuckerberg

Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook from his Harvard dorm room in 2003. In order to promote reading, Zuckerberg started an online book club called the “A Year of Books” in 2015. He made book recommendations every two weeks through his Facebook account, offering a total of 23 options. 

His favorite books are:

Why Nations Fail by. Daren Acemoglu and James Robinson

The Rational Optimist by. Matt Ridley

Portfolios of the Poor by. Daryl Collins, Jonathan Morduch, Stuart Rutherford, and Arlanda Ruthven

The Three-Body Problem by. Liu Cixin

Genome by. Matt Ridley

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Bill Gates

Microsoft founder Bill Gates is well known for his proclivity for reading. He releases a new list of his favorite books annually, and reads at least one book every week. In 2017, Gates shared with Time magazine that reading was “absolutely essential to success.”

His favorite books are:

The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined by. Steven Pinker

The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History by. Elizabeth Kolbert

The Man Who Fed the World by. Leon Hesser

Business Adventures: Twelve Classic Tales from the World of Wall Street by. John Brooks

The Vital Question by. Nick Lane

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Jeff Bezos

When Amazon debuted in 1994, it was known as an online marketplace for selling books. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Jeff Bezos is well read. According to his biographer, he claims to learn more from reading fictional novels, like his top pick “The Remains of the Day”, than non-fiction.

His favorite books are:

The Remains of the Day by. Kazuo Ishiguro

Sam Walton: Made in America by. Sam Walton

Memos from the Chairman by. Alan Greenberg

The Mythical Man-Month by. Frederick P Brooks Jr.

Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies by. Jim Collins

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Janet Yellen

Janet Yellen must love what she does, because the economist and former Chair of the Federal Reserve has a book list that matches her resume. The New York Times reported that her vacations to the beach include “a suitcase of economics books”.

Her favorite books are:

The Rise and Fall of American Growth by. Robert Gordon

The Second Machine Age by. Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee

The Federal Reserve System: Purposes and Functions by. Board of Governors

Gold: The Monetary Polaris by. Nathan Lewis

Capitalism Will Save Us by. Steve Forbes

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Gretchin Rubin

Former lawyer and Supreme Court Clerk, Gretchin Rubin is known for her expertise on the subject of human happiness. Her book, “The Happiness Project” was a New York Times Best Seller.

Her favorite books are:

Man’s Search for Meaning by. Viktor Frankl

Jackie Under My Skin by. Wayne Koestenbaum

My Early Life by. Winston Churchill

The Life of Samuel Johnson by. James Boswell

The Habit of Being by. Flannery O’Connor

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Sheryl Sandberg

You might be surprised to learn that Sheryl Sandberg, COO of tech company Facebook, prefers physical paperbacks to digital readers. Though she uses an iPad when traveling, she describes her method of traditional reading: “I like holding a book open and being able to leaf through it, highlight with a real yellow pen and dog-ear important pages. After I finish a book, I’ll often look to see how many page corners are turned down as one gauge of how much I liked it.”

Her favorite books are:

A Short Guide to a Happy Life by. Anna Quindlen

Bossypants by. Tina Fey

Conscious Business: How to Build Value Through Values by. Fred Kofman

Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood by. Michael Lewis

Now, Discover Your Strengths by. Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton

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Barack Obama

The 44th president of the United States releases a list of his favorite books every year through Twitter. He has said, “reading is the gateway skill that makes all other learning possible, from complex world problems and the meaning of our history to scientific discovery and technological proficiency.”
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His favorite books are:

Moby Dick by. Herman Melville

Self-Reliance by. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Song of Solomon by. Toni Morrison

Parting the Waters by. Taylor Branch

Gilead by. Marylinne Robinson

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Larry Page

Larry Page was moved to tears by an autobiography of Nikola Tesla that he read when he was 12 (talented inventor Tesla died in penniless obscurity). Page says, “I figured that inventing things wasn’t any good. You really had to get them out into the world and have people use them to get any effect.” The lesson seems to have taken hold – Page is a cofounder of Google, one of the most widely used internet services in the world.
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His favorite books are:

My Inventions: The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla by. Nikola Tesla

Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! by. Richard P. Feynman

What Do You Care What Other People Think? by. Richard P. Feynman

QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter by. Richard P. Feynman

The Pleasure of Finding Things Out by. Richard P. Feynman

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Oprah Winfrey

Oprah has said that “nothing, not one thing or activity, can replace the experience of a good read – being transported to a different land, a different realm, through words and language.” Her book club recommended 70 books during its 15 year run.

Her favorite books are:

Discover the Power Within You by. Eric Butterworth

A New Earth by. Eckhart Tolle

The Poisonwood Bible by. Barbara Kingsolver

Night by. Elie Wiesel

A Fine Balance by. Rohinton Mistry