men will have more time to read in 2021
The men I know used to commute to and from work every day and had limited opportunities for quiet time alone. These days, men (and women) have been traveling less and finding more free time to spend with family, to do things around the house… and to read books! Anyone can enjoy these selections of Jen’s books for men… making them ideal housewarming gifts, the holidays, and perfect additions to everyone’s bookshelf. scroll down to see recommendations from men who read.
The Magician by Colm Toibin (9/9)
You are reading: Best books for men 2021
From one of our greatest living writers comes a sweeping novel of unrequited love and exile, war and family.
the magician tells the story of thomas mann, whose life was full of great praise and contradictions. he would find himself on the wrong side of history in the first world war, cheering on the German army, but he would have a clear vision of the future in the second, anticipating the horrors of Nazism. he would have six children and keep his homosexuality hidden from him; he was a man forever connected to his family, and yet he witnessed the ravages of suicide. He would write some of the best works in European literature and win the Nobel Prize, but he would never return to the country that inspired his creativity.
Through a life, Colm Toibin tells the impressive story of the 20th century.
Crossroads by Jonathan Franzen (10/5)
Jonathan Franzen’s gift for wedding depth and vibrancy of character with breadth of social vision has never been more glaringly evident than at the crossroads.
It’s December 23, 1971, and bad weather is forecast for Chicago. Russ Hildebrandt, the associate pastor of a liberal suburban church, is about to break free from a marriage he finds dismal, unless his wife, Marion, who has her own secret life, beats him to it. His eldest son, Clem, returns home from college burning with moral absolutism, having taken an action that will tear his father apart. Clem’s sister Becky, long the social queen of her high school class, has strayed sharply into the counterculture, while her brilliant younger brother Perry, who has been selling drugs to seventh graders, has decided to be a better person. each of the hildebrandts seeks a freedom that each of the others threatens to complicate.
Jonathan Franzen’s novels are celebrated for their unforgettably vivid characters and keen insight into contemporary America. Now, at a crossroads, Franzen ventures into the past and explores the history of two generations. with characteristic humor and complexity, and with even greater warmth, he evokes a world that resonates powerfully with our own.
A tour de force of interlocking perspectives and sustained suspense, its action largely unfolding on a single winter’s day, Crossroads is the story of a Midwestern family at a pivotal moment of moral crisis. Jonathan Franzen’s knack for merging the small picture and the big picture has never been more dazzlingly apparent.
Silverview by John Le Carre (10/12)
In silverview, john le carré turns his attention to the world that has occupied his writing for the last sixty years: the secret world itself. julian lawndsley has quit his high-flying job in the city for a simpler life running a bookstore in a small English seaside town. But just a couple of months into his new career, Julian’s night is interrupted by a visitor. Edward, a Polish émigré who lives in Silverview, the big house on the outskirts of town, seems to know a lot about Julian’s family and is overly interested in the inner workings of his modest new company. When a letter appears on the doorstep of a London spy chief warning him of a dangerous escape, investigations lead him to this sleepy town by the sea. . .silverview is the fascinating story of an encounter between innocence and experience and between public duty and private morality. With the inimitable voice of John Le Carré, the greatest chronicler of our time, he seeks to answer the question of what we truly owe to the people we love.
Lean Fall Stand by Jon McGregor (9/21)
The long-awaited new novel by the author of reservoir 13, winner of the Costa Award and three times included in the booker’s list.
When an Antarctic research expedition goes wrong, the consequences are far-reaching, both for the men involved and their families back home. Robert “Doc” Wright, a veteran of Antarctic fieldwork, has the clues to what happened, but is no longer able to communicate them. As his wife Anna navigates the sharp contours of her new life as a caregiver, Robert is forced to learn a whole new way of being in the world. notion of heroism and explores the indomitable human drive to tell our stories, even when words fail us. a meditation on the line between sacrifice and selfishness; this is a story of the underrated and unacknowledged courage it may take to get through the day.
Better off Dead: A Jack Reacher Novel by Lee Child and Andrew Child (10/26)
Jack Reacher is back in the new thriller from acclaimed #1 bestselling authors Lee Child and Andrew Child.
reacher is not one to back down from a fight. And when a shadowy team raises the stakes, he won’t hesitate to teach them a lesson: when you’re fighting a ranger, you better be dead.
Billy Summers by Stephen King (8/3)
billy summers is a man in a room with a gun. he is a hitman and the best in the business. but he will get the job done only if the target is a really bad guy. and now billy wants out. but first there is one last blow. Billy is one of the world’s best snipers, a decorated iraq war veteran, a houdini when it comes to disappearing after the job is done. so what could go wrong?
how’s everything?
The Last Mona Lisa by Jonathan Santlofer (8/17)
August 1911: The Mona Lisa is stolen by Vincent Peruggia. exactly what happens in the two years before her recovery is a mystery. Many replicas of the Mona Lisa exist, and more than one historian has wondered if the painting now in the Louvre is a fake, changed in 1911.
Today: Art teacher Luke Perrone searches for the truth behind his most famous ancestor: Peruggia. the search for him draws an interpol detective with something to prove and an unknown but curiously helpful woman. Soon, Luke is drawn into the world of art and forgery, a land of obsession and danger.
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A gripping novel that explores the 1911 heist and the underbelly of today’s art world, The Last Mona Lisa is a suspenseful story that taps into our universal fascination with da Vinci’s enigma, why do people they are driven to own certain works of art and our fascination with the real and the fake.
The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles (10/5)
The bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow and the Rules of Civility and master of sophisticated and absorbing fiction returns with an elegant and propulsive novel set in 1950s America
In June 1954, eighteen-year-old Emmett Watson is driven home to Nebraska by the director of the working farm where he has just served a year for involuntary manslaughter. his mother is long gone, his father recently passed away and the family farm was repossessed by the bank, emmett’s intention is to pick up his eight year old brother and head west where they can begin their lives again. But when the warden drives away, Emmett discovers that two friends from the farm have hidden in the trunk of the warden’s car. Together, they have hatched a completely different plan for Emmett’s future.
Lasting just ten days and told from multiple points of view, Towles’ third novel will satisfy fans of his multi-layered literary style while providing them with a variety of richly new settings, characters and themes. imagined.
The Guide by Peter Heller (8/24)
The author of the bestselling The River returns with a gripping thriller about a young man who, escaping his own pain, is hired by an elite fishing lodge in Colorado, where, amidst the natural beauty from the sun, streams and soggy forests, uncover a patch of shocking menace. Kingfisher Lodge, nestled in a canyon on a mile and a half of the planet’s most pristine river water, is known by locals as the mile of the billionaires and is locked behind a heavy door. sandwiched between barbed wire and a meadow with a sign that says don’t get shot! the resort boasts boutique fishing at its finest. Safe from the viruses that have plagued the United States for years, Kingfisher offers respite for wealthy customers. now it also promises a second chance for jack, a return to normalcy after a young life full of loss. When she’s assigned to guide a well-known singer, her only job is to manipulate her line, carry her gear, and guide her to the best trout she can find. But then a human scream pierces the night, and Jack soon realizes that this idyllic fishing lodge may just be a cover for a much more sinister operation. A novel as gripping as it is lyrical, as terrifying as it is moving, The Guide is another Peter Heller masterpiece.
Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead (9/14)
From the two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Underground Railroad and the Nickel Boys, a gloriously entertaining novel of heists, extortions and swindles set in 1960s Harlem. “Ray Carney was just a little crooked when he arrived. to be crooked…” to his customers and neighbors on 125th Street, Carney is a true seller of affordable furniture, making a decent living for himself and his family. he and his wife elizabeth are expecting his second child, and if her parents in wrestlers’ row don’t approve of him or his little apartment across from the subway tracks, it’s still home to the. Few people know that he descends from a line of uptown kingpins and thieves, and that his facade of normalcy has more than a few cracks. cracks that get bigger all the time. Money is tight, especially with all those installment couches, so if his cousin Freddie occasionally leaves behind a strange ring or necklace, Ray doesn’t ask where it came from. he meets a discreet jeweler downtown who doesn’t ask questions either. Later, Freddie joins a team planning to rob Theresa’s Hotel, the “Waldorf of Harlem,” and volunteers for Ray’s services as Fence. the heist doesn’t go as planned; they rarely do. Now Ray has a new clientele, one made up of shady cops, vicious local gangsters, petty pornographers and a variety of other Harlem thugs. thus begins the internal struggle between ray the fighter and ray the thief. As Ray navigates this double life, he begins to see who really pulls the strings in Harlem. Can Ray avoid getting killed, save his cousin, and get his share of his big score, all while maintaining his reputation as the one-stop source for all your quality home furnishings needs? ? The witty tale of Harlem Shuffle takes place in a beautifully recreated New York City in the early 1960s. It’s a family saga masquerading as a crime novel, a hilarious morality play, a social novel about race and power, and, in ultimately a love letter to harlem. But most of all, it’s a joy to read, another dazzling novel from Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winner Colson Whitehead.
Lightning Strike by William Kent Krueger (8/24)
the author of the instant new york times bestseller this tender earth returns with a powerful prequel to his acclaimed series cork o’ connor: a book about fathers and children, long-simmering conflict in a small Minnesota town, and the events that resonate through youth and shape our lives forever.
Aurora is a small town nestled in the old growth forest along the shores of Minnesota’s Iron Lake. In the summer of 1963, it’s the whole world to twelve-year-old Cork O’Connor, his rhythms as familiar as the beats of his own heart. But when Cork stumbles across the body of a man he revered hanging from a tree in an abandoned logging camp, it’s the first in a series of events that will cause him to question everything he took for granted about his hometown, his family, and his family. himself.
Cork’s father, Liam O’Connor, is the Sheriff of Aurora and it is his job to confirm that the man’s death was the result of suicide, as all the evidence suggests. In the shadow of his father’s official investigation, Cork begins searching for answers on his account. Together, father and son face the ultimate test of choosing between what their heads tell them is true and what their hearts know is right.
In this masterful tale of a young man and a people on the cusp of change, beloved novelist William Kent Krueger shows that some mysteries can be solved while others are beyond understanding.
recommendations from men who read
I recently asked a friend from high school, a friend from my days in new york in the early 90’s, a friend from westport, ct, and my brother, all of whom are well-educated, hard-working husbands and fathers with lots of hobbies. and interests, letting them know what they have recently read and enjoyed. this is what they said…
Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir author of The Martian
ryland grace is the lone survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission, and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish. except right now, he doesn’t know. he can’t even remember his own name, much less the nature of his task or how to complete it. all he knows is that he has been asleep for a long, long time. and he has just woken up to find himself millions of miles from home with nothing but two corpses for company. his crewmates dead, memories of him blurring back, he realizes that he now faces an impossible task. Alone on this little ship cobbled together by every government and space agency on the planet and dropped into the depths of space, it’s up to him to conquer an extinction threat to our species. And thanks to an unexpected ally, he just might have a chance. Part scientific mystery, part dazzling interstellar voyage, the Ave Maria Project is a story of discovery, speculation, and survival to rival the Martian, as he takes us places he never dreamed of going.
recommended by bob gans (my brother). bob says: “fantastic, exhilarating, good!”
bob gans is the global head of in-house employment law at nasdaq, where he advises HR and senior leaders. also involved in managing outside counsel, immigration law, acquisitions, global trade affairs, mergers and acquisitions work, works councils/union activity, corporate safety/workplace violence, data privacy, diversity/inclusion, compensation/pay equity and various contracts. problems. Bob reads about 70 books a year. he lives in maryland with his wife and his three children.
Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan
a deeply rendered self-portrait of a lifelong surfer by acclaimed New York writer
barbarian days are william finnegan’s memoirs about an obsession, a complex enchantment. surfing just seems like a sport. for initiates, it is something else entirely: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous hobby, a way of life. Raised in California and Hawaii, Finnegan began surfing as a child. he has chased waves all over the world, wandering for years the south pacific, australia, asia, africa. A bookish boy, then an overly adventurous young man, he became a distinguished writer and war reporter. Barbarian Days takes us to unknown worlds, some of them right under our noses, off the coast of New York and San Francisco. immerses the reader in the avant-garde camaraderie of intimate male friendships baked in waves of defiance.
Finnegan shares stories of life in an all-white gang at a tough Honolulu school, even when his closest friend was a Hawaiian surfer. He shows us a world turned upside down for children and adults alike by the social upheavals of the 1960s. He details for them the intricacies of the famous waves and their own learnings. youthful folly (she drops lsd while cruising maui’s sprawling honolua bay) is served with sad humor. he and a friend, with their backpacks full of reef maps, tour polynesia. They discover, while camping on an uninhabited island in Fiji, one of the largest waves in the world. As Finnegan’s travels take him further and further afield, he becomes an unlikely anthropologist: stripping down the quaint simplicity of a Samoan fishing village, dissecting the sexual politics of Tongans’ interactions with Americans and Japanese, navigating the the Indonesian black market while nearly succumbing to malaria. throughout, he cruises, taking readers with him on rides of harrowing and unprecedented lucidity.
Days of Barbarism is an old-school adventure story, an intellectual autobiography, a social history, a literary road movie, and an extraordinary exploration of the gradual mastery of a demanding and little-understood art. Today, Finnegan’s surf life hasn’t slowed down. Frantically juggling work and family, he chases his charm through the ice storms of Long Islands and the dark corners of Madagascar.
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recommended by mike troiano. mike says, “finnegan draws you in with details and uses surfing as a lens to share stories about his travels. well written and read by the author in the audible version.“
mike troiano is a venture capitalist who brings nearly 25 years of executive leadership and marketing experience to help entrepreneurs. He is ranked in the top 1% of most influential people on twitter, is one of the top writers on both venture capital and entrepreneurship media, and hosts the boston startup community’s popular #asktrap podcast. /p>
A Swim In A Pond In The Rain by George Saunders
from the new york times bestselling author, booker award winner of lincoln in the bard and december tenth, comes a literary masterclass in what makes great stories tick and what they can tell us about ourselves ourselves and our world today. for the past twenty years, george saunders has been teaching a class on the russian tale to his graduate students at syracuse university. bathing in a pond in the rain, he shares a version of that class with us, offering some of what he and his students have discovered together over the years. Along with iconic tales from Chekhov, Turgeniev, Tolstoy, and Gogol, the seven essays in this book are intended for anyone interested in how fiction works and why it is more relevant than ever in these turbulent times. In his introduction, Saunders writes: “We are going to go into seven painstakingly constructed models of the world, made for a specific purpose which our times may not fully support, but which these writers implicitly accepted as the aim of art, namely, to make the big questions, questions like, how are we supposed to live down here? why did they put us here? what should we value? what is truth, anyway, and how can we recognize it? approaches the stories in a technical but accessible way, and through them explains how the narrative works; why we stay immersed in a story and why we resist it; and the fundamental virtues that a writer should foster. The process of writing, Saunders reminds us, is a technical craft, but also a way of training oneself to see the world with a new openness and curiosity. swimming in a pond in the rain is a deep exploration not only of how great writing works but of how the mind itself works while reading, and how reading and writing stories make genuine connection possible.
recommended by mike troiano. mike says: “he uses the classic short stories of russian masters like tolstoy and chekhov to help aspiring writers find their voice and hone their craft. the best book on writing from elements of style…”
mike troiano is a venture capitalist who brings nearly 25 years of executive leadership and marketing experience to help entrepreneurs. He is ranked in the top 1% of most influential people on twitter, is one of the top writers on both venture capital and entrepreneurship media, and hosts the boston startup community’s popular #asktrap podcast. /p>
His Truth Is Marching On by Jon Meacham
An intimate and inspiring portrait of America’s veteran and civil rights icon. uu. congressman john lewis, tying his life to the pursuit of justice in the united states from the 1950s to the present, from the pulitzer prize-winning author of the soul of america john lewis, who at age twenty-five marched in selma, alabama, and was defeated on the edmund pettus bridge, he is a visionary and a man of faith. Drawing on decades of extensive interviews with Lewis and in-depth research into the history of the civil rights movement, Jon Meacham writes about how this great-grandson of a slave and the son of an Alabama tenant farmer was inspired by the Bible and its teachers in the Bible. nonviolence, the reverend james lawson and martin luther king, jr., to risk their lives in the service of what abraham lincoln called “our nature’s best angels”. A believer in hope above all else, Lewis learned from a young age that nonviolence was not just a tactic but a philosophy, a biblical imperative, and a transformative reality. At the age of four, Lewis, with ambitions of becoming a minister, practiced preaching to his family’s chickens. when his mother cooked one of the chickens, the boy refused to eat it: his first act, he wryly recalled, of nonviolent protest. An integral part of Lewis’s commitment to bettering the nation was his faith in humanity and God, and an unwavering belief in the power of hope. Meacham calls Lewis “as important to the founding of a modern, multi-ethnic America in the 20th and 21st centuries as Thomas Jefferson and James Madison and Samuel Adams were in the initial creation of the nation-state in the 18th century. he did what he did: risk body and life to bear witness to the powerless against the powerful, not in spite of the united states, but because of the united states, and not in spite of religion, but because of religion ”. In many ways, Lewis made his vision a reality, and his example offers Americans today a road map for social and political change.
recommended by spencer brown.
spencer brown is the founder of cadence13, one of the largest podcast networks in the country. Before founding Cadence, he was CEO of Westwood One, a leading radio network. spencer lives in westport, ct with his wife wendy and his two children. he’s an avid reader, golfer, and on good days a mediocre senior men’s hockey goalie.
Risk Reward and Repeat by Eric Gleacher
Risk: Success requires risk, risk that stands firm on the platform of integrity.
reward: integrity inspires reward: generosity to those who helped you succeed.
repetition: Generosity fuels repetition, helping others forge their own path forward.
these are the lifelong principles of eric gleacher, the marine corps officer and investment banker who, along with a handful of others, dominated the mergers and acquisitions industry in the second half of the 20th century and transformed the face of American business.
risk. reward. repeat. chronicles his exciting journey: from a deeply isolated childhood to harsh leadership lessons from the marine corps, lehman brothers and morgan stanley, to his own company, going head-to-head with the giants of wall street. >
gleacher’s book puts to shame today’s culture of hype, gimmicks, and life hacks with its simple, timeless formula: be yourself, tell the truth, lead by example, do your best, own up to your mistakes , work hard, take risks. , earn your success and give it back.
all profits from the sale of this book will be donated to charity.
recommended by spencer brown.
spencer brown is the founder of cadence13, one of the largest podcast networks in the country. Before founding Cadence, he was CEO of Westwood One, a leading radio network. spencer lives in westport, ct with his wife wendy and his two children. he’s an avid reader, golfer, and on good days a lackluster senior men’s hockey goalie.
The River of Doubt by Candice Millard
An incredible adventure narrative and a penetrating biographical portrait, The River of Doubt is the true story of Theodore Roosevelt’s harrowing exploration of one of the most dangerous rivers on earth.
the river of doubt: it is a black and uncharted tributary of the amazon that meanders through one of the most treacherous jungles in the world. Indians armed with poisoned arrows hover in their shadows; piranhas glide through its waters; rock-strewn rapids turn the river into a turbulent cauldron.
After his humiliating electoral loss in 1912, Roosevelt set his sights on the toughest physical challenge he could find, the first descent of an Amazon tributary that is not on a map and is clogged with rapids. Together with his son Kermit and Brazil’s most famous explorer, Cândido Mariano da Silva Rondon, Roosevelt accomplished a feat so great that many at the time refused to believe it. In the process, he changed the map of the Western Hemisphere forever.
Along the way, Roosevelt and his men faced an incredible series of hardships, losing their canoes and supplies to the punishing whitewater rapids, and enduring starvation, Indian attack, disease, drowning, and a assassination within their own ranks. three men died and roosevelt was on the verge of suicide. The River of Doubt brings these extraordinary events to life in a powerful nonfiction narrative thriller featuring one of the most famous Americans who ever lived.
From the awe-inspiring beauty of the Amazon rainforest to the darkest night of Theodore Roosevelt’s life, here is Candice Millard’s dazzling debut.
recommended by mike waxman.
mike says, “it’s amazing to understand how remote and dangerous this trip was, and how incredibly poorly planned the entire trip was. she’s lucky she didn’t lose her life and the lives of everyone else on the trek.”
mike waxman is a trial attorney in portland, maine. He grew up in Weston, CT and attended Harvard University and Boston University Law Schools. He has four children and is remarried to a woman named Kate Sabatine who has two children. he keeps fit by biking, playing tennis, and doing crossfit-style exercises. he loves to read, as does his wife, who is a nurse. they read by themselves and then every night at bedtime he reads aloud to her until one of them falls asleep.
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