For a slightly incomplete but annotated version of this list, see my Twitter thread.
- Rings of Saturn, W.G Sebald
- The Cello Suites, Eric Siblin
- Handel In London, Jane Glover
- Albert Speer: His Battle With Truth, Gitta Sereny
- The Shortest History of Europe, John Hirst
- The Saturday Caller, Georges Simenon
- The Sleepwalkers, Arthur Koestler
- Science and Government, C.P. Snow
- One Nation Under a Groove: Motown and
American Culture, Gerald Early - Quack This Way: David Foster Wallace and Bryan Garner Talk Language and Writing
- Believe In People: The Essential Karel Čapek
- The Driver’s Seat, Muriel Spark
- Isaac Newton, James Gleick
- What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, Haruki Murakami
- The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
- The Girls of Slender Means, Muriel Spark
- Lady Sings The Blues, Billie Holiday
- Billie Holiday: The Musician and the Myth, John Szwed
- For Esmé, With Love and Squalor, J.D. Salinger
- Just Kids, Patti Smith
- The Evolution of Everything, Matt Ridley
- A King Condemned: The Trial and Execution of Charles I, C.V. Wedgwood
- No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention, Erin Meyer and Reed Hastings.
- Flaubert’s Parrot, Julian Barnes.
- The Undoing Project Michael Lewis
- The Smile Revolution: In Eighteenth Century Paris, Colin Jones.
- The Fire of Joy, Clive James
- The State of Disbelief, Juliet Rosenfeld
- The Lion and the Unicorn, Richard Aldous
- Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, John Le Carré.