As a literary format, the memoir goes waaaay back. Ancient Rome’s least humble statesman, Julius Caesar, wrote about his
military triumphs circa 55 BCE. St. Augustine wrote a
pretty popular book in the 4th century, and Japanese court culture was crazy for memoirs around
900 CE.
For today’s collection, we’re tightening up the focus just a little bit. We’ve collected below the most popular and highly rated memoirs from the past 10 years, according to Goodreads members’ ratings and reviews. Each of the titles below earned a minimum 3.5 rating from readers, and the books are sequenced according to overall popularity.
Some of the books up top may look familiar, even if you haven’t read them yet. Several broke out into the general cultural conversation in the years they were released, like
Michelle Zauner’s
Crying in H Mart,
Suleika Jaouad’s
Between Two Kingdoms, and
Carmen Maria Machado’s
In the Dream House. You’ll find a few brand-new books from 2025 here, too, like
Sarah Wynn-Williams’
Careless People and
Shari Franke’s
The House of My Mother.
In between you’ll find
princes and
presidents,
actors and
musicians, and the occasional
housekeeper or
sociopath. Click on the book cover images for more information about each title, and use the
Want to Read button to flag any potential future reading projects.
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