The books Lenny's Podcast guests recommend most

7 Rules of Power by Jeffrey Pfeffer

• Deb Liu: The more practical follow-up on gaining power.

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry

• Elizabeth Stone: A great story about human complexity, hardship and relationships.

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

• Bill Carr: A recent personal favorite.

A Guide to Midwestern Conversation by Joseph Fink

• Jackson Shuttleworth: A funny guide to what Midwesterners really mean when they speak.

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle

• Camille Hearst

Accelerate by Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, Gene Kim

• John Cutler: Rigorous research on what actually drives team performance.

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

• Emily Kramer: Beautifully written fiction on a heavy topic, a break from business reading.

American Kingpin by Nick Bilton

• Jonathan Becker: A thriller-like story of the Silk Road, half startup tale, half gangster story.

Amp It Up by Frank Slootman

• Varun Parmar: Inspired some of the ideas they use in how Miro builds product.

An Immense World by Ed Yong

• Hari Srinivasan: Shows how animals sense the world differently, a reminder of how limited our own perception is.

Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie

• Zoelle Egner: Fiction that offers a different way of thinking about AI.

Atomic Habits by James Clear

• Uri Levine: Building habits, measuring them and improving them matters a lot.

Awareness by Anthony de Mello

• Amol Avasare: A similar take on the mind from a different angle.

Bad Leadership by Barbara Kellerman

• Judd Antin: Studies the worst leaders and what makes them bad, which helps everyone.

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott

• Eeke de Milliano: A touching book on writing, and product managers should be great writers.

Brief Interviews with Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace

• Ryan J. Salva: Short stories that read like a villain's big self-explaining speech, repeated for many terrible people.

Business Adventures by John Brooks

• Farhan Thawar: Long, deep stories that reward sustained focus and teach a lot.

Calling Bullshit by Carl T. Bergstrom and Jevin D. West

• Ronny Kohavi: Teaches you to doubt results that look too extreme, in line with Twyman's law.

Carry On, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse

• Jessica Livingston: Very funny and wonderfully written; a good place to start with Wodehouse.

Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor by Tren Griffin

• Gustav Söderström: Teaches applying several mental models to a problem to raise your odds of being right.

Chop Wood Carry Water by Joshua Medcalf

• Chris Miller: A parable about loving the dull parts of the process; a reminder of patience and humility.

Circe by Madeline Miller

• Claire Vo: A retelling of Circe's story from her view; everyone they recommended it to loved it.

Collapse by Jared Diamond

• Qasar Younis: Same author, same strength at linking long human history to today.

Computing Taste by Nick Seaver

• Zoelle Egner: An academic look at the hidden assumptions of people building recommendation algorithms, relevant to AI.

Connect by David L. Bradford and Carole Robin

• Jules Walter: Based on Stanford's Touchy-Feely class; helps build emotional skills and better relationships.

Consolations by David Whyte

• Jonny Miller: Short essays on 52 everyday words; the book they have gifted most and that affected them most.

Continuous Discovery Habits by Teresa Torres

• Melissa Perri and Denise Tilles: A fantastic product management book.

Cool Gray City of Love by Gary Kamiya

• Vijay Iyengar: San Francisco's history and neighborhoods; helped them discover new parts of the city.

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky

• Nilan Peiris: Characters so real you learn something about being human; less heavy than it sounds.

Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson

• Kayvon Beykpour: Science fiction exercises the imagination and helps them be more creative.

Dare to Lead by Brené Brown

• Claire Butler: Their go-to book when coaching and growing new managers.

Dare to Lead Like a Girl by Dalia Feldheim

• Inbal Shani

Decisive by Chip Heath and Dan Heath

• Ethan Evans: The science of better decisions helps both your career and your personal life.

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

• Judd Antin: Moving, sad novel that helps you understand rural poverty.

Die with Zero by Bill Perkins

• Chris Hutchins: Argues for spending on experiences over a lifetime instead of only saving; it changed their thinking most.

Don't Think of an Elephant! by George Lakoff

• Will Larson: About framing in conversations; it changed how they communicate.

Dune by Frank Herbert

• Oji Udezue: Classic science fiction with incredible world building.

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

• Nicole Forsgren: A fun, easy read they used to hand out to students.

Energy and Civilization: A History by Vaclav Smil

• Ian McAllister: A fascinating read for learning, even if not a bestseller.

Escaping the Build Trap by Melissa Perri

• Melissa Perri and Denise Tilles

Essentialism by Greg McKeown

• Yuriy Timen: Taught them to cut noise, focus, and say no; they bought copies for their whole team.

Everybody Lies by Seth Stephens-Davidowitz

• Chris Miller: Uses search data to show how people really behave and makes data science approachable.

Expecting Better by Emily Oster

• Laura Modi: A good classic.

Facilitator's Guide to Participatory Decision-Making by Sam Kaner

• Heidi Helfand

Failing Forward by John C. Maxwell

• Inbal Shani

Fate Is the Hunter by Ernest K. Gann

• Jackson Shuttleworth: Wild stories from early commercial flying that make you appreciate modern aviation.

Foundation by Isaac Asimov

• Oji Udezue: Classic science fiction with incredible world building.

Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman

• Ramesh Johari: Accepting you will always have too much to do frees you to choose priorities calmly.

From Third World to First by Lee Kuan Yew

• Jag Duggal: Singapore's founding is like a startup story; an honest account of what it takes to succeed.

Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield

• Lulu Cheng Meservey: A well-written story of Thermopylae about leadership, courage, and creativity.

Getting Real by 37signals

• Ian McAllister: The chapter on epicenter design is the thing they have shared most.

Getting Things Done by David Allen

• Jackie Bavaro

Getting to Yes by Roger Fisher, William Ury

• Dalton Caldwell: Reading the popular basic sales books gets founders most of the way, no expensive coach needed.

God Save Texas by Lawrence Wright

• Josh Miller: By a favorite author; good for anyone into road trips, politics, food and culture.

Gödel's Proof by Ernest Nagel, James R. Newman

• Gustav Söderström: Explains the incompleteness theorem: some true statements can never be proven.

Good Inside by Becky Kennedy

• Andrew 'Boz' Bosworth: A parenting book with lessons on managing emotions in any context.

Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond

• Qasar Younis: Helps connect the dots from early humans to modern society.

Hakim's Odyssey by Fabien Toulmé

• Tanguy Crusson: An illustrated true story of a Syrian refugee that makes the refugee crisis personal.

Happy Money by Elizabeth Dunn and Michael Norton

• Chris Hutchins: Collects research on how to spend money in ways that make you happier.

Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths and Total Nonsense by Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert I. Sutton

• Ronny Kohavi: Shows that many widely accepted management beliefs have no evidence behind them.

Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson

• Josh Miller

Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling

• Mihika Kapoor: Everyone should read the whole series, in order; it may help creativity.

HBR Guide to Better Business Writing by Bryan A. Garner

• Wes Kao: A book on the craft of writing.

Helgoland by Carlo Rovelli

• Gustav Söderström: On the relational interpretation of quantum mechanics.

Hell Yeah or No by Derek Sivers

• Jason Fried: Its 'hell yeah or no' test clarifies decisions; they use the phrase at work all the time.

Hit Refresh by Satya Nadella

• Varun Parmar: Inspired some of the ideas they use in how Miro builds product.

Home-Made: Contemporary Russian Folk Artifacts by Vladimir Arkhipov

• Jason Fried: Shows objects people built from scraps because they could not buy them; admires that ingenuity.

How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan

• Emilie Gerber: Interest in changing thought patterns and shifting perspective to become a better leader.

How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff

• Ramesh Johari: A short, fun classic for anyone who works with data.

How to Stop Caring What Others Think: For Real by Shona Schwartz

• Eli Schwartz: Helps you focus on your own success instead of others' opinions. Written by their wife.

How Will You Measure Your Life? by Clayton M. Christensen, James Allworth, Karen Dillon

• Meltem Kuran Berkowitz: Applies business lessons to your life; short and easy to finish.

How Women Rise by Sally Helgesen and Marshall Goldsmith

• Hila Qu: They learned a lot from it and gift it to women on their team.

Hyperion by Dan Simmons

• Tom Conrad: A classic of big, complex science fiction that everyone should read.

Illusions by Richard Bach

• Christopher Lochhead: Their pick on the personal side.

Immune by Philipp Dettmer

• Benjamin Lauzier: A fun, entertaining explanation of how the immune system works.

Inside Paragraphs by Cyrus Highsmith

• Jessica Hische: A short, well-illustrated, easy introduction to type and typography.

Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino

• Sam Schillace: A beautiful reflection on cities and Venice that struck them on their first trip to Italy.

It by Stephen King

• Maya Prohovnik: Their all-time favorite Stephen King book.

It Was the Best of Sentences, It Was the Worst of Sentences by June Casagrande

• Wes Kao: A book on the craft of writing.

It's Not How Good You Are, It's How Good You Want to Be by Paul Arden

• Paul Adams: Shows everyone has unlimited potential if they think about it the right way.

Just Kids by Patti Smith

• Jessica Hische: A story of making art with nothing in New York, driven by passion over career.

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

• Barbra Gago: One of their favorite Murakami novels.

Kindred by Octavia E. Butler

• Camille Hearst

Leadership: In Turbulent Times by Doris Kearns Goodwin

• Noah Weiss: Shows how four presidents' leadership changed in crises; the best book on leadership style.

Lean Analytics by Alistair Croll, Benjamin Yoskovitz

• Itamar Gilad: The Lean series is full of value and underrated.

Lean Enterprise by Jez Humble, Joanne Molesky, Barry O'Reilly

• Itamar Gilad: The Lean series is full of value and underrated.

Lean UX by Jeff Gothelf, Josh Seiden

• Itamar Gilad: The Lean series is full of value and underrated.

Leonardo da Vinci by Walter Isaacson

• Julia Schottenstein: A favorite biography.

Let My People Go Surfing by Yvon Chouinard

• Tim Holley: A founder turned a passion into a business while treating employees well; inspiring on culture.

Liberating Structures by Henri Lipmanowicz and Keith McCandless

• Heidi Helfand

Life by Keith Richards

• Jessica Livingston: An honest autobiography that does not hold back.

Little Bets by Peter Sims

• Sanchan Saxena: How to live and build businesses through small experiments.

Make It So by Nathan Shedroff and Christopher Noessel

• Ryan J. Salva: Shows how interfaces from science fiction end up in real products decades later; eye-opening and fun.

Make Time by Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky

• Ben Williams: Radically changed how they relate to incoming information.

Manna by Marshall Brain

• Farhan Thawar: A short, easy read about a future where AI tells people what to do at work.

Metabolical by Robert H. Lustig

• Laura Modi: Argues the US has a health crisis, not a healthcare crisis, rooted in food and lifestyle.

Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie

• Nilan Peiris: Sentences crafted like works of art, telling the story of India's partition.

Million Dollar Consulting by Alan Weiss

• Eli Schwartz: For growth advisors: how to build a brand and a consulting practice.

Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana

• Upasna Gautam

Mindset by Carol S. Dweck

• Tomer Cohen: Skills can grow over time; a core idea in their household.

Misbehaving by Richard H. Thaler

• Benjamin Lauzier: A great introduction to behavioral economics, which maps well to product work.

Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me) by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson

• Ronny Kohavi: A humbling look at the mental traps people fall into to justify themselves.

Monetizing Innovation by Madhavan Ramanujam and Georg Tacke

• Naomi Ionita: Practical pricing stories and tips from hundreds of tech company engagements; they often gift it to founders.

My American Journey by Colin Powell, Joseph E. Persico

• Qasar Younis: Very good memoir.

My Name Is Barbra by Barbra Streisand

• Jessica Livingston: Her success in male-dominated Hollywood should inspire every female founder.

Only the Paranoid Survive by Andy Grove

• Richard Rumelt: Learning from business leaders' stories beats reading strategy theory alone.

Orbiting the Giant Hairball by Gordon MacKenzie

• Jeff Weinstein: An illustrated, fun guide to staying creative and sane inside a slow, rule-heavy company.

Originals by Adam Grant

• Vikrama Dhiman: Helped them rethink their own growth and gives a reality check to self-styled innovators.

Out of Sheer Rage by Geoff Dyer

• Andy Raskin: A funny, inward-looking book about procrastinating on writing a book; they just enjoy it.

Outcomes Over Output by Joshua Seiden

• Petra Wille: A strong concept they use often when coaching senior executives.

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

• Ebi Atawodi: Helps you see the patterns behind success.

Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind by Al Ries, Jack Trout

• Arielle Jackson: Still their favorite marketing book, decades after it came out.

Power: Why Some People Have It and Others Don't by Jeffrey Pfeffer

• Deb Liu: Shows power is not accidental and how to think about the playing field.

Powerful by Patty McCord

• Patrick Campbell: Challenges what you think HR and people ops should be; you can design them your way.

Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely

• Kristen Berman: A great starter book on behavioral science.

Presenting to Win by Jerry Weissman

• Sean Ellis: Helped their presenting: well-organized material leads to confident delivery.

Principles by Ray Dalio

• Paul Adams: They strongly believe in working from principles and give it to people.

Product Roadmaps Relaunched by C. Todd Lombardo, Bruce McCarthy, Evan Ryan, Michael Connors

• Christine Itwaru: Still a useful quick reference on how to communicate a roadmap.

Profit from the Core by Chris Zook, James Allen

• Casey Winters

Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

• Elena Verna: Science fiction so gripping they read it in about two days.

Reamde by Neal Stephenson

• Kayvon Beykpour: Science fiction exercises the imagination and helps them be more creative.

Recapture the Rapture by Jamie Wheal

• Jonny Miller: Covers the state of the world, practices for shifting your state of mind, and building ethical communities.

Resonate by Nancy Duarte

• John Mark Nickels: They give it to PMs to build storytelling, vision and presentation skills.

Right Ho, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse

• Jessica Livingston: Very funny and wonderfully written; a good place to start with Wodehouse.

Running Lean by Ash Maurya

• Itamar Gilad: Another valuable book from the Lean series.

Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari

• Naomi Gleit: A model of simplifying a hugely complex subject, all of human history, into clear ideas.

Scientific Advertising by Claude C. Hopkins

• Archie Abrams: Early direct marketing with first-principles lessons on writing and selling that still hold.

Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees by Lawrence Weschler

• Josh Miller: Their top product management book, about the artist Robert Irwin.

Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

• Bill Carr: A personal favorite.

Several Short Sentences About Writing by Verlyn Klinkenborg

• Jason Fried: Their go-to writing book: all about the sentence, beautifully written and fun.

Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts

• Brian Tolkin: Their fun pick.

Shape Up by Ryan Singer

• Bob Moesta: Phenomenal.

Smart Brevity by Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen, Roy Schwartz

• Luc Levesque: Teaches crisp, short writing; they saw their team's messages improve after sharing it.

Something Deeply Hidden by Sean Carroll

• Gustav Söderström: On the interpretation of quantum mechanics.

Spark by John J. Ratey

• Luc Levesque: Explains how a specific kind of exercise improves thinking and performance; shaped their morning routine.

Sprint by Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky and Braden Kowitz

• Jiaona Zhang

Start at the End by Matt Wallaert

• Bangaly Kaba: Helps you think about what you are building in a more complete way.

Start with Why by Simon Sinek

• Eli Schwartz: Helps you understand what a product or business is meant to do for users.

Story by Robert McKee

• Andy Raskin: The standard reference for screenwriters and anyone interested in story.

Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert

• Sahil Mansuri: Psychology studies that show founders how buyers decide and offer a new way to think about sales.

Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard by Chip Heath, Dan Heath

• Tamar Yehoshua: Changes how you drive change in organizations by setting a path and motivating people.

Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu (Stephen Mitchell translation)

• Carilu Dietrich: A philosophy about the flow of life they have carried with them for 25 years.

Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin

• Tamar Yehoshua: A fascinating leadership book about Lincoln building his Civil War cabinet.

Team of Teams by Stanley McChrystal

• Tim Holley: Shows how to trust teams and push decisions to the people closest to the work, even in the military.

That Will Never Work by Marc Randolph

• Uri Levine: Helps founders understand the startup journey and the doubters along the way.

The 100% Solution by Solomon Goldstein-Rose

• Gustaf Alström: Lays out climate solutions in detail and leaves you optimistic rather than despairing.

The Adventures of Women in Tech Workbook by Alana Karen, Marily Nika

• Marily Nika: Their own workbook to help women navigate careers in tech.

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

• Paige Costello

The Art and Adventure of Leadership by Warren Bennis, Steven B. Sample

• Austin Hay: A philosophical take on leadership rather than a how-to for running a business.

The Art of Action by Stephen Bungay

• Melissa Perri and Denise Tilles: Explains how to deploy strategy and spot gaps in how a company carries it out.

The Art of Profitability by Adrian Slywotzky

• Janna Bastow

The Art of Thinking Clearly by Rolf Dobelli

• Petra Wille: Explains human biases in a clear, illustrated way.

The Art of War by Sun Tzu

• Barbra Gago: Good for strategic thinking.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X by Malcolm X, Alex Haley

• Qasar Younis: A less obvious pick they use to give listeners something new.

The Baroque Cycle by Neal Stephenson

• Jeremy Henrickson: Their favorite series: fun historical fiction set around the start of the Enlightenment.

The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch

• Gustav Söderström: Part of their interest in science and mathematics.

The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks

• Tristan de Montebello: Explains how we sabotage ourselves when things go well and how to remove that limit.

The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

• Brian Tolkin

The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood

• Paige Costello

The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy

• Katie Dill: Funny and wise; reminds you that how you react is a great freedom.

The Case Against Reality by Donald Hoffman

• Gustav Söderström: Argues evolution optimizes for fitness, not for seeing the truth.

The Cold Start Problem by Andrew Chen

• Jason Feifer: Strong lessons about network effects that keep coming up for them.

The Contrarian's Guide to Leadership by Steven B. Sample

• Austin Hay: A philosophical take on leadership rather than a how-to for running a business.

The Conversation by Robert Livingston

• Deb Liu: An honest, fact-based look at race in America that helps people talk about it.

The Courage to Be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi, Fumitake Koga

• Kevin Yien: They reread it yearly; it teaches focusing on what you control and challenges their beliefs.

The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin

• Jessica Hische: A calming book for artists that is both big-picture and practical.

The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday, Stephen Hanselman

• Timothy Davis: They read it every day for short lessons in stoic philosophy.

The Dandelion Dynasty by Ken Liu

• Eric Ries: A silkpunk fantasy series showing real optimism about engineers changing the world.

The Darwin Economy by Robert H. Frank

• Kristen Berman: Underrated look at how status and social norms drive behavior.

The Demon in the Machine by Paul Davies

• Gustav Söderström: A lesser-known favorite on information, entropy and information engines.

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

• Naomi Gleit: Narrative nonfiction that makes learning history gripping.

The Dream Machine by M. Mitchell Waldrop

• Andrew 'Boz' Bosworth: A missing history of modern computing, newly relevant with human-in-the-loop AI.

The Effective Executive by Peter F. Drucker

• Bill Carr: A management classic.

The End of Average by Todd Rose

• Bob Moesta: They relisten every year and learn something new each time.

The Enlightened Capitalists by James O'Toole

• Eric Ries: A century of case studies of founders failing to fix the same problems, so you can learn from them.

The Experience Machine by Andy Clark

• Nir Eyal: Currently reading and enjoying it.

The Fabric of Reality by David Deutsch

• Gustav Söderström: Part of their interest in science and mathematics.

The Fearless Organization by Amy C. Edmondson

• Christina Wodtke: An excellent book on psychological safety.

The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin

• Nikita Miller: They recommend almost anything by Baldwin and recently reread this.

The Five Temptations of a CEO by Patrick Lencioni

• Sarah Tavel: A fast, insightful read for founders.

The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz

• Melissa Tan: Short, easy read with good principles to live by.

The Gene: An Intimate History by Siddhartha Mukherjee

• Hamilton Helmer: A beautifully written, knowledgeable history of genetics, an important topic.

The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

• Ebi Atawodi: A beautifully written favorite.

The Great Work of Your Life by Stephen Cope

• Paul Millerd: Stories of people through history who built their lives around their work.

The Halo Effect by Phil Rosenzweig

• Oji Udezue: Teaches you to separate real lessons from storytelling and cherry-picked evidence in business books.

The Inner Game of Tennis by W. Timothy Gallwey

• Lane Shackleton: A classic they really like.

The Innovator's Solution by Clayton M. Christensen, Michael E. Raynor

• Noah Weiss: The follow-up; together with the first, the best reading on product strategy.

The Joy of Living by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

• Amol Avasare: Offers new ways to see your experience and practical steps to change how you think.

The Luxury Strategy by Jean-Noël Kapferer and Vincent Bastien

• Anuj Rathi: Explains the psychology of social hierarchy behind aspirational products.

The Making of a Manager by Julie Zhuo

• Jiaona Zhang: A great guide to being a good manager.

The Manual by Epictetus

• Phyl Terry: A short introduction to Stoicism: accept your feelings without letting them rule your decisions.

The Mystery of the Aleph by Amir D. Aczel

• Gustav Söderström: An amazing book on mathematics.

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

• Kayvon Beykpour: Fantasy escapism that feeds their creativity and imagination.

The One World Schoolhouse by Salman Khan

• Logan Kilpatrick: An incredible story; AI can make its vision of a teacher per student real.

The Origin of Wealth by Eric D. Beinhocker

• Alex Komoroske: Explains complexity economics and was their entry into systems thinking.

The Overstory by Richard Powers

• Christina Wodtke: A mind-blowing novel about trees.

The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories by Ken Liu

• Kevin Yien: Found it through a post by early Slack PM Sean Rose.

The Perfect Mile by Neal Bascomb

• Archie Abrams: A runner's story of perseverance in the race to break the four-minute mile.

The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control by Katherine Morgan Schafler

• Jason Feifer: Helpful for founders dealing with anxiety and perfectionism.

The Person and the Situation by Lee Ross, Richard E. Nisbett

• Evan LaPointe: Hard going but shows how personality and situation each shape behavior.

The Power Broker by Robert A. Caro

• Tim Holley: A huge but fascinating account of how one man reshaped New York, often for the worse.

The Power of Creative Destruction by Philippe Aghion, Céline Antonin and Simon Bunel

• Phyl Terry: Explains why new technology creates more jobs than it destroys, and why being near the frontier matters.

The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle

• Lauren Ipsen

The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs by Carmine Gallo

• Maggie Crowley: Improves speaking and presenting, and helps get busy executives to agree with your point.

The Product-Led Organization by Todd Olsen

• Christine Itwaru: Practical guide for companies going through a product-led transformation right now.

The River of Doubt by Candice Millard

• Sander Schulhoff: Their favorite book: Roosevelt's near-fatal Amazon river journey shows remarkable mental toughness.

The Road to Reality by Roger Penrose

• Hamilton Helmer: Very demanding mathematics, but the author's brilliance and learning make it amazing.

The Simple Path to Wealth by JL Collins

• Laura Schaffer: An easy read covering personal finance basics, since money problems often get in the way of happiness.

The Snowball by Alice Schroeder

• Julia Schottenstein: A favorite biography, about Warren Buffett.

The Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson

• Ayo Omojola

The Ten Faces of Innovation by Tom Kelley and Jonathan Littman

• Chandra Janakiraman: Describes the different personality types a team needs to create something special.

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell

• Emily Kramer: A classic marketing book that has lasted while tactics keep changing.

The User's Journey by Donna Lichaw

• Donna Lichaw: They wrote it to combine all their favorite ideas on product development into one book.

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

• Arielle Jackson: A recent novel they loved.

The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks

• Sam Schillace: A disturbing but interesting deep look into a mind; recommended with caution.

The Wright Brothers by David McCullough

• Katie Dill: Story of resolve against impossible odds and a strong partnership; relevant to founders.

The Writer's Journey by Christopher Vogler

• Nancy Duarte: A classic that turns the hero's journey into steps for understanding story.

This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends by Nicole Perlroth

• Ben Williams: An amazing look inside the world of digital espionage.

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

• Hari Srinivasan: A very well done novel they just finished.

Traffic by Ben Smith

• Melissa Perri and Denise Tilles: An exciting story of the rise of BuzzFeed, Gawker and online media.

Transformed by Marty Cagan

• Christian Idiodi: About moving companies to the product operating model.

Transitions by William Bridges

• Heidi Helfand

Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson

• Jiaona Zhang: A recent fantasy novel from an author they love.

Vagabonding by Rolf Potts

• Chris Hutchins: A different take on long-term travel that helped them plan a seven-month trip around the world.

Very Good, Jeeves! by P.G. Wodehouse

• Jessica Livingston: Very funny and wonderfully written; a good place to start with Wodehouse.

Vivre avec la Terre by Perrine and Charles Hervé-Gruyer

• Tanguy Crusson: Shows a productive small-scale farming system without pesticides that could feed people sustainably.

Waking Up by Sam Harris

• Lane Shackleton: A book on mindfulness they like.

Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination by Neal Gabler

• Chandra Janakiraman: Shows how Disney tinkered with theme parks and watched reactions, testing ideas long before A/B tests.

Wanting by Luke Burgis

• Paul Millerd: A personal story mixed with a deep dive into a nerdy topic; their favorite read of the year.

We Are Legion (We Are Bob) by Dennis E. Taylor

• Elena Verna: Science fiction about uploading human consciousness into AI that feels close to a possible future.

What Got You Here Won't Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith

• Camille Fournier: For anyone trying to challenge themselves and grow.

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami

• Elizabeth Stone: Insightful reflection on running and writing as meditative flow states.

What They Don't Teach You at Harvard Business School by Mark H. McCormack

• Christopher Lochhead: A lesser-known business book, unlike the ones everyone recommends.

What You Do Is Who You Are by Ben Horowitz

• Kevin Aluwi: They care a lot about building interesting, engaging company cultures.

What's Our Problem? by Tim Urban

• Marty Cagan: Provocative; it challenged their thinking in many ways.

When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chödrön

• Camille Fournier: A calming reminder in hard times that life is hard for everyone, which makes you kinder.

Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson

• Sam Schillace: Its ideas on the adjacent possible are still useful for business.

Who: The A Method for Hiring by Geoff Smart and Randy Street

• Tanguy Crusson: Helped them get better at interviewing to find who will do well on the team.

Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker

• Logan Kilpatrick: Caring about your sleep is one of the biggest improvements you can make.

Wool by Hugh Howey

• Ian McAllister: A great series by their favorite author.

Year of Yes by Shonda Rhimes

• Ami Vora: About saying yes and finding your voice when you feel like the only one; it changed their life.

You Are Here by Thich Nhat Hanh

• Lauren Ipsen

You Look Like a Thing and I Love You by Janelle Shane

• Marily Nika: A fun, accessible explanation of how AI works and why it makes the world weirder.

You Will Hear Thunder by Anna Akhmatova

• Nikita Miller: An excellent book of poetry.

Your Brain at Work by David Rock

• Wes Kao: Helps you manage attention and mental energy, like hiding your phone and doing hard tasks early.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig

• Karri Saarinen: Explores what quality is and why it is so hard to define.