Barack Obama Summer Reading Book Guide

Whether you're camped out on the beach or curled up on the couch on a rainy day, there's nothing quite like sitting down with a great book in the summer. While we were still in the White House, I began sharing my summer favorites—and over the years, it's become a little tradition that I look forward to sharing with you all. So without further ado, here are some books I've read recently. Hope you enjoy them as much as I did.


You can see the original post here.

We wanted to make a simple site with the links to find the books from retailers quite simply, so here it is!


At Night All Blood Is Black by David Diop

Type: Fiction

Alfa Ndiaye is a Senegalese man who, never before having left his village, finds himself fighting as a so-called "Chocolat" soldier with the French army during World War I. When his friend Mademba Diop, in the same regiment, is seriously injured in battle, Diop begs Alfa to kill him and spare him the pain of a long and agonizing death in No Man's Land.


Land of Big Numbers by Te-Ping Chen

Type: Fiction

In this magnificent collection of stories, the author vividly captures the desires and losses of a richly drawn cast while drawing on the realities of contemporary China


Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe

Type: Nonfiction

The book examines the history of the Sackler family, many of whom were founders of Purdue Pharma, and their role in the opioid epidemic. The book followed Keefe's 2017 article on the Sackler family in the The New Yorker, titled The Family That Built an Empire of Pain.


Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

Type: Fiction

Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission—and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish


When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamín Labatut

Type: Fiction

A fictional examination of the lives of real-life scientists and thinkers whose discoveries resulted in moral consequences beyond their imagining.


Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future by Elizabeth Kolbert

Type: Nonfiction

That man should have dominion “over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth” is a prophecy that has hardened into fact. So pervasive are human impacts on the planet that it's said we live in a new geological epoch: the Anthropocene. Negative effects on climate change among other issues, there are a variety of issues that we need to solve.

This book was also reccomended by Bill Gates.

Things We Lost to the Water by Eric Nguyen

Type: Fiction

A stunning debut novel about an immigrant Vietnamese family who settles in New Orleans and struggles to remain connected to one another as their lives are inextricably reshaped.


Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam

Type: Fiction

A magnetic novel about two families, strangers to each other, who are forced together on a long weekend gone terribly wrong.


Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

Type: Fiction

Klara and the Sun is a thrilling book that offers a look at our changing world through the eyes of an unforgettable narrator, and one that explores the fundamental question: what does it mean to love?


The Sweetness of Water by Nathan Harris

Type: Fiction

An extraordinary novel of life after slavery for readers of Washington black, the underground railroad and days without end.

This book was also reccomended by Oprah's Book Club.

Intimacies by Kazuo Ishiguro

Type: Fiction

Intimacies is a haunting, precise, and morally astute novel that reads like a psychological thriller…. Katie Kitamura is a wonder.