Best & Worst of 2010 - Nonfiction

Over the next few days I'll be posting about my favorite reads of 2010 as well as those that I didn't like so much. I decided to post the best and worst separately by genre this year because they would make a ridiculously long post otherwise. Still to come later this week are the best and worst of general fiction, young adult, time travel fiction, short stories and graphic novels. My lists are made up of books that I read in 2010, and although they do contain some books that were published last year, they also include a lot of older books.

Best Nonfiction:

The Hot Zone by Richard Preston This 1994 book about the history of Ebola and an outbreak of the disease amongst a population of lab monkeys in the US is scarier than fiction.






The Caliphs House by Tahir Shah What I loved most about this 2006 memoir about a British family that moves to Casablanca was the mixture of humor, home renovation disasters and culture shock.





Th e Glass Castle by Jeannette Wells Although her childhood was just about as far as you can get from being sunshine and roses, this childhood memoir was an inspirational tale of overcoming hardship.






Worst Nonfiction:

The Link by Colin Tudge This could have been an interesting book about fossils, or evolution, or research and discovery. Unfortunately all it ending up being was boring.






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