5 Top essays books like The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing by Adam Moss

Cover of The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing by Adam Moss

The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

By: Adam Moss

4.22

Format: 432 pages, Hardcover

From former editor of New York magazine Adam Moss, a collection of illuminating conversations exami…

If you liked the essays plot in The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing by Adam Moss , here is a list of 5 books like this:

Cover of The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan

1. The Backyard Bird Chronicles

By: Amy Tan

4.14

Format: 320 pages, Flexibound

A gorgeous, witty account of birding, nature, and the beauty around us that hides in plain sight. … read more

Similar categories in Amy Tan's The Backyard Bird Chronicles book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • art
  • nonfiction
  • essays
"If there is anything I have learned these past six years, it is this: Each bird is surprising and thrilling in its own way. But the most special is the bird that pauses when it is eating, looks and a…"

-Amy Tan, The Backyard Bird Chronicles

"The (Anna's Hummingbird) males are deadbeat dads that contribute nothing to making the nest, or to feeding either the female or the nestlings. They are off to find other females they can impress with…"

-Amy Tan, The Backyard Bird Chronicles

"During daylight hours, they (Anna's Hummingbirds) feed every 15 minutes, be it tiny insects or nectar from flowers or feeders. If they don't consume food often enough, they can die during the day. If…"

-Amy Tan, The Backyard Bird Chronicles

"I asked Bernd Heinrich if he knew why feeder birds, like finches, discard so many seeds. It turns out he and other scientiests did research on this back in the 1990s - of course, he did -measuring di…"

-Amy Tan, The Backyard Bird Chronicles

Cover of All Fours by Miranda July

2. All Fours

By: Miranda July

3.81

Format: 336 pages, Hardcover

The New York Times–bestselling author of The First Bad Man returns with an irreverently sexy, tende… read more

Similar categories in Miranda July's All Fours book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

"But maybe the road split between: a life spent longing vs. a life that was continually surprising"

-Miranda July, All Fours

"Maybe we shouldn't do that," Jordi said. "Flatten ourselves like that. Erratic doesn't have to mean crazy or irresponsible. Shouldn't we be normalizing change?"

-Miranda July, All Fours

"I guess any calling, no mater what it is, is a kind of unresolved ache," I said, giving in to knowing more than him. "It's a problem that you can't fix, but there is some relief in knowing you will c…"

-Miranda July, All Fours

"For me lying created just the right amount of problems and what you saw was just one of my four or five faces- each real, each with different needs. The only dangerous lie was one that asked me to co…"

-Miranda July, All Fours

Cover of Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us by Susan Magsamen

3. Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us

By: Susan Magsamen

3.91

Format: 304 pages, Hardcover

A life-altering journey through the science of neuroaesthetics, which offers proof for how our brai… read more

Similar categories in Susan Magsamen's Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • art
  • nonfiction
  • self help
Cover of Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey Among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See by Bianca Bosker

4. Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey Among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See

By: Bianca Bosker

4.16

Format: 370 pages, Hardcover

The author of Cork Dork takes readers on another fascinating, hilarious, and revelatory journey—thi… read more

Similar categories in Bianca Bosker's Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey Among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • art
  • nonfiction
"Art Lovers pitied me: They said I lacked "Visual literacy", which they swore was downright dangerous in a world so saturated with pictures."

-Bianca Bosker, Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey Among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See

Cover of There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension by Hanif Abdurraqib

5. There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension

By: Hanif Abdurraqib

4.40

Format: 352 pages, Hardcover

A poignant, personal reflection on basketball, talent and allegiance, and of course, LeBron James—f… read more

Similar categories in Hanif Abdurraqib's There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
  • essays
"Heartbreak itself is a primary color. Stagnant without a series of secondary colors to activate it. Longing is an activator."

-Hanif Abdurraqib, There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension

"With enough repetition, anything can become a religion. It doesn’t matter if it works or not, it simply matters if a person returns."

-Hanif Abdurraqib, There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension

"It is a strange miracle to be able to trace your own aging, your own mortality through someone who's living alongside you, someone who has survived eras at the same time as you have in some of the sa…"

-Hanif Abdurraqib, There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension

Cover of Modern Poetry: Poems by Diane Seuss

6. Modern Poetry: Poems

By: Diane Seuss

4.53

Format: 112 pages, Hardcover

Diane Seuss’s signature voice―audacious in its honesty, virtuosic in its artistry, outsider in its … read more

Similar categories in Diane Seuss's Modern Poetry: Poems book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

Cover of The Lede: Dispatches from a Life in the Press by Calvin Trillin

7. The Lede: Dispatches from a Life in the Press

By: Calvin Trillin

3.80

Format: 336 pages, Hardcover

A fascinating, opinionated portrait of journalism and the people who make it, told through pieces c… read more

Similar categories in Calvin Trillin's The Lede: Dispatches from a Life in the Press book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
  • essays
Cover of Old in Art School: A Memoir of Starting Over by Nell Irvin Painter

8. Old in Art School: A Memoir of Starting Over

By: Nell Irvin Painter

3.50

Format: 331 pages, Hardcover

How are women, and artists, "seen" and judged by their age, race, and looks? And how does this seei… read more

Similar categories in Nell Irvin Painter's Old in Art School: A Memoir of Starting Over book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • art
  • nonfiction
Cover of Any Person Is the Only Self: Essays by Elisa Gabbert

9. Any Person Is the Only Self: Essays

By: Elisa Gabbert

3.97

Format: 240 pages, Paperback

Contagiously curious essays on reading, art, and the life of the mind, from the acclaimed author of… read more

Similar categories in Elisa Gabbert's Any Person Is the Only Self: Essays book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
  • essays
Cover of When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s by John Ganz

10. When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s

By: John Ganz

4.23

Format: 432 pages, Hardcover

A lively, revelatory look back at the convulsions at the end of the Reagan era―and their dark legac… read more

Similar categories in John Ganz's When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
Cover of Playground by Richard Powers

11. Playground

By: Richard Powers

4.35

Format: 400 pages, Hardcover

A magisterial new novel from the Pulitzer Prize–winning and New York Times best-selling author of T… read more

Similar categories in Richard Powers's Playground book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

Cover of The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya

12. The Hypocrite

By: Jo Hamya

3.55

Format: 240 pages, Hardcover

From a fiercely talented writer poised to be a new generation’s Rachel Cusk or Deborah Levy, a nove… read more

Similar categories in Jo Hamya's The Hypocrite book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

"No stories are entirely imaginary, cherub, he'd said then. Everything is always a little bit real. Sometimes you steal things from other stories and change them until they work how you like."

-Jo Hamya, The Hypocrite

"The contradiction of the time had been the heightened moral obligation to consider other people as a means to keeping one's own self-interest afloat. Showing other people care meant avoiding them."

-Jo Hamya, The Hypocrite

"In the theatre's dark, he weighs up what to do out of love. There have been enough divergences so far for him to believe that Sophia's play is a self-contained thing that may only tangentially concer…"

-Jo Hamya, The Hypocrite

Cover of Sharks Don't Sink: Adventures of a Rogue Shark Scientist by Jasmin  Graham

13. Sharks Don't Sink: Adventures of a Rogue Shark Scientist

By: Jasmin Graham

4.15

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

From a marine biologist and co-founder of Minorities in Shark Sciences, a powerful debut the uplif… read more

Similar categories in Jasmin Graham's Sharks Don't Sink: Adventures of a Rogue Shark Scientist book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
Cover of Catalina by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio

14. Catalina

By: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio

3.65

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

A year in the life of the unforgettable Catalina Ituralde, a wickedly wry and heartbreakingly vulne… read more

Similar categories in Karla Cornejo Villavicencio's Catalina book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

Cover of Concerning the Future of Souls by Joy Williams

15. Concerning the Future of Souls

By: Joy Williams

4.05

Format: 176 pages, Hardcover

“Quite possibly America's best living writer of short stories.”—NPR“Williams is a writer for our b… read more

Similar categories in Joy Williams's Concerning the Future of Souls book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

Cover of New and Selected Poems by Marie Howe

16. New and Selected Poems

By: Marie Howe

4.49

Format: 192 pages, Hardcover

An indispensable collection of more than three decades of profound, luminous poetry from acclaimed … read more

Similar categories in Marie Howe's New and Selected Poems book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

Cover of The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing by Adam Moss

17. The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

By: Adam Moss

4.22

Format: 432 pages, Hardcover

From former editor of New York magazine Adam Moss, a collection of illuminating conversations exami… read more

Similar categories in Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • art
  • nonfiction
  • design
  • essays
  • writing
  • self help
Cover of Autocracy, Inc. by Anne Applebaum

18. Autocracy, Inc.

By: Anne Applebaum

4.28

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

All of us have in our minds a cartoon image of what an autocratic state looks like, with a bad man … read more

Similar categories in Anne Applebaum's Autocracy, Inc. book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
"Americans who rarely think about Russia would be stunned to learn how much time Russian state television devotes to America’s culture wars, especially arguments over gender. Putin himself has display…"

-Anne Applebaum, Autocracy, Inc.

"Isolationism is an instinctive and even understandable reaction to the ugliness of the modern interconnected world. For some politicians in democracies, it will continue to offer a successful path to…"

-Anne Applebaum, Autocracy, Inc.

"The temptation of what is sometimes called realism—the belief that nations are solely motivated by a struggle for power, that they have eternal interests and permanent geopolitical orientations—is as…"

-Anne Applebaum, Autocracy, Inc.

Cover of The Bookshop: A History of the American Bookstore by Evan Friss

19. The Bookshop: A History of the American Bookstore

By: Evan Friss

4.18

Format: 416 pages, Hardcover

An affectionate and engaging history of the American bookstore and its central place in American cu… read more

Similar categories in Evan Friss's The Bookshop: A History of the American Bookstore book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
  • writing
Cover of On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything by Nate Silver

20. On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything

By: Nate Silver

3.84

Format: 576 pages, Hardcover

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Signal and the Noise, the definitive guide to our… read more

Similar categories in Nate Silver's On the Edge: The Art of Risking Everything book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction
  • self help
Cover of Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI by Yuval Noah Harari

21. Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI

By: Yuval Noah Harari

4.11

Format: 528 pages, Hardcover

For the last 100,000 years, we Sapiens have accumulated enormous power. But despite all our discove… read more

Similar categories in Yuval Noah Harari's Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI book and Adam Moss's The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing

  • nonfiction

14 Top nonfiction books like The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing by Adam Moss

Transform Your Habits

The Backyard Bird Chronicles

Amy Tan

4.14

Transform Your Habits

Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us

Susan Magsamen

3.91

Transform Your Habits

Get the Picture: A Mind-Bending Journey Among the Inspired Artists and Obsessive Art Fiends Who Taught Me How to See

Bianca Bosker

4.16

Transform Your Habits

There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension

Hanif Abdurraqib

4.40

View all the books

19 must-read audiobook books like The Backyard Bird Chronicles by Amy Tan

Transform Your Habits

The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year

Margaret Renkl

4.37

Transform Your Habits

An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s

Doris Kearns Goodwin

4.71

Transform Your Habits

James

Percival Everett

4.54

Transform Your Habits

The Backyard Bird Chronicles

Amy Tan

4.14

View all the books

Never miss a story from us, get weekly updates in your inbox.