17 must-read nonfiction books like Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond

Cover of Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond

Poverty, by America

By: Matthew Desmond

4.27

Format: 284 pages, Hardcover

Reimagining the debate on poverty, making a new and bracing argument about why it persists in Ameri…

"To live and strive in modern America is to participate in a series of morally fraught systems. If a family’s entire financial livelihood depends on the value of its home, it’s not hard to understand why that family would oppose anything that could potentially lower its property values, like a proposal to develop an affordable housing complex in the neighborhood."

-Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America

"To live and strive in modern America is to participate in a series of morally fraught systems. If a family’s entire financial livelihood depends on the value of its home, it’s not hard to understand why that family would oppose anything that could potentially lower its property values, like a proposal to develop an affordable housing complex in the neighborhood."

-Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America

"To live and strive in modern America is to participate in a series of morally fraught systems. If a family’s entire financial livelihood depends on the value of its home, it’s not hard to understand why that family would oppose anything that could potentially lower its property values, like a proposal to develop an affordable housing complex in the neighborhood."

-Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America

"To live and strive in modern America is to participate in a series of morally fraught systems. If a family’s entire financial livelihood depends on the value of its home, it’s not hard to understand why that family would oppose anything that could potentially lower its property values, like a proposal to develop an affordable housing complex in the neighborhood."

-Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America

If you liked the nonfiction plot in Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond , here is a list of 17 books like this:

Cover of Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives by Siddharth Kara

1. Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

By: Siddharth Kara

4.37

Format: 288 pages, Hardcover

The revelatory New York Times and Publishers Weekly bestseller, shortlisted for the Financial Times… read more

Similar categories in Siddharth Kara's Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • social justice
  • economics
  • audiobook
"Now you understand how people like us work?"

-Siddharth Kara, Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

"Nothing looks the same after a trip to the Congo. The world back home no longer makes sense. It is difficult to reconcile how it even inhabits the same planet. Neatly arranged mountains of vegetables…"

-Siddharth Kara, Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

"Cobalt mining is the slave farm perfected. The cost of labor has been nullified through the degradation of Africans at the bottom of an economic chain that purports to exonerate all participants of a…"

-Siddharth Kara, Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

Cover of A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them by Timothy Egan

2. A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them

By: Timothy Egan

4.38

Format: 432 pages, Hardcover

A historical thriller by the Pulitzer and National Book Award-winning author that tells the rivetin… read more

Similar categories in Timothy Egan's A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • social justice
  • audiobook
"When hate was on the ballot, especially in the guise of virtue, a majority of voters knew exactly what to do."

-Timothy Egan, A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them

"Stephenson had succeeded with an unusual formula for a mass movement: men were the muscle, women spread the poison, and ministers sanctified it all."

-Timothy Egan, A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them

"The governor of Georgia, Clifford Walker, told a Klan rally in 1924 that the United States should 'build a wall of steel, a wall as high as heaven' against immigrants."

-Timothy Egan, A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them

"There are millions who have never joined, but who think and feel and, when called on, will fight with us," Evans wrote. "This is our real strength, and no one who ignores it can hope to understand Am…"

-Timothy Egan, A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them

Cover of Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection by Charles Duhigg

3. Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection

By: Charles Duhigg

4.05

Format: 320 pages, Hardcover

Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780593243916. Who and what are supercommunicators? They're the … read more

Similar categories in Charles Duhigg's Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
"Strong leaders didn't help people align. In fact, groups with a dominant leader had the least amount of neural synchrony."

-Charles Duhigg, Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection

"To communicate with someone, we must connect with them. When we absorb what someone is saying and they comprehend what we say, it's because our brains have, to some degree, aligned."

-Charles Duhigg, Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection

Cover of James by Percival Everett

4. James

By: Percival Everett

4.54

Format: 303 pages, Hardcover

A brilliant, action-packed reimagining of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn , both harrowing and f… read more

Similar categories in Percival Everett's James book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • audiobook
Cover of Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein

5. Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World

By: Naomi Klein

4.22

Format: 416 pages, Hardcover

What if you woke up one morning and found you’d acquired another self―a double who was almost you a… read more

Similar categories in Naomi Klein's Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • sociology
  • audiobook
"Our role here on earth is not simply to maximize the advantage in our lives. It’s to maximize (protect, regenerate) all of life. We are here not just to make sure we as individuals survive, but to ma…"

-Naomi Klein, Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World

"A state of shock is what happens to us- individually or as a society- when we experience a sudden and unprecedented event for which we do not yet have adequate explanation. At its essence, a shock is…"

-Naomi Klein, Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World

Cover of King: A Life by Jonathan Eig

6. King: A Life

By: Jonathan Eig

4.67

Format: 688 pages, Hardcover

The first full biography in decades, King mixes revelatory and exhaustive new research with brisk a… read more

Similar categories in Jonathan Eig's King: A Life book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • social justice
  • audiobook
Cover of Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America by Heather Cox Richardson

7. Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America

By: Heather Cox Richardson

4.42

Format: 286 pages, Hardcover

“Engaging and highly accessible.” —Boston Globe “A vibrant, and essential history of America's u… read more

Similar categories in Heather Cox Richardson's Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • social justice
  • audiobook
Cover of The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James   McBride

8. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store

By: James McBride

4.00

Format: 385 pages, Hardcover

In 1972, when workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, were digging the foundations for a new housing de… read more

Similar categories in James McBride's The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • audiobook
Cover of Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange

9. Wandering Stars

By: Tommy Orange

3.89

Format: 315 pages, Hardcover

The eagerly awaited follow-up to Pulitzer Prize-finalist Tommy Orange’s breakout best seller There … read more

Similar categories in Tommy Orange's Wandering Stars book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • audiobook
"And in the year 1924 Indian citizenship will have been granted, even though they will mean to dissolve tribes by giving citizenship, dissolve being another word for disappearance, a kind of chemical …"

-Tommy Orange, Wandering Stars

Cover of Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

10. Chain-Gang All-Stars

By: Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

4.14

Format: 367 pages, Hardcover

Two top women gladiators fight for their freedom within a depraved private prison system not so far… read more

Similar categories in Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah's Chain-Gang All-Stars book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • audiobook
"They were all humans, and yet they had completely different ideas about what humanity meant."

-Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Chain-Gang All-Stars

"My brother-in-law is an alien. I have a bunch of alien friends. I can't be racist," Randy Mac continued."

-Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Chain-Gang All-Stars

"An absurd thing for the murderous state to plead for, but, as always, the massive violence of the state was “justice,"

-Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Chain-Gang All-Stars

"...despite how hard it was, she wasn't afraid with love. She knew how to wield it, how to grow it, and how to receive it."

-Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, Chain-Gang All-Stars

Cover of The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder by David Grann

11. The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder

By: David Grann

4.19

Format: 331 pages, Hardcover

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Killers of the Flower Moon, a page-turning story o… read more

Similar categories in David Grann's The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • nonfiction
  • history
  • audiobook
Cover of The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession by Michael Finkel

12. The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession

By: Michael Finkel

3.97

Format: 224 pages, Hardcover

One of the most remarkable true-crime narratives of the twenty-first century: the story of the worl… read more

Similar categories in Michael Finkel's The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • nonfiction
  • history
  • audiobook
"Museums are secular churches . . . and to steal there is blasphemous."

-Michael Finkel, The Art Thief: A True Story of Love, Crime, and a Dangerous Obsession

Cover of Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond

13. Poverty, by America

By: Matthew Desmond

4.27

Format: 284 pages, Hardcover

Reimagining the debate on poverty, making a new and bracing argument about why it persists in Ameri… read more

Similar categories in Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • social science
  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • social justice
  • poverty
  • social issues
  • economics
  • sociology
  • audiobook
"To live and strive in modern America is to participate in a series of morally fraught systems. If a family’s entire financial livelihood depends on the value of its home, it’s not hard to understand …"

-Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America

"The rest of us, on the ·other hand-we members of the protected classes-have grown increasingly· dependent on our welfare programs. In 2020 the federal government spent more than $193 billion on homeo…"

-Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America

"In her book The Government-Citizen Disconnect, the political scientist Suzanne Mettler reports that 96 percent of American adults have relied on a major government program at some point in their live…"

-Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America

Cover of We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America by Roxanna Asgarian

14. We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America

By: Roxanna Asgarian

4.32

Format: 320 pages, Hardcover

The shocking, deeply reported story of a murder-suicide that claimed the lives of six children—and … read more

Similar categories in Roxanna Asgarian's We Were Once a Family: A Story of Love, Death, and Child Removal in America book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • nonfiction
  • social justice
  • sociology
  • audiobook
Cover of The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality by Amanda Montell

15. The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality

By: Amanda Montell

3.54

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

From the bestselling author of Cultish and host of the podcast Sounds Like a Cult, a delicious blen… read more

Similar categories in Amanda Montell's The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • nonfiction
  • sociology
  • audiobook
"While magical thinking is an age-old quirk, overthinking feels distinct to the modern era—a product of our innate superstitions clashing with information overload, mass loneliness, and a capitalistic…"

-Amanda Montell, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality

"Information transmission research suggests that folks with higher anxiety are quicker to engage with, and slower to disengage from, negative information; so "as a trait and state," anxiety itself per…"

-Amanda Montell, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality

Cover of The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism by Tim Alberta

16. The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism

By: Tim Alberta

4.45

Format: 506 pages, Kindle Edition

Evangelical Christians are perhaps the most polarizing—and least understood—people living in Americ… read more

Similar categories in Tim Alberta's The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • politics
  • history
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness by Jonathan Haidt

17. The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness

By: Jonathan Haidt

4.46

Format: 400 pages, Hardcover

After more than a decade of stability or improvement, the mental health of adolescents plunged in t… read more

Similar categories in Jonathan Haidt's The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • nonfiction
  • sociology
  • audiobook
"Socially prescribed perfectionism is closely related to anxiety; people who suffer from anxiety are more prone to it. Being a perfectionist also increases your anxiety because you fear the shame of p…"

-Jonathan Haidt, The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness

"Girls in virtual networks are subjected to hundreds of times more social comparison than girls had experienced for all of human evolution. They are exposed to more cruelty and bullying because social…"

-Jonathan Haidt, The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness

Cover of Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World by Henry Grabar

18. Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World

By: Henry Grabar

4.20

Format: 368 pages, Kindle Edition

An entertaining, enlightening, and utterly original investigation into one of the most quietly infl… read more

Similar categories in Henry Grabar's Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • economics
  • sociology
  • audiobook
Cover of The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet by Jeff Goodell

19. The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet

By: Jeff Goodell

4.32

Format: 400 pages, Hardcover

The world is waking up to a new wildfires are now seasonal in California, the Northeast is getting… read more

Similar categories in Jeff Goodell's The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • politics
  • history
  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
Cover of How to Say Babylon by Safiya Sinclair

20. How to Say Babylon

By: Safiya Sinclair

4.47

Format: 352 pages, Hardcover

With echoes of Educated and Born a Crime, How to Say Babylon is the stunning story of the author’s … read more

Similar categories in Safiya Sinclair's How to Say Babylon book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • nonfiction
  • audiobook
"As I grew older, I knew I would never be his perfect Rasta daughter. I was too headstrong, too curious. Too much of myself, and not enough of him."

-Safiya Sinclair, How to Say Babylon

Cover of When Crack Was King: A People's History of a Misunderstood Era by Donovan X. Ramsey

21. When Crack Was King: A People's History of a Misunderstood Era

By: Donovan X. Ramsey

4.36

Format: 448 pages, Hardcover

A kaleidoscopic account of the crack cocaine era and a community’s ultimate resilience, told throug… read more

Similar categories in Donovan X. Ramsey's When Crack Was King: A People's History of a Misunderstood Era book and Matthew Desmond's Poverty, by America

  • history
  • politics
  • nonfiction
  • social justice
  • sociology
  • audiobook

21 Top audiobook books like Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond

Transform Your Habits

Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

Siddharth Kara

4.37

Transform Your Habits

A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them

Timothy Egan

4.38

Transform Your Habits

Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection

Charles Duhigg

4.05

Transform Your Habits

James

Percival Everett

4.54

View all the books

18 must-read audiobook books like The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Caused an Epidemic of Mental Illness by Jonathan Haidt

Transform Your Habits

The Women

Kristin Hannah

4.64

Transform Your Habits

How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen

David Brooks

4.14

Transform Your Habits

Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection

Charles Duhigg

4.05

Transform Your Habits

The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War

Erik Larson

4.24

View all the books

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