Stephen L. Carter, Columnist

My 15 Favorite Nonfiction Books of 2018

Each reflects serious thought, research and argument, and made me look at things in a new way.

December 20, 2018 at 3:30 PM UTC

Stephen L. Carter is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist, a professor of law at Yale University and author of “Invisible: The Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster.”

Just can’t get enough.
Photographer: Joel Saget/AFP/Getty Images

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Just in time for holiday buying, here are my nominees for the best nonfiction books of 2018. I haven’t read everything published this year, but I read a great deal, and these are my 15 favorites.1 Each reflects serious thought, research and argument. Each made me look at things in a new way. The first 14 are listed in random order (no tyranny of the alphabet). At the end is my choice for best nonfiction book of the year.

Richard Sennett: “Building and Dwelling: Ethics for the City.” Sennett, who has been writing about cities for a good half century, has never been sharper. As the world grows more urban, he argues, we face a crisis: Cities are shaped by the designs of planners rather than by the actual lives, needs and beliefs of their inhabitants. People who live in cities should not only be free but feel free.