22 of 2022’s Top New Books (So Far)

Health and Wellness

The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Pain by Meghan O’Rourke

The author vividly describes living for years with undiagnosed, debilitating symptoms — while facing skeptical, dismissive physicians — before being told she had late-stage Lyme disease. The millions of other Americans silently struggling with such hard-to-label illnesses, including a growing number with autoimmune disorders, will relate to her frustrations at “living at the edge of medical knowledge.” (March 1)

Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention — and How to Think Deeply Again by Johann Hari

Journalist Hari’s call for an “Attention Revolution” explores the consequences of our general lack of focus in the internet age — including less satisfying individual lives and a hampered ability to confront global crises — and how we might reverse our slide into mindless distracted lives. Read it (if you can concentrate long enough), and you may want to throw your smartphone out the window. (Jan. 25)

Healing: Our Path From Mental Illness to Mental Health by Thomas Insel, M.D.

Those with mental illness and their families will appreciate this passionate call for a new way to address our country’s growing mental health crisis. A former director of the National Institute of Mental Health, Insel suggests, among other reforms, a heavier focus on prevention and a more holistic approach to recovery, and presents the problem as a critical human rights issue. (Feb. 22)

Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole by Susan Cain

Why do some of us love sad, yearning music? Why does so much transcendent art derive from suffering? The author of the best seller Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking now offers a poetic and poignant exploration of melancholy. She views it as an authentic “response to the problem of being alive in a deeply flawed yet stubbornly beautiful world” and an inspiration for connection and creativity. (April 5)

The Beauty of Dusk: On Vision Lost and Found by Frank Bruni

The New York Times columnist movingly describes how he lost sight in one eye after a stroke at age 52; a doctor told him there was a very definite possibility he’d go blind. Spoiler alert: He didn’t. But the journey toward recovery was a frightening experience that, he writes, spurred him to “contemplate and experience aging as I never had before,” including its many upsides, and develop a new perspective on — and gratitude for — life. (March 1)

The Whole Body Reset: Your Weight-Loss Plan for a Flat Belly, Optimum Health & a Body You’ll Love by Stephen Perrine with Heidi Skolnik

Many of us gain weight and lose muscle in midlife, but there are simple ways to prevent such age-related decline, laid out in this diet and health guide developed by AARP and approved by a team of nutritionists, doctors and fitness experts. (March 1)

52 Ways to Walk: The Surprising Science of Walking for Wellness and Joy, One Week at a Time by Annabel Streets

This short, enthusiastic guide extolling walking’s mental and physical benefits will motivate you to get outside and move, step by step, throughout the year in 52 chapters. (Feb. 17)

Super Gut: Reprogram Your Microbiome to Restore Health, Lose Weight and Turn Back the Clock by William Davis, M.D.

A cardiologist and author of the mega-bestseller Wheat Belly, about the health horrors caused by modern wheat consumption, Davis now argues that our unnatural lifestyles have led to a proliferation of unhealthy bacteria in our digestive tract — a “monstrous microbial mess” that contributes to constipation, colon cancer and loads of other woes. He lays out a diet plan to establish order in our intestines. (Feb. 1)

History, travel and more

Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth by Elizabeth Williamson

Williamson, a seasoned journalist in The New York Times’ Washington bureau, explores the 2012 school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, where a gunman killed 20 children and six adults. Her presentation of the story is bolstered by fantastically thorough reporting that dives deep into not only what happened on that awful day but also the disturbing events that followed. Parents of dead children faced insults and threats from some seriously unhinged conspiracy theorists who declared the event was a hoax — bizarre assertions Williamson views as a precursor to the decline in fact-based political discourse in recent years. (March 8)

50 States, 500 Campgrounds by Joe Yogerst

If you like camping or even are considering giving it a try, this book from National Geographic will whet your appetite with a stunning range of places to pitch your tent all over the U.S., including in national and state parks, and Canada. But it’s not all about camping: There’s lots here for RVers, glampers and more — such as Treehouse Cottages in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, where you can sleep in four-poster beds among the trees. This guide follows NG’s also incredibly comprehensive 2017 book 50 States, 5,000 Ideas: Where to Go, When to Go, What to See, What to Do. (Feb 22)

Finance for the People: Getting a Grip on Your Finances by Paco de Leon

De Leon, founder of a financial firm for freelancers and creative people, offers a great resource for straight talk about money and — more important, she suggests — how we feel about money. She doesn’t offer investing advice, but rather asks you to look frankly at whether you’re limiting your financial potential by sticking to unhelpful saving and spending habits, possibly shaped by your upbringing and social expectations. “Understanding why we’re weird about money is the first step in having the power to be less weird about it,” she writes. (Feb. 1)

The Second Half: Forty Women Reveal Life After Fifty by Ellen Warner

Warner, a photojournalist, spent 15 years traveling the world to talk to women — all of them age 50 or older — about how they’re experiencing the “second half” of life. The result is a series of 40 portraits of and interviews with a wildly diverse range of women, from the late actress Olivia de Havilland to an Algerian nomad. For similarly inspiring reading, check out Collective Wisdom: Lessons, Inspiration and Advice From Women Over 50 by Grace Bonney, which came out last year and features more than 100 American women — including author Cheryl Strayed and model JoAni Johnson — who discuss their regrets, hopes, challenges and dreams. (March 8)

Nana Loves You More by Jimmy Fallon

Here’s one for the grandkids: Host of NBC’s The Tonight Show, Fallon moonlights (daylights?) as a children’s book author. The father of two daughters — author of Your Baby’s First Words Will Be Dada, among others — says his latest book is “for all of the Nanas out there — the Grandmas, the Gammys, the Grans, the GiGis, the Meemaws, the Abuelas, and the Bubbies. Whatever you call your grandmother, we wouldn’t be who we are without their love.“ A taste of this sweet book, best for ages 1 to 3: “How much does Nana love you? More than the moon? More than the stars? More than all of the planets by far!” Aw… (March 29)

365 Quick & Easy Tips: Home Organization by Weldon Owen

If you take decluttering and tidying one day — and one section of your home — at a time, you can neaten up the whole place within a year (then begin again, perhaps?). That’s the premise of this low-stress guide that breaks down what can be an overwhelming project task by task. The word is that such tidying can be life-changing. (Jan. 4)

Love to read? Join the Girlfriend Book Club, a fun Facebook group devoted to all things literary. Get ideas for your TBR list, and enjoy live author talks and book giveaways!