WSJ’s Top Book Recommendations-Cary Regional

Discover the best books of the year, handpicked by the editors of The Wall Street Journal. From thought-provoking nonfiction to engrossing fiction, our Top Book Recommendations offer a curated list of exceptional reads that will inform, inspire, and entertain. Featuring titles from acclaimed authors and emerging voices, our selection spans genres and subjects, ensuring there's something for every reader. Dive into the world of ideas, stories, and perspectives that will change the way you think, feel, and see the world.

Showing 1 - 20 of 302  There are a total of 302 valid entries on the list.
Book cover for "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People"
Star rating for The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:

When it was first published, in 1990, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People was an almost instant bestseller—and became a permanent part of the cultural lexicon. With more than 15 million copies sold in over 33 languages and 75 countries since its first publication, this book continues to help millions of people become more effective—both in their personal and professional lives.

What author Stephen R. Covey advocates is

...
Book cover for "The 22 murders of Madison May"
Star rating for The 22 murders of Madison May
Description:
"From the critically acclaimed author of Jennifer Government and Lexicon comes mind-bending speculative psychological suspense about a serial killer pursuing his victim across time and space, and the woman who is determined to stop him, even if it upends her own reality"--
Book cover for "33 Place Brugmann"
Star rating for 33 Place Brugmann
Description:
"An extraordinarily accomplished debut novel-a love story, mystery, and philosophical puzzle-told in the singular voices of the residents of a Beaux Arts apartment building in Belgium in 1939. On the eve of the occupation, in the heart of Brussels, life for the residents of eight apartments at 33 Place Brugmann is about to change forever. Art student Charlotte Sauvin, daughter of a prominent architect in apartment 4L, knows all the details of the...
Book cover for "Abe"
Star rating for Abe
Description:
"ABE is a cultural biography of Abraham Lincoln, following Lincoln's monumental life from cradle to grave while weaving a narrative that includes Lincoln's cultural influences and the nation-wide and regional cultural trends and moods and happenings of his day, and how Lincoln both shaped and was shaped by his America. The music, humor, literature, and fashions of the time and their impact on Lincoln's life are explored as well, and analysis of other...
Book cover for "All her little secrets"
Star rating for All her little secrets
Average Rating:
5 stars
Description:
"Everyone has something to hide...Ellice Littlejohn seemingly has it all: an Ivy League law degree, a well-paying job as a corporate attorney in midtown Atlanta, great friends, and a "for fun" relationship with a rich, charming executive, who just happens to be her white boss. But everything changes one cold January morning when Ellice arrives in the executive suite and finds him dead with a gunshot to his head. And then she walks away like nothing...
Book cover for "All the frequent troubles of our days"
Star rating for All the frequent troubles of our days
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
Part biography, part political thriller, part scholarly detective story that draws on letters, diary entries, notes smuggled out of a Berlin prison, and other documents, this true story chronicles the life and brutal death of Mildred Harnack, the American leader of one of the largest underground resistance groups in Germany.
Book cover for "Alter ego"
Star rating for Alter ego
Description:
"Alex Segura, LA Times Book Prize-winning author of Secret Identity, returns with a clever and escapist mystery set in the world of comic books. In the present day, a comics legend is given the chance to revive a beloved but forgotten character. But at what price? Annie Bustamante is a cultural force like none other: an acclaimed filmmaker, an author, a comic book artist known for one of the all time best superhero comics in recent memory. But she's...
Book cover for "American visions"
Star rating for American visions
Description:
"A revealing history of the formative period when voices of dissent and innovation defied power and created visions of America still resonant today'-- With so many of our histories falling into dour critique or blatant celebration, here is a welcome departure: a book that offers hope as well as honesty about the American past. The early decades of the nineteenth century saw the expansion of slavery, Native dispossession, and wars with Canada and...
Book cover for "The anarchy"
Star rating for The anarchy
Average Rating:
5 stars
Book cover for "Anatomy of a murder"
Star rating for Anatomy of a murder
Average Rating:
5 stars
Notes:
This book was ranked #1 as the best book on courtroom drama by the WSJ on May 18th, 2025.
Description:
First published by St. Martin's in 1958, Robert Traver's Anatomy of a Murder immediately became the number-one bestseller in America, and was subsequently turned into the now classic Otto Preminger film of the same name, starring Jimmy Stewart and Duke Ellington. It's not only the most popular courtroom drama in American fiction, but one of the most popular novels of our time. A gripping tale of deceit, murder, and a sensational trial, Anatomy of...
Book cover for "Andrew Carnegie"
Star rating for Andrew Carnegie
Author:
Notes:
#1 book listed on the WSJ on June1, 2025 as one of the top 5 books on leaders in business and philanthropy
Book cover for "Angelica"
Star rating for Angelica
Author:
Description:
Through the extraordinary life of Angelica Schuyler Church, a politically astute and socially influential figure, this story reveals how women shaped early American history through diplomacy, personal networks, and a strategic presence in key revolutionary moments.
Book cover for "The anxious generation"
Star rating for The anxious generation
Average Rating:
3.9 stars
Description:
After more than a decade of stability or improvement, the mental health of adolescents plunged in the early 2010s. Rates of depression, anxiety, self-harm, and suicide rose sharply, more than doubling on many measures. Why? In The Anxious Generation, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt lays out the facts about the epidemic of teen mental illness that hit many countries at the same time. He then investigates the nature of childhood, including why children...
Book cover for "The Appalachian Trail"
Star rating for The Appalachian Trail
Description:
"The Appalachian Trail is America's most beloved trek, with millions of hikers setting foot on it every year. Yet few are aware of the fascinating backstory of the oddballs and obsessives who helped bring it to life over the past century"--
Book cover for "The arsenal of democracy"
Star rating for The arsenal of democracy
Average Rating:
5 stars
Description:
Tells the incredible story of how Detroit answered the call to arms during WWII, centering on Henry Ford and his tortured son Edsel, who, when asked if they could deliver 50,000 airplanes, made an outrageous claim: Ford Motor Company would erect a plant that could yield a "bomber an hour."
Book cover for "Axiom's end"
Star rating for Axiom's end
Series:
Noumena volume 1.
Average Rating:
4.5 stars
Description:
"By the fall of 2007, one well-timed leak revealing that the U.S. government might have engaged in first contact has sent the country into turmoil, and it is all Cora Sabino can do to avoid the whole mess. The force driving this controversy is Cora's whistleblower father, and even though she hasn't spoken to him in years, his celebrity has caught the attention of the press, the Internet, the paparazzi, and the government-and redirected it to her....
Book cover for "Bad blood"
Star rating for Bad blood
Average Rating:
4.6 stars
Description:
"In 2014 Theranos founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes was widely seen as the female Steve Jobs: a brilliant Stanford dropout whose startup 'unicorn' promised to revolutionize the medical industry with a machine that would make blood tests significantly faster and easier ... There was just one problem: The technology didn't work. For years, Holmes had been misleading investors, FDA officials, and her own employees. When [the author], working at The Wall...
Book cover for "Badlands"
Star rating for Badlands
Average Rating:
5 stars
Description:
"In the New Mexico badlands, the skeleton of a woman is found-and the case is assigned to FBI Agent Corrie Swanson. The victim walked into the desert, shedding clothes as she went, and died in agony of heatstroke and thirst. Two rare artifacts are found clutched in her bony hands-lightning stones used by the ancient Chaco people to summon the gods. Is it suicide or... sacrifice? Agent Swanson brings in archaeologist Nora Kelly to investigate. When...
Book cover for "Basic economics"
Star rating for Basic economics
Average Rating:
4.3 stars
Description:
A presentation of economics in plain language.
Book cover for "The best minds"
Star rating for The best minds
Average Rating:
4.3 stars
Description:
"When the Rosens moved to New Rochelle in 1973, Jonathan Rosen and Michael Laudor seemed destined to become inseparable. The boys, both children of college professors, grew up on the same street in intellectually vibrant homes shaped by ideas, liberal Jewish culture, the trauma of the Holocaust, and a shared love of basketball and standup comedy. But the two best friends were also keen competitors bearing the same great expectations, and when Michael...