Nonfiction Favorites
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Nonfiction Favorites
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Nonfiction Favorites
NEH Nonfiction Booklist for Young Readers
As part of our fiftieth anniversary, we want to celebrate the work we've done for children, such as the Youth Grants, Summer Seminars and Institutes to train teachers, and a perennial favorite: our Summertime Favorites reading list.
We recently took another look at the list and realized that very little of the list qualified as informational texts. In order to fulfill the need for high-quality children's nonfiction, we scoured nonfiction awards lists and crowdsourced recommendations, consulting with a panel of respected education and library science experts. After extensive review and consultation, we have put together a list of books covering many of the wide range of projects we have funded over the last half century.
We welcome your feedback. Email us, follow @NEHgov on Twitter, or like us on Facebook!
If you would like to download the poster as a PDF, please click here for Page 1 and here for Page 2.
The entire Nonfiction Booklist appears below. You can also view the list by age group:
5-8
Recommended for ages 5-8, either for reading by children or for reading to them.
| A Life Like Mine | UNICEF |
| Artist in Overalls | John Duggleby |
| Ballet for Martha: Making Appalachian Spring | Jan Greenberg and Sarah Jordan |
| Ballons Over Broadway: The True Story of the Puppeteer of Macy's Parade | Melissa Sweet |
| The Camping Trip That Changed America | Barb Rosenstock |
| Dave the Potter; Artist, Poet, Slave | Laban Carrick Hill |
| Eleanor | Barbara Cooney |
| Family Pictures/Cuadros de Familia | Carmen Lomas Garza |
| Fifty Cents and a Dream: Young Booker T. Washington | Jabari Asim |
| Founding Mothers | Cokie Roberts |
| Frida | Jonah Winter |
| From the Good Mountain | James Rumford |
| George Did It | Suzanne Jurmain |
| Hoop Genius: How a Desperate Gym Teacher and a Rowdy Gym Class Invented Basketball | John Coy |
| The House That George Built | Suzanne Slade |
| How the Sphinx Got to the Museum | Jessie Hartland |
| In the Bag: Margaret Knight Wraps It Up | Monica Kulling |
| John Muir | Kathryn Lasky |
| José! Born to Dance: the Story of José Limón | Susanna Reich |
| Lightship | Brian Floca |
| The Man Who Walked Between the Towers | Mordicai Gerstein |
| Martin's Big Words: The Life of Martin Luther King | Doreen Rappaport |
| Moses: When Harriett Tubman Led Her People to Freedom | Carole Weatherford |
| My Hands Sing the Blues: Romare Bearden's Childhood Journey | Jeanne Walker Harvey |
| Passage to Freedom: the Sugihara Story | Ken Mochizuki |
| Pirates: Robbers of the High Seas | Gail Gibbons |
| Rosa's Bus: the Ride to Civil Rights | Jo Kittinger |
| The Secret World of Walter Anderson | Hester Bass |
| Sequoyah: The Cherokee Man Who Gave His People Writing | James Rumford |
| Side by Side | Monica Brown |
| Soar, Elinor! | Tammy Lewis Brown |
| A Splash of Red | Jen Bryant |
| Starry Messenger: a Book Depicting the Life of a Famous Scientist, Mathematician, Astronomer, Philosopher, Physicst: Galileo Galilei | Peter Sís |
| To Fly: the Story of the Wright Brothers | Wendie Old |
| We the Kids: the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States | David Catrow |
| When Marian Sang | Pam Muñoz Ryan |
| When Thunder Comes | J. Patrick Lewis |
| The Worst of Friends | Suzanne Jurmain |
7-10
| Action Jackson | Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan |
| And Then What Happened, Paul Revere? | Jean Fritz |
| Bad News for Outlaws: The Remarkable Life of Bass Reeves, Deputy U.S. Marshall | Vaunda Micheaux Nelson |
| Eleanor, Quiet No More | Doreen Rappaport |
| Electric Ben: the Amazing Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin | Robert Byrd |
| The Extraordinary Mark Twain (According to Susy) | Barbara Kerley |
| Flight: the Journey of Charles Lindbergh | Robert Burleigh |
| The Grand Mosque of Paris: a Story of How Muslims Rescued Jews During the Holocaust | Karen Ruelle and Deborah Desaix |
| Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad | Ann Petry |
| Harvesting Hope: the Story of Cesar Chavez | Kathleen Krull |
| The House Baba Built | Ed Young |
| Kate Shelley and the Midnight Express | Margaret Wetterer |
| Night Flight: Amelia Earhart Crosses the Atlantic | Robert Burleigh |
| The Poppy Lady: Molina Belle Michael and Her Tribute to Veterans | Barbara Elizabeth Walsh |
| Pyramid | David Macaulay |
| Sit-In: How Four Friends Stood Up by Sitting Down | Andrea Davis Pinckney |
| Snowflake Bentley | Jacqueline Briggs Martin |
| Teammates | Peter Golenbock |
| Walt Whitman: Words for America | Barbara Kerley |
| War Boy: A Country Childhood | Michael Foreman |
| What to Do About Alice?: How Alice Roosevelt Broke the Rules, Charmed the World, and Drove Her Father Teddy Crazy! | Barbara Kerley |
| William Shakespeare and the Globe | Aliki |
| Wilma Unlimited: How Wilma Rudolph Became the World's Fastest Woman | Kathleen Krull |
9-13
| 14 Cows for America | Carmen Agra Deedy |
| Amelia Lost: the Life and Disappearance of Amelia Earhart | Candace Fleming |
| Black Elk's Vision: a Lakota Story | S.D. Nelson |
| Bloody Times | James Swanson |
| Bodies from the Ice: Melting Glaciers and the Recovery of the Past | James Deem |
| Brooklyn Bridge | Lynn Curlee |
| Buffalo Hunt | Russell Freedman |
| Candy Bomber: the Story of the Berlin Airlift's "Chocolate Pilot" | Michael Tunnell |
| Carver: a Life in Poems | Marilyn Nelson |
| Castle | David Macaulay |
| Children of the Wild West | Russell Freedman |
| The Children We Remember | Chana Byers Ables |
| Chuck Close Up Close | Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan |
| Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice | Phillip Hoose |
| Drawing from Memory | Allen Say |
| The Duel: the Parallel Lives of Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr | Judith St. George |
| Eleanor Roosevelt: a Life of Discovery | Russell Freedman |
| The Fairy Ring: Or, Elsie and Frances Fool the World | Mary Losure |
| Fossil Feud: the Rivalry of the First American Dinosaur Hunters | Thom Holmes |
| Freedom Riders: John Lewis and Jim Zwerg on the Front Lines of the Civil Rights Movement | Ann Bausum |
| Freedom Walkers: the Story of the Montgomery Bus Boycott | Russell Freedman |
| Heart and Soul: the Story of America and African Americans | Kadir Nelson |
| The Great Molasses Flood | Deborah Kops |
| Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow | Susan Campbell Bartoletti |
| Horrible Histories | Terry Deary |
| In Defense of Liberty: the Story of America's Bill of Rights | Russell Freedman |
| It Jes' Happened: When Bill Traylor Started to Draw | Don Tate |
| The Journey That Saved Curious George: the Wartime Escape of Margret and H.A. Rey | Louise Borden |
| Kennedy Through the Lens | Martin Sandler |
| Kids at Work: Lewis Hine and the Crusade Against Child Labor | Russell Freedman |
| Lafayette and the American Revolution | Russell Freedman |
| Leonardo da Vinci | Diane Stanley |
| The Life and Death of Crazy Horse | Russell Freedman |
| Lincoln: a Photobiography | Russell Freedman |
| Lincoln Shot!: a President's Life Remembered | Barry Denenberg |
| Looking for Life in the Universe | Ellen Jackson |
| Lost Star: the Story of Amelia Earhart | Patricia Lauber |
| The Many Rides of Paul Revere | James Cross Giblin |
| Marching for Freedom: Walk Together, Children, and Don't You Grow Weary | Elizabeth Partidge |
| More About Boy | Roald Dahl |
| Noah Webster: Weaver of Words | Pegi Deitz Shea |
| Photo by Brady | Jennifer Armstrong |
| Red Bird Sings: the Story of Zitkala-Ša—Native-American Author, Musician, and Activist | Gina Capaldi and Q.L. Pearce |
| Small Worlds: Maps and Mapmaking | Karen Romano Young |
| Spies of Mississippi | Rick Bowers |
| Surviving Hitler: a Boy in the Nazi Death Camps | Andrea Warren |
| Sweethearts of Rhythm: the Story of the Greatest All-Girl Swing Band in the World | Marilyn Nelson |
| Terezin: Voices from the Holocaust | Ruth Thomson |
| Through My Eyes | Ruby Bridges |
| Titanic: Voices from the Disaster | Deborah Hopkinson |
| Vincent van Gogh | Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan |
| The Voice That Challenged a Nation: Marian Anderson and the Struggle for Equal Rights | Russell Freedman |
| The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain | Peter Sís |
| The War to End All Wars: World War I | Russell Freedman |
| We Are the Ship: the Story of Negro League Baseball | Kadir Nelson |
| We Were There, Too! Young People in U.S. History | Phillip Hoose |
| Wideness and Wonder: the Life and Art of Georgia O'Keefe | Susan Goldman Rubin |
| The Wright Brothers: How They Invented the Airplane | Russell Freedman |
| The Year of Goodbyes | Debbie Levy |
11-15
| An American Plague: the True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793 | Jim Murphy |
| Auschwitz: Voices from the Death Camp | James Deem |
| Birmingham Sunday | Larry Dane Brimner |
| Black & White: the Confrontation Between Reverend Fred L. Shuttlesworth and Eugene "Bull" Connor | Larry Dane Brimner |
| Black Potatoes: the Story of the Great Irish Famine 1845-1850 | Susan Campbell Bartoletti |
| Bomb: the Race to Build—and Steal—the World's Most Dangerous Weapon | Steve Sheinkin |
| Burma Chronicles | Guy Delisle |
| Charles and Emma | Deborah Heiligman |
| Chasing Lincoln's Killer | James Swanson |
| Children of the Dust Bowl: the True Story of the Children at Weedpatch Camp | Jerry Stanley |
| The Circuit | Francisco Jiménez |
| Clara Schumann: Piano Virtuoso | Susanna Reich |
| e e cummings: a Poet's Life | Catherine Reef |
| Extraordinary Explorers and Adventurers | Judy Alter |
| Facing the Lion: Growing Up Maasai on the African Savanna | Joseph Lemasolai Lekuton |
| Family of Man | Edward Steichen |
| The Forbidden Schoolhouse | Suzanne Jurmain |
| George Washington, Spymaster | Thomas Allen |
| Harriet Tubman, Secret Agent | Thomas Allen |
| If Stones Could Speak: Unlocking the Secrets of Stonehenge | Marc Aronson |
| Jane Austen: a Life Revealed | Catherine Reef |
| The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler | James Cross Giblin |
| The Longitude Prize | Joan Dash |
| March | John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell |
| Maus I & II | Art Spiegelman |
| Mister Lincoln's High-Tech War | Thomas B. Allen and Roger MacBride Allen |
| The Notorious Benedict Arnold: a True Story of Adventure, Heroism, and Treachery | Steve Sheinkin |
| Painting the Wild Frontier: the Art and Adventures of George Catlin | Susanna Reich |
| The Port Chicago 50 | Steve Sheinkin |
| The President Has Been Shot | James Swanson |
| Reconstruction and the Aftermath of the Civil War | Lisa Colozza Cocca |
| The Secret of the Yellow Death | Suzanne Jurmain |
| Secrets of a Civil War Submarine: Solving the Mysteries of the H.L. Hunley | Sally Walker |
| Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World: the Extraordinary True Story of Shackleton and the Endurance | Jennifer Armstrong |
| Sir Walter Raleigh and the Quest for El Dorado | Marc Aronson |
| Six Days in October: the Stock Market Crash of 1929 | Karen Blumenthal |
| They Called Themselves the KKK: the Birth of an American Terrorist Group | Susan Campbell Bartoletti |
| Truce: the Day Soldiers Stopped Fighting | Jim Murphy |
| Warriors Don't Cry | Melba Pattillo Beals |
| Written in Bone: Buried Lives of Jamestown and Colonial Maryland | Sally Walker |
14-17
| 1968 | Michael Kaufman |
| Anne Frank: the Diary of a Young Girl | Anne Frank |
| Assault in Norway | Thomas Gallagher |
| Bad Boy | Walter Dean Myers |
| The Day the World Exploded: the Earthshaking Catastrophe at Krakatoa | Simon Winchester |
| Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock | David Margolick |
| Flesh and Blood So Cheap: the Triangle Disaster and its Legacy | Albert Marrin |
| God Grew Tired of Us | John Bul Dau |
| Guest of Honor: Booker T. Washington, Theodore Roosevelt, and the White House Dinner That Shocked a Nation | Deborah Davis |
| Hole in my Life | Jack Gantos |
| The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks | Rebecca Skloot |
| In Cold Blood | Truman Capote |
| Into Thin Air | Jon Krakauer |
| Kaffir Boy | Mark Mathabane |
| Life in a Jar | Jack Mayer |
| Lipstick Jihad | Azadeh Moaveni |
| Malcolm X | Andrew Helfer and Randy DuBurke |
| Nelson Mandela | Umlanda Wezithombe/The Nelson Mandela Foundation |
| The Other Wes Moore | Wes Moore |
| Persepolis | Marjane Satrapi |
| The Photographer | Guibert Lefevre Lemercier |
| She Would Not Be Moved: How We Tell the Story of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott | Herbert Kohl |
| Stitches | David Small |
| Sugar Changed the World | Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos |
| With Courage and Cloth: Winning the Fight for a Woman's Right to Vote | Ann Bausum |
| The Words We Live By: Your Annotated Guide to the Constitution | Linda Monk |