My Bookshelf
Books that inspire, inform and shape how I see the world.
Everything from behavioural psychology & economics, to memoirs, fiction and more.
My Bookshelf
Stories have always been part of who I am. As a kid, I devoured books so intensely and close to my face, my parents thought I needed glasses. Nope, I just wanted to be closer to the story.
That love of reading has never left me. My bookshelf is a curated collection of the books that have changed how I think, feel, and move through the world. It’s always growing, just like me.
Stay tuned. I plan to update it often. Because books ARE magic.
Also, feel free to send me book recommendations via the"You Gotta Read This" Button.
*Because I believe in supporting local, all books are linked to my favourite indie book shop, Flying Books, lovingly owned by my brilliant friend, Martha Sharp.
What I'm Currently Reading...
A Little Life, by Hanya Yanahihara has been sitting on my bookshelf for almost FIVE years. Everyone has told me how amazing this book is and that I HAVE to read it. BUT, everyone has also told me it will emotionally destroy me, so I kept putting off picking it up.
Well friends, I am finally ready to dig in. This one might take me a bit longer to finish, but I have stocked up on tissues, so here goes! This is the synopsis:
A Little Life follows four college classmates—broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition—as they move to New York in search of fame and fortune. While their relationships, which are tinged by addiction, success, and pride, deepen over the decades, the men are held together by their devotion to the brilliant, enigmatic Jude, a man scarred by an unspeakable childhood trauma. A hymn to brotherly bonds and a masterful depiction of love in the twenty-first century, Hanya Yanagihara’s stunning novel is about the families we are born into, and those that we make for ourselves.
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Behavioural Psychology, Economics & Strategy
Everyone needs to read this book—now. May Contain Lies unpacks how misinformation thrives and how our own biases, especially confirmation bias, make us more susceptible to it. Just because we want something to be true doesn’t make it so.
Big takeaway: Data is not evidence. Evidence helps you distinguish between competing ideas—data alone doesn’t. Even studies backed by solid data can mislead. Correlation is not causation.
This book is eye-opening, timely, and absolutely essential. I devoured it.
This was such a great read, full of powerful stories about perseverance and what's possible when the right support is in place. There are so many useful case studies and insights into how we can build the kind of motivational "scaffolding" that helps people achieve big goals. Every manager, teacher, coach, and parent should read this.
This is one of the most important books I’ve read in a long time. It digs into why we can’t pay attention anymore, and it’s not just our phones. Hari looks at everything from tech and education to sleep and stress, showing how our entire environment is wired for distraction.
He also looks into our desire for "quick fixes" and what that means for our ability to process complex information and how that has potentially let us to the current political state.
This is MANDATORY reading for any woman in management AND anyone who manages women in management, or anyone who struggles to rise. So many nuggets of gold, including why we need to do strategic self-promotion, and tips to do it, so you don't sacrifice warmth for assertiveness or vice versa. It's full of fantastic research paired with great storytelling and a side of humour. ​​
There's a reason James Clear’s Atomic Habits has been a bestseller every year since it was released in 2018. It's simple, science-backed, and calls for tiny changes stacked on to daily activities you're already doing. Want to remember to take your Vitamins? Put them beside your toothbrush. The book super easy to digest, and actually apply. I bet you read it more than once, I have .
When it comes to AI, Wharton professor, Ethan Mollick is who you want to listen to. Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI is the perfect book to understand how to use AI as a tool, what it can do, what it can't do (so far) and where it's going. He's a great storyteller too, so this one is very easy to digest.
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Loved this one! It's packed with case studies from brands like Airbnb and Dropbox, and breaks down the growth mindset and testing frameworks that fuel success. It’s tactical, insightful, and written for marketers, product teams, and founders. It really showcases how looking at the systems and nuances can change the game. Cannot recommend it enough. I learned a lot !
Memoirs & Non-Fiction
Michelle Zauner’s Crying in H Mart is a dual love letter to her mother and to Korean food. It’s one of the most beautiful, intimate, and engaging memoirs I’ve ever read. It will break your heart and make you hungry, often at the same time.
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Her writing is raw and vivid, filled with memory, grief, identity, and the meals that hold it all together. I couldn’t put it down. Note: You will shed tears.
Suleika Jaouad’s Between Two Kingdoms is an emotional roller coaster, in the best way. It’s a raw, honest look at what it means to survive, and then figure out how to live. Her writing is sharp and intimate, and the way she explores how illness can both strengthen and strain relationships hit hard.
Her cross-country road trip in search of connection and healing is one of the most powerful things I’ve ever read. I was gutted, inspired, and completely hooked.
This is the true story of Stéphane Bréitwieser, the world’s most prolific art thief. He pulled off more than 200 museum heists in broad daylight and stole over $2 billion worth of art—not to sell, but because he couldn’t resist the need to possess beauty.
It’s WILD. Read it and then reach out!
Also, check out my interview with author Michal Finkle!
This is one of those books that stays with you long after you finish it. Tara Westover was raised in a strict, isolated survivalist household with no formal education. Her journey from that world to earning a PhD is jaw-dropping.
Educated is about survival, self-invention, and the cost of breaking away from everything you’ve ever known. Her sense of self and determination still blows me away.
There aren’t many books I’d recommend listening to over reading, but this is one of them.
Trevor Noah is a master storyteller, and hearing him bring his childhood in apartheid South Africa to life is unforgettable. It’s hilarious, heartbreaking, and full of heart.​
Just Kids by Patti Smith is pure magic. It’s her love letter to art, music, New York City, and her bond with Robert Mapplethorpe. The way she captures their hunger, creativity, and devotion to each other is both gritty and poetic.
It’s a coming-of-age story, an artist’s origin story, and a time capsule of a wild, beautiful era. I didn’t want it to end
Fiction
The Kite Runner will forever be one of my favourite books. I devoured it, along with his other novels, A Thousand Splendid Suns and And the Mountains Echoed. Khaled Hosseini just has a way of breaking your heart and putting it back together.
Set against the backdrop of a changing Afghanistan, this is a powerful story of friendship, betrayal, and redemption. It explores the complicated bond between fathers and sons, and the weight of guilt we carry when we fail the people we love.
It’s beautifully written, deeply human, and impossible to forget.
If An Egyptian Cannot Speak English is like nothing I’ve read before—and I loved it. It captures that in-between space so many first-generation kids know, where you don’t fully belong to the land of your birth or your parents’ homeland. You’re always straddling both, but never fully grounded in either.
But this book is about so much more. It dives into class, addiction, power, the fallout of the Arab Spring, and the complexity of love. Noor Naga’s writing is sharp, haunting, and deeply original. I’m still thinking about it.
This is easily one of the most fun books I’ve read in years. I went in knowing nothing, and by the end of the first chapter I was hooked. I had no idea where the story was going to take me, but I was all in.
I won’t spoil the plot, because I want you to laugh at the hilarious twists and turns. But one of my favourite lines was: “Who knew gluten-free Mac’n’ Cheese could bring a terrorist so much happiness?”
And check out my interview ​with author Zarqa Nawaz (creator of Little Mosque on the Prairie).
Fierce. Feminist. Funny are perfect descriptors for this book, I would also add highly creative. It's set in 1950s America, and drops us into a world where thousands of women suddenly transform into dragons, challenging everything about a woman's place in society.
Kelly Barnhill tackles rage, memory, and the quiet ways women are told to stay small. This story is about what happens when they stop listening and finally take up the space they deserve. I loved every minute of it.
The Nightingale is the book that made me realize I actually love historical fiction—especially when it’s as beautifully written and well-researched as Kristin Hannah’s. Set in Nazi-occupied France, it follows two very different sisters as they each navigate the horrors of war in their own way.
This is a story about courage, sacrifice, and the strength of women during one of the darkest periods in history. The writing is powerful, the characters unforgettable, and I’ll just say this, read the the last ten pages in private, the tears, oh they will flow.
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This is a perfect little book about the small things and not necessarily getting what you want in life, but getting what you need. Toshikazu Kawaguchi has such a beautiful grasp of softness and subtly, and pairs it with a touch of magic. Before The Coffee Gets Cold interweaves four heartwarming stories in tiny café in a Tokyo back alley, where time travel is possible, but you have to come back before the coffee gets cold.
This one gave me all the feels, and is the perfect read for when you're feeling overwhelmed.
My TBR List (To Be Read)
Behavioural Economics & Strategy
Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
Think Again by Adam Grant
Radical Candor by Kim Scott
Facilitating With Ease by Ingrid Bens
Memoirs & Non-Fiction
Carless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams
The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates
Easy Beauty by Chloé Cooper Jones
Fiction
James by Percival Everett
Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler
I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman
Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri
Washes, Prays by Noor Naga
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