15 books Malcolm Gladwell thinks everyone should read

malcolm gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell isn't shy about sharing his enthusiasm for what he reads.

A 2015 New York Times article poked fun at how often he blurbs books and recommends them on social media.

The bestselling author has published multiple books and articles exploring human behavior from all angles; he also recently launched a hit podcast.

We dug through years of his tweets, book blurbs, and interviews to find some of the works that have made the greatest impact on him.

'Irresistible' by Adam Alter

"One of my favorite books of the year," Gladwell tweeted when this book launched in 2017. Alter, a psychologist at New York University, explores the myriad ways in which digital technology and social media are destroying our brains.

Gladwell gushed in his review of the book: "As if to prove his point, Adam Alter has written a truly addictive book about the rise of addiction."

Buy it here »

'A Thousand Pardons' by Jonathan Dee

In July 2013, Gladwell tweet-declared this book his favorite of the summer. It's a novel about a family living in a New York City suburb, the father plagued by depression and driven to scandal, and the mother left to find a new job in the city.

It's an example of "powerful and moving accounts of ordinary people coming to make difficult moral choices," Gladwell told the Globe and Mail later that year.

Buy it here »

'The Paris Architect' by Charles Belfoure

"The Paris Architect" is a work of historical fiction: It's the 1940s, and a Parisian architect is trying to find a hiding place for a Jewish man in exchange for money.

Gladwell told the Guardian it was his favorite book of 2013, and he picked it up "entirely randomly, in an airport bookstore."

Gladwell went on: "It is a beautiful and elegant account of an ordinary man's unexpected and reluctant descent into heroism during the second world war. I have no idea who Belfoure is" — he's an American author and architect living in Maryland — "but he needs to write another book, now!"