Has social distancing left you running out of things to do? These books will be sure to help beat boredom for the whole family, especially now our days are getting shorter.

Picking up a book is the perfect way to stay entertained this fall while also social distancing. Below, we have listed several of our favorite books to help make the search for a good read easier. From health and wellness books to self-help to political conspiracy, there’s something for everyone.

A Mother’s Grace: Healing the World One Woman at a Time
By Michelle Moore

When a child is born, so is a mother, as she sets off on the most profound, rewarding journey one can take. Mothers sacrifice, nurture, heal, teach and guide their children. And, at each stage, they must learn to let go. Michelle Moore’s “A Mother’s Grace” features 12 amazing women who learned this lesson the cruelest way after a profound loss of life, home, health, or livelihood brought them to their knees. Though they experienced unimaginable tragedy, each of them turned their suffering and grief into something positive to help others. 

The Ultimate College Student Health Handbook: Your Guide for Everything from Hangovers to Homesickness
By Jill Grimes

The COVID-19 pandemic has focused our attention on health like never before. As millions of students begin their college careers, and begin to take responsibility for their own health, they will be dealing with the added challenges of issues like homesickness, close quarters of dormitories, test anxiety and even hangovers, in addition to illness and injuries. As a university campus physician and mother of two collegiate students, Jill Grimes began writing helpful tips and creating first aid kits for common college ailments, which steadily evolved into this must-buy handbook.

Don’t F*** This Up!: How to Get What You Want out of Life
By Fred Stuvek

Has the new normal just f***ed up the future for young adults? Thanks to a pandemic, they’re entering adulthood, their college career, or the workforce during record unemployment, a terrifying economy, and social guidelines that have all but eliminated life as we knew it. And what about the millions of newly unemployed workers in America? As they look for a fresh start, how will they overcome the challenges of an economy decimated by COVID-19? If having a strategy for the future was important before, now it’s critical, says Fred Stuvek. The choices new grads, young adults, or the newly unemployed make and the practices they adopt right now are going to shape not only their career, but every other aspect of their life as well.

The Journalist: Life and Loss in America’s Secret War
By Lucy Rose Fischer and Jerry A. Rose 

This true story by Lucy Rose Fischer and Jerry A. Rose captures the exciting and perilous life of a young journalist in Vietnam. In the early 1960s, Rose interviews Vietnamese villagers in a countryside riddled by a war of terror and embeds himself with soldiers on the ground—the start of a dramatic and dangerous career. Through his stories and photographs, he exposes the secret beginnings of America’s involvement in the Vietnam War at a time when most Americans have not yet even heard of Vietnam.

The Secret Language of Cells: What Biological Conversations Tell Us About the Brain-Body Connection,
the Future of Medicine, and Life Itself
By Jon Lieff

While cells are commonly considered the building block of living things, it is actually the communication between cells that brings us to life, controlling our bodies and brains, determining whether we are healthy or sick, and directly influencing how we think, feel and behave. In his intriguing book, doctor and neuroscientist Jon Lieff lets us listen in on these conversations, and reveals their significance for everything from mental health to cancer. Lieff explains the surprising science of how very different cells—bacteria and brain cells, blood cells and viruses—all speak the same language. This overarching principle has been long overlooked because scientific journals use impenetrable jargon that makes it hard to be understood across disciplines, much less by the general public.

Greedy Bastards: One City’s Texas-Size Struggle to Avoid a Financial Crisis
By Sheryl Sculley

When Sheryl Sculley was recruited to serve as San Antonio’s city manager in 2005, the organization she inherited was a disorganized mess. City infrastructure was crumbling, strong financial policies and systems were nonexistent, many executive positions were vacant, public satisfaction was low, ethical standards were weak, and public safety union salaries and benefits were outpacing revenues, crowding out other essential city services. Simply put: San Antonio was on the verge of collapse. “Greedy Bastards” tells the story of Sculley and her new team’s uphill battle to turn around city government. She takes you behind closed doors to share the hard changes she made and the strategies she used to create mutually beneficial solutions to the city’s biggest problems.

Make Your Own Damn Cheese: Understanding, Navigating, and Mastering the 3 Mazes of Success
By John Chuback M.D.

“Make Your Own Damn Cheese” is a deceptively powerful work of nonfiction, cloaked in the disguise of a charming and easy-to-read fable about a young mouse named Earl who wanders ceaselessly about the maze into which he was born. He yearns for a better life, filled with freedom and happiness, and desires more than the maze has to offer―a life where the cheese is plentiful and never out of reach. He believes he needs to get out of the maze, but how? John Chubak shows Earl how.

Prospects of a Woman: A Novel by Wendy Voorsanger

“Prospects of a Woman” is a fresh, authentic retelling of the West in which author Wendy Voorsanger explores women’s contributions in California and shatters the stereotypes of the typical hard-boiled novel of the West that has captured the American imagination for over a century. Elisabeth Parker comes to California from Massachusetts in 1849 with her new husband, Nate, to reunite with her father, who’s struck gold on the American River. She soon realizes her husband is not the man she thought—and neither is her father, who abandons them shortly after they arrive. As Nate struggles with his sexuality, Elisabeth is forced to confront her preconceived notions of family, love, and opportunity. 

Provisions for Abundance: A Christian’s Guide to Money Management, Gratitude, and Giving Back
By Ryan Mack

These issues may seem insurmountable, but African American author and financial planner Ryan Mack, also known as the “Financial Evangelist,” says that the principals of the Word, the will of God, can protect us all in the midst of a recession. In his new devotional guidebook, Mack empowers each one of us to be part of the solution by offering advice on managing God’s resources responsibly, setting realistic financial goals, fulfilling our unique purpose, and giving back to our communities.

Just the Truth
By Gen LaGreca

100 years after women were granted the right to vote and in the era of “fake news,” “Just the Truth” is a relevant political thriller from Gen LaGreca about Laura Taninger, a newswoman with unwavering integrity fighting against the overpowering institutional and economic pressures compromising journalism, as she uncovers suspicious circumstances that just might manipulate an upcoming election.

Cover photo courtesy Alex Geerts on Unsplash

Madison Trousdale is from Fredericksburg, TX and is a senior at Texas A&M University, studying ag communications and journalism.