The Five Books Bill Gates Recommended for 2020

Source: Forbes

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The Five Books Bill Gates Recommended

As usual, Bill Gates shared his annual holiday list of top 5 books on his website GatesNotes, to read in 2020. These are the books Bill gates read throughout the year and for him, it has become a tradition to share his favorite books.

Gates wrote; “In tough times—and there’s no doubt that 2020 qualifies as tough times—those of us who love to read turn to all kinds of different books”. He further wrote, “As a result, I read a wide range of books and a lot of excellent ones.”

Now, let’s explore this amazing list of 5 books Bill Gates recommends.

1. The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness

This book was written by Michelle Alexander in 2010. The author of this book is a civil rights litigator and legal scholar who magnificently discussed race-related issues of African Americans. He shed light on the discrimination faced specifically by African Americans. As Gates said

“Alexander’s book offers an eye-opening look into how the criminal justice system unfairly targets communities of color and especially Black communities.”

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2. Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

The second book from Bill Gates list 2020, Range: why generalists triumph in a specialized world is written by David Epstein in 2019.

He made an argument on unwarranted early specification. David explained the common traits among the world’s most successful people for which he considered people from every field athletes, musicians, scientists, and others. The author observes that most successful people have the same variety of interests.

What Bill Gates said about this book is: “If you’re a generalist who has ever felt overshadowed by your specialist colleagues, this book is for you”

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3. The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance during the Blitz

Through this book the writer, Erik Larson is telling the story of Blitz and Winston Churchill from the year 1940 to 1941.

While introducing this book, Bill Gates writes “Larson gives the reader a ‘you are there’ sense of the intensity of Churchill’s work with his team on life-and-death challenges—and solving them at a pace I found to be mind-blowing.”

He further praises “Its scope is too narrow to be the only book you ever read on World War II, but it’s a great addition to the literature focused on that tragic period”

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4. The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War

The amazing nonfiction book describes another true story of the political crisis that was written by Ben Macintyre and published in 2018.

This book was included in Bill Gates recommended as Gates think of reading something lighter at the end of the day.

“The Spy and the Traitor” is a true tale of a KGB officer, Oleg Gordievsky who worked as a double agent for the British during the cold war. Macintyre wrote this book as a suspenseful spy novel as he followed almost the entire journey of Gordievsky.

Bill Gates writes “Macintyre, who has a keen eye for detail, does a great job narrating the escape scene and every bit as exciting as my favorite spy novels”

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5. Breath from Salt: A Deadly Genetic Disease, a New Era in Science, and the Patients and Families Who Changed Medicine

Let’s introduce this book by Bill Gates, he wrote

Bijal P. Trivedi wrote, “A book about the genetic disease cystic fibrosis, is truly uplifting”. He adds “I suspect we’ll see many more books like this in the coming years, as biomedical miracles emerge from labs at an ever-greater pace”

The book Breath from salt told us about remarkable scientific innovation which dramatically improved the lives of Cystic fibrosis patients.