Gates' last pick explores how energy — from donkey-powered mills to renewable power sources — has shaped societies throughout history.
Gates has read nearly all of Smil's 37 books, including his latest one, which makes the case that energy consumption and economic growth are undeniably linked.
"Yes, our history has a lot to do with kings and queens and games of thrones," Gates wrote. "Smil shows that it has even more to do with energy innovation."
Nguyen’s Pulitzer-winning, historical fiction novel is about a Vietnamese double agent who spies on a refugee community in Los Angeles on behalf of the North Vietnamese government.
The book offers insight into what it was like to be caught between two sides of the Vietnam War, according to Gates.
"Nguyen doesn’t shy away from how traumatic the Vietnam War was for everyone involved. Nor does he pass judgment about where his narrator’s loyalties should lie. Most war stories are clear about which side you should root for – 'The Sympathizer' doesn’t let the reader off the hook so easily," he wrote.
In this memoir, Izzard writes about how he worked through his childhood struggles, learned new skills, and became a world-renowned comedian, actor, writer, runner, and activist.
Gates said he connected with Izzard even though it would appear they have nothing in common. But that might be the very point the author is trying to communicate, Gates noted.
"I’ve recently discovered that I have a lot in common with a funny, dyslexic, transgender actor, comedian, escape artist, unicyclist, ultra-marathoner, and pilot from Great Britain. Except all of the above," Gates wrote. "We’re all cut from the same cloth. In his words, 'We are all totally different, but we are all exactly the same.'"
Gates called this book a "searing portrait of American poverty."
Desmond, a sociologist at Princeton University, spent 18 months living in two high-poverty neighborhoods in Milwaukee, Wisconsin — one mostly white, the other mostly black — and documented the lives of residents, including landlords and renters.
Gates said it was easy to empathize with the subjects, since Desmond helps you understand why they make their choices. He won a MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant and a Pulitzer for "Evicted."
"When you’re paying so much to keep a roof over your head, there’s no room for bad luck. A single bad incident can send you reeling," Gates wrote.
This autobiographic graphic novel follows the daughter of Vietnamese refugees who came to the United States after the fall of Saigon in 1975.
She learns a heartbreaking truth about the sacrifices her parents made for her and her siblings, as well as the turmoil created by French and American occupation in Vietnam.
"I thought she did a great job capturing how daunting it feels to be responsible for your family," Gates wrote. "At the same time, her family’s experience is different from most (and certainly mine). It’s clear that a lot of the dysfunction surrounding her childhood is a direct result of what happened in Vietnam."
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