Peter Attia portrait

Peter Attia's Top Book Recommendations

Founder/Attia Medical

Want to know what books Peter Attia recommends? We've researched interviews, social media posts, podcasts, and articles to build a comprehensive list of Peter Attia's favorite book recommendations of all time. At Shortform, we know books. Our book guides are the best in the world. Learn why.

The Talent Code: Greatness Isn't Born. It's Grown. Here's How. book cover1

The Talent Code: Greatness Isn't Born. It's Grown. Here's How.

Daniel Coyle

4.3
What is the secret of talent? How do we unlock it? In this groundbreaking work, journalist and New York Times bestselling author Daniel Coyle provides parents, teachers, coaches, businesspeople—and everyone else—with tools they can use to maximize potential in themselves and others.

Whether you're coaching soccer or teaching a child to play the piano, writing a novel or trying to improve your golf
"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!": Adventures of a Curious Character book cover2

"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!": Adventures of a Curious Character

Richard P. Feynman

4.4
A series of anecdotes, such as are included in Surely You're Joking, Mr Feynman, shouldn't by rights add up to an autobiography, but that's just one of the many pieces of received wisdom that Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman (1918-88) cheerfully ignores in this engagingly eccentric book. Fiercely independent (read the chapter entitled "Judging Books by Their Covers"), intolerant of st
Bottle of Lies: The Inside Story of the Generic Drug Boom book cover3

Bottle of Lies: The Inside Story of the Generic Drug Boom

Katherine Eban

4.6
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2019


New York Public Library Best Books of 2019


Kirkus Reviews Best Health and Science Books of 2019


Science Friday Best Books of 2019


New postscript by the author

From an award-winning journalist, an explosive narrative investigation of the generic drug boom that reveals fraud and life-threatening dangers on a global scale—The Jungle fo
10% Happier: How I Tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge, and Found Self-Help That Actually Works book cover4

10% Happier: How I Tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge, and Found Self-Help That Actually Works

Dan Harris

4.2
Nightline anchor Dan Harris embarks on an unexpected, hilarious, and deeply skeptical odyssey through the strange worlds of spirituality and self-help, and discovers a way to get happier that is truly achievable.

After having a nationally televised panic attack on Good Morning America, Dan Harris knew he had to make some changes. A lifelong nonbeliever, he found himself on a bizarre adventure, invo
The Presidents Club: Inside the World's Most Exclusive Fraternity book cover5

The Presidents Club: Inside the World's Most Exclusive Fraternity

Nancy Gibbs, Michael Duffy

4.4
The Presidents Club, established at Dwight Eisenhower's inauguration by Harry Truman and Herbert Hoover, is a complicated place: its members are bound forever by the experience of the Oval Office and yet are eternal rivals for history's favor. Among their secrets: How Jack Kennedy tried to blame Ike for the Bay of Pigs. How Ike quietly helped Reagan win his first race in 1966. How Richard Nixon co
6

Dancing Naked in the Mind Field

Kary Mullis

4.2
In a book that challenges readers to question the authority of scientific dogma even as it reveals the workings of an uncannily original scientific mind, Mullis, the world's most eccentric and outspoken Nobel Prize-winning scientist, relates his outrageous ideas and extraordinary adventures.
King of Hearts: The True Story of the Maverick Who Pioneered Open Heart Surgery book cover7

King of Hearts: The True Story of the Maverick Who Pioneered Open Heart Surgery

G. Wayne Miller

4.5
Few of the great stories of medicine are as palpably dramatic as the invention of open-heart surgery, yet, until now, no journalist has ever brought all of the thrilling specifics of this triumph to life.

This is the story of the surgeon many call the father of open-heart surgery, Dr. C. Walton Lillehei, who, along with colleagues at University Hospital in Minneapolis and a small band of pioneers e
8

The Puzzle People: Memoirs Of A Transplant Surgeon

Thomas Starzl

4.3
Given the tensions and demands of medicine, highly successful physicians and surgeons rarely achieve equal success as prose writers. It is truly extraordinary that a major, international pioneer in the controversial field of transplant surgery should have written a spellbinding, and heart-wrenching, autobiography.

Thomas Starzl grew up in LeMars, Iowa, the son of a newspaper publisher and a nurse.
One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer book cover9

One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer

Nathaniel Fick

4.4
A former captain in the Marines’ First Recon Battalion, who fought in Afghanistan and Iraq, reveals how the Corps trains its elite and offers a point-blank account of twenty-first-century battle.

If the Marines are “the few, the proud,” Recon Marines are the fewest and the proudest. Only one Marine in a hundred qualifies for Recon, charged with working clandestinely, often behind enemy lines. Fick’
The Double Helix book cover10

The Double Helix

James Watson

4.2
By identifying the structure of DNA, the molecule of life, Francis Crick and James Watson revolutionized biochemistry & won themselves a Nobel Prize. At the time, Watson was only 24, a young scientist hungry to make his mark. His uncompromisingly honest account of the heady days of their thrilling sprint against other world-class researchers to solve one of science's greatest mysteries gives a daz
The Psychedelic Explorer's Guide: Safe, Therapeutic, and Sacred Journeys book cover11

The Psychedelic Explorer's Guide: Safe, Therapeutic, and Sacred Journeys

James Fadiman

4.4
Psychedelics for spiritual, therapeutic, and problem-solving use

- Presents practices for safe and successful psychedelic voyages, including the benefits of having a guide and how to be a guide
- Reviews the value of psychedelics for healing and self-discovery as well as how LSD has facilitated scientific and technical problem-solving
- Reveals how ultra-low doses improve cognitive functioning,
12

Forgive and Remember: Managing Medical Failure

Charles L. L. Bosk

4.2
On its initial publication, Forgive and Remember emerged as the definitive study of the training and lives of young surgeons. Now with an extensive new preface, epilogue, and appendix by the author, reflecting on the changes that have taken place since the book's original publication, this updated second edition of Charles L. Bosk's classic study is as timely as ever.
Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error book cover13

Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error

Kathryn Schulz

4.2
In the tradition of The Wisdom of Crowds and Predictably Irrational comes Being Wrong, an illuminating exploration of what it means to be in error and why homo sapiens tend to tacitly assume (or loudly insist) that they are right about almost everything. Kathryn Schulz, editor of Grist magazine, argues that error is the fundamental human condition and should be celebrated as such. Guiding the read
Jonathan Livingston Seagull book cover14

Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Richard Bach, Russell Munson

4.3
This is a story for people who follow their hearts and make their own rules...people who get special pleasure out of doing something well, even if only for themselves...people who know there's more to this living than meets the eye: they’ll be right there with Jonathan, flying higher and faster than ever they dreamed.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull is no ordinary bird. He believes it is every gull's r
Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader book cover15

Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader

Brent Schlender

4.4
#1 New York Times Bestseller There have been many books—on a large and small scale—about Steve Jobs, one of the most famous CEOs in history. But this book is different from all the others.

Becoming Steve Jobs takes on and breaks down the existing myth and stereotypes about Steve Jobs. The conventional, one-dimensional view of Jobs is that he was half-genius, half-jerk from youth, an irascible and s
Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts book cover16

Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts

Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson

4.2
Why do people dodge responsibility when things fall apart? Why the parade of public figures unable to own up when they screw up? Why the endless marital quarrels over who is right? Why can we see hypocrisy in others but not in ourselves? Are we all liars? Or do we really believe the stories we tell?

Renowned social psychologists Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson take a compelling look into how the b