Bill Gates recommends 5 books for summer reading

"I loved all of them and hope you’ll find something you enjoy too."

Microsoft co-founder and a visionary, Bill Gates who keeps inspiring the world through his motivational words has listed his recommendations for the summer. Ranging from climate change to gender equity and the hard truth that life never goes the way young people think it will, the diverse reads may leave you enriched both intellectually and spiritually.

The Power, by Naomi Alderman

Bill writes he was recommended the book by his older daughter and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. “Reading The Power, I gained a stronger and more visceral sense of the abuse and injustice many women experience today. And I expanded my appreciation for the people who work on these issues in the U.S. and around the world,” Gates wrote. 

 The Power proposes a single idea—what if all the women in the world suddenly gained the power to produce deadly electric shocks from their bodies? Naomi Alderman, a Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year and Granta Best of British writer, not just explores the idea of how the world would change if power was in the hands of women but also exposes, with breath-taking daring, our contemporary world.

Why We’re Polarized, by Ezra Klein

Expressing concerns over rising polarization in America, especially when in comes to politics, Bill suggests this insightful book argues the cause of this split is identity—"the human instinct to let our group identities guide our decision making." 

It is a 2020 non-fiction book in which the author analyzes political polarization in the United States. In this New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, the author claims that America’s political system isn’t broken. The truth is scarier: it’s working exactly as designed.

The Lincoln Highway, by Amor Towles 

Set in the 1950s the author narrates the story of eighteen-year-old Emmett Watson is driven home to Nebraska by the warden of the work farm where he has just served a year for involuntary manslaughter. After his parents' death Emmett’s intention is to pick up his eight-year-old brother and head west where they can start their lives anew. But en route Emmett discovers that two friends from the work farm have hidden themselves in the trunk and have hatched an altogether different plan for Emmett’s future. 

Bill suggests, “Towles takes inspiration from famous hero’s journeys and seems to be saying that our personal journeys are never as linear or predictable as we might hope.”

The Ministry for the Future, by Kim Stanley Robinson

“When I was promoting my book on climate change last year, a number of people told me I should read this novel, because it dramatized many of the issues I had written about. I’m glad I picked it up, because it’s terrific,” Bill writes.  

Set in the year 2025 Kim envisions climate change like no one has ever imagined. Told entirely through fictional eye-witness accounts, The Ministry For The Future is a masterpiece of the imagination, the story of how climate change will affect us all over the decades to come.

How the World Really Works, by Vaclav Smil. 

Bill endorses the book by stating, “if you want a brief but thorough education in numeric thinking about many of the fundamental forces that shape human life, this is the book to read. It’s a tour de force.” Compelling, data-rich and revisionist, this wonderfully broad, interdisciplinary masterpiece finds faults with both extremes. Looking at the world through this quantitative lens reveals hidden truths that change the way we see our past, present and uncertain future.