Today, we will check out some of the best Tom Hanks book recommendations.
Tom Hanks is an actor, who is known for movies such as Forrest Gump, Saving Private Ryan, Sully, Cast Away, and Toy Story. He has won many awards including 7 Emmy Awards and a Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Although not very well known, Tom Hanks is quite the reader. He once said, “That guy under the clock, reading some book? That’s me, and it should be you, too.”
He also said, “I stack up the books, three columns, six or eight books at a time, and just wear that pile down. And, when someone tells me they finally read a book they could never crack, I take a whack out of a sense of a challenge. That’s how I finally read Moby Dick, the book everyone pretends to know.”
Tom Hanks really seems to be into books about history or set in certain historical times.
List of Tom Hanks Book Recommendations
Here is the full list of the best Tom Hanks book recommendations:
- Bossypants by Tina Fey
- The Martian by Andy Weir
- My Name Is Asher Lev by Chaim Potok
- Stoner by John Williams
- Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari
- Lenin’s Tomb by David Remnick
Bossypants by Tina Fey
Bossypants is an autobiography written by Tina Fey. She published this book in 2011, and it is 275 pages long.
Tom Hanks is a big fan of Tina Fey and her work, so it’s no surprise he recommended her book, saying, “If you haven’t read Tina Fey’s Bossypants, you will, and whatever you are drinking will come out of your nose due to laughter.”
We all love Tina Fey for her hilarious time on Saturday Night Live, 30 Rock, and the countless other movies that have made us laugh until we cry. This is her just-as-funny autobiography written in the form of essays.
When Tina Fey was a little girl, she said she had dreamed of two things. One was being chased through the airport by her gym teacher, and the other was to be a comedian. Lucky for Tina, both of these came true.
In her autobiography, Tina Fey goes all the way back to her childhood, the early days, and all the steps that she took to get to where her career is today.
In her hilarious book, we learn all about her original passion for beauty, why she sometimes eats off the floor, all her crazy romances, and her wild honeymoon.
Just like Tom Hanks said, this book is sure to make you laugh from beginning to end.
The Martian by Andy Weir
The Martian is a science fiction book written by Andy Weir. This book was published in 2011, and is around 387 pages long. This book became a popular movie in 2015 starring Matt Damon.
In his short and sweet book recommendation, Tom Hanks said, “Andy Weir’s masterpiece! Jealous of Matt Damon! First in line for the movie? Me!” He doesn’t sound jealous at all.
The Martian follows Mark Watney on his journey on Mars. He is the very first person to ever walk on the planet. Sadly, he is quite sure he will also be the first to die on Mars.
During a huge dust storm that forces him and his crew to evacuate, he is separated from them. His crew leaves him behind because they think he has died and they are unable to reach or find him.
Now he is all alone on the red planet. He has no way to communicate with Earth, and has limited supplies. He doesn’t think he will survive for very long. Not to mention the hostile environment that is trying to kill him before he starves to death.
Luckily, Mark has a strong will, high intelligence, and refuses to go down easy. Will he be able to survive on a planet not yet meant for humans?
Fun fact: Before Andy Weir became successful with The Martian, he was a software engineer.
My Name Is Asher Lev by Chaim Potok
My Name Is Asher Lev was written by Chaim Potok. This book was published in 1972, and it is 372 pages long.
Once, in an interview, Tom Hanks was asked who his favorite author is. He said, “Chaim Potok, the man who wrote My Name is Asher Lev. I’ve read almost everything that he wrote.”
If you didn’t already guess, the book follows Asher Lev, a Jewish artistic loner, in Brooklyn, New York. Although he is a gifted artist, many people, including his own family, seem to have a problem with his art.
Asher Lev himself is conflicted between his own art and his devotion to God. And his art just seems to further the rift between him and God. He begins to think what everyone tells him is true – that his art is a waste of time.
Throughout the novel, his art creates conflict between him, his family, and their religion. Asher knows this rift is getting wider and wider, yet continues to pursue art. Will he ever be able to make his art and religion work together?
Stoner by John Williams
Stoner by John Williams was published in 1965. The book is 278 pages long.
Even though the book doesn’t sound so exciting, Tom Hanks said, “It’s simply a novel about a guy who goes to college and becomes a teacher. One of the most fascinating things that you’ve ever come across.”
Stoner follows William Stoner, the son of a poor Missouri farmer. In order to help his family and their future, he goes to a state university to study soil and farming.
While at the university, he falls in love with English literature, and decides to become a scholar. The book follows his entire life after making the fateful decision.
Though, just because he went from a poor farmer to a scholar doesn’t mean that his problems have disappeared.
The person he decides to marry makes his parents angry, so they shun him from the family. His career isn’t exactly going well. Eventually, his wife and daughter start to distance themselves from him, and because of this, he finds a new love that may bring on a huge scandal.
Life gets to be too much for John Williams, and he decides to embrace stoicism, silence, and solitude.
Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari
Sapiens was written by Yuval Noah Harari, published in 2015, and is 464 pages long.
Tom Hanks recommended Sapiens in an interview, when he said, “Sapiens is about humans. As in, all of us, each and every person who every stood erect on this spinning globe.”
Yuval Noah Harari’s book, Sapiens, provides a comprehensive account of the entire history of humanity, spanning from the Stone Age to the present day.
Harari identifies four distinct periods of human evolution and highlights the technological revolutions that propelled us from one era to the next.
Initially, six different human species inhabited the Earth. However, how did we ultimately arrive at having just one species, the modern Homo Sapien? Modern science gives us a better glimpse at what happened.
Embark on a journey spanning 100,000 years, as we trace the path of human evolution and uncover the forces that led to our current state.
Additionally, explore the potential futures that await our species, using evidence from the past to make predictions about future events.
As humans continue to gain control over their surroundings, where will this ultimately lead us and the world?
If you liked this book, you can check out some other books like Sapiens.
Lenin’s Tomb by David Remnick
Lenin’s Tomb: The Last Days of the Soviet Empire was written by David Remnick. This book was published in 1994, winning the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction. It is 624 pages in length.
Tom Hanks recommended the book after being asked which book is his favorite on Soviet Union history. He replied with, “Lenin’s Tomb by David Remnick of The New Yorker. Hands down. It’s from a verifiable period of USSR history. Much of the very early stuff is fraught with propaganda.”
Lenin’s Tomb is exceptionally well written as a history book that is full of eyewitness accounts. These first hand stories put you right there with the people of the collapsing Soviet Union. We hear from Communist Party members, democratic activists who opposed Communism, Holocaust survivors, and even prominent people like Gorbachev, Yeltsin, and Sakharov.
The book opens up with the Katyn massacre, and continues on to show the flaws of the Soviet Union and how they impacted the people of the region to the modern day (modern in 1994).
That’s over 75 years of the history of the region. We get to see how events led to things that happened in the future, and draw the connections back to them. So many events, mostly bad, happened during this time, and you can really see how this history affects the people of Russia.
This is THE book to read on the end of the Soviet Union.