The Best Presidential Biographies to Add to Your Reading List in 2023

His Very Best: Jimmy Carter, a Life

This definitive biography of Carter shines light on a complicated and often poorly understood man and his legacy. Book critic Michael Schaub called it "a book that's bound to fascinate anyone with an interest in American history."

Truman

This 1992 biography of the 33rd president won this celebrated popular historian his first of two Pulitzer Prizes. Harvard professor Robert N. Stavins called Truman "a remarkable book about an ordinary man who did great things."

First in His Class: A Biography of Bill Clinton

A true authority on #42, Maraniss won a Pulitzer for his reporting on Clinton only three years earlier. It's got everything you ever wanted to know about Clinton's presidency according to NPR's Kitty Eisele, who called it "a character study par excellence."

Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson III

Book three in this colossal four-part biography of the 36th president won Caro both a Pulitzer and the National Book Award. At age 87, the author is still working on the last volume of his Johnson biography.

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln

Bill Gates named this one of his five favorite books, calling it "the best guide to leading a country...Goodwin is one of America’s best biographers, and Team of Rivals is arguably her masterpiece."

Washington: A Life (Pulitzer Prize Winner)

Esquire named this Pulitzer winner one of the 50 best biographies of all time. According to critic Adam Morgan, "Chernow will change your impression of Washington from a boring, frowning statesman to something like an 18th-century punk rocker..."

John Quincy Adams: Militant Spirit

Luckily for all lovers of American history, Adams kept a journal for nearly all his life, and that 14,000-page document serves as the backbone of Traub's unique biography. The book is as much a glimpse into Adams' inner life as it is a chronicle of his political career.

Richard Nixon: The Life

This biography of the disgraced 37th president was a Pulitzer finalist. Journalist John Harwood tweeted glowing praise: "It's hard to say emphatically enough how good Jack Farrell's Nixon biography is - in its literary style, scholarship, and analytical acuity... just terrific."

And There Was Light: Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle

We know - there are TOO MANY Lincoln books to keep up with, but this is our must-read pick from one of the great presidential biographers of recent decades.

Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America

This is the Trump book that will go down in history, given the author's front-row seat to the action. Journalist Caspar Henderson's take on the book made us laugh: "brings all the joy of reliving one of your worst nightmares in painstaking and excruciating detail."