essay about hurricane katrina

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Hurricane Katrina

By: History.com Editors

Updated: August 28, 2023 | Original: November 9, 2009

Early in the morning on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast of the United States. When the storm made landfall, it had a Category 3 rating on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale–it brought sustained winds of 100–140 miles per hour–and stretched some 400 miles across. 

While the storm itself did a great deal of damage, its aftermath was catastrophic. Levee breaches led to massive flooding, and many people charged that the federal government was slow to meet the needs of the people affected by the storm. Hundreds of thousands of people in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama were displaced from their homes, and experts estimate that Katrina caused more than $100 billion in damage.

Hurricane Katrina: Before the Storm

The tropical depression that became Hurricane Katrina formed over the Bahamas on August 23, 2005, and meteorologists were soon able to warn people in the Gulf Coast states that a major storm was on its way. By August 28, evacuations were underway across the region. That day, the National Weather Service predicted that after the storm hit, “most of the [Gulf Coast] area will be uninhabitable for weeks…perhaps longer.”

Did you know? During the past century, hurricanes have flooded New Orleans six times: in 1915, 1940, 1947, 1965, 1969 and 2005.

New Orleans was at particular risk. Though about half the city actually lies above sea level, its average elevation is about six feet below sea level–and it is completely surrounded by water. Over the course of the 20th century, the Army Corps of Engineers had built a system of levees and seawalls to keep the city from flooding. The levees along the Mississippi River were strong and sturdy, but the ones built to hold back Lake Pontchartrain, Lake Borgne and the waterlogged swamps and marshes to the city’s east and west were much less reliable. 

Levee Failures

Before the storm, officials worried that surge could overtop some levees and cause short-term flooding, but no one predicted levees might collapse below their designed height. Neighborhoods that sat below sea level, many of which housed the city’s poorest and most vulnerable people, were at great risk of flooding.

The day before Katrina hit, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin issued the city’s first-ever mandatory evacuation order. He also declared that the Superdome, a stadium located on relatively high ground near downtown, would serve as a “shelter of last resort” for people who could not leave the city. (For example, some 112,000 of New Orleans’ nearly 500,000 people did not have access to a car.) By nightfall, almost 80 percent of the city’s population had evacuated. Some 10,000 had sought shelter in the Superdome, while tens of thousands of others chose to wait out the storm at home.

By the time Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans early in the morning on Monday, August 29, it had already been raining heavily for hours. When the storm surge (as high as 9 meters in some places) arrived, it overwhelmed many of the city’s unstable levees and drainage canals. Water seeped through the soil underneath some levees and swept others away altogether. 

By 9 a.m., low-lying places like St. Bernard Parish and the Ninth Ward were under so much water that people had to scramble to attics and rooftops for safety. Eventually, nearly 80 percent of the city was under some quantity of water.

Hurricane Katrina: The Aftermath

Many people acted heroically in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The Coast Guard rescued some 34,000 people in New Orleans alone, and many ordinary citizens commandeered boats, offered food and shelter, and did whatever else they could to help their neighbors. Yet the government–particularly the federal government–seemed unprepared for the disaster. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) took days to establish operations in New Orleans, and even then did not seem to have a sound plan of action.

Officials, even including President George W. Bush , seemed unaware of just how bad things were in New Orleans and elsewhere: how many people were stranded or missing; how many homes and businesses had been damaged; how much food, water and aid was needed. Katrina had left in her wake what one reporter called a “total disaster zone” where people were “getting absolutely desperate.”

Failures in Government Response

For one thing, many had nowhere to go. At the Superdome in New Orleans, where supplies had been limited to begin with, officials accepted 15,000 more refugees from the storm on Monday before locking the doors. City leaders had no real plan for anyone else. Tens of thousands of people desperate for food, water and shelter broke into the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center complex, but they found nothing there but chaos. 

Meanwhile, it was nearly impossible to leave New Orleans: Poor people especially, without cars or anyplace else to go, were stuck. For instance, some people tried to walk over the Crescent City Connection bridge to the nearby suburb of Gretna, but police officers with shotguns forced them to turn back.

Katrina pummeled huge parts of Louisiana , Mississippi and Alabama , but the desperation was most concentrated in New Orleans. Before the storm, the city’s population was mostly black (about 67 percent); moreover, nearly 30 percent of its people lived in poverty. Katrina exacerbated these conditions and left many of New Orleans’s poorest citizens even more vulnerable than they had been before the storm.

In all, Hurricane Katrina killed nearly 2,000 people and affected some 90,000 square miles of the United States. Hundreds of thousands of evacuees scattered far and wide. According to The Data Center , an independent research organization in New Orleans, the storm ultimately displaced more than 1 million people in the Gulf Coast region. 

Political Fallout From Hurricane Katrina

In the wake of the storm's devastating effects, local, state and federal governments were criticized for their slow, inadequate response, as well as for the levee failures around New Orleans. And officials from different branches of government were quick to direct the blame at each other.

"We wanted soldiers, helicopters, food and water," Denise Bottcher, press secretary for then-Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco of Louisiana told the New York Times . "They wanted to negotiate an organizational chart."

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin argued that there was no clear designation of who was in charge, telling reporters, “The state and federal government are doing a two-step dance."

President George W. Bush had originally praised his director of FEMA, Michael D. Brown, but as criticism mounted, Brown was forced to resign, as was the New Orleans Police Department Superintendent. Louisiana Governor Blanco declined to seek re-election in 2007 and Mayor Nagin left office in 2010. In 2014 Nagin was convicted of bribery, fraud and money laundering while in office.

The U.S. Congress launched an investigation into government response to the storm and issued a highly critical report in February 2006 entitled, " A Failure of Initiative ."

Changes Since Katrina

The failures in response during Katrina spurred a series of reforms initiated by Congress. Chief among them was a requirement that all levels of government train to execute coordinated plans of disaster response. In the decade following Katrina, FEMA paid out billions in grants to ensure better preparedness.

Meanwhile, the Army Corps of Engineers built a $14 billion network of levees and floodwalls around New Orleans. The agency said the work ensured the city's safety from flooding for the time. But an April 2019 report from the Army Corps stated that, in the face of rising sea levels and the loss of protective barrier islands, the system will need updating and improvements by as early as 2023. 

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Adding to the destruction following Hurricane Katrina, fires burn in parts of New Orleans in an apocalyptic scene from early on September 3, 2005. The storm struck the Gulf Coast with devastating force at daybreak on Aug. 29, 2005, pummeling a region that included New Orleans and neighboring Mississippi.

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Hurricane Katrina, explained

Hurricane Katrina was the costliest storm in U.S. history, and its effects are still felt today in New Orleans and coastal Louisiana.

Hurricane Katrina made landfall off the coast of Louisiana on August 29, 2005. It hit land as a Category 3 storm with winds reaching speeds as high as 120 miles per hour . Because of the ensuing destruction and loss of life, the storm is often considered one of the worst in U.S. history. An estimated 1,200 people died as a direct result of the storm, which also cost an estimated $108 billion in property damage , making it the costliest storm on record.

The devastating aftermath of Hurricane Katrina exposed a series of deep-rooted problems, including controversies over the federal government's response , difficulties in search-and-rescue efforts, and lack of preparedness for the storm, particularly with regard to the city's aging series of levees—50 of which failed during the storm, significantly flooding the low-lying city and causing much of the damage. Katrina's victims tended to be low income and African American in disproportionate numbers , and many of those who lost their homes faced years of hardship.

Ten years after the disaster, then-President Barack Obama said of Katrina , "What started out as a natural disaster became a man-made disaster—a failure of government to look out for its own citizens."

( What are hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons ?)

The city of New Orleans and other coastal communities in Katrina's path remain significantly altered more than a decade after the storm, both physically and culturally. The damage was so extensive that some pundits had argued, controversially, that New Orleans should be permanently abandoned , even as the city vowed to rebuild.

The population of New Orleans fell by more than half in the year after Katrina, according to Data Center Research . As of this writing, the population had grown back to nearly 80 percent of where it was before the hurricane.

Timeline of a Storm

Katrina first formed as a tropical depression in Caribbean waters near the Bahamas on August 23, 2005. It officially reached hurricane status two days later, when it passed over southeastern Miami as a Category 1 storm. The tempest blew through Miami at 80 miles per hour, where it uprooted trees and killed two people. Katrina then weakened to a tropical storm, since hurricanes require warm ocean water to sustain speed and strength and begin to weaken over land. However, the storm then crossed back into the Gulf of Mexico, where it quickly regained strength and hurricane status. ( Read a detailed timeline of how the storm developed .)

On August 27, the storm grew to a Category 3 hurricane. At its largest, Katrina was so wide its diameter stretched across the Gulf of Mexico.

Before the storm hit land, a mandatory evacuation was issued for the city of New Orleans, which had a population of more than 480,000 at the time. Tens of thousands of residents fled. But many stayed, particularly among the city's poorest residents and those who were elderly or lacked access to transportation. Many sheltered in their homes or made their way to the Superdome, the city's large sports arena, where conditions would soon deteriorate into hardship and chaos .

Katrina passed over the Gulf Coast early on the morning of August 29. Officials initially believed New Orleans was spared as most of the storm's worst initial impacts battered the coast toward the east, near Biloxi, Mississippi, where winds were the strongest and damage was extensive. But later that morning, a levee broke in New Orleans, and a surge of floodwater began pouring into the low-lying city. The waters would soon overwhelm additional levees.

The following day, Katrina weakened to a tropical storm, but severe flooding inhibited relief efforts in much of New Orleans. An estimated 80 percent of the city was soon underwater. By September 2, four days later, the city and surrounding areas were in full-on crisis mode, with many people and companion animals still stranded, and infrastructure and services collapsing. Congress issued $10 billion for disaster relief aid while much of the world began criticizing the U.S. government's response .

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Geography of new orleans.

The city of New Orleans was at a disadvantage even before Hurricane Katrina hit, something experts had warned about for years , but it had limited success in changing policy. The region sits in a natural basin, and some of the city is below sea level so is particularly prone to flooding. Low-income communities tend to be in the lowest-lying areas.

Just south of the city, the powerful Mississippi River flows into the Gulf of Mexico. During intense hurricanes, oncoming storms can push seawater onto land, creating what is known as a storm surge . Those forces typically cause the most hurricane-related fatalities. As Hurricane Katrina hit, New Orleans and surrounding parishes saw record storm surges as high as 19 feet.

Katrina, Then and Now

Levees can be natural or manufactured. They are essentially walls that prevent waterways from overflowing and flooding nearby areas. New Orleans has been protected by levees since the French began inhabiting the region in the 17th century, but modern levees were authorized for construction in 1965 after Hurricane Betsy flooded much of the city . The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers then built a complex system of 350 miles of levees. Yet a report by the

Corps released in 2006 concluded that insufficient funding, information, and poor construction had left the flood system vulnerable to failure.

Even before Katrina made landfall off the Gulf, the incoming storm surge had started to overwhelm the levees, spilling into residential areas. More than 50 levees would eventually fail before the storm subsided. While the winds of the storm itself caused major damage in the city of New Orleans, such as downed trees and buildings, studies conducted in the years since concluded that failed levees accounted for the worst impacts and most deaths.

The aftermath

An assessment from the state of Louisiana confirmed that just under half of the 1,200 deaths resulted from chronic disease exacerbated by the storm, and a third of the deaths were from drowning. Hurricane death tolls are debated, and for Katrina, counts can vary by as much as 600. Collected bodies must be examined for cause of death, and some argue that indirect hurricane deaths, like being unable to access medical care, should be counted in official numbers.

Hurricane Katrina was the costliest in U.S. history and left widespread economic impacts. Oil and gas industry operations were crippled after the storm and coastal communities that rely on tourism suffered from both loss of infrastructure and business and coastal erosion.

An estimated 400,000 people were permanently displaced by the storm. Demographic shifts followed in the wake of the hurricane. The lowest-income residents often found it more difficult to return. Some neighborhoods now have fewer residents under 18 as some families chose to permanently resettle in cities like Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta. The city is also now more racially diverse, with higher numbers of Latino and Asian residents, while a disproportionate number of African-Americans found it too difficult to return.

Rebuilding part of New Orleans's hurricane defenses cost $14.6 billion and was completed in 2018. More flood systems are pending construction, meaning the city is still at risk from another large storm. A series of flood walls, levees, and flood gates buttress the coast and banks of the Mississippi River.

Simulations modeled in the years after Katrina suggest that the storm may have been made worse by rising sea levels and warming temperatures . Scientists are concerned that hurricanes the size of Katrina will become more likely as the climate warms. Studies are increasingly showing that climate change makes hurricanes capable of carrying more moisture . At the same time, hurricanes are moving more slowly, spending more time deluging areas unprepared for major flooding.

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Hurricane Katrina Essay

Hurricane Katrina was one of the deadliest and most destructive hurricanes to ever hit the United States. The storm made landfall on August 29, 2005, causing widespread damage across Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. In all, more than 1,800 people lost their lives and tens of billions of dollars in property damage was done.

Katrina was particularly devastating for the city of New Orleans, which saw its levees fail and floodwaters inundate much of the city. In the aftermath of the storm, many residents were left stranded without food or water for days.

The response to Hurricane Katrina was widely criticized, with many people pointing to the slow federal response as a major failing. In the years since, however, much has been done to improve disaster response in the United States. Hurricane Katrina was a tragic event that will be remembered for years to come.

Our environment and ecosystem allow us to thrive and enjoy our planet. Natural catastrophes are not affected by man’s will or desire. They might happen at any time and in any place, but we may choose how to protect our environment by acting responsibly for these natural disasters.

Hurricane Katrina was one of the most destructive natural disasters in U.S. history. It hit the Gulf Coast region on August 29th, 2005 and caused catastrophic damage, particularly in the city of New Orleans and the state of Mississippi. The hurricane killed over 1,800 people and displaced hundreds of thousands more.

The physical damage from Hurricane Katrina was widespread and devastating. Entire neighborhoods were leveled, leaving nothing but debris behind. Houses were torn from their foundations, trees were uprooted, and cars were thrown about like toys. Floodwaters inundated entire communities, causing even more damage as they rose and receded. In all, it is estimated that Hurricane Katrina caused over $100 billion in damage.

But the damage from Hurricane Katrina was not just physical. The storm also had a profound psychological effect on those who lived through it. Many people who survived the hurricane recounted feeling traumatized by their experiences. They described a sense of loss, displacement, and grief that was overwhelming. For many, the stormrepresented not just the destruction of their homes and belongings but also the loss of their community and way of life.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, there was a great deal of discussion about how to rebuild the affected communities. Some argued that it was important to rebuild as quickly as possible in order to restore a sense of normalcy for residents. Others argued that rebuilding should be done thoughtfully and with an eye towards creating more resilient communities that could better withstand future storms.

What is clear is that Hurricane Katrina was a major disaster with far-reaching implications. The physical and psychological damage caused by the storm will be felt by those who lived through it for many years to come.

The aquatic ecosystem of the nearby lakes was devastated by the levee failure in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. The breach of the dikes caused water to rapidly flood the region and become contaminated with city sewage, chemicals, medical waste, and human remains, which were then pumped into the lakes.

The main body of water effected was Lake Pontchartrain which provides much of the city’s drinking water. The hurricane also destroyed the coastal wetlands which act as a natural buffer from storms, these wetlands have not yet recovered.

New Orleans is situated in a bowl-shaped area surrounded by levees that protect it from flooding. The bowl is actually below sea level, so when Hurricane Katrina hit on August 29, 2005, and the levees failed, the entire city was flooded. More than 80% of New Orleans was under water, with some areas being submerged under 20 feet of water.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, many people were left stranded without food or clean water. As conditions in the city deteriorated, looting and violence became widespread. The federal government was criticized for its slow response to the disaster.

Hurricane Katrina was one of the deadliest and most destructive hurricanes in US history. It caused more than $100 billion in damage, and left thousands of people homeless. More than 1,800 people were killed, making it one of the deadliest natural disasters in US history.

Water bearing all sorts of pollutants was pumped into any available destination, as long as it didn’t submerge the city, after Katrina. Apart from Katrina causing havoc, one of the most significant flaws in government and army Corps of Engineers efforts was the lack of protection and efficiency of the levees. The consequences of the levees’ failure and water eventually engulfing the city were only amplified.

The water that submerged New Orleans following Katrina was filled with all types of contaminants. Oil from cars and boats, animal carcasses, and even human remains were all mixed in the murky water. This water not only destroyed homes and buildings, but also seeped in to the soil and groundwater. The long-term effects of this contaminated water are still being studied, but it is safe to say that they will be felt for many years to come.

In addition to the contaminated water, there was also a great deal of air pollution caused by Katrina. As the storm ripped through houses and buildings, it generated a tremendous amount of dust and debris which contained harmful toxins like asbestos and lead. This debris was then sent airborne where it was inhaled by residents, further exacerbating the health problems caused by the storm.

All of this pollution had a devastating effect on the environment of New Orleans. The contaminated water destroyed plant and animal life, as well as the natural habitats that they lived in. The air pollution tainted the air quality for miles around, making it difficult for people and animals to breathe. And the debris left behind clogged up waterways and made it difficult for new vegetation to grow. It will take many years for the environment of New Orleans to recover from the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina.

We must recognize that the traditional “levee solution” is more detrimental than beneficial, and it must be rethought. According to the Association of State Floodplain Managers, “There are only two kinds of levees: ones that have failed and ones that will fail.” To protect and safeguard our ecosystems more effectively, levi structure and design must be significantly altered.

We have to think long-term when it comes to these things. In 2005, one of the most infamous natural disasters occurred in the United States. Hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana and Mississippi hard, causing many fatalities and leaving thousands homeless. This hurricane was different than any other because of the widespread damage that it did.

It is important to note that while hurricanes are a common occurrence in this area, the devastation caused by Katrina was Unprecedented. In order to understand how such destruction could happen, we must first understand what goes into making a hurricane and the different types of storms.

A tropical cyclone is “a rotating, organized system of clouds and thunderstorms that originates over tropical or subtropical waters” (National Hurricane Center). These storms are fueled by warm, moist air and can grow to be very large. There are three main types of tropical cyclones: tropical depressions, tropical storms, and hurricanes.

A tropical depression is the weakest type of storm and has winds that range from 22-38 mph. A tropical storm is a bit stronger, with winds reaching 39-73 mph. The last and most severe type of storm is the hurricane. These storms have winds that surpass 74 mph and can cause catastrophic damage (National Hurricane Center).

Now that we know what goes into making a hurricane, we can begin to understand how Katrina formed. The conditions for this particular hurricane were just right; it had all of the necessary ingredients to turn into a category 5 storm.

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Hurricane Katrina

Satellite image of Hurricane Katrina during landfall as a Category 3 hurricane. Courtesy of NASA.

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Hurricane Katrina was one of the deadliest hurricanes to hit the United States. An estimated 1,833 people died in the hurricane and the flooding that followed. Millions of people were left homeless along the Gulf Coast and in New Orleans. Hurricane Katrina caused approximately $161 billion in damage, and is the costliest hurricane on record.

On August 23, 2005, a tropical depression formed over the Bahamas, and became Tropical Storm Katrina on August 24, 2005. The storm made landfall in Florida on August 25 as a Category 1 hurricane, then moved into the Gulf of Mexico where it intensified into a Category 5. When it made landfall in southeast Louisiana on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina was classified as a Category 3, with recorded wind speeds of 140 miles per hour. The hurricane then tracked east and devastated communities in Alabama and Mississippi.

New Orleans experienced wind gusts of up to 100 miles per hour and extensive flooding after levees in the city were breached by flood waters. By August 31, 2005, 80% of the city of New Orleans was underwater.

President George W. Bush gave a speech from the White House on August 31, 2005, in which he described relief efforts. On September 2, 2005, the President visited affected areas in Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. The recovery would take years, President George W. Bush noted in his August 31 speech. However, he also emphasized that he believed recovery was possible:

The folks on the Gulf Coast are going to need the help of this country for a long time. This is going to be a difficult road. The challenges that we face on the ground are unprecedented. But there's no doubt in my mind we're going to succeed. Right now the days seem awfully dark for those affected -- I understand that. But I'm confident that, with time, you can get your life back in order, new communities will flourish, the great city of New Orleans will be back on its feet, and America will be a stronger place for it.

At the three-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina in August 2008, near the end of President George W. Bush’s second term, relief efforts were ongoing. At that time, the federal government had committed more than $126 billion to Gulf Coast rebuilding, and had appropriated $12.85 billion to repair and rebuild the New Orleans levees. The Department of Education provided $2 billion in grants to schools.

The following resources, some of which are from the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum, provide further information about Hurricane Katrina. 

Archival Research Guide

For a more complete guide of the archival records that are open for research, please download the Archival Research Guide:

Document Material at the George W. Bush Presidential Library Pertaining To Hurricane Katrina

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• Hurricane Katrina: Rebuilding the Gulf Coast Region
• Hurricane Katrina Speeches and Press Releases Archive
• Hurricane Katrina: Response and Recovery
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• Mrs. Bush: Comforting Those in Need
• Mrs. Bush: Rebuilding the Gulf Coast
• National Day of Prayer: Remembering Our Fellow Americans
• The National Weather Service. “ Hurricane Katrina .”
• The National Weather Service. “ Extremely Powerful Hurricane Katrina Leaves a Historic Mark on the Northern Gulf Coast. ”
• Office for Coastal Management. “ Hurricane Costs. ”
• The White House. “ Fact Sheet: Rebuilding the Gulf Coast .”
• The White House. “ President Outlines Hurricane Katrina Relief Efforts .”
• Additional photo essays, Presidential Messages and Statements, press releases, and more from 2001 - 2009 are available through the  Archived White House Website .

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Hurricane Katrina summary

Hurricane Katrina , Tropical cyclone that struck the U.S. in 2005. The storm that became Hurricane Katrina was one of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record, with winds in excess of 170 mi (275 km) per hour. On August 29 the hurricane struck Louisiana and, later, Mississippi . It caused massive destruction, especially in New Orleans , where the levee system failed. By August 30, about 80 percent of the city was underwater. A public-health emergency ensued, and civil disorder was widespread until an effective military presence was established on September 2. Ultimately, the storm and its aftermath caused more than $160 billion in damage and claimed more than 1,800 lives. It was the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history.

Essay on Hurricane Katrina

Students are often asked to write an essay on Hurricane Katrina in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Hurricane Katrina

What was hurricane katrina.

Hurricane Katrina was a big and very bad storm that hit the United States in August 2005. It was one of the worst disasters in the country’s history. The storm grew very strong before it reached land near New Orleans, Louisiana.

The storm caused a lot of destruction. It broke dams, and water flooded many homes and streets. Thousands of people lost their houses, and many had to leave the city. Sadly, some people also lost their lives.

The Response

After the storm, people from all over the country came to help. They gave food, clothes, and a place to stay to those who lost everything. The government and charities worked to rebuild homes and help the city recover.

Lessons Learned

Hurricane Katrina taught everyone a lot about preparing for big storms. Now, cities and people make better plans to keep safe when a hurricane is coming. It showed how important it is to help each other in tough times.

250 Words Essay on Hurricane Katrina

The impact of the storm.

When Katrina reached land, it brought very strong winds and huge waves. These waves, called storm surges, pushed water onto the land and flooded many areas. New Orleans was especially hard hit because it is built below sea level and relies on walls called levees to keep water out. Sadly, the levees broke, and most of the city was covered in water. Many homes were destroyed, and people had to leave their houses.

Helping After the Disaster

After the storm, many people needed help. They had no electricity, food, or clean water. Groups from all over the country came to give aid. They brought food, water, and clothes. They also helped people find places to stay. The whole country worked together to help those affected by the storm.

Hurricane Katrina taught us a lot about preparing for big storms. Now, cities have better plans for when such disasters happen. They make sure levees are strong and help people leave dangerous areas before the storm arrives. Katrina was a tragic event, but it made people realize how important it is to be ready for nature’s power.

500 Words Essay on Hurricane Katrina

Introduction to hurricane katrina.

Hurricane Katrina is remembered as one of the most powerful and destructive storms in the history of the United States. It struck the Gulf Coast in August 2005. This storm caused a lot of damage in many places, especially in the city of New Orleans, Louisiana. Many homes were destroyed, and a lot of people had to leave their homes and move to other places.

What is a Hurricane?

A hurricane is a huge storm that forms over warm ocean waters and has very strong winds. These winds spin around a calm center called the “eye” of the hurricane. Hurricanes can cause heavy rain, high winds, and big waves called storm surges. These storm surges can flood the land near the coast.

The Power of Hurricane Katrina

The impact on new orleans.

New Orleans was one of the worst-hit areas. The city is built below sea level and is protected by walls called levees. But during Hurricane Katrina, the levees broke, and water flooded into the city. Many houses were covered with water, and people had to go to their rooftops to wait for help. The flood made it very hard for people to get food, water, and medical care.

Rescue and Help for People

After the storm, many people came to help those who were affected by the hurricane. The government, charities, and volunteers from all over the country worked together. They gave out food and water, and they helped people find safe places to stay. Rescue teams used boats and helicopters to save people who were trapped by the floodwaters.

Rebuilding and Remembering

Hurricane Katrina was a very sad event that showed how powerful nature can be. It reminds us that we need to be prepared for big storms and help each other when they happen. Even though it was a time of trouble, it also showed how people can come together to help those in need. Katrina will always be remembered, not just for the damage it caused, but also for the strength and kindness people showed in the face of disaster.

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Hurricane Katrina’s Analysis Essay

• To find inspiration for your paper and overcome writer’s block
• As a source of information (ensure proper referencing)
• As a template for you assignment

Hurricane Katrina is undoubtedly one of the most overwhelming storms in United States history, going by the number of fatalities caused and damage in dollar terms (Rogers, Keating, & Minutaglio, 2015). A penetrating analysis provided in the videos and articles offers deep insights into how a natural disaster turned into one of the worst manmade disasters due to systemic failures by stakeholders. The present paper provides a narrative description of some of the issues that transpired to qualify Hurricane Katrina into a manmade disaster.

The evidence provided in the materials shows that New Orleans is vulnerable to flooding due to its low elevation, continuous human interference, haphazard construction of levees, and disappearance of natural wetlands and barrier islands. The innovation of draining swamplands to allow for the city’s expansion was counterproductive in terms of making New Orleans more susceptible to storm surges. Although wetlands serve as nature’s best natural defense against storms, the narratives provided in the videos show that manmade activities caused the wetlands to disappear at an incredible rate, leaving the city exposed to natural calamities.

Another factor relates to the planning failure and the inability by officials to put in place measures to deal with a storm even after information was availed about an impending hurricane. Here, evidence demonstrates that the huge investments made to divert the Mississippi River and build defensive levees actually hastened the sinking of whole neighborhoods below sea level, while poorly constructed levees served to worsen the flooding. Additionally, it is evident that city officials were unable to plan on how to prevent the tragic aftermath of the storm despite the accuracy of information provided by scientists about the harmful impact of the hurricane (Kasinitz, 2006). It is disturbing to note how officials ignored the warning despite having prior knowledge of Hurricane Ivan that ravaged Louisiana in 2004.

The engineering failures of the levees and canals aptly demonstrate how human mistakes, rather than nature, conspired to trigger the worst devastation in New Orleans history. Here, it is important to note that the Industrial Canal, 17 th Street Canal levee, London Avenue Canal, and Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet Canal failed to contain the floods due to inadequate design and construction by the Corps of Engineers (Bergel, 2007). These breaches caused massive flooding in New Orleans City and other neighborhoods, such as St. Bernard, Tennessee Street, Lower Ninth Ward, and Jefferson.

Further evidence demonstrates that there was social strife in the days after Katrina hit New Orleans, whereby cases of looting, violence, and rape increased dramatically. Although these events may have informed the police to use ‘martial law’ and deadly force, it is clear from the evidence presented in the videos that the police went overboard in instigating what is now commonly referred to as premeditated homicide. The Henry Glover incident and the Danziger Bridge shootings are good examples that show New Orleans police officers lied in the handling of the disaster. Henry Glover’s badly burnt body was discovered with multiple bullet injuries to the head even after it was apparent that he had been taken to police officers for assistance with injuries to the chest. While some of the police officers involved in these incidents received reduced sentences for the capital offense of murder, others are yet to pay for their mistakes.

Drawing from the evidence presented in this paper, it is clear that Hurricane Katrina caused heavy devastation due to man-made systemic failures that could have been prevented. It is therefore important for the U.S. government and other relevant stakeholders to make heavy investments in erecting quality flood clearance channels and pump stations, educating the public on proper disaster response mechanisms, and building resilient healthcare systems for use in caring for the victims. The main learning point from the videos and articles is that it is important to address the human-related issues related to surveillance, law enforcement, flood management, and coordination of response activities if the country is to succeed in preventing the catastrophic effects associated with natural disasters.

Bergel, J. (2007). Investigating what went wrong and how. Nieman Reports, 61 , 57-58.

Kasinitz, P. (2006). Katrina, the media and the American public sphere. Sociological Forum, 21 (1), 141-146. Web.

Rogers, R., Keating, C., & Minutagrio, R. (2015). Hurricane Katrina 10 years later: New lives, new hope. People, 84 , 72-78.

• "When the Levees Broke" by Spike Lee
• “When the Levees Broke” by Spike Lee
• Disaster of Hurricane Katrina in 2005
• Hurricane Ike 2008 and its Impacts on America
• 2011 Tsunami in Tohoku and Its Effects on Japan
• Flood Mitigation Measures in the United States
• Fire Prevention Versus Fire Suppression
• Saudi Arabian and Asian Disaster Epidemiology
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2020, August 25). Hurricane Katrina's Analysis. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hurricane-katrinas-analysis/

"Hurricane Katrina's Analysis." IvyPanda , 25 Aug. 2020, ivypanda.com/essays/hurricane-katrinas-analysis/.

IvyPanda . (2020) 'Hurricane Katrina's Analysis'. 25 August.

IvyPanda . 2020. "Hurricane Katrina's Analysis." August 25, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hurricane-katrinas-analysis/.

1. IvyPanda . "Hurricane Katrina's Analysis." August 25, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hurricane-katrinas-analysis/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Hurricane Katrina's Analysis." August 25, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/hurricane-katrinas-analysis/.

Houstonia Magazine

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Port of Hope

Photography by Katya Horner By Jeff Balke September 1, 2015 Published in the September 2015 issue of Houstonia Magazine

I t was ten years ago, in the wee hours of August 29, that Hurricane Katrina made landfall along the Louisiana and Mississippi coasts on its way to becoming one of the largest disasters in the nation's history. According to official estimates, the storm left more than 1,800 people dead and caused over $100 billion in damage along the Gulf Coast from Texas to Florida. But it was New Orleans that took the biggest hit. Massive flooding occasioned by the failure of the city's levee system created widespread destruction and death—particularly in the poorest neighborhoods—along with scenes of carnage that will live on in the country's consciousness forever. 

Just as America emerged from the Katrina tragedy a different nation, Houston—five hours west of ground zero and hardly touched by the storm—emerged a different city. 

On the evening of August 31, the first bus of Katrina evacuees, filled with mostly teenagers, arrived outside the Astrodome here. Over the next three weeks, some 65,000 victims, many fleeing the horrific conditions inside the New Orleans Superdome, would pass through the de facto checkpoint that became known as Reliant City. (Those victims were part of an estimated quarter-million people evacuated to Houston, over half of whom, by some estimates, would eventually put down roots here.) 

More than 27,000 of those who arrived at Reliant City would remain there for portions of the next three weeks, sleeping on cots inside the Astrodome, while thousands of others were routed to additional shelters in Houston, including the George R. Brown Convention Center, and cities throughout Texas and the US.  Many were sick or injured, most had been separated from their families, all were shell-shocked and wondering how to piece their lives back together. 

Despite the short notice, Houstonians mounted a massive and remarkably well-organized response to Katrina. Even as the Red Cross, relief organizations and the federal government were at odds over how to respond in New Orleans, officials and volunteers here were doing what Houstonians do best at such moments. They rolled up their sleeves and got to work. 

Within days of those first arrivals, the Texas Medical Center and Harris County Hospital District worked together to build an enormous medical facility inside Reliant Center adjacent to the Astrodome, complete with surgical bays and a working pharmacy. The YMCA, with help from Gallery Furniture owner Jim McIngvale, set up a sprawling children’s play area complete with basketball courts, a working daycare/preschool and an indoor video arcade. From meals to veteran’s services, housing to job placement, grief counseling to religious support, at least 60,000 volunteers from this city and around the globe worked in Houston to provide one of the most remarkable relief efforts ever assembled.

Among them was Katya Horner. The Clear Lake native arrived at the Astrodome just minutes after that first bus did, and spent the better part of the next two weeks offering support, lending a hand—and shooting photographs. Having taken up photography as a hobby just half a year  earlier, Horner had no idea that some of the pictures she was posting online would become iconic images of the Katrina aftermath, or that she would eventually come to make her living as a photographer. 

The last decade having changed her own life utterly, Horner was curious to revisit some of the subjects of her post-Katrina photographs, to see how their lives had or hadn't changed. But what follows is more than a then-and-now essay. It's a tribute to the spirit of Houstonians past and present, permanent and temporary, now and forever—a timely reminder that it's the worst of times that brings out the best in us.

Kataria in his home state of Connecticut.

Image: Julie Bidwell

Niraj Kataria

Y ou can leave New Orleans, but it never leaves you, it seems. Consider Niraj Kataria, a start-up business development expert who worked in NOLA in the early 2000s. He’d already relocated to Connecticut by the time Katrina hit, but as soon as it did he got on a plane to Houston, having read about the evacuation. “I felt the need to go there and help out,” Kataria explains.

Once there, he spent most of his time comforting evacuees and helping with Red Cross applications. “I met a man who used a refrigerator and a mattress to help his family float through the water,” recalls the 52-year-old. “The buses were coming in droves.”

Niraj Kataria shows a young girl his camera.

Image: Katya Horner

Harold, who lost his wife Louvenia three years before Katrina, brought her photo to Houston.

He spent only three days in Houston before heading to New Orleans to help with clean-up and relief efforts, but it’s a place he’ll never forget. “I was very pleased with Houston,” Kataria says, “Not only the fact that you took [evacuees] with open arms, not only the fact that you were giving them a very clean place, but you gave them jobs.”

For Kataria, who made several trips to New Orleans to lend a hand in the months following the storm, it all seems like yesterday. “That was 10 years ago?” he asks. “Oh, my God, I can’t believe it.”

Reverend Brenda Overfield in her office at St. Matthias’ Episcopal Church in Midlothian, Virginia.

Image: Adam Ewing

Reverend Brenda Overfield

Photographs offer a brutally accurate account of the death and destruction left in the wake of Katrina. But capturing the emotional toll it exacted on survivors has been harder. When the hurricane hit, Reverend Brenda Overfield, then a minister at the Holy Trinity Episcopal Church in Long Island, New York, came to Houston to do what she does best: listen.

Overfield works with an evacuee inside Reliant Arena.

She vividly recalls the tales of horror she heard at the Dome. Everyone she listened to told a story of unspeakable tragedy, including an evacuee she remembers counseling. “She had been in the Superdome and was describing the nightmare of being there,” Overfield says. “She saw a man take a gun from a policeman and shoot him in the head. She watched him die.”

For a moment, her voice cracks. “It still touches me a lot.” 

The first bus to arrive at the Astrodome is filled with children caring for children.

A 2-year-old sleeps inside the Astrodome after being reunited with his grandmother.

Overfield, who is now a rector at a church in Virginia, spent two long weeks at the Astrodome in 2005, listening and helping people sort out their lives. And sadness and loss were not the only things she heard. One evacuee noticed that Overfield had taken to wearing shorts with her minister’s collar to alleviate the Dome’s stifling heat. “Honey, I love your shorts,” the woman told her. “Jesus Christ has set you free.”

Eckels revisits the Dome in 2015.

Judge Robert Eckels 

“It’s never good when the phone rings at 2:30 in the morning,” says former Harris County Judge Bob Eckels, remembering the call he received from Jack Colley, Texas’s then-chief of emergency management, two days after Katrina hit. Eckels recalls Colley asking, Remember those 2,500 people we asked you to take care of? Can you make it 23,000? They’ll be there tonight.

It wasn’t a lot of notice, but as it happened, Eckels and other county and city officials had been preparing for the moment for over a decade. In 1995, when Eckels took office, he brought emergency management under his purview, a move that had its first test in 2001 during Tropical Storm Allison, which caused $5 billion in damage and 22 deaths in Harris County. But no amount of preparation could ever be enough for a disaster like Katrina. “There had been planning,” he says, “but not for this scale.” 

Judge Robert Eckels waits to film a TV spot outside the Astrodome.

Media surround the first bus to arrive at the Astrodome, while weary passengers wait to get inside.

A massive stretch of cots inside the George R. Brown Convention Center.

Organizers on the Astrodome floor preparing for volunteers and evacuees.

Demetrius and Demetrius Jr. were rescued by a boat in New Orleans.

Over the next three weeks, more than 60,000 evacuees escaping the devastation in New Orleans moved in and out of Reliant Center and other area shelters before being relocated, finding permanent homes or returning to the Crescent City.  “The real miracle is not that we were up and running in 14 hours,” says Eckels. “It was that in three weeks, we had them out of here.”

While Eckels was responsible for coordinating much of the city's response, he heaps praise on the organizing team of officials from the county, city and state as well as the diverse array of people who turned up to help. “There was a woman here in pearls and a silk blouse, slacks, straight out of the country club,” he explains. “She was serving snacks and drinks to people from the lower Ninth.” 

“It was one of those paradigm shifts for the whole city.”  

Moreno with Omar and Marie at the Harriet and Joe Foster Family YMCA.

Trazanna Moreno

In the aftermath of a catastrophe, little hints of normalcy can have a great impact on shell-shocked survivors, especially children. “They’d come in at first and be nervous, and it was only a few minutes before they were playing and laughing,” explains Trazanna Moreno, describing the YMCA playground, a kind of tent city for kids built in the parking lot of Reliant Park. “You wouldn’t think that people who were trapped—they had nowhere to go—that recreation for children would be their first priority, but it was really important that the kids had a place to play and that parents had a place where their kids could be safe.”

And it was quite a place. “We had basketball goals,” says Moreno, now the Chief Marketing Officer of YMCA Houston. “There had to be at least 10 of them in a parking lot wide enough so you could have five or six full court games going on.” In addition, tent city housed a massive daycare center with toys and padded floors “as if you were in a preschool,” as well as an indoor video arcade with unlimited free play.

Trazanna Moreno gives an update at the Joint Information Center Press Briefing.

A 12-year-old girl who spent most of her time at the Dome entertaining her younger cousin.

Her most vivid impressions are of the scope of the entire aid operation, and not just by the YMCA. “It was just massive and overwhelming to see that whole space full, inside and outside.” Moreno says, adding, “It would be inappropriate to describe it as controlled chaos. It was organized. It was orderly.”

And the YMCA gave parents a chance to pick up the pieces of their lives while their kids had a place to feel like kids again. “At first it was really sad,” she says, “But for the times they were there, they weren’t sleeping in a cot….They got to play.” 

A Real Local’s Guide to Houston’s East End Neighborhood

05/02/2024 By Reyes Ramirez and Daniel Renfrow

Cultural Cuisine

What to Expect from Chef Chris Williams’s Late August

04/29/2024 By Sofia Gonzalez

Paying It Forward

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04/25/2024 By Sofia Gonzalez

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Bringing Mexico Home

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04/18/2024 By Sofia Gonzalez

A Ranking of Houston’s Free Bar Snacks

04/17/2024 By Daniel Renfrow

On The Town

Houston Summer Arts Guide

05/30/2022 By Chris Gray

Plan My Weekend

Our Guide to the Best Weekend Ever in Houston (May 3–5)

05/03/2024 By Uvie Bikomo

Reappearing Act

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05/02/2024 By Daniel Renfrow

How to Have Fun in Houston for Free (Yes, Totally Free)

04/24/2024 By Claire Anderson , Jessica Lodge , and Daniel Renfrow

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Will the Montrose Bridge Lights Ever Dazzle Our Commute Again?

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Mobile Expression

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Political Contender

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Are We in for Another Summer Scorcher in Houston?

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Bayougraphy

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An Insider’s Guide to Houston’s Best Vintage Stores

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Treat Yourself

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Vintage Playground

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Our Favorite Houston Sports Bars

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The 1 00 Best Books of the 21st Century

New! 60 - 41

As voted on by 503 novelists, nonfiction writers, poets, critics and other book lovers — with a little help from the staff of The New York Times Book Review.

Many of us find joy in looking back and taking stock of our reading lives, which is why we here at The New York Times Book Review decided to mark the first 25 years of this century with an ambitious project: to take a first swing at determining the most important, influential books of the era. In collaboration with the Upshot, we sent a survey to hundreds of literary luminaries , asking them to name the 10 best books published since Jan. 1, 2000.

Stephen King took part. So did Bonnie Garmus, Claudia Rankine, James Patterson, Sarah Jessica Parker, Karl Ove Knausgaard, Elin Hilderbrand, Thomas Chatterton Williams, Roxane Gay, Marlon James, Sarah MacLean, Min Jin Lee, Jonathan Lethem and Jenna Bush Hager, to name just a few .

As we publish the list over the course of this week ( today: 60-41! ), we hope you’ll discover a book you’ve always meant to read, or encounter a beloved favorite you’d like to pick up again. Above all, we hope you’re as inspired and dazzled as we are by the breadth of subjects, voices, opinions, experiences and imagination represented here.

Be first to see what’s new. Every day this week, the Book Review will unveil 20 more books on our Best Books of the 21st Century list. You can get notified when they’re up — and hear about book reviews, news and features each week — when you receive the Book Review’s newsletter. Sign up here.

Tree of Smoke

Denis Johnson 2007

Like the project of the title — an intelligence report that the newly minted C.I.A. operative William “Skip” Sands comes to find both quixotic and useless — the Vietnam-era warfare of Johnson’s rueful, soulful novel lives in shadows, diversions and half-truths. There are no heroes here among the lawless colonels, assassinated priests and faith-stricken NGO nurses; only villainy and vast indifference.

Liked it? Try “ Missionaries ,” by Phil Klay or “ Hystopia ,” by David Means.

Interested? Read our review . Then reserve it at your local library or buy it from Amazon , Apple , Barnes & Noble or Bookshop .

How to Be Both

Ali Smith 2014

This elegant double helix of a novel entwines the stories of a fictional modern-day British girl and a real-life 15th-century Italian painter. A more conventional book might have explored the ways the past and present mirror each other, but Smith is after something much more radical. “How to Be Both” is a passionate, dialectical critique of the binaries that define and confine us. Not only male and female, but also real and imaginary, poetry and prose, living and dead. The way to be “both” is to recognize the extent to which everything already is. — A.O. Scott, critic at large for The Times

Liked it? Try “ Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi ,” by Geoff Dyer or “ The Argonauts ,” by Maggie Nelson.

Ann Patchett 2001

A famed opera singer performs for a Japanese executive’s birthday at a luxe private home in South America; it’s that kind of party. But when a group of young guerrillas swoops in and takes everyone in the house hostage, Patchett’s exquisitely calibrated novel — inspired by a real incident — becomes a piano wire of tension, vibrating on high.

My wife and I share books we love with our kids, and after I raved about “Bel Canto” — the voice, the setting, the way romance and suspense are so perfectly braided — I gave copies to my kids, and they all loved it, too. My son was in high school then, and he became a kind of lit-pusher, pressing his beloved copy into friends’ hands. We used to call him the Keeper of the Bel Canto. — Jess Walter, author of “Beautiful Ruins”

Liked it? Try “ Nocturnes ,” by Kazuo Ishiguro or “ The Piano Tuner ,” by Daniel Mason.

Men We Reaped

Jesmyn Ward 2013

Sandwiched between her two National Book Award-winning novels, Ward’s memoir carries more than fiction’s force in its aching elegy for five young Black men (a brother, a cousin, three friends) whose untimely exits from her life came violently and without warning. Their deaths — from suicide and homicide, addiction and accident — place the hidden contours of race, justice and cruel circumstance in stark relief.

Liked it? Try “ Breathe: A Letter to My Sons ,” by Imani Perry or “ Memorial Drive: A Daughter’s Memoir ,” by Natasha Trethewey.

Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments

Saidiya Hartman 2019

A beautiful, meticulously researched exploration of the lives of Black girls whom early-20th-century laws designated as “wayward” for such crimes as having serial lovers, or an excess of desire, or a style of comportment that was outside white norms. Hartman grapples with “the power and authority of the archive and the limits it sets on what can be known” about poor Black women, but from the few traces she uncovers in the historical record, she manages to sketch moving portraits, restoring joy and freedom and movement to what, in other hands, might have been mere statistics. — Laila Lalami, author of “The Other Americans”

Liked it? Try “In the Wake: On Blackness and Being,” by Christina Sharpe or “ All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, A Black Family Keepsake ,” by Tiya Miles.

Bring Up the Bodies

Hilary Mantel 2012

The title comes from an old English legal phrase for summoning men who have been accused of treason to trial; in the court’s eyes, effectively, they are already dead. But Mantel’s tour-de-force portrait of Thomas Cromwell, the second installment in her vaunted “Wolf Hall” series, thrums with thrilling, obstinate life: a lowborn statesman on the rise; a king in love (and out of love, and in love again); a mad roundelay of power plays, poisoned loyalties and fateful realignments. It’s only empires, after all.

Liked it? Try “ This Is Happiness ,” by Niall Williams or “ The Western Wind ,” by Samantha Harvey.

Zadie Smith 2005

Consider it a bold reinvention of “Howards End,” or take Smith’s sprawling third novel as its own golden thing: a tale of two professors — one proudly liberal, the other staunchly right-wing — whose respective families’ rivalries and friendships unspool over nearly 450 provocative, subplot-mad pages.

“You don’t have favorites among your children, but you do have allies.”

Let’s admit it: Family is often a kind of war, even if telepathically conducted. — Alexandra Jacobs, book critic for The Times

Liked it? Try “ Crossroads ,” by Jonathan Franzen.

Station Eleven

Emily St. John Mandel 2014

Increasingly, and for obvious reasons, end-times novels are not hard to find. But few have conjured the strange luck of surviving an apocalypse — civilization preserved via the ad hoc Shakespeare of a traveling theater troupe; entire human ecosystems contained in an abandoned airport — with as much spooky melancholic beauty as Mandel does in her beguiling fourth novel.

Liked it? Try “ Severance ,” by Ling Ma or “ The Passage ,” by Justin Cronin.

The Days of Abandonment

Elena Ferrante; translated by Ann Goldstein 2005

There is something scandalous about this picture of a sensible, adult woman almost deranged by the breakup of her marriage, to the point of neglecting her children. The psychodrama is naked — sometimes hard to read, at other moments approaching farce. Just as Ferrante drew an indelible portrait of female friendship in her quartet of Neapolitan novels, here, she brings her all-seeing eye to female solitude.

“The circle of an empty day is brutal, and at night it tightens around your neck like a noose.”

It so simply encapsulates how solitude can, with the inexorable passage of time, calcify into loneliness and then despair. — Alexandra Jacobs

Liked it? Try “ Eileen ,” by Ottessa Moshfegh or “ Aftermath: On Marriage and Separation ,” by Rachel Cusk.

The Human Stain

Philip Roth 2000

Set during the Clinton impeachment imbroglio, this is partly a furious indictment of what would later be called cancel culture, partly an inquiry into the paradoxes of class, sex and race in America. A college professor named Coleman Silk is persecuted for making supposedly racist remarks in class. Nathan Zuckerman, his neighbor (and Roth’s trusty alter ego), learns that Silk, a fellow son of Newark, is a Black man who has spent most of his adult life passing for white. Of all the Zuckerman novels, this one may be the most incendiary, and the most unsettling. — A.O. Scott

Liked it? Try “ Vladimir ,” by Julia May Jonas or “ Blue Angel ,” by Francine Prose.

The Sympathizer

Viet Thanh Nguyen 2015

Penned as a book-length confession from a nameless North Vietnamese spy as Saigon falls and new duties in America beckon, Nguyen’s richly faceted novel seems to swallow multiple genres whole, like a satisfied python: political thriller and personal history, cracked metafiction and tar-black comedy.

Liked it? Try “ Man of My Time ,” by Dalia Sofer or “ Tomás Nevinson ,” by Javier Marías; translated by Margaret Jull Costa.

Hisham Matar 2016

Though its Pulitzer Prize was bestowed in the category of biography, Matar’s account of searching for the father he lost to a 1990 kidnapping in Cairo functions equally as absorbing detective story, personal elegy and acute portrait of doomed geopolitics — all merged, somehow, with the discipline and cinematic verve of a novel.

Liked it? Try “ A Day in the Life of Abed Salama: Anatomy of a Jerusalem Tragedy ,” by Nathan Thrall, “ House of Stone: A Memoir of Home, Family, and a Lost Middle East ,” by Anthony Shadid or “ My Father’s Fortune ,” by Michael Frayn.

The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis

Brevity, thy name is Lydia Davis. If her work has become a byword for short (nay, microdose) fiction, this collection proves why it is also hard to shake; a conflagration of odd little umami bombs — sometimes several pages, sometimes no more than a sentence — whose casual, almost careless wordsmithery defies their deadpan resonance.

Liked it? Try “ Ninety-Nine Stories of God ,” by Joy Williams or “ Tell Me: Thirty Stories ,” by Mary Robison.

Detransition, Baby

Torrey Peters 2021

Love is lost, found and reconfigured in Peters’s penetrating, darkly humorous debut novel. But when the novel’s messy triangular romance — between two trans characters and a cis-gendered woman — becomes an unlikely story about parenthood, the plot deepens, and so does its emotional resonance: a poignant and gratifyingly cleareyed portrait of found family.

Peters’s sly wit and observational genius, her ability to balance so many intimate realities, cultural forces and zeitgeisty happenings made my head spin. It got me hot, cracked me up, punched my heart with grief and understanding. I’m in awe of her abilities, and will re-read this book periodically just to remember how it’s done. — Michelle Tea, author of “Against Memoir”

Liked it? Try “ I Heard Her Call My Name: A Memoir of Transition ,” by Lucy Sante or “ Didn’t Nobody Give a Shit What Happened to Carlotta ,” by James Hannaham.

Frederick Douglass

David W. Blight 2018

It is not hard to throw a rock and hit a Great Man biography; Blight’s earns its stripes by smartly and judiciously excavating the flesh-and-bone man beneath the myth. Though Douglass famously wrote three autobiographies of his own, there turned out to be much between the lines that is illuminated here with rigor, flair and refreshing candor.

Liked it? Try “ The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family ,” by Kerri K. Greenidge or “Freedom National: The Destruction of Slavery in the United States, 1861-1865,” by James Oakes.

George Saunders 2000

An ersatz caveman languishes at a theme park; a dead maiden aunt comes back to screaming, scatological life; a bachelor barber born with no toes dreams of true love, or at least of getting his toe-nubs licked. The stories in Saunders’s second collection are profane, unsettling and patently absurd. They’re also freighted with bittersweet humanity, and rendered in language so strange and wonderful, it sings.

Liked it? Try “ Swamplandia! ,” by Karen Russell or “ Friday Black ,” by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah.

The Emperor of All Maladies

Siddhartha Mukherjee 2010

The subtitle, “A Biography of Cancer,” provides some helpful context for what lies between the covers of Mukherjee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, though it hardly conveys the extraordinary ambition and empathy of his telling, as the trained oncologist weaves together disparate strands of large-scale history, biology and devastating personal anecdote.

Liked it? Try “ Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End ,” by Atul Gawande, “ Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death, and Brain Surgery ,” by Henry Marsh or “ I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life ,” by Ed Yong.

When We Cease to Understand the World

Benjamín Labatut; translated by Adrian Nathan West 2021

You don’t have to know anything about quantum theory to start reading this book, a deeply researched, exquisitely imagined group portrait of tormented geniuses. By the end, you’ll know enough to be terrified. Labatut is interested in how the pursuit of scientific certainty can lead to, or arise from, states of extreme psychological and spiritual upheaval. His characters — Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg and Erwin Schrödinger, among others — discover a universe that defies rational comprehension. After them, “scientific method and its object could no longer be prised apart.” That may sound abstract, but in Labatut’s hands the story of quantum physics is violent, suspenseful and finally heartbreaking. — A.O. Scott

Liked it? Try “ The Rigor of Angels: Borges, Heisenberg, Kant, and the Ultimate Nature of Reality ,” by William Egginton, “ The Noise of Time ,” by Julian Barnes or “The End of Days,” by Jenny Erpenbeck; translated by Susan Bernofsky.

Hurricane Season

Fernanda Melchor; translated by Sophie Hughes 2020

Her sentences are sloping hills; her paragraphs, whole mountains. It’s no wonder that Melchor was dubbed a sort of south-of-the-border Faulkner for her baroque and often brutally harrowing tale of poverty, paranoia and murder (also: witches, or at least the idea of them) in a fictional Mexican village. When a young girl impregnated by her pedophile stepfather unwittingly lands there, her arrival is the spark that lights a tinderbox.

Liked it? Try “ Liliana’s Invincible Summer: A Sister’s Search for Justice ,” by Cristina Rivera Garza or “ Fever Dream ,” by Samanta Schweblin; translated by Megan McDowell.

John Jeremiah Sullivan 2011

When this book of essays came out, it bookended a fading genre: collected pieces written on deadline by “pulpheads,” or magazine writers. Whether it’s Sullivan’s visit to a Christian rock festival, his profile of Axl Rose or a tribute to an early American botanist, he brings to his subjects not just depth, but an open-hearted curiosity. Indeed, if this book feels as if it’s from a different time, perhaps that’s because of its generous receptivity to other ways of being, which offers both reader and subject a kind of grace.

Liked it? Try “ Sunshine State ,” by Sarah Gerard, “ Consider the Lobster ,” by David Foster Wallace or “ Yoga for People Who Can’t Be Bothered to Do It ,” by Geoff Dyer.

The Story of the Lost Child

Elena Ferrante; translated by Ann Goldstein 2015

All things, even modern literature’s most fraught female friendship, must come to an end. As the now middle-aged Elena and Lila continue the dance of envy and devotion forged in their scrappy Neapolitan youth, the conclusion of Ferrante’s four-book saga defies the laws of diminishing returns, illuminating the twined psychologies of its central pair — intractable, indelible, inseparable — in one last blast of X-ray prose.

Liked it? Try “The Years That Followed,” by Catherine Dunne or “From the Land of the Moon,” by Milena Agus; translated by Ann Goldstein.

A Manual for Cleaning Women

Lucia Berlin 2015

Berlin began writing in the 1960s, and collections of her careworn, haunted, messily alluring yet casually droll short stories were published in the 1980s and ’90s. But it wasn’t until 2015, when the best were collected into a volume called “A Manual for Cleaning Women,” that her prodigious talent was recognized. Berlin writes about harried and divorced single women, many of them in working-class jobs, with uncanny grace. She is the real deal. — Dwight Garner, book critic for The Times

“I hate to see anything lovely by myself.”

It’s so true, to me at least, and I have heard no other writer express it. — Dwight Garner

Liked it? Try “ The Flamethrowers ,” by Rachel Kushner or “ The Complete Stories ,” by Clarice Lispector; translated by Katrina Dodson.

Jon Fosse; translated by Damion Searls 2022

You may not be champing at the bit to read a seven-part, nearly 700-page novel written in a single stream-of-consciousness sentence with few paragraph breaks and two central characters with the same name. But this Norwegian masterpiece, by the winner of the 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature, is the kind of soul-cleansing work that seems to silence the cacophony of the modern world — a pair of noise-canceling headphones in book form. The narrator, a painter named Asle, drives out to visit his doppelgänger, Asle, an ailing alcoholic. Then the narrator takes a boat ride to have Christmas dinner with some friends. That, more or less, is the plot. But throughout, Fosse’s searching reflections on God, art and death are at once haunting and deeply comforting.

I had not read Fosse before he won the Nobel Prize, and I wanted to catch up. Luckily for me, the critic Merve Emre (who has championed his work) is my colleague at Wesleyan, so I asked her where to start. I was hoping for a shortcut, but she sternly told me that there was nothing to do but to read the seven-volume “Septology” translated by Damion Searls. Luckily for me, I had 30 hours of plane travel in the next week or so, and I had a Kindle.

Reading “Septology” in the cocoon of a plane was one of the great aesthetic experiences of my life. The hypnotic effects of the book were amplified by my confinement, and the paucity of distractions helped me settle into its exquisite rhythms. The repetitive patterns of Fosse’s prose made its emotional waves, when they came, so much more powerful. — Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University

Liked it? Try “ Armand V ,” by Dag Solstad; translated by Steven T. Murray.

An American Marriage

Tayari Jones 2018

Life changes in an instant for Celestial and Roy, the young Black newlyweds at the beating, uncomfortably realistic heart of Jones’s fourth novel. On a mostly ordinary night, during a hotel stay near his Louisiana hometown, Roy is accused of rape. He is then swiftly and wrongfully convicted and sentenced to 12 years in prison. The couple’s complicated future unfolds, often in letters, across two worlds. The stain of racism covers both places.

Liked it? Try “ Hello Beautiful ,” by Ann Napolitano or “ Stay with Me ,” by Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀.

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

Gabrielle Zevin 2022

The title is Shakespeare; the terrain, more or less, is video games. Neither of those bare facts telegraphs the emotional and narrative breadth of Zevin’s breakout novel, her fifth for adults. As the childhood friendship between two future game-makers blooms into a rich creative collaboration and, later, alienation, the book becomes a dazzling disquisition on art, ambition and the endurance of platonic love.

Liked it? Try “ Normal People ,” by Sally Rooney or “ Super Sad True Love Story ,” by Gary Shteyngart.

Mohsin Hamid 2017

The modern world and all its issues can feel heavy — too heavy for the fancies of fiction. Hamid’s quietly luminous novel, about a pair of lovers in a war-ravaged Middle Eastern country who find that certain doors can open portals, literally, to other lands, works in a kind of minor-key magical realism that bears its weight beautifully.

Liked it? Try “ The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida ,” by Shehan Karunatilaka or “ A Burning ,” by Megha Majumdar.

Olive Kitteridge

Elizabeth Strout 2008

When this novel-in-stories won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2009, it was a victory for crotchety, unapologetic women everywhere, especially ones who weren’t, as Olive herself might have put it, spring chickens. The patron saint of plain-spokenness — and the titular character of Strout’s 13 tales — is a long-married Mainer with regrets, hopes and a lobster boat’s worth of quiet empathy. Her small-town travails instantly became stand-ins for something much bigger, even universal.

Liked it? Try “ Tom Lake ,” by Ann Patchett or “ Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage ,” by Alice Munro.

The Passage of Power

Robert Caro 2012

The fourth volume of Caro’s epic chronicle of Lyndon Johnson’s life and times is a political biography elevated to the level of great literature. His L.B.J. is a figure of Shakespearean magnitude, whose sudden ascension from the abject humiliations of the vice presidency to the summit of political power is a turn of fortune worthy of a Greek myth. Caro makes you feel the shock of J.F.K.’s assassination, and brings you inside Johnson’s head on the blood-drenched day when his lifelong dream finally comes true. It’s an astonishing and unforgettable book. — Tom Perrotta, author of “The Leftovers”

Liked it? Try “ G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century ,” by Beverly Gage, “ King: A Life ,” by Jonathan Eig or “ American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer ,” by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin.

Secondhand Time

Svetlana Alexievich; translated by Bela Shayevich 2016

Of all the 20th century’s grand failed experiments, few came to more inglorious ends than the aspiring empire known, for a scant seven decades, as the U.S.S.R. The death of the dream of Communism reverberates through the Nobel-winning Alexievich’s oral history, and her unflinching portrait of the people who survived the Soviet state (or didn’t) — ex-prisoners, Communist Party officials, ordinary citizens of all stripes — makes for an excoriating, eye-opening read.

Liked it? Try “ Gulag ,” by Anne Applebaum or “ Is Journalism Worth Dying For? Final Dispatches ,” by Anna Politkovskaya; translated by Arch Tait.

The Copenhagen Trilogy

Tove Ditlevsen; translated by Tiina Nunnally and Michael Favala Goldman 2021

Ditlevsen’s memoirs were first published in Denmark in the 1960s and ’70s, but most English-language readers didn’t encounter them until they appeared in a single translated volume more than five decades later. The books detail Ditlevsen’s hardscrabble childhood, her flourishing early career as a poet and her catastrophic addictions, which left her wedded to a psychotic doctor and hopelessly dependent on opioids by her 30s. But her writing, however dire her circumstances, projects a breathtaking clarity and candidness, and it nails what is so inexplicable about human nature.

Liked it? Try “ The End of Eddy ,” by Édouard Louis; translated by Michael Lucey.

All Aunt Hagar’s Children

Edward P. Jones 2006

Jones’s follow-up to his Pulitzer-anointed historical novel, “The Known World,” forsakes a single narrative for 14 interconnected stories, disparate in both direction and tone. His tales of 20th-century Black life in and around Washington, D.C., are haunted by cumulative loss and touched, at times, by dark magical realism — one character meets the Devil himself in a Safeway parking lot — but girded too by loveliness, and something like hope.

“It was, I later learned about myself, as if my heart, on the path that was my life, had come to a puddle in the road and had faltered, hesitated, trying to decide whether to walk over the puddle or around it, or even to go back.”

The metaphor is right at the edge of corniness, but it's rendered with such specificity that it catches you off guard, and the temporal complexity — the way the perspective moves forward, backward and sideways in time — captures an essential truth about memory and regret. — A.O. Scott

Liked it? Try “ The Office of Historical Corrections ,” by Danielle Evans or “ Perish ,” by LaToya Watkins.

The New Jim Crow

Michelle Alexander 2010

One year into Barack Obama’s first presidential term, Alexander, a civil rights attorney and former Supreme Court clerk, peeled back the hopey-changey scrim of early-aughts America to reveal the systematic legal prejudice that still endures in a country whose biggest lie might be “with liberty and justice for all.” In doing so, her book managed to do what the most urgent nonfiction aims for but rarely achieves: change hearts, minds and even public policy.

Liked it? Try “ Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America ,” by James Forman Jr., “ America on Fire: The Untold History of Police Violence and Black Rebellion Since the 1960s ,” by Elizabeth Hinton or “ Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent ,” by Isabel Wilkerson.

Interested? Reserve it at your local library or buy it from Amazon , Apple , Barnes & Noble or Bookshop .

Sigrid Nunez 2018

After suffering the loss of an old friend and adopting his Great Dane, the book’s heroine muses on death, friendship, and the gifts and burdens of a literary life. Out of these fragments a philosophy of grief springs like a rabbit out of a hat; Nunez is a magician. — Ada Calhoun, author of “Also a Poet: Frank O’Hara, My Father, and Me”

“The Friend” is a perfect novel about the size of grief and love, and like the dog at the book’s center, the book takes up more space than you expect. It’s my favorite kind of masterpiece — one you can put into anyone’s hand. — Emma Straub, author of “This Time Tomorrow”

Liked it? Try “ Autumn ,” by Ali Smith or “ Stay True: A Memoir ,” by Hua Hsu.

Far From the Tree

Andrew Solomon 2012

In this extraordinary book — a combination of masterly reporting and vivid storytelling — Solomon examines the experience of parents raising exceptional children. I have often returned to it over the years, reading it for its depth of understanding and its illumination of the particulars that make up the fabric of family. — Meg Wolitzer, author of “The Interestings”

Liked it? Try “ Strangers to Ourselves: Unsettled Minds and the Stories That Make Us ,” by Rachel Aviv or “ NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity ,” by Steven Silberman.

We the Animals

Justin Torres 2011

The hummingbird weight of this novella — it barely tops 130 pages — belies the cherry-bomb impact of its prose. Tracing the coming-of-age of three mixed-race brothers in a derelict upstate New York town, Torres writes in the incantatory royal we of a sort of sibling wolfpack, each boy buffeted by their parents’ obscure grown-up traumas and their own enduring (if not quite unshakable) bonds.

Liked it? Try “ Shuggie Bain ,” by Douglas Stuart, “ Fire Shut Up in My Bones ,” by Charles Blow or “ On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous ,” by Ocean Vuong.

The Plot Against America

Philip Roth 2004

What if, in the 1940 presidential election, Charles Lindbergh — aviation hero, America-firster and Nazi sympathizer — had defeated Franklin Roosevelt? Specifically, what would have happened to Philip Roth, the younger son of a middle-class Jewish family in Newark, N.J.? From those counterfactual questions, the adult Roth spun a tour de force of memory and history. Ever since the 2016 election his imaginary American past has pulled closer and closer to present-day reality. — A.O. Scott

Liked it? Try “ Biography of X ,” by Catherine Lacey or “ The Netanyahus: An Account of a Minor and Ultimately Even Negligible Episode in the History of a Very Famous Family ,” by Joshua Cohen.

The Great Believers

Rebecca Makkai 2018

It’s mid-1980s Chicago, and young men — beautiful, recalcitrant boys, full of promise and pure life force — are dying, felled by a strange virus. Makkai’s recounting of a circle of friends who die one by one, interspersed with a circa-2015 Parisian subplot, is indubitably an AIDS story, but one that skirts po-faced solemnity and cliché at nearly every turn: a bighearted, deeply generous book whose resonance echoes across decades of loss and liberation.

Liked it? Try “ The Interestings ,” by Meg Wolitzer, “ A Little Life ,” by Hanya Yanagihara or “ The Emperor’s Children ,” by Claire Messud.

Mary Gaitskill 2005

Set primarily in a 1980s New York crackling with brittle glamour and real menace, “Veronica” is, on the face of it, the story of two very different women — the fragile former model Alison and the older, harder Veronica, fueled by fury and frustrated intelligence. It's a fearless, lacerating book, scornful of pieties and with innate respect for the reader’s intelligence and adult judgment.

Liked it? Try “ The Quick and the Dead ,” by Joy Williams, “ Look at Me ,” by Jennifer Egan or “ Lightning Field ,” by Dana Spiotta.

Ben Lerner 2014

How closely does Ben Lerner, the very clever author of “10:04,” overlap with its unnamed narrator, himself a poet-novelist who bears a remarkable resemblance to the man pictured on its biography page? Definitive answers are scant in this metaphysical turducken of a novel, which is nominally about the attempts of a Brooklyn author, burdened with a hefty publishing advance, to finish his second book. But the delights of Lerner’s shimmering self-reflexive prose, lightly dusted with photographs and illustrations, are endless.

“Shaving is a way to start the workday by ritually not cutting your throat when you’ve the chance.”

“10:04” is filled with sentences that cut this close to the bone. Comedy blends with intimations of the darkest aspects of our natures, and of everyday life. Who can shave anymore without recalling this “Sweeney Todd”-like observation? — Dwight Garner

Liked it? Try “ The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. ,” by Adelle Waldman, “ Open City ,” by Teju Cole or “ How Should a Person Be? ,” by Sheila Heti.

Demon Copperhead

Barbara Kingsolver 2022

In transplanting “David Copperfield” from Victorian England to modern-day Appalachia, Kingsolver gives the old Dickensian magic her own spin. She reminds us that a novel can be wildly entertaining — funny, profane, sentimental, suspenseful — and still have a social conscience. And also that the injustices Dickens railed against are still very much with us: old poison in new bottles. — A.O. Scott

Liked it? Try “ James ,” by Percival Everett or “ The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store ,” by James McBride.

Kiese Laymon 2018

What is the psychic weight of secrets and lies? In his unvarnished memoir, Laymon explores the cumulative mass of a past that has brought him to this point: his Blackness; his fraught relationship to food; his family, riven by loss and addiction and, in his mother’s case, a kind of pathological perfectionism. What emerges is a work of raw emotional power and fierce poetry.

Liked it? Try “ Men We Reaped ,” by Jesmyn Ward or “ Another Word for Love ,” by Carvell Wallace.

Jeffrey Eugenides 2002

Years before pronouns became the stuff of dinner-table debates and email signatures, “Middlesex” offered the singular gift of an intersex hero — “sing now, O Muse, of the recessive mutation on my fifth chromosome!” — whose otherwise fairly ordinary Midwestern life becomes a radiant lens on recent history, from the burning of Smyrna to the plush suburbia of midcentury Grosse Pointe, Mich. When the teenage Calliope, born to doting Greek American parents, learns that she is not in fact a budding young lesbian but biologically male, it’s less science than assiduously buried family secrets that tell the improbable, remarkable tale.

Liked it? Try “ The Nix ,” by Nathan Hill, “ The Heart’s Invisible Furies ,” by John Boyne or “ The Signature of All Things ,” by Elizabeth Gilbert.

Hua Hsu 2022

An unlikely college friendship — Ken loves preppy polo shirts and Pearl Jam, Hua prefers Xeroxed zines and Pavement — blossoms in 1990s Berkeley, then is abruptly fissured by Ken’s murder in a random carjacking. Around those bare facts, Hsu’s understated memoir builds a glimmering fortress of memory in which youth and identity live alongside terrible, senseless loss.

Liked it? Try “ Truth & Beauty: A Friendship ,” by Ann Patchett, “ The Best Minds: A Story of Friendship, Madness, and the Tragedy of Good Intentions ,” by Jonathan Rosen or “ Just Kids ,” by Patti Smith.

Nickel and Dimed

Barbara Ehrenreich 2001

Waitress, hotel maid, cleaning woman, retail clerk: Ehrenreich didn’t just report on these low-wage jobs; she actually worked them, trying to construct a life around merciless managers and wildly unpredictable schedules, while also getting paid a pittance for it. Through it all, Ehrenreich combined a profound sense of moral outrage with self-deprecating candor and bone-dry wit. — Jennifer Szalai, nonfiction book critic for The Times

Liked it? Try “ Poverty, by America ,” by Matthew Desmond or “ The Working Poor: Invisible in America ,” by David K. Shipler.

The Flamethrowers

Rachel Kushner 2013

Motorcycle racing across the arid salt flats of Utah; art-star posturing in the downtown demimonde of 1970s New York; anarchist punk collectives and dappled villas in Italy: It’s all connected (if hardly contained) in Kushner’s brash, elastic chronicle of a would-be artist nicknamed Reno whose lust for experience often outstrips both sense and sentiment. The book’s ambitions rise to meet her, a churning bedazzlement of a novel whose unruly engine thrums and roars.

Liked it? Try “ City on Fire ,” by Garth Risk Hallberg or “ The Girls ,” by Emma Cline.

The Looming Tower

Lawrence Wright 2006

What happened in New York City one incongruously sunny morning in September was never, of course, the product of some spontaneous plan. Wright’s meticulous history operates as a sort of panopticon on the events leading up to that fateful day, spanning more than five decades and a geopolitical guest list that includes everyone from the counterterrorism chief of the F.B.I. to the anonymous foot soldiers of Al Qaeda.

Liked it? Try “ Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 ,” by Steve Coll or “ MBS: The Rise to Power of Mohammed bin Salman ,” by Ben Hubbard.

Tenth of December

George Saunders 2013

For all of their linguistic invention and anarchic glee, Saunders’s stories are held together by a strict understanding of the form and its requirements. Take plot: In “Tenth of December,” his fourth and best collection, readers will encounter an abduction, a rape, a chemically induced suicide, the suppressed rage of a milquetoast or two, a veteran’s post-­traumatic impulse to burn down his mother’s house — all of it buffeted by gusts of such merriment and tender regard and daffy good cheer that you realize only in retrospect how dark these morality tales really are.

Nobody writes like George Saunders. He has cultivated a genuinely original voice, one that is hilarious and profound, tender and monstrous, otherworldly and deeply familiar, much like the American psyche itself. With each of these stories, you feel in the hands of a master — because you are. — Matthew Desmond, author of “Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City”

Liked it? Try “Delicate Edible Birds: And Other Stories,” by Lauren Groff, “ Oblivion: Stories ,” by David Foster Wallace or “ The Nimrod Flipout: Stories ,” by Etgar Keret, translated by Miriam Shlesinger and Sondra Silverston.

Alice Munro 2004

On one level, the title of Munro’s 11th short-story collection refers to a pet goat that goes missing from its owners’ property; but — this being Munro — the deeper reference is to an unhappy wife in the same story, who dreams of leaving her husband someday. Munro’s stories are like that, with shadow meanings and resonant echoes, as if she has struck a chime and set the reverberations down in writing.

Liked it? Try “ Homesickness ,” by Colin Barrett or “ The Collected Stories of Lorrie Moore .”

Train Dreams

Denis Johnson 2011

Call it a backwoods tragedy, stripped to the bone, or a spare requiem for the American West: Johnson’s lean but potent novella carves its narrative from the forests and dust-bowl valleys of Spokane in the early decades of the 20th century, following a day laborer named Robert Grainier as he processes the sudden loss of his young family and bears witness to the real-time formation of a raw, insatiable nation.

Liked it? Try “ That Old Ace in the Hole ,” by Annie Proulx or “ Night Boat to Tangier ,” by Kevin Barry.

Life After Life

Kate Atkinson 2013

Can we get life “right”? Are there choices that would lead, finally, to justice or happiness or save us from pain? Atkinson wrestles with these questions in her brilliant “Life After Life” — a historical novel, a speculative novel, a tale of time travel, a moving portrait of life before, during and in the aftermath of war. It gobbles up genres and blends them together until they become a single, seamless work of art. I love this goddamn book. — Victor LaValle, author of “Lone Women”

“‘Fox Corner — that’s what we should call the house. No one else has a house with that name and shouldn’t that be the point?’

‘Really?’ Hugh said doubtfully. ‘It’s a little whimsical, isn’t it? It sounds like a children’s story. The House at Fox Corner. ’

‘A little whimsy never hurt anyone.’

‘Strictly speaking, though,’ Hugh said, ‘can a house be a corner? Isn’t it at one?’

So this is marriage, Sylvie thought.”

“Her brilliant ear. Her humor. Her openness. Her peculiar gifts. Some of her books are perfect. The rest are merely superb.” — Amy Bloom

Liked it? Try “Light Perpetual,” by Francis Spufford or “ Neverhome ,” by Laird Hunt.

Hernan Diaz 2022

How many ways can you tell the same story? Which one is true? These questions and their ethical implications hover over Diaz’s second novel. It starts out as a tale of wealth and power in 1920s New York — something Theodore Dreiser or Edith Wharton might have taken up — and leaps forward in time, across the boroughs and down the social ladder, breathing new vitality into the weary tropes of historical fiction. — A.O. Scott

Be prepared for some serious mind games! Set in New York City in the 1920s and ’30s, the story of a Manhattan financier and his high-society wife is told through four “books” — a novel, a manuscript, a memoir and a journal. But which version should you trust? Is there even one true reality?

As we sift our way through these competing narratives, Diaz serves us clues and red herrings in equal measure. We know we are being gamed, but we’re not sure exactly which character is gaming us. While each reader will draw their own conclusion when they reach the end of this complex and thrilling book, what is never disputed is the ease with which money and power can bend reality itself. — Dua Lipa, singer and songwriter behind the Service95 Book Club

Liked it? Try “ This Strange Eventful History ,” by Claire Messud or “ The Luminaries ,” by Eleanor Catton.

The Vegetarian

Han Kang; translated by Deborah Smith 2016

One ordinary day, a young housewife in contemporary Seoul wakes up from a disturbing dream and simply decides to … stop eating meat. As her small rebellion spirals, Han’s lean, feverish novel becomes a surreal meditation on not just what the body needs, but what a soul demands.

“I want to swallow you, have you melt into me and flow through my veins.”

“The Vegetarian” is a short novel with a mysterious, otherworldly air. It feels haunted, oppressive … It’s a story about hungers and starvation and desire, and how these become intertwined.” — Silvia Moreno-Garcia, author of “Mexican Gothic”

Liked it? Try “ My Year of Rest and Relaxation ,” by Ottessa Moshfegh or “ Convenience Store Woman ,” by Sayaka Murata; translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori.

Marjane Satrapi 2003

Drawn in stark black-and-white panels, Satrapi’s graphic novel is a moving account of her early life in Iran during the Islamic Revolution and her formative years abroad in Europe. The first of its two parts details the impacts of war and theocracy on both her family and her community: torture, death on the battlefield, constant raids, supply shortages and a growing black market. Part 2 chronicles her rebellious, traumatic years as a teenager in Vienna, as well as her return to a depressingly restrictive Tehran. Devastating — but also formally inventive, inspiring and often funny — “Persepolis” is a model of visual storytelling and personal narrative.

Liked it? Try “ https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/19/books/review/martyr-kaveh-akbar.html '>Martyr! ,” by Kaveh Akbar or “ Disoriental ,” by Négar Djavadi; translated by Tina Kover.

Toni Morrison 2008

Mercies are few and far between in Morrison’s ninth novel, set on the remote colonial land of a 17th-century farmer amid his various slaves and indentured servants (even the acquisition of a wife, imported from England, is strictly transactional). Disease runs rampant and children die needlessly; inequity is everywhere. And yet! The Morrison magic, towering and magisterial, endures.

Liked it? Try “ Year of Wonders ,” by Geraldine Brooks or “ The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois ,” by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers.

The Goldfinch

Donna Tartt 2013

For a time, it seemed as if Tartt’s vaunted 1992 debut, “The Secret History,” might be her only legacy, a once-in-a-career comet zinging across the literary sky. Then, more than a decade after the coolish reception to her 2002 follow-up, “The Little Friend,” came “The Goldfinch” — a coming-of-age novel as narratively rich and riveting as the little bird in the Dutch painting it takes its title from is small and humble. That 13-year-old Theo Decker survives the museum bombing that kills his mother is a minor miracle; the tiny, priceless souvenir he inadvertently grabs from the rubble becomes both a talisman and an albatross in this heady, haunted symphony of a novel.

Liked it? Try “ Freedom ,” by Jonathan Franzen or “ Demon Copperhead ,” by Barbara Kingsolver.

The Argonauts

Maggie Nelson 2015

Call it a memoir if you must, but this is a book about the necessity — and also the thrill, the terror, the risk and reward — of defying categories. Nelson is a poet and critic, well versed in pop culture and cultural theory. The text she interprets here is her own body. An account of her pregnancy, her relationship with the artist Harry Dodge and the early stages of motherhood, “The Argonauts” explores queer identity, gender politics and the meaning of family. What makes Nelson such a valuable writer is her willingness to follow the sometimes contradictory rhythms of her own thinking in prose that is sharp, supple and disarmingly heartfelt. — A.O. Scott

Liked it? Try “My 1980s and Other Essays,” by Wayne Koestenbaum, “ No One Is Talking About This ,” by Patricia Lockwood or “ On Immunity ,” by Eula Biss.

The Fifth Season

N.K. Jemisin 2015

“The Fifth Season” weaves its story in polyphonic voice, utilizing a clever story structure to move deftly through generational time. Jemisin delivers this bit of high craft in a fresh, unstuffy voice — something rare in high fantasy, which can take its Tolkien roots too seriously. From its heartbreaking opening (a mother’s murdered child) to its shattering conclusion, Jemisin shows the power of what good fantasy fiction can do. “The Fifth Season” explores loss, grief and personhood on an intimate level. But it also takes on themes of discrimination, human breeding and ecological collapse with an unflinching eye and a particular nuance. Jemisin weaves a world both horrifyingly familiar and unsettlingly alien. — Rebecca Roanhorse, author of “Mirrored Heavens”

Liked it? Try “ American War ,” by Omar El Akkad or “ The Year of the Flood ,” by Margaret Atwood.

Tony Judt 2005

By the time this book was published in 2005, there had already been innumerable volumes covering Europe’s history since the end of World War II. Yet none of them were quite like Judt’s: commanding and capacious, yet also attentive to those stubborn details that are so resistant to abstract theories and seductive myths. The writing, like the thinking, is clear, direct and vivid. And even as Judt was ruthless when reflecting on Europe’s past, he maintained a sense of contingency throughout, never succumbing to the comfortable certainty of despair. — Jennifer Szalai

Liked it? Try “ We Don’t Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Ireland ,” by Fintan O’Toole, “ Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin ,” by Timothy D. Snyder or “ To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918 ,” by Adam Hochschild.

A Brief History of Seven Killings

Marlon James 2014

“Brief”? For a work spanning nearly 700 pages, that word is, at best, a winky misdirection. To skip even a paragraph, though, would be to forgo the vertiginous pleasures of James’s semi-historical novel, in which the attempted assassination of an unnamed reggae superstar who strongly resembles Bob Marley collides with C.I.A. conspiracy, international drug cartels and the vibrant, violent Technicolor of post-independence Jamaica.

Liked it? Try “ Telex From Cuba ,” by Rachel Kushner or “ Brief Encounters With Che Guevara ,” by Ben Fountain.

Small Things Like These

Claire Keegan 2021

Not a word is wasted in Keegan’s small, burnished gem of a novel, a sort of Dickensian miniature centered on the son of an unwed mother who has grown up to become a respectable coal and timber merchant with a family of his own in 1985 Ireland. Moralistically, though, it might as well be the Middle Ages as he reckons with the ongoing sins of the Catholic Church and the everyday tragedies wrought by repression, fear and rank hypocrisy.

This is the book I would like to have written because its sentences portray a life — in all its silences, subtleties and defenses — that I would hope to live if its circumstances were mine. It’s never idle, I guess, to be asked what we would give up for another. — Claudia Rankine, author of “Citizen”

Liked it? Try “ The Rachel Incident ,” by Caroline O’Donoghue or “ Mothers and Sons ,” by Colm Tóibín.

See you tomorrow for books 40 -21 . Every day this week, the Book Review will unveil 20 more books on our Best Books of the 21st Century list. You can get notified when they’re up — and hear about book reviews, news and features each week — when you receive the Book Review’s newsletter. Sign up here.

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Methodology

In collaboration with the Upshot — the department at The Times focused on data and analytical journalism — the Book Review sent a survey to hundreds of novelists, nonfiction writers, academics, book editors, journalists, critics, publishers, poets, translators, booksellers, librarians and other literary luminaries, asking them to pick their 10 best books of the 21st century.

We let them each define “best” in their own way. For some, this simply meant “favorite.” For others, it meant books that would endure for generations.

The only rules: Any book chosen had to be published in the United States, in English, on or after Jan. 1, 2000. (Yes, translations counted!)

After casting their ballots, respondents were given the option to answer a series of prompts where they chose their preferred book between two randomly selected titles. We combined data from these prompts with the vote tallies to create the list of the top 100 books.

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