A critical tech reading list for winter 2026

Last summer I had an admission to make: I’d only read eight books so far in the year! I was not proud of it. But I wanted to get a better total by the end of the year. While I didn’t hit my usual goal of 52 books a year, I did achieve a respectable 21. I hope you had a successful reading year too!

A lot of those books were, admittedly, for work. Some of my favorites were Empire of AI by Karen Hao and Mood Machine by Liz Pelly. But I also found The House of Huawei by Eva Dou fascinating because it was about a company I don’t know nearly enough about. There were also some older books in there, like The Silicon Valley of Dreams by David Naguib Pellow and Lisa Sun-Hee Park, which I meant to write a commentary on but just haven’t had the time. Maybe I’ll get to it this year!

On the more personal side, one of the books I was really intrigued by was Empire of the Elite by Michael M. Grynbaum, about the Conde Nast magazine empire. It ended a bit abruptly without the extent of assessment I would have liked, but the history was really interesting to read — a window into a very different time in media. I’d also recommend Exhalation by Ted Chiang and ended my year by picking up The Lord of the Rings in French for some language practice.

Anyway, my own reading habits aside, there are plenty of tech books coming out over the next few months that have piqued my attention. I’ve included 11 of them on this list that I thought you might want to check out.

These lists of forthcoming books are a special perk for paid subscribers. You can find previous ones on our reading list page, along with a list of recommended reads that’s available to anyone.

Have a great winter! (Or summer, if you on the other side of the equator!)

— Paris