"Sometimes I think I've figured out some order in the universe, but then I find myself in Florida." Follow Susan Orlean—who you may know from her bestselling work The Library Book on her investigative journey through the world of orchid-collecting, a surprisingly high-stakes environment. This true story about plants, passion, and justice also inspired the feature-length film Adaptation.

On April 29, 1986, a fire consumed part of the Los Angeles Public Library, destroying four hundred thousand books and damaging seven hundred thousand more. All these years later, it remained a mystery as to whether someone purposefully set the fire and, if so, who did it. Staff reporter for the New Yorker Susan Orlean puts her considerable talent toward unearthing the culprit, while also providing a deep dive into libraries and librarianship. It’s as much a love letter to books and the institutions that provide access to them as it is an account of arson and LA history.

“Writers on writing” is a big theme this fall, and this memoir about Orlean’s life and work is a standout. Orlean built her career writing books and longform pieces focused on quiet lives that, as she puts it, are nevertheless “shimmering and gorgeous and worth talking about.” She relishes introducing her readers to fascinating stories that are hiding in plain sight, or that will make her readers say, Wow! Who knew? Joyride details the life experiences that spurred her to develop the engaged curiosity necessary to do this kind of writing well, as well as how she researches and writes stories that don’t have flashy subjects but have readers hanging on every word from the first line. Now I’m hungry to read more of her work—and to watch Adaptation.