TED-Ed’s categorized list of 40 books is eclectic and worth a look.  For example, Art and History (Ways of Seeing, by John Berger); Biography (e.g., The Last Lecture, by Randy Pausch); The Classics (including Hemingway and James Joyce); English and Writing (e.g., The Mother Tongue: English and how it got that way, by Bill Bryson); and many more, from History to Books by our Educators.