Author Guide · Nonfiction
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In 1998 Andrew Solomon published an article in The New Yorker about his own depression, and it grew into a book. The Noonday Demon (2001) mixes his breakdowns with interviews with patients, doctors, researchers and drug developers, and it won the National Book Award. His next big book took about ten years and more than 300 families: Far from the Tree (2012), about parents whose children are deaf, autistic, schizophrenic, prodigies or otherwise very unlike them. Born in New York in 1963, he is also a novelist, a reporter from Moscow to Kabul, a former president of PEN America and a professor of clinical psychology at Columbia. This guide covers his five key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 5 key books · 1991–2016 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Andrew Solomon has written five books: The Irony Tower (1991), the novel A Stone Boat (1994), The Noonday Demon (2001), Far from the Tree (2012) and Far and Away (2016). Start with The Noonday Demon, his National Book Award winner on depression; Far from the Tree applies the same mix of reporting and memoir to parents and children.
Where to Start with Andrew Solomon
If you want his defining book
→ The Noonday Demon (2001) — depression, from his own breakdowns to the science and politics.
If you want the book about families
→ Far from the Tree (2012) — parents raising children very different from themselves.
If you want his reporting from abroad
→ Far and Away (2016) — twenty-five years of dispatches from seven continents.
If you want his fiction
→ A Stone Boat (1994) — his only novel, about a son and his dying mother.
5 Andrew Solomon Books, in Order
The Irony Tower
Solomon was in Moscow for the 1988 Sotheby’s auction that introduced a generation of unofficial Soviet artists to the West, and ended up living among them, including in the artists’ squat on Furmanny Lane. The book follows figures such as Konstantin Zvezdochetov, Vadim Zakharov and Dmitri Prigov through the perestroika years, at home and abroad. A Russian edition appeared in 2013.
A Stone Boat
His only novel. Harry, a successful young concert pianist, goes to Paris to confront his mother about her disapproval of his homosexuality and learns that she is terminally ill. The book follows her illness, his affairs, including one with a long-time female friend, and the love between mother and son. It was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times first fiction award.
The Noonday Demon
A study of depression that grew out of his 1998 New Yorker article. Solomon describes his own breakdowns and treatment, then widens out to interviews with patients, doctors, researchers, politicians and pharmaceutical scientists, covering treatments, suicide, addiction, poverty, history and depression in other cultures. It won the 2001 National Book Award for Nonfiction, was a finalist for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize, and a later edition added a chapter on new treatments.
Far from the Tree
Built on interviews with more than 300 families over about ten years, the book looks at parents whose children have what Solomon calls “horizontal” identities: deafness, dwarfism, Down syndrome, autism, schizophrenia or severe disabilities, as well as prodigies, children conceived in rape, children who commit crimes and transgender children. Besides the National Book Critics Circle Award it won the Wellcome Book Prize in 2014. A documentary of the same name, directed by Rachel Dretzin, was released in 2018.
Far and Away
A quarter-century of essays and dispatches from seven continents, often from places in upheaval: Moscow during the 1991 coup, Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban, Myanmar during its uneven opening. Solomon connects the reporting to his own life. It was a New York Times Notable Book of 2016 and was reissued in 2017 as Far and Away: How Travel Can Change the World.
In What Order to Read Andrew Solomon
None of the books depends on another, so you can read by subject. The two long books, The Noonday Demon and Far from the Tree, are the core of his work and share a method: his own experience at the start, then hundreds of interviews.
Read The Noonday Demon first, because Far from the Tree picks up where it ends, with Solomon’s own identity as a gay man and, by the end, as a father. Far and Away collects the reporting that runs alongside both, including the Moscow years that produced The Irony Tower.
A reading path
1. The Noonday Demon (2001)
2. Far from the Tree (2012)
3. Far and Away (2016)
4. A Stone Boat (1994)
5. The Irony Tower (1991)
Other Editions
Beyond the 5 key books: 1 more, grouped by kind.
Open a group with the + to see every book in it.
Adaptations of his own books
1
1 book · 2017
- 2017Far from the Tree: Young Adult Editionan abridged edition of the 2012 book for younger readers
The years · 1963–2015
Quick facts about Andrew Solomon
- Known for
- Andrew Solomon is known for writing about depression, identity and family by combining his own experience with hundreds of interviews.
- 1963
- Born in Manhattan, New York
- 1991
- The Irony Tower
- 2015
- President of PEN American Center
- Born
- 30 October 1963, Manhattan, New York
- Education
- Yale (BA, 1985); Jesus College, Cambridge (MA); PhD in psychology, Cambridge (2013)
- Teaches
- Professor of clinical psychology, Columbia University Medical Center
- PEN
- President of PEN American Center, 2015–2018
- Family
- Married to the journalist John Habich; father of two
- Honours
- National Book Award (2001), National Book Critics Circle Award (2012), Wellcome Book Prize (2014)
The red mark is 2001: The Noonday Demon, his National Book Award-winning book on depression.
How Andrew Solomon Writes: Memoir Plus Hundreds of Interviews
Each of his big books starts from his own life. The Noonday Demon opens with his breakdowns and treatment; Far from the Tree opens with his mother discovering, when he was two, that he was dyslexic, and with his parents’ later struggle to accept that he was gay. The personal chapters are there to get the reader inside the subject, not to stay there.
Then he widens out on a very large scale. The Noonday Demon draws on patients, doctors, researchers, politicians and drug developers; Far from the Tree rests on more than 300 families and about ten years of work. He lets the people he interviews describe their own lives at length, and the same habit runs through his reporting from Moscow, Afghanistan and Myanmar.
The central idea of Far from the Tree is the difference between “vertical” identities passed from parent to child, such as ethnicity, nationality and language, and “horizontal” ones a child does not share with the parents. He keeps science, history and personal testimony on the same page, which is why his books are read by patients, parents and clinicians alike.
Watch
Depression, the secret we share
Solomon talks at TEDxMet in October 2013 about his own depression and the people around the world who told him theirs while he wrote The Noonday Demon.
Frequently asked questions about Andrew Solomon’s books
How many books has Andrew Solomon written?
Five: The Irony Tower (1991), A Stone Boat (1994), The Noonday Demon (2001), Far from the Tree (2012) and Far and Away (2016). There is also a young adult edition of Far from the Tree (2017).
What are Andrew Solomon’s books in order?
The Irony Tower: Soviet Artists in a Time of Glasnost (1991), A Stone Boat (1994), The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression (2001), Far from the Tree: Parents, Children, and the Search for Identity (2012) and Far and Away: Reporting from the Brink of Change (2016).
Where should I start with Andrew Solomon?
With The Noonday Demon, his book on depression. If you are more interested in parenting and identity, start with Far from the Tree instead; the two can be read in either order.
What is Andrew Solomon’s most famous book?
The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression (2001), which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction and was a finalist for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize. In 2019 The Guardian placed it 23rd in its list of the 100 best books of the 21st century.
What is Far from the Tree about?
Parents whose children are very different from them: deaf, dwarfs, with Down syndrome, autism, schizophrenia or severe disabilities, prodigies, conceived in rape, convicted of crimes or transgender. Solomon interviewed more than 300 families over about ten years. The UK edition is subtitled A Dozen Kinds of Love.
Has Far from the Tree been made into a film?
Yes. Rachel Dretzin’s documentary Far from the Tree premiered at DOC NYC in November 2017 and was released in 2018. It follows several families, including a man with Down syndrome, a couple with dwarfism and the father of a teenager who killed a child.
What prizes has Andrew Solomon won?
The National Book Award for The Noonday Demon (2001), and the National Book Critics Circle Award (2012) and Wellcome Book Prize (2014) for Far from the Tree, among others. The Noonday Demon was also a Pulitzer Prize finalist.
Did Andrew Solomon write a novel?
Yes, one: A Stone Boat (1994), about a concert pianist whose mother is dying of cancer. It was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times first fiction award.
Is Andrew Solomon a psychologist?
He holds a PhD in psychology from Cambridge (2013) and is a professor of clinical psychology at Columbia University Medical Center, but he is a writer first, not a practising clinician. His TED talk on depression from 2013 has been played more than 13 million times on TED’s site.
Is Andrew Solomon still alive?
Yes. He was born on 30 October 1963 in Manhattan and lives in New York with his husband, the journalist John Habich, and their son.
Footnotes
- Andrew Solomon — Wikipedia
- The Noonday Demon — Wikipedia
- Far from the Tree wins the Wellcome Book Prize 2014 — Wellcome
- The Irony Tower — Garage Museum of Contemporary Art
- A Stone Boat — Simon & Schuster
- Depression, the secret we share — TED
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“Depression is the flaw in love.”
— Andrew Solomon, The Noonday Demon (2001), the first line of the book
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