The short answer
- Best for someone who loves ideas: Logicomix by Apostolos Doxiadis and Christos Papadimitriou (2009). A graphic novel about Bertrand Russell's hunt for the foundations of mathematics, and clever people rarely own it.
- Best for a history reader: The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan (2015). It moves the centre of world history to Persia and Central Asia, and the rest of their shelf reads differently afterwards.
- Best for a word nerd: The Etymologicon by Mark Forsyth (2011). One long chain of word histories that loops back to where it started.
- Best for a science reader: What If? by Randall Munroe (2014). Absurd questions answered with real physics by the author of xkcd.
- Best for a puzzle person: a year of Brilliant, the interactive maths and science lessons app. Short problems that fit into a commute.
- A gift that lasts all year: 365 Days of Philosophy. 130+ thinkers at a page a day, Socrates to Sartre in order, starting January 1.
Below, the picks for each kind of curiosity, then the daily books that cover a field in a year. All 12 are in one table at the end.
For the ideas person
Logicomix is a comic about the foundations of mathematics, which sounds like a dare. It follows Bertrand Russell's attempt to put all of maths on solid logical ground, and the people (Wittgenstein and Gödel among them) who made that harder.
A philosophy reader has read Russell. They almost certainly haven't read him drawn in ink. Gifts for philosophy lovers has 11 more.
For the history reader
The Silk Roads (2015) by Peter Frankopan puts Persia and Central Asia at the centre of the map and tells world history from there. Someone raised on European history comes out of it with their shelf rearranged.
The non-book pick is a membership to the museum they visit anyway. Members usually get free entry and first booking for the big exhibitions, and they'll go more often once it's paid for.
If they love one period, gifts for history buffs sorts books by era.
For the word person
The Etymologicon (2011) by Mark Forsyth is one long chain. Every chapter follows a connection out of the one before, and the last page arrives back where the book began.
It's the book they'll quote at dinner, and for once the pub fact will be correct.
For the science reader
What If? (2014) by Randall Munroe answers absurd questions with real physics and stick figures. One asks what happens if you try to hit a baseball pitched at 90% of the speed of light. The stadium doesn't survive the answer.
There's a sequel, What If? 2 (2022), for anyone who owns the first.
For the puzzle person
Brilliant is an app and website of short interactive lessons in maths and science. A year of it gives a puzzle person something to chew on in a queue.
On paper, The Moscow Puzzles by Boris Kordemsky, edited in English by Martin Gardner, is a Soviet collection of hundreds of maths puzzles. It suits someone who does the hard crossword in pen.
For someone curious about how the mind works
Being You (2021) by Anil Seth, a neuroscientist at the University of Sussex, argues that what you perceive is a controlled hallucination: the brain's best guess about what's out there. It's the most readable recent book on consciousness.
Gödel, Escher, Bach (1979) by Douglas Hofstadter is the big one, over 700 pages on how a mind might come out of meaningless symbols. It won the Pulitzer. Give it to someone with a long January ahead.
A gift that lasts all year
A page-a-day book is a subscription that arrives all at once: 365 small openings, starting January 1. Give it in December and it's in use a week later.
365 Days of Philosophy gives a page each to 130+ thinkers, Socrates to Sartre. The order is chronological, so the ideas build on each other through the year. ★4.5 across 233 Amazon ratings.
365 Days of World History does the same for the human story, ancient empires to modern times, with 1,000+ facts along the way. ★4.5 across 61 Amazon ratings.
The generalist's version is The Intellectual Devotional (2006) by David S. Kidder and Noah D. Oppenheim. It rotates 7 subjects by day of the week, history on Mondays through religion on Sundays.
365 Days of Philosophy and 365 Days of World History are the wrong gift for a specialist, because a single page on Kant is short for someone writing a thesis on him. The free daily philosophy email sends the same one-page format each morning if you'd like to read a few before buying. The full daily reader comparison has the rest of the shelf.
All 12 at a glance
| Kind of curiosity | The gift | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| Ideas | Logicomix · Apostolos Doxiadis and Christos Papadimitriou (2009) | Bertrand Russell and the foundations of mathematics, as a graphic novel. |
| History | The Silk Roads · Peter Frankopan (2015) | World history with Central Asia at the centre. Rearranges the rest of the shelf. |
| History | A museum membership | Free entry all year to the place they visit anyway. |
| Words | The Etymologicon · Mark Forsyth (2011) | A chain of word histories that ends where it started. |
| Science | What If? · Randall Munroe (2014) | Absurd questions answered with real physics and stick figures. |
| Puzzles | A year of Brilliant | Interactive maths and science problems, a few minutes at a time. |
| Puzzles | The Moscow Puzzles · Boris Kordemsky, edited by Martin Gardner | Hundreds of classic maths puzzles. Pencil required. |
| The mind | Being You · Anil Seth (2021) | A neuroscientist on perception as the brain's best guess. |
| The mind | Gödel, Escher, Bach · Douglas Hofstadter (1979) | The Pulitzer-winning doorstop about how minds come out of symbols. |
| A gift that lasts all year | 365 Days of Philosophy · ours | 130+ thinkers, one page a day, Socrates to Sartre. ★4.5 across 233 Amazon ratings. |
| A gift that lasts all year | 365 Days of World History · ours | Ancient empires to modern times at a page a day, with 1,000+ facts. ★4.5 across 61 Amazon ratings. |
| A gift that lasts all year | The Intellectual Devotional · David S. Kidder and Noah D. Oppenheim (2006) | 7 subjects on rotation, one for each day of the week. |
If you're late
Send a Kindle book. On the Amazon page for a Kindle edition, the "Buy for others" button takes their email and a delivery date, and it arrives on Christmas morning.
For more by subject, see philosophy books for beginners and world history books for beginners. The holiday book gift guide covers everyone else on your list.
Common questions
What do you get someone who is really smart?
A book from next to their field. A philosophy reader gets Logicomix, a history reader gets The Silk Roads, a word person gets The Etymologicon. For someone curious about everything, a page-a-day book such as 365 Days of Philosophy covers a new thinker every morning from January 1.
What are good gifts for intellectuals that aren't books?
A year of Brilliant for maths and science puzzles, or a membership to a museum they already visit. Both get used all year.
What is a good book for someone who has read everything?
Something in a form they don't usually read. Logicomix tells a maths story as a graphic novel, and Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter is a Pulitzer-winning puzzle of a book about how minds work. Both are books clever people recommend and forget to buy.
Is The Intellectual Devotional a good gift?
Yes, for a generalist. It rotates 7 subjects by day of the week, so no single subject goes deep. For one subject all year, 365 Days of Philosophy and 365 Days of World History each follow a single timeline from January 1.
What is a good gift for a curious person with no time to read?
A page-a-day book, since each reading takes 2 to 5 minutes. 365 Days of Philosophy, 365 Days of World History and The Intellectual Devotional all start on January 1. The daily reader comparison has more.