Elizabeth Gilbert

Photo: Vallery Jean/FilmMagic/Getty Images

Elizabeth Gilbert
What book is on your nightstand now?

Rome, by Robert Hughes. Though I'm finding it challenging to read about Rome without immediately wanting to run away to Rome.
lena dunham

Photo: Jason LaVeris/FilmMagic/Getty Images

Lena Dunham
What book is on your nightstand now?

Right now I'm looking right at Mary Gaitskill's Bad Behavior; the new Diane Keaton autobiography; Having It All, by Helen Gurley Brown; and, The Consolations of Philosophy, by Alain de Botton—all in various states of having-been-read-ness.
Emma Thompson

Photo: Michael Tran/FilmMagic/Getty Images

Emma Thompson
What book is on your nightstand now?

Mary Poppins, by P. L. Travers, Dancing to the Precipice, by Caroline Moorehead and Bring Up the Bodies, by Hilary Mantel. I've always got two or three with me while on-the-go.
Arnold Schwarzenegger

Photo: Karwai Tang/WireImage/Getty Images

Arnold Schwarzenegger
What book is on your nightstand now?

Right now I'm reading a book called Incognito, by David Eagleman, about the human brain. I've always been interested in psychology, so learning about the things that influence our thinking is really important for me. In bodybuilding, I was known for psyching out my opponents with mind tricks. I wish I had had this book then because the stuff I was doing was Mickey Mouse compared with what's in this book.
Ira Glass

Photo: Steve Mack/FilmMagic/Getty Images

Ira Glass
What book is on your nightstand now?

Everything I'm reading right now is homework of one sort or another. That's pretty typical. I'm jumping around like a grad student, writing a paper on Mary Lethert Wingerd's history, North Country: The Making of Minnesota, for this big story we're doing on the show about the Dakota Uprising of 1862.
John Grisham

Photo: Taylor Hill/Getty Images Entertainment

John Grisham
There are a dozen. I'm halfway through All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren. I haven't read it since college.
Anne Lamott

Photo: Tim Mosenfelder/Getty Images Entertainment

Anne Lamott
What book is on your nightstand now?

Three books: one is Gypsy Boy, by Mikey Walsh; a novel, The Darlings, by Cristina Alger; and, a wonderful collection of stories by Alethea Black, I Knew You'd Be Lovely, which reminds me so much of the late, great Laurie Colwin.
Colin Powell

Photo: Charles Norfleet/Getty Images Entertainment

Colin Powell
What book is on your nightstand now?

The Summer of 1787, by David O. Stewart. As I grow older, I am increasingly fascinated by our founding fathers—the challenges they faced, and the compromises they made, good and bad, to create a nation, have inspired us and people around the world. I wish today's political leaders, especially in Washington, would show such courage and willingness to fight for what they believe in, while also possessing an understanding of the need to compromise in order to solve the nation's problems. They all need to go off and read 1787.

Excerpted from By the Book by Pamela Paul, published October 28, 2014 by HenryHolt and Company, LLC. Copyright © 2014 by The New York Times Company. All rights reserved.
Published 10/28/2014