Our bestsellers of 2022

The MIT Press books that readers around the world added to their shelves this year

As we flip through the last pages of 2022, we are feeling nostalgic for all of the incredible scholarship we published this year. From books to monographs to journals to textbooks, we would be hard pressed to choose our favorites. But what were some of our readers’ favorites? 

To celebrate the end of the year, we gathered a list of our best selling books of 2022. While our hottest books from 2022 made it onto the list, we are also thrilled to see that some of our classic titles remain amongst our best selling. Read on below to explore our bestsellers of the year, or discover more new releases from the MIT Press here.


Our newest bestsellers:

Inclusion on Purpose: An Intersectional Approach to Creating a Culture of Belonging at Work by Ruchika Tulshyan 

Few would disagree that inclusion is both the right thing to do and good for business. Then why are we so terrible at it? If we believe in the morality and the profitability of including people of diverse and underestimated backgrounds in the workplace, why don’t we do it? Because, explains Ruchika Tulshyan in this eye-opening book, we don’t realize that inclusion takes awareness, intention, and regular practice. Inclusion doesn’t just happen; we have to work at it. Tulshyan presents inclusion best practices, showing how leaders and organizations can meaningfully promote inclusion and diversity.

“Whether you are a manager or you want to become one, this book is essential reading!” —Reema Batnagar, VP People, Pixar Animation Studios


Introduction to Algorithms, Fourth Edition by Thomas H. Cormen, Charles E. Leiserson, Ronald L. Rivest and Clifford Stein

This year we published the latest edition of Introduction to Algorithms, a classic textbook with a cult following. Since the publication of the first edition in 1990, Introduction to Algorithms has become the leading algorithms text in universities worldwide as well as the standard reference for professionals. This fourth edition has been updated throughout, with new chapters on matchings in bipartite graphs, online algorithms, and machine learning, and new material on such topics as solving recurrence equations, hash tables, potential functions, and suffix arrays.


Power On! by Jean J. Ryoo and Jane Margolis

This lively graphic novel follows a diverse group of teenage friends as they discover that computing can be fun, creative, and empowering. Taylor, Christine, Antonio, and Jon seem like typical young teens—they communicate via endless texting, they share jokes, they worry about starting high school, and they have each other’s backs. But when a racially-biased artificial intelligence system causes harm in their neighborhood, they suddenly realize that tech isn’t as neutral as they thought it was. But can an algorithm be racist? And what is an algorithm, anyway?

“A must-read for every educator working to make the pressing issues of technology and harm legible to kids.” —Safiya Noble, UCLA; author of Algorithms of Oppression


Behind Their Screens: What Teens Are Facing (and Adults Are Missing) by Emily Weinstein and Carrie James

What are teens actually doing on their smartphones? Contrary to many adults’ assumptions, they are not simply “addicted” to their screens, oblivious to the afterlife of what they post, or missing out on personal connection. They are just trying to navigate a networked world. In Behind Their Screens, Emily Weinstein and Carrie James, Harvard researchers who are experts on teens and technology, explore the complexities that teens face in their digital lives, and suggest that many adult efforts to help—“Get off your phone!” “Just don’t sext!”—fall short.

“A helpful guide for any parent constantly arguing with their teens about screens, people who feel that social media is ‘running the new generation,’ and anyone who wants to know more about how the modern digital age is affecting young people.” —San Francisco Chronicle


Reimagining Design: Unlocking Strategic Innovation by Kevin G. Bethune

Design offers so much more than an aesthetically pleasing logo or banner, a beautification add-on after the heavy lifting. In Reimagining Design, Kevin Bethune shows how design provides a unique angle on problem-solving—how it can be leveraged strategically to cultivate innovation and anchor multidisciplinary teamwork. As he does so, he describes his journey as a Black professional through corporate America, revealing the power of transformative design, multidisciplinary leaps, and diversity—and ultimately shows how design can transform both individual lives and organizations.

“At a time of increasing uncertainty, what can we do to solve ever-changing problems? Designer Kevin Bethune takes on that thorny issue in his new book, with a view to diversity and inclusion.” —Design Week


Our classic hits:

Graphic Artists Guild Handbook, 16th Edition: Pricing & Ethical Guidelines by The Graphic Artists Guild

For forty-eight years, the Graphic Artists Guild Handbook has been the industry bible for graphic arts professionals. This sixteenth edition represents the most ambitious revision and redesign in over a decade, providing both artists and clients the very latest information on business, ethical, and legal issues. As the graphic art marketplace continues to evolve to meet the needs of both digital and print media, the new Handbook offers professionals an essential guide for keeping up with rapidly changing technology.


Electrify: An Optimist’s Playbook for Our Clean Energy Future by Saul Griffith

Climate change is a planetary emergency. We have to do something now—but what? Saul Griffith has a plan. In Electrify, Griffith lays out a detailed blueprint—optimistic but feasible—for fighting climate change while creating millions of new jobs and a healthier environment. Griffith’s plan can be summed up simply: electrify everything. He explains exactly what it would take to transform our infrastructure, update our grid, and adapt our households to make this possible. Billionaires may contemplate escaping our worn-out planet on a private rocket ship to Mars, but the rest of us, Griffith says, will stay and fight for the future.

“One of the most quietly revolutionary policy books I’ve ever read.” —Derek Thompson, The Atlantic


His Master’s Voice by Stanisław Lem

By pure chance, scientists detect a signal from space that may be communication from rational beings. How can people of Earth understand this message, knowing nothing about the senders—including whether or not they even exist? Written as the memoir of a mathematician who participates in the government project attempting to decode what seems to be a message from outer space, this classic novel from the critically acclaimed author of Solaris shows scientists grappling with fundamental questions about the nature of reality, the confines of knowledge, the limitations of the human mind, and the ethics of military-sponsored scientific research.

“Such deadly wit, such deadly playful tightrope walking… a modern European version of Swift or Voltaire.” —Peter S. Beagle, The New York Times


Algorithms by Panos Louridas

Digital technology runs on algorithms, sets of instructions that describe how to do something efficiently. Application areas range from search engines to tournament scheduling, DNA sequencing, and machine learning. Arguing that every educated person today needs to have some understanding of algorithms and what they do, in this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Panos Louridas offers an introduction to algorithms that is accessible to the nonspecialist reader. Louridas explains not just what algorithms are but also how they work, offering a wide range of examples and keeping mathematics to a minimum.


101 Things I Learned in Architecture School by Matthew Frederick

This is a book that students of architecture will want to keep in the studio and in their backpacks. It is also a book they may want to keep out of view of their professors, for it expresses in clear and simple language things that tend to be murky and abstruse in the classroom. These 101 concise lessons in design, drawing, the creative process, and presentation—from the basics of “How to Draw a Line” to the complexities of color theory—provide a much-needed primer in architectural literacy, making concrete what too often is left nebulous or open-ended in the architecture curriculum.

“A must-have for anyone starting out in the field.” —Will Coldwell, The Independent


Explore more new releases from the MIT Press