People who read books tend to be pretty smart, so there are a lot of good books out there for (and by) smart people. Take Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. He won the Nobel Prize in 2002, and now he’s a best-selling author. I’d say his book was selling like hotcakes if hotcakes filled you with knowledge instead of carbohydrates— so maybe you could say it’s selling better than hotcakes. If your smart person already has that one, there’s Roy F. Baumeister’s Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength, which was a favorite nonfiction book around the Amazon offices this year, even if we didn’t really catch on to it until after it had already been published.

Some other great “Big Idea” books that we recommend:

The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt

The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood by James Gleick

Radioactive: Marie & Pierre Curie: A Tale of Love and Fallout by Lauren Redniss

If your smart person is more into business and technology, you might consider:

Endgame: The End of the Debt Supercycle and How It Changes Everything by John Mauldin

In The Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives by Steven Levy

If your brainiac is the type who sees the world as a geography of the mind:

Maphead: Charting the Wide, Weird World of Geography Wonks by Ken Jennings (of Jeopardy fame)

National Geographic Atlas of the World, Ninth Edition by Thomas Hayden

If you know someone who’s into more esoteric knowledge, here are two excellent books:

A History of the World in 100 Objects by Neil MacGregor

Just My Type: A Book About Fonts by Simon Garfield

And if your genius is an all-out geek (and geeks are cool, by the way), then you might consider:

Reamde: A Novel by Neal Stephenson

Dungeons and Dragons Core Rulebook Gift Set, 4th Edition by the Wizards RPG Team Boxed Set.

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline