Listed below are some wonderful books about Mali, its people, cultures, politics, and history. Most are scholarly and written in English. If you’d like to recommend a book that doesn’t appear here, please leave a comment at the bottom of the page.
2023
Rémi Carayol, Le mirage sahélien : La France en guerre en Afrique. Serval, Barkhane et après ?
2022
Attaher A. Maïga, Entre Terrorisme et Militaires Etrangers : Quels devenirs pour l’armée malienne ?
Ophélie Rillon, Le Genre de la Lutte : Une autre histoire du Mali contemporain (1956-1991)
2021
Monique Bertrand, Bamako : De la ville à l’agglomération
Candace Keller, Imaging Culture: Photography in Mali, West Africa
Dorothea Schulz, Political Legitimacy in Postcolonial Mali
Laura Ann Twagira, Embodied Engineering: Gendered Labor, Food Security, and Taste in 20th-Century Mali
2020
Camilla Toulmin, Land, Investment and Migration: Thirty-five Years of Village Life in Mali
Marc-Antoine Pérouse de Montclos, Une Guerre Perdue : La France au Sahel.
2018
Michael Gomez, African Dominion: A New History of Empire in Early and Medieval West Africa
Choguel Kokalla Maïga, Les Rébellions au Nord du Mali : Des origines à nos jours
2016
Rosa de Jorio, Cultural Heritage in Mali in the Neoliberal Era
2015
Jaimie Bleck, Education and Empowered Citizenship in Mali
Ryan Skinner, Bamako Sounds: The Afropolitan Ethics of Malian Music
Greg Mann, From Empire to NGOs in the West African Sahel: The Road to Nongovernmentality
Emily Burrill, States of Marriage: Gender, Justice, and Rights in Colonial Mali
2014
Sarah Brett-Smith, The Silence of the Women: Bamana Mud Cloths in Mali
Jean-Christophe Notin, La Guerre de la France au Mali
2013
Andy Morgan, Music, Culture, and Conflict in Mali
2012
Dorothea Schulz, Muslims and New Media in West Africa: Pathways to God
Judith Scheele, Smugglers and Saints of the Sahara: Regional Connectivity in the Twentieth Century
2011
Robert Fowler, A Season in Hell: My 130 Days in the Sahara with Al Qaeda
Cheick M. Chérif Keita, Outcast to Ambassador: The Musical Odyssey of Salif Keita
Brian J. Peterson, Islamization from Below: The Making of Muslim Communities in Rural French Sudan, 1880-1960
2010
Baz Lecocq, Disputed Desert: Decolonisation, Competing Nationalisms and Tuareg Rebellions in Northern Mali
2009
Marie Rodet. Les migrantes ignorées du Haut-Sénégal (1900-1946)
2008
Molly Roth, Ma Parole S’achête: Money, Identity, and Meaning in Malian Jeliya
Daouda Gary-Tounkara, Migrants soudanais/maliens et conscience ivoirienne : Les étrangers en Côte d’Ivoire (1903-1980)
2006
Kris Holloway, Monique and the Mango Rains: Two Years with a Midwife in Mali
2005
Benjamin F. Soares, Islam and the Prayer Economy: History and Authority in a Malian Town
2002
Saskia Brand, Mediating Means and Fate: A Socio-Political Analysis of Fertility and Demographic Change in Bamako, Mali
2000
Banning Eyre, In Griot Time: An American Guitarist in Mali
Bridges from Bamako 
I believe it’s Andy Morgan and not Martin.
You can also add my book: Les migrantes ignorées du Haut-Sénégal (1900-1960) (Paris: Karthala).
Thanks
Nothing wrong with a little self-promotion… and you’re right, I’ll fix Andy’s last name. Andy Martin is a different writer!
Daouda Gary-Tounkara (2008) Migrants soudanais/maliens et conscience ivoirienne. Les étrangers en Côte d’Ivoire (1903-1980 ). Paris: L’Harmattan.
Hello Bruce, I’ve been enjoying your blog, and just wondered if you might be interested in my book, which is coming out soon. It’s called ‘The Timbuktu School for Nomads’, and it’s about my journeys in Morocco, Mauritania and especially Mali. It delves into the history and culture of various nomadic communities, from the Tuareg and Berabiche around Timbuktu, to Fulani communities in Central Mali, Bozo on the Niger and Moors, Saharawis & Berber/Amazighen in Mauritania and Morocco. Cheers, Nick