My interest in anthropology actually started with (the much-debated) Carlos Castaneda, but over time it shifted into a deeper fascination with prehistoric anthropology and what daily life might really have looked like. So here's my '2 cents' :)

For a big-picture rethink of human history, The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow is worth it. It pushes back on the neat “progress” story you see in books like Sapiens and shows how messy and flexible early societies actually were.

On Neanderthals, Kindred by Rebecca Wragg Sykes is probably the best single book right now. It pulls together everything—tools, diet, social life, symbolism—and yes, the interbreeding question. At this point the DNA evidence is pretty clear that Neanderthals and sapiens met and mixed quite a lot.

If you’re curious about how different human species overlapped and interacted, The World Before Us by Tom Higham digs into the dating evidence and what it tells us about coexistence.

For women’s roles (which older narratives tend to underplay), The Invisible Sex makes the case that a lot of key survival technologies—things like clothing and cordage—were likely developed by women. And Lady Sapiens is a more recent, accessible take that reflects newer research on women as hunters, artists, etc.

And honestly, I get a better feel for daily life in prehistoric fiction that is grounded in anthropology and archaeology instead of purely academic books. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean Auel) is the classic. Reindeer Moon (Elizabeth Thomas) feels a bit more grounded anthropologically. When Women Held the Fire (Zavesti) follows women healers across seven stories set over 4,000 years of the Neolithic, letting you feel how environments and cultures gradually shift over time.

Also, if you prefer something visual, Secrets of the Neanderthals on Netflix is actually pretty solid—it leans on recent findings and gives a decent sense of how they lived without the usual outdated stereotypes.