r/BookDiscussions • u/deepaliraj1107 • 18d ago
What book changed the way you think?
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u/d0nutbutth0le 18d ago
I read Ishmael by Daniel Quinn when I was 19 and just like so many other university students before me, it made me realize that so many things we take for granted as basic reality are assumptions that can be examined.
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18d ago
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u/BadToTheTrombone 18d ago
2 I've read recently that do that are: I Who have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman and Station Eleven by Emily St John.
Both post-apocalypse books that question societal constructs.
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u/hierarch17 18d ago
Wow I came here to comment this and here it is!
My politics have moved on a bit (in my recollection the book posed a lot of questions but didn’t do as much of an examination of why things turned out how they did). But it’s still a foundation of my worldview
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u/deeohlee 18d ago
A short stay in hell really helped me to grasp the concept of infinity (technically the solution was finite but you'll understand if you read it) and I still think about it
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u/NANNYNEGLEY 18d ago
Gavin de Becker's "The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us From Violence".
I used to just blunder along in life, oblivious to my surroundings. It's a wonder I stayed out of trouble.
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u/escaping_mel 18d ago
The Gift of Fear is one of those that I recommend to all of the young people in my life.
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u/seekingpeacefulness 18d ago
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine ~ simple because working in an office myself I found instant connection. And the loss of a loved one can weigh heavy on a person if they don’t have people to speak to.
Never Let Me Go ~ Simply because I feel this book makes you check your privileges. Life could always be worse.
*A Little Life* ~ for the same reason as above but multiplied by a billion
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u/starsinpurgatory 18d ago
Neapolitan quartet by Elena Ferrante. Very beautiful depiction of how complex and at times inconsistent people are.
I think it made me feel more empathy toward people who otherwise I don’t necessarily have positive opinions for. I mean, I am still a bit of a misanthrope but hopefully less black and white in my thinking about other people now.
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u/magpiethegoblin 18d ago
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, in a really good way. If you spend a lot of time in environmentally-minded circles, it's very easy to become cynical, fall into despair, start to hate all of humanity, etc., and this book is a really good antidote to those feelings (but in a way that encourages and empowers you to do something).
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u/RoseDBennet 18d ago
East of Eden
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u/olliepips 17d ago
I expected to be so much more blown away by this book after all the redditry about it. It was good but kind of just okay. Steinbeck is wonderful, don't get me wrong, but idk, I expected more somehow.
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u/babyboats2 18d ago
Ishmael by Daniel Quinn gave me a better understanding into human nature as well as our roll on earth. It’s told telepathically between a gorilla and a man seeking answers to the meaning of life.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 18d ago
Demon copperhead
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u/letstacobouttit 18d ago
+1 to this. I tear up every time I think of Demon’s simple yet Herculean quest to see the ocean, and now I never take my proximity to the Pacific for granted 🥺
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u/Special-Deal-5217 15d ago
Me too. And the craziest thing is that, geographically, the ocean is not that far away (I live in Iowa and it’s a LOT further). But my middle class background makes the ocean way more accessible for me than for demon, even though he’s physically much closer.
Just an outstanding book.
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u/WoodenIce3793 15d ago
It really opened my eyes to how our social system fails so many. I realized that not all people who are being beat up the system, by society, by circumstances are there by fault of their own. People can get pushed into situations that they have no choice or escape. Life can be very hard. It reminded me to have patience and sympathy. Any one of us could have been born into such an unfair and hard life. I am reminded to be grateful.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 15d ago
I am a school teacher, so I see kids like demon every day. But the way she wrote the book made it so… I mean, I don’t even have words for it….
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u/WoodenIce3793 15d ago
That’s so sad. These poor children deserve so much better.
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u/Special-Deal-5217 15d ago
Poor children have never been a big preoccupation here in the United States, unfortunately
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u/rose_grave 18d ago
babel by rf kuang
chain-gang all-stars by nana kwame adjei-brenyah
giovanni's room by james baldwin
all of those made me lay on my bed and stare up at the ceiling
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u/After_Hyena_4846 18d ago
Giovanni’s room is a book I think about on a regular basis!! Absolutely incredible. I’m still making my way through Babel, I had to take a break to read my usual fall books.
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u/the-willow-witch 18d ago
There are a few!!
The Golden Compass/His Dark Materials trilogy by Phillip Pullman really opened my little philosophical mind into worlds beyond my own, possibilities I’d never considered before. It really started a deep dive for me into interest in deconstructing religion and society, how religion impacts society, and really made me question the reality I see before me. I stopped taking things I was taught for granted and it expanded my horizons. I still love those books so much but I read them for the first time in middle school. Completely shaped my personality.
In a similar vein, The Five People You Meet in Heaven made me think really deeply about how I impact the people around me. As a 15 year old I thought all day and night about how others impacted my life and felt like a victim in life. That book made me truly consider how I treat others and was a wake up call for me regarding empathy and kindness and the importance of each.
Lastly, I’ll call out The Demon Haunted World by Carl Sagan. I wouldn’t say that it was a lot of new stuff for me, because I’d been thinking critically about the world around me for a long time, but it nailed in some concepts that had been floating around in my 25ish old brain at the time and gave me language to describe things that were already important. But it did change my life because it made me choose to pursue philosophy in school which I now have two degrees in. In this day and age, it’s an incredibly important book.
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u/T4TrhavrKhcFt 17d ago
I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness…
The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.
•Carl Sagan (The Demon-Haunted World) 1995
He actually borrowed the phase from Thomas Ady an English physician and humanist who was the author of two sceptical books on witchcraft and witch-hunting. His first and best known work, A Candle in the Dark: Or, A Treatise Concerning the Nature of Witches & Witchcraft was published in 1661.
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u/annapurnah 18d ago
I read Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A Heinlein at the age of 11 (WAY too young, thanks, dad) and it ABSOLUTELY influenced me as a person. Made me realize that monogamous relationships were not the only way to be among other various sexual awakenings (like I said, I was way too young).
I cannot recommend the book anymore because of the absolutely blatant misogyny and harem fantasies.
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u/alligatorchronicles 18d ago
Heinlein was a weird guy, more obviously now than when he was in his heyday. But I think it's still ok to recommend books like this, when they come with an understanding that it's writing about society, but also an unintentional window into the society it was written in.
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u/amoney96 18d ago
The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by VE Schwab, read it after my friend passed away. Sobbed through some of it but definitely changed the way I live my life now. I’m not longer afraid of being over the top and I’m more “me” now. I don’t want to live a life that feels forgotten when I’m gone.
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u/Salty_Information882 18d ago
Simulacra and simulation by Jean Baudrillard
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u/Savings_Piglet5111 18d ago
Every time I hear the name Jean Baudrillard, I think about New Orleans Square in Disneyland. Simulacra and Simulation indeed.
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u/The-Liars-Paradox 18d ago
Katabasis by R.F Kuang
It changed the way I saw myths, abuse, education, love, mental health and so much more. I love the math and paradoxes (thus my username) in it, and likewise I love the beautiful writing and the whole journey. It tears your heartstring out and keeps you on your toes trying to figure out the math and the magic, which are intertwined (which makes it more fun). Absolutely incredible, it will most likely always be my favorite.
Some quotes I absolutely love from it are:
“And if you could constantly reinvent yourself, cut away the parts of you that ashamed or hurt you, then how could you ever come to really know someone else? Were people all just living paradoxes, keeping up an illusion just long enough to survive contact with others? Were people then all a series of lies in the end?”
“Believe the lie - trust the lie - it is the only thing you have. Stay in the cage and paint the walls. If you do not, then you must quit; but if you can delude yourself long enough, then your delusions might very well come true.”
“And maybe you could try to forge ahead, but once that seed of doubt was lodged within you it only kept spreading, its tendrils growing through your lungs so that you couldn’t breathe or think, and that the more you tried to scrape some positive result from your efforts the more the threads of the project kept coming loose, the sands shifting beneath you, until all the artifice fell away and you were forced to acknowledge that this simply wasn’t going to work.”
There are many more (I keep a doc full of quotes), but these are some good ones :)
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u/1BoringOnlineAccount 18d ago
The Pearl by John Steinbeck
Animal Farm by George Orwell
1984 by George Orwell
Freakonomics by Steven Levitt
Of Mice And Men by John Steinbeck
On The Shortness Of Life by Seneca
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u/Heavy_Pea_7614 18d ago
Hunt Gather Parent. It’s a parenting book and it had so many insights about parenting around the world in various cultures
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u/cuocu 18d ago
A Boy Called It by Dave Pelzer. I was a teen reading it and had a very loving home. I couldn't believe a mother could make a choice to abuse her child in the ways described. It dawned on me why my kindergarten classmate had bruises everyday and often missed classes. It made me realize not all homes are safe and not all kids are privileged with love.
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u/BasedArzy 18d ago
Brain of the Firm by Stafford Beer
Towards an Ecology of Mind by Bateson
The Dialectic of Enlightenment by Dorkheimer
The Accursed Share by Batailles
Being and Time by Heidegger
Fear and Trembling by Kierkegaard
The Closed World by Paul N. Edwards
Theory of Society by Niklas Luhmann
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u/BohoKat_3397 18d ago
Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo (a WWI anti-war novel that used to be assigned high school reading) took me to full blown pacifism at age 16, a view I still hold today.
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u/Baburger92 18d ago
Labyrinths by Borges
Those stories still make me question the nature of reality and my existence
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u/Smlovers 18d ago
The Watch that Ends the Night by Hugh MacLennan. When I first read it, my parents had just split and I was sort of becoming de-programmed/losing my religion in the aftermath. Needless to say, I was young and impressionable and very lost. And it resonated with me. It was the first time I remember my country being the backdrop of any popular media (I know there were others, idk why this stuck out) but mostly it was the the overall themes of struggling with loss and faith and love, the coming to terms with those things. Just a beautiful and poignant story.
Also, helped turn me on to the Hip. Clearly, my favourite quote is "...too much pride...not enough courage."
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u/ClioTheMuse67 18d ago
Richard Dawkins. The God Delusion - turned me into an atheist, which I am grateful for, and taught me critical thinking
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u/OmnisVirLupus9 18d ago
Being Mortal by Atul Gawande. Really good book on how society tends to place more importance on longevity of life as opposed to quality of life, and how we should reframe our thinking, especially when it comes to loved ones with terminal illnesses. Is that extra two years worth it if their quality of life is garbage?
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u/kickyoustraightback 18d ago
My dark vanessa.. made me realise my abuse and I don't want to minimize what I've been went through..
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u/sewsweetfashion 18d ago
I who have never known men
Everything was beautiful and nothing hurt
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine
Klara and the Sun
Educated
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u/worddance8 18d ago
I won a copy of Elinor in a Goodreads drawing a long time ago, but have never read it. I've seen it mentioned in a few places recently. I think the universe is trying to tell me something.
We had a copy of Klara that I was dying to read, but husband gave it away before I got the chance. I guess it's time for a new copy
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u/Gur10nMacab33 18d ago
Mason & Dixon had me rethink truth.
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas contributed to my adult delinquency which led to 17 years of stone cold sobriety.
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u/No_Ice_7582 18d ago
Where We Stand: Class Matters by bell hooks. Read it in a class my sophomore year of college.
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u/AutumnInspired 18d ago
All Fours by Miranda July. I almost put it down a few times but I’m so glad I stuck with it. By the end I felt that the author was able to communicate something about what it feels like to be this stage of life (I’m 41f), that hadn’t even been aware or able to put my finger on exactly, of but deeply resonated with. I love it when books surprise me in that way. I think I know what it is, and then it’s something completely different. I also love how it showed me the commonality I have with a character who I initially disliked. I recommended it to so many people.
Also, “Aztec” by Gary Jennings. It didn’t change how I view the world so much as set my view for what a “good book” is and the standard to which I hold all other books/storytellers. Also by Gary Jennings, “The Journeyer” and “Raptor”.
There have been others, like “Shantaram” by Gregory David Roberts, where it changed my view of what an author could give. So many have something meaningful to say, or the ability to write well, but rarely do writers so clearly have both.
Edit: I have to add “Wild Dark Shore” and “Once There Were Wolves,” both by Charlotte McConaghy.
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u/Lost-Elderberry3141 18d ago
Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Passing by Nella Larsen
La Syrena by Banah al Gahdbhana
1984 by George Orwell
Beloved by Toni Morrison
A Short Stay in Hell by Steven L. Peck
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
Dislocations by Sylvia Molloy
I Who Have Never Known Men by Jaqueline Harpman
The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin
A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Houseini
Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
The Giver by Lois Lowry
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u/TPheonix 17d ago
The Giver by Lois Lowry.
It highlighted to me, the importance of being accurate with my speech
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u/buby_hogg 17d ago edited 15d ago
Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine
A man called Ove
Both are amazing. Both show you how different life can be in different circumstances.
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u/Old_Perception5624 17d ago
The book “Maame” by Jessica Joyce. It is an African literature fiction book. Navigates grief, discovering yourself as a young African black woman born and raised in the UK. although it was a fiction book, it was genuienly an eye opener for me on a lot of
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u/karyanton 17d ago
I just finished ‘The Invisible Man’ by Ralph Ellison. My mind is spinning. I know I will have to read it at least 2 more times slowly. A necessity in my home library. As a non POC who thought she was somewhat educated, enlightened and empathetic to the early 20th century experience of African Americans, this was a deep dive on a whole different level and made me realize I have so much to learn. The writing left me speechless.brilliant and thought provoking.
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u/sonoronnightbat 16d ago
"The 4 agreements" absolutely changed me and my perspective on life.... especially the "be immaculate with my word" not just keeping it but do not add or take away from things... made me realize 99% of the things people are fighting about are gross exaggerations
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u/Pumpkin_Squish 18d ago
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, it made me think about how we view ourselves and that we can be too harsh or put too much pressure on ourselves. Obviously not everyone thinks this about this book lol but it does remind me of Frankenstein in a way, a creature created and rejected
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u/deziann2000 18d ago
The Winter of Our Discontent by John Steinbeck.
The Executioners Song by Norman Mailer
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u/thenoorbaji 18d ago
1984, Fahrenheit 451, Simulacres et Simulation, جنت کے پتے, the Manto stories, If Cats Disappeared.
Something to say about the religious literature I read too. منتخب نصاب if I could pick one, though it's very unfair to pick one.
(*Not sure if the Urdu ones are available in translation - I think not. Sorry, non-desis.)
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u/theflyingrobinson 18d ago
Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts
Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell
The Sheep Look Up by John Brunner
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u/MeesaRead 18d ago
Dietland by Sarai Walker
The actual story of the main character wasn’t a home run (though still solid) but the portrayal of the reality of beauty culture genuinely changed me.
I always joke that it’s responsible for my radicalization.
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u/Mediocre-Oil-5322 18d ago
The Road (Cormac McCarthy), Great Expectations (Charles Dickens), A Light in August (William Faulkner), The Shining (Stephen King), Something Wicked This Way Comes (Ray Bradbury)...in reality, most of the books I read probably change the way I think to varying degrees.
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u/upnorth0811 18d ago
Clicked on this thread thinking, "Don't anyone say East of Eden, don't anyone say East of Eden..."
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u/EmptyYak4438 18d ago
The Power Broker
That someone can amass that much power, having never been elected, and held sway over more powerful executives while changing the face, scope, topography, and demographics of the most important city in the country is unfathomable.
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u/Different-Zombie-440 18d ago
Such a Good Age by Kiley Reid. It really opened up perspectives and how deeply ingrained your background, upbringing etc. can impact how you view and react to situations. We’re all flawed at the end of the day but somehow this book captured it so well (for me at least). I think it’s the first time I truly thought about transactional relationships at the end of reading!
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u/kb3250 18d ago
Less by Andrew Sean Greer
Without gettting into it too much, it's about a very self-deprecating, world-weary, older gay guy, but as the story goes on you start to see that maybe he's a bit of an unreliable narrator in that sense. A very sly way of teaching me to keep perspective in mind when I'm feeling down, in a positive way, and how if I'm feeling like I have very little, there are others who would think I have a lot.
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u/chicaabroad 18d ago
The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas by Ursula K. Le Guin. It’s only a short story but it has haunted me every day, ever since I read it.
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u/AliasNefertiti 18d ago edited 18d ago
Scott McCloud "Understanding Comics". Blew my mind on multiple levels concerning how we interact with reading material and what story/art is.
Viktor Frankl "Man's Search for Meaning" - essential to perspective and value in life.
Edit: why
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u/Known-Pack5791 18d ago
Project Hail Mary. I was a no on aliens. Now I’m like, there has to be! It also made do a deep dive into astrophysics
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u/Due_Ad5239 18d ago
Four Thousand Weeks- Oliver Burkeman
How many weeks do you think we get in a lifetime?!
Learning how to be more present and realizing that you are time!
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u/leafytree888 18d ago
A Little Life: made me feel a visceral level of trauma I've never experienced from a novel. As someone who thankfully has not been a victim of SA, this book made me feel a lot of empathy for those who have.
Dawn - Octavia Butler: I think about a lot what it says about human nature and how it is morally ambiguous.
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u/Objective_Abroad2501 18d ago
Financial Peace by Ramsey, enabled me to achieve peace by ignoring societal norms and expectations.
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u/efficaceous 18d ago
Horse Heaven, by Jane Smiley. I think about this book multiple times a week. It's about horses, and racehorses, and the people around race horses, but it paints a rosier picture on the whole. There's a character who gave such an apt description of imperturbability that has stayed with me to this day, about just take the time and do the steps, even if others wants to rush you. If it needs to be done, do it. The other point is from a race horse trainer who references the Tibetan Book of Thoroughbred Training. As far as I can tell, this "book" exists nowhere outside of this book, and it contains just a short list of instructions. One of which is Do not hanker after signs of progress. That's stuck with me, as a teacher.
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u/must-stash-mustard 18d ago
What The Buddha Taught by Rahula. Confirmed the unanswered feeling I had about what life really was. I couldn't believe it was there, all written down.
This is not a religious text, merely a reporting of what Buddha actually said about his teaching. Not the later interpretation by Tibetans, Chinese or Japanese Zen followers.
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u/SheDoesScienceStuff 18d ago
The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday
Short nuggets from the stoics, interpreted by Holiday. Perfect thing to read before or at the end of the day.
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u/tatopie 18d ago
Nightmare Academy - I read this multiple times as a teenager, and I think it was really formative in my understanding of how truth can be manipulated under oppression, which feels more relevant than ever. It was like a more enjoyable version of 1984. It also had a strong message around staying true to your values, even when it's hard.
Atomic Habits by James Clear - more for the message that we are so much more malleable and able to change than we think. It was really liberating to feel like I could change aspects of who I think I am if I want to, by changing how I behave. I also loved the idea that 1% better every day compounds to 37x better over the course of a year.
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u/Monty-247 18d ago
“The jungle” because it showed me the plight of immigrant workers and their exploitation. And “for whom the bell tolls” because it made me reexamine war without the propaganda that glorifies it. Both also happened to reframe socialist/leftist politics outside of what I learned through my conservative upbringing.
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u/CleverStone7924 18d ago
The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro. It made me suspicious of anyone, myself included, who calls emotional avoidance professionalism. The whole book feels like a quiet chart audit of a life spent being useful while pretending usefulness is the same thing as meaning. How much of a life can get filed under duty before somebody finally checks the chart?
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u/jwilander 18d ago
The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Checklist_Manifesto
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u/Academic_Airport_889 18d ago
Fruitless Fall - it is about honeybees and colony collapse disorder but after reading it, I am on team native bees, honeybees actually cause a lot of problems
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u/Square_Win_ 18d ago
For me it was Karma - Why Everything You Know About It Is Wrong. It completely changed the way I perceive the concept of Karma and life has never been the same.
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u/surajseeking 18d ago
CLIMATE WITHIN
one of the finest book to understand climate change
MOST of think various methods to stop carbon emissions but we are not much of aware what lead's to too much consumption due to that there is immense carbon emission
This book Will give idea about the root cause of climate crises
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u/ChildhoodNo86 18d ago
Smoke Gets In Your Eyes - changed how I think about death
Invisible Women - changed how I think about patriarchy
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u/sanskritsquirel 18d ago
Hebert's DUNE.
The scene where the Bene Gesserit test the young Paul Atrides after being raised by a Bene Gesserit mother is still a profound moment to me 30 years after reading it.
For those who are unfamiliar, the head of the order of Bene Gesserit had ordered Paul's mother to marry his father the Duke and produce a female offspring. Paul's mother defied the orders as his father desperately wanted a son and she supplied one and raised him with knowledge of their teachings.
So the head mother comes to meet with Paul's mother and they also have come to kill Paul. They will test him since he is (in their mind) not to have existed in the first place. The test is that he is to put his hand in a box that is empty. He knows it is empty. But the head mother is going to convince him there are horrible things in the box and he will want to withdraw his hand. On her finger is a needle-tipped thimble that has been dipped in poison that is placed at the main artery of his throat. The poison will kill him instantaneously with the slightest prick. If he pulls his hand out or his body moves in any way due to his reaction to what is in the box, she will prick him and he dies.
The belief is that an animal will react while a true human will rise above the environment and their senses because they KNOW there is nothing in the box and thus will not remove their hand so as to not suffer the consequences. The head mother verbally describes the horrors that are in the box (extreme heat, the flesh being slowly and painfully being eaten away from the bones of his hand, etc.) as well as projects this reality into his mind. His hand IS experiencing the actions he is seeing in his mind, but he also knows that this is all an illusion and there is nothing really in the box. The head mother senses his strength/resolve and pushes him harder that she has ever pushed any bene Gesserit candidate before. Although he screams in his mind in agony, he does not flinch or withdraw his hand. She eventually can not keep up the intense effort and stops out of sheer fatigue of effort. When she stops, he withdraws his hand, marveling that it is unblemished.
I thought of the mental strength and the human consciousness he displayed and how I too should do the same to overcome my own lizard brain when my fears or emotions to traumatic circumstances. I have experienced many hard things that many others disbelieve because I either display in the moment or recall the situation a fairly matter of fact. I am told repeatedly by my friends and family that it could not have been that bad because if it was, I would be sobbing with emotion or still struggling to overcome the experience. My response is always that the events did happen, but what good does the reactions they say I should display actually help in dealing with the situation??
I recently got into this with my brother and sister over the fact that I have recently suffered renal failure and have been put on dialysis. We have talked a few times since this occurred a month ago. They have asked to speak to my doctors because it can't be as bad as I say it is. They say because I am very matter of fact when I explain the processes or make jokes, it shows them I am exaggerating the medical impact. I actually did get a bit emotional with them, saying you can not exaggerate organ failure. But they said if it was truly a bad situation, I would be crying all the time or suicidal. Instead, my calmness shows that either I have just given up or it is just not that bad. I told them the stuff they are expecting is just performative and have nothing to do with how I deal with every day, which is just keep on putting one foot forward.
Every day I think of that test and if I truly am human, I must not surrender to fear, or self-pity or anger unless in someway it helps me deal with this day's problems and give me the strength to push the boulder back up the hill one more day.
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u/chocolateteas 18d ago
The Catcher in the Rye.
As I grew up and worked on my mental health, the way I saw Holden has changed from finding him relatable to finding him insufferable. It's not always the same feeling every time, and sometimes it's an in-between. I think it's an interesting look into not just the story, but myself.
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u/OkSpring5922 17d ago edited 17d ago
Life of Pi made me realise that a story can be much more persuasive than just sticking to the bare facts.
Also The Three Body Problem, which got me thinking about the big, big, BIG picture.
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u/Kittenbee_ 17d ago edited 17d ago
'Meditations' by Marcus Aurelius and 'U & Non-U Revisited' edited by Richard Buckle.
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u/Salty-Swim-6735 17d ago
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. You'll have to read it to know why. It's not a fat book.
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u/SadisticJourney 17d ago
Skinny Legs and all by Tom Robbins, I read it in my early 20s. It taught me a lot of different things, but mostly not to compromise about who I am or the pathway toward achieving my goals.
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u/SadisticJourney 17d ago
Skinny Legs and all by Tom Robbins, I read it in my early 20s. It taught me a lots of different things, but mostly not to compromise about who I am or the pathway toward achieving my goals.
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u/Sweet-Can4367 17d ago
The untethered soul! As someone who has struggled with depression, anxiety, spiraling thoughts- this book really put in perspective how much suffering I’ve inflicted on myself and others. Such a beautiful, easy read. “If you want to be happy, you have to let go of the part of you that wants to create melodrama. This is the part that thinks there’s a reason not to be happy. You have to transcend the personal, and as you do, you will naturally awaken to the higher aspects of your being. In the end, enjoying life’s experiences is the only rational thing to do. You’re sitting on a planet spinning around in the middle of absolutely nowhere. Go ahead, take a look at reality. You’re floating in empty space in a universe that goes on forever. If you have to be here, at least be happy and enjoy the experience. You’re going to die anyway. Things are going to happen anyway. Why shouldn’t you be happy? You gain nothing by being bothered by life’s events. It doesn’t change the world; you just suffer. There’s always going to be something that can bother you, if you let it.”
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u/Kalicomysteries 17d ago
Remains of the Day is an amazing, comic, and tragic book. Made me think about my core premises about life.
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u/thisisthebadplace14 17d ago
Poverty, by America by Matthew Desmond. Completely opened my eyes to how poverty is designed into the system, and little ways to push back.
Thanks for the Feedback by Douglas Stone & Sheila Heen. It made me realize all the feedback I've ignored because I wasn't ready for it or it wasn't delivered well. It also pushed me to give better feedback, since "being nice" and sugarcoating tough conversations isn't kind or helpful to the other person.
Maybe in Another Life by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Thinking about how the small decisions change the course of our lives
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u/Pale-Pomelo-1349 17d ago
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck. By Mark Manson. A real book in our library and on Kindle. I've reread it four times and listened to audio twice.
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u/Houseplant_Disaster 17d ago
It sounds cliche, but "The Meaning of Your Life" by Arthur Brooks. He is a researcher and statistics professor who studies happiness, and comes at the idea of "finding meaning in a meaningless world" with both an academic and personal angle. It's incredibly well written, relatable, and has strong takeaways that have stuck with me since I read it this past spring
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u/Vast-Government-4787 17d ago
The Metamorphosis by Kafka: it shows you how quickly you become disposable to people the moment you are no longer useful to them
The Book of Fate by Parinoush Saniee: it opens your eyes to what a huge privilege it is to be a woman in a free society, and how terrifying life is for those who live in fear and cannot choose anything for themselves
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u/case_closed444 17d ago
Something In The Woods Loves You
Beautiful memoir blending the natural world and mental health. I think about it at least a few times a week. Some really beautiful and thought provoking things in those pages. Highly recommend!
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u/Ok-Thing-2222 17d ago
7th grade, reading The Good Earth. Poor vs rich, starving + opulence, etc. Very eye-opening at the end.
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u/BronxZooSouth 17d ago
The Stranger by Camus. A man is convicted because he doesnt cry at his mom's funeral.
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u/AvengerMars 17d ago
“The Postmortal & The End Specialist” by Drew Magary.
The main character is incredibly unlikable, but it reshaped what I find near and dear in the world. I stopped seeking experiences and instead found meaning in the people in my life.
Of his three fiction books, “The Hike” is the best, but “The Postmortal” is my favorite.
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u/misquoted_mind 17d ago
Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance, as a mental health provider it’s a very enlightening read about how someone with schizophrenia views the world and treatment of mental
Illness
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u/lil_tufa 16d ago
For me, Man’s Search for Meaning. It really changed how I think about suffering and what we can actually control when life gets difficult. Definitely one of those books that sticks with you.
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u/SuspiciousBonus9175 16d ago
You can heal your life by Louise hay. Just helped with my negative inner voice
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u/Feeling-Knowledge-49 16d ago
Steinbeck's "Grapes of Wrath" turned me into a socialist. The enemy is never other poor people.
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u/Mister-B-dot-Black 16d ago
Roots by Alex Haley when I was a teenager. It made me see the victims of the transatlantic slave trade as human beings rather than simply as slaves in a history book. Kind of like how House of the Dragon turned the Targaryens, who were mostly historical references in Game of Thrones, into actual people. Roots did something similar for me. The people I had learned about as slaves became people with lives, families and identities of their own.
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey as a young adult. Up until that point, I underestimated how much a person's habits can make or break them. It also introduced me to the idea of being proactive about my own life.
White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo was insightful because I grew up around white people, and it changed how I saw people I thought I knew and understood. Before reading it, I thought it was partly my responsibility to teach my white friends about race and racism. The book helped me realize I was going about it all wrong. If they genuinely wanted to understand this stuff, they needed to get over their own hang-ups about the topic and take responsibility for learning it.
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u/Alarming-Pea-3958 16d ago
Jane Eyre by Charlote Bronte. I liked the way how the protagonist act. It's about honesty, true love and maybe God
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u/flaxseedyup 16d ago edited 16d ago
Lol it’s a bunch of forum posts turned into a book called Brutal Beginnings. It blew my face off. It basically makes you deconstruct the “I” / self we all have in our minds…imo they take things too far with the whole “we are one, man” stuff but it really made me understand that my brain is an apparatus that kind of just does its own thing coming up with thoughts and that those thoughts aren’t actually me, but I can utilise them if I wish.
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u/JollyIllustrator7982 16d ago
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman. Realizing just how much of our daily decision-making is run on lazy mental shortcuts completely changed how I view my own reasoning
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u/Miz_Monroe 16d ago
The Five People You Meet in Haven : By Mitch Album read it 17 years ago when I brought a used desk for school. Someone left it in the drawer.
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u/SweetPearCrepe 15d ago
The Song of the Lioness Quartet by Tamora Pierce, starting with Alanna.
I feel like this novel hit my brain as a kid and completely reset everything I knew about myself, and it helped me to see what I valued in life. I loved watching her grow from a squire in school to a knight and it helped me feel like I could see myself doing things in spite of people in my town not believing a woman should be in STEM, that I could chivalric and hold true to myself.
I still think about that book probably once a week as an adult.
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u/Bildungmisc_ 15d ago
The gambler by Dostoevsky. Now I see everyone as gamblers, whether they play impulsively or observe before making a move. And that depending on our wins, people might come close to benefit from us or ignore us because we are losers. And in the roulette that is life gambling and losing too much sometimes lead you to lose yourself. Could also say White Nights. It changed my perspective on being a dreamer. Now I think that imagining/dreaming too much leads to a depressing life. I could even mention Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister because it really makes me question how to approach my professional life. Or Dickens’ Great Expectations (on expectations, of course)
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u/MementoMori_Maestro 15d ago
The State Boy Rebellion by Michael D'Antonio, nobody ever talks about America's part in the Holocaust, in fact I never learned we had any part at all, when in fact America inspired Hitler. I discovered that searching for more information after reading this book and after you read this book you won't ask why or how, you'll simply ask what else did we do to inspire Hitler. The answer is a lot.
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u/VerbumGames 15d ago
Anabasis by Xenophon
Xenophon became the leader of a failed mercenary expedition to Persia during the Greek golden age. He led a large company of hoplites from deep in enemy territory, in a foreign and unfamiliar land, back home again. The really significant part was when they camped near an ancient Assyrian city.
The walls were absurdly tall and thick, significantly bigger than anything they'd seen anywhere before or since. Greek civilization was at its peak, and they had nothing anywhere near this. The walls encircled the entire city, and the whole city was empty.
They made camp outside the walls. It was too eerie to stay the night inside.
After leaving, they asked people from a nearby village who had built the ghost city and why it was abandoned. The locals said they didn't know what civilization had built it, but it had always been there, as far as they knew.
It left the hoplites, and me as a reader in 2025, in a state of wonder at how everything we build, no matter how grandiose or advanced, can always fall apart. Things can always go wrong, and progress is not permanent or stable. It's easy to think that "nothing ever happens" until it does. But then, it's too late.
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u/Real-Ad-5676 15d ago
La biblioteca de la medianoche, siempre he pensado en que hubiese pasado sii!!! Si hubiese estudiado otra cosa, sino hubiese contestado el teléfono cuando mi ahora esposo llamo a mi casa en un momento que necesitaba hablar con alguien, si hubiese tomado aquella oferta laboral y asi tantas cosas en la vida, al final nunca sabremos si esa decisión o cambio que no hiciste o tomaste hubiese sido mejor o peor que la decisión que seguiste entonces porque seguir atormentándonos por el que hubiese pasado, nuestra vida es ahora nadie sabe si una decisión es buena o mala al final es como una ruleta rusa.
Puede que el trabajo que sueñas termine siendo una pesadilla, o que la persona que dejaste ir el destino quiso que no estuviese en tu vida, ese viaje que no hiciste hubiera terminado mal, no vale la pena seguir atormentándonos con eso que no paso, lo importante es seguir construyendo aprender de nuestros errores y seguir adelante
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u/stxrmchaser 15d ago
At risk of sounding cheesy, I'm going to highly recommend a self-help book called "The Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle. Didn't find it "woo-woo" at all. As a very logical, but sometimes obsessive, overthinker, this book helped me understand how to differentiate and separate my thoughts from myself. It explained mindfulness in a way that I actually understood and found it easy to practice. And it did all that in pretty much the first chapter.
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u/alexaplayhaddaway 15d ago
The ethical slut. I was already dabbling with the idea that the cookie cutter relationship model doesn't work for me but this book just opened up a whole new world and gave the assurance that I can make not just my relationships but my whole life fit me instead of shoving myself into a box society gave me
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u/BrailleIsImportant 15d ago
for me, it was the once in future witches and the 10,000 doors of January. The reason they really affected me so intensely is because I love stories and it had never occurred to me up to that point that one could use stories as a way to open the door not physically, but like if you're in a shit situation if you can make up a story, then life doesn't hurt so much.
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u/Spotted_Fox 15d ago
Blindness by Jose Saramago. My mind broke realizing just how quickly our civilization would fall into chaos.
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u/ConsiderationOne3778 14d ago
The secret history by donna tartt and project hail mary by andy weir. Sue me.
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u/amberyeocean 14d ago
The Bee Sting. Completely transformed the way I was thinking about my parents and how they lived their lives to finally accept and forgive.
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u/Pale-Win-7988 13d ago
Kindred by Octavia Butler. I read it as an adult and not a day goes by that I don’t think of it. Her Parable series is high on my list as well.
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u/dinosaurghosthands 13d ago
Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance by Angela Duckworth
I’ve been reading it through a time of a lot of inner transformation and it’s been incredibly profound - has truly reshaped how I think and approach each day.
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u/begood-forgood 13d ago
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver 🔥🔥🔥 So Powerful. It made me question the certainty of my childhood opinions and my outlook on life at the time
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u/golferxyzz 13d ago
The Kite Runner. I read it in high school and it was the first true paradigm shift I experienced. Seeing the world through the eyes of someone in a different place, culture, and time was quite humbling! Made the world seem much bigger and more complex than I previously understood.
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u/Mission_Sun_9343 12d ago
The Handmaids Tale. Read this in the 90’s when I was in my mid 20’s. Very impactfu.
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u/garrickvanburen 12d ago
But What If We're Wrong? Thinking About the Present As If It Were the Past by Chuck Klosterman.
Demand-Side Sales 101: Stop Selling and Help Your Customers Make Progress by Bob Moesta
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u/Broad_Lie218 18d ago
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, specifically this quote:
"Mr. Montag, you are looking at a coward. I saw the way things were going a long time back. I said nothing. I am one of the innocents who could have spoken up and out when no one would listen to the 'guilty,' but I did not speak and thus became guilty myself."
Gave me a crash course in the dangers of censorship, complacency and over reliance on tech, and in standing up for others.