What Book Changed Your Life?

[Orchidea73]

Some of the books which I'm attached to, for various reasons, and have kept re-reading them over the years. I will never get tired of reading them.

Ulysses by James Joyce
Iliad by Homer
Aeneid by Virgil
The Silmarillion by Tolkien
The Lord of the Rings by Tolkien
Three Comrades by Remarque
If This is a Man by Primo Levi
The Drowned and the Saved by Primo Levi
The Gulag Archipelago by Solzhenitsyn
The Idiot by Dostoevsky
The Master and Margarita by Bulgakov
War and Peace by Tolstoy
Heart of Darkness by Conrad
David Copperfield by Dickens
One Thousand and One Nights
The Old Man and the Sea by Hemingway
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
The Royal Game (aka Chess Story) by Stefan Zweig
Amok by Stefan Zweig
A Song of Ice And Fire by George R.R. Martin

 

[Chillygirl]

The Lost Daughters of China

Read it during the adoption process...the one child law...it’s brutal.

 

[JonBHappy]

Not sure if a single one has changed my life, but some endure in the way I think about things, or via re - reads.

Hard Times (and a few other Dickens)
Far From The Madding Crowd (plus other Thomas Hardy)
The Glass Bead Game and Narcissus and Goldmund, both by Hesse
Sapiens and Homo Deus, both by Yuval Noah Harari
Cider with Rosie by Laurie Lee
Les Miserables, Victor Hugo
L'Étranger, Albert Camps
Nausea, Jean-Paul Sartre

 

[Hornblende]

Here are a few!

The Return Of The Native - Thomas Hardy
Sons and Lovers - D.H Lawrence
The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
The Marriages Between Zones Three, Four and Five - Doris Lessing
Northern Lights - Philip Pullman

...I could go on...

 

[Lydia_Deetz]

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig

I've read this one a few times and find new philosophical meaning within the narration each time. It really inspired me to think more deeply about my values.

 

[Blumper]

In Cold Blood - Truman Capote
A Garden of Sand - Earl Thompson

 

[Rainydaythings]

.....

 

[Scareltt]

Lucy Fairbourne...

There have been a lot of books that caused change in my life. Most of it was short term, or more passive.

FemDom For Nice Girls changed how I thought.

http://wonder-woman.info/ds/Femdom%20for%20Nice%20Girls%20-%20Lucy%20Fairbourne.pdf

 

[TheOriginalSA]

Stolen Legacy
It reminded me of, the accomplishments of my ancestors

Great Gatsby
To aspire for more and never let money change you

Flowers in the Attic
Made me feel normal as a kid, knowing other children were going through harsh conditions and making the best of a horrible situation




Most other books I read were for school or entertainment

 

[Modern_drunkard]

The Satanic Bible by Anton LaVey

 

[sally_sparrow]

Stolen Legacy
It reminded me of, the accomplishments of my ancestors

Great Gatsby
To aspire for more and never let money change you

Flowers in the Attic
Made me feel normal as a kid, knowing other children were going through harsh conditions and making the best of a horrible situation

Most other books I read were for school or entertainment

I hated The Great Gatsby when i first read it. I tried it again years later and loved it. There is so much symbolism throughout the book. I may need to read that one again some day soon, it's been a long time!

 

[Jada59]

The phone book. No internet in those days. It was the next best thing!

 

[sally_sparrow]

The Satanic Bible by Anton LaVey

I bet that was an enlightening read.

The phone book. No internet in those days. It was the next best thing!

Good one! I can't remember the last time I used a phone book

 

[Tampafel]

The Three Pillars of Zen by Philip Kapleau. It really helped me find some stability when I was dealing with a lot personal demons. It also turned me onto Zen Buddhism and Sanbo Kyodan in particular.

 

[Huff76]

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck by Mark Manson

I need to read this

 

[Stillrandy]

For Adult Children of Alcoholics

"Recovery: A Guide for Adult Children of Alcoholics".
By Herbert Gravitz & Julie Bowen

This little book was recommended by a therapist in 1991 and has been pivotal in helping me understand the impact of my alcoholic father on my life. Both growing up and as an adult. I was in my 50's before I realized how that early life experience had affected me ever after. I have recently been re-reading it because I find myself lapsing into old habitual thinking. Just paging through the book and seeing how many lines and paragraphs I have underlined and commented on is refreshing!

I also received a lot of related help from another book:

"Codependent No More" by Melodie Beattie. Being an ACOA is closely related to codependency.

And anyone who lives with an alcoholic (or other substance abuser) will likely be helped by these books.

 

[sally_sparrow]

"Recovery: A Guide for Adult Children of Alcoholics".
By Herbert Gravitz & Julie Bowen

This little book was recommended by a therapist in 1991 and has been pivotal in helping me understand the impact of my alcoholic father on my life. Both growing up and as an adult. I was in my 50's before I realized how that early life experience had affected me ever after. I have recently been re-reading it because I find myself lapsing into old habitual thinking. Just paging through the book and seeing how many lines and paragraphs I have underlined and commented on is refreshing!

I also received a lot of related help from another book:

"Codependent No More" by Melodie Beattie. Being an ACOA is closely related to codependency.

And anyone who lives with an alcoholic (or other substance abuser) will likely be helped by these books.

Thanks for these Stillrandy. It's so nice to see you again!

 

[Orchidea73]

I love everything Shakespeare. But these are my favorites.

1. Macbeth
2. King Lear
3. The Merchant of Venice

I love Shylock because he's such a tragic figure. He's suppose to be the "villain" but I've never seen him like that. He's not perfect but he's a human being, with good and bad, and he's a father who does love his daughter. I feel great empathy and sympathy for him. I find him one of Shakespeare’s most memorable characters ever. The Merchant is supposed to be a comedy but it always leaves me with a sense of sadness.

His speech, “It Will Feed my Revenge!”, is so powerful and gets me every time.

"To bait fish withal: if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a million; laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies; and what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge. The villainy you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction."

 

[Rosa2019]

On Spirituality (Not religion):

The Power of Now and A New Earth --- by Eckhart Tolle

Wake Up Now--- by Stephan Bodian

A Thousand Names ---by Katie, Byron

Books by Wayne Dyer (easier reading)

 

[CurvyAngel_2]

Forever?

Yes, that's the one!

 

[Booboobear84]

Meditations of Marcus Aurelius
Road Less Traveled M. Scot Peck
The Millionaire Next Door (showed me that my clients weren't anomalies but the rule)

 

[Fazer600]

Taking notes here. I have read many of these, and love them too. I have a long list as well. Travels With Charley by John Steinbeck is on my list currently. Log From the Sea of Cortez.
The Monkey Wrench Gang by Edward Abbey I re-read every few years. And then I follow it with "Hayduke Lives," the sequel
I will add to this list later... subscribing to this thread.

 

[Booboobear84]

and How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnigie. Should be titled how to be nice to people.

 

[Boots_and_Bourbon]

THE most moving and influential book I have ever read has to be - The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Others have referenced it as well. May be the closest thing to what should be required reading in school. And a cautionary tale about absolute ideologies, the danger of 'the greater good' at the expense of the individual and the unimaginable brutality and cruelty of what people can do to each other.

On a lighter and more positive note.

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
An amazing book of relatively short and insightful reflections

Letters from a Stoic by Seneca
I really like this book. Similar to Meditations above except longer letters on stoic principles.

Make Your Bed - Little things that can change your life...And maybe the world by Admiral William Craven (US Navy Retired).
Also one of the best commencement speeches ever
-

 

[Orchidea73]

THE most moving and influential book I have ever read has to be - The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Others have referenced it as well. May be the closest thing to what should be required reading in school. And a cautionary tale about absolute ideologies, the danger of 'the greater good' at the expense of the individual and the unimaginable brutality and cruelty of what people can do to each other.

-

I couldn't have said it better. And I can't recommend this book enough. It's a MUST!

I would also recommend "A Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley. Written in 1931 and yet so frightfully relevant today.