The Most Influential Books In Your Life

[deb1]

Quote:
I love the Foxfire series and want to buy it one day.

If I won the lottery, I would spend the entire amount on new books.

 

[Spookwriter]

Certainly the Bible stands out. Love it or hate it, everyone should at
least read it.

I might have a short list of favorites...These are always kept separate
from my other books.

Harper Lee's, "To Kill a Mockingbird".....Written in 1960, it won the Pulitzer.


Richard Bach..what a message "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" left us in 1970.


John Griffin....spellbounding, "Black Like Me". 1961.



.....I've several bookcases full of books....but I also have a shelf where I have
only the books special to me. Signed by friends...one I helped my friend Bob do
his final draft on....Winn-Dixie, because my daughter and I took turns reading it
to each other.

And these three...

 

[dappertophatter]

Robin Hood, by Howard Pyle.

400th post! WOOOOOOOT!!!

 

[SilverPhoenix]

It may sound a bit silly, but my favorite book of all time is The Last Unicorn. by Peter S. Beagle. It seems like such a simple story, but woven into it are so many profound statements about life and mortality. I read it over and over again, and it seems to grow more and more beautiful and meaningful each time I read it. I've read a great number of the classic books written throughout history, and I have yet to find anything that emotionally moves me so much as this reasonably short, sweet, lovely book.

I also absolutely love Watership Down, Ender's Game, The Power of One (every chicken lover should read this book--the main character's best friend growing up is a rooster named Granpa Chook! Just a fantastic book in general, too), Beloved, Fluke, The Poisonwood Bible, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Much like my music tastes, I don't like to stick to just one genre, subject matter, or type of book--I'll read pretty much anything that looks "interesting" no matter what it's about.

As far as non-fiction books go, I really liked Thanking the Monkey and Old Souls. Probably others as well that I can't remember off the top of my head.

 

[mamagardener]

Upton Sinclairs The Jungle. That book opened my eyes to how unfair life can be.

 

[SilverPhoenix]

Quote:
Oh yeah, The Jungle is a great book. Nice choice.

 

[deb1]

Quote:
I have a friend who keeps trying to get me to read that book. He even loaned it to me but I was too busy to start it. What is the book about? My friend really wanted me to read it.

 

[farmerlor]

The Bible (though it didn't necessarily influence me in a good way)
To Ride a Silver Broomstick
The Red Tent
Mists of Avalon
The Bhagavad-Gita
The Nag Hammadi
The Gospels of Mary

 

[mamagardener]

Quote:
I have a friend who keeps trying to get me to read that book. He even loaned it to me but I was too busy to start it. What is the book about? My friend really wanted me to read it.

The base of the story is the lives of immigrants working in the Chicago Stockyards and how hard life was for them. It is definitely not for the weak of heart. It also put me off of eating meat for a good while. It's basically how the poor work hard and the rich robber barons get richer off of the blood and sweat of expendable labor. Really made me lose respect for all those robber barons that everyone else idolized for their business savvy. They would have been nothing without the very cheap labor, almost slave labor of the immigrants.

 

[Wifezilla]

• Atlas Shrugged
• Lord of the Rings
• Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal
• David Eddings' Belgariad series
• Ender's Game Series (Orson Scott Card)
• Star Tide Rising Series (David Brin)