[Closed] Life changing books

Irrationality, the enemy within.

Boris Vian: [i]L'Arrache Coeur[/i]

Richard's Bicycle Book

Embracing the ordinary . Michael Foley. Not Life changing but certainly inspiring.

Read the Celestine Prophesy years ago that was supposed to change people's perspective.....load of cobblers really 🙂

Books that changed the way I think or see things in some way:

Bad Science - Ben Goldacre.
The Magic Mountain - Thomas Mann (incidentally, Sir Jimmy has scrawled something silly on the front cover of my copy when we were on a train once heading from Glasgow back to Leeds, not sure whether that enhances or devalues the book 🙂 )

Others have been life enhancing, but haven't really changed anything as such.

@Mefty, Was that a Dorling Kingsly book about all aspects of cycling?

Hubert Selby Junior- His whole bibliography. Every novel & short story is significant at a particular time in my life, particularly the "Song Of The Silent Snow" collection which contains the story "The Jacket".

Beautiful and a real friendship book.

As for Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake...It's just part of who I am.

The Secret - Rhonda Byrne.

Definitely contributed (along with cycling) to turning my life around and ending six years of clinical depression and medication!

Jack Canfield - The Success Principles

Very enlightening and inspirational book, not just for those in business or whatever, more for anyone wanting to take stock of life, get in control and make the best of themselves. And before anyone says anything, the book (and Jack himself) pitch "success" as not necessarily being financial, but in terms of feeling fulfilled by life.

Really great reading, and something I go back to quite often....

The Secret - Rhonda Byrne.

Definitely contributed (along with cycling) to turning my life around and ending six years of clinical depression and medication!

Another excellent book here 🙂

Er, what Mefty said RIchards Bicycle Book is my desert island choice.

And To Kill A Mockingbird as a kid.

The Sun Also Rises by Hemmingway as a youth.

The Road Less Travelled by M Scott Peck

If only for his definition of love.

Plenty more books aswell, although I tend to believe the book finds us, when we are ready for it.

Richard's Bicycle Book

+2 I wish i knew who has my copy of it.

The Easy Way - Allen Carr.
Understanding Organisations - Charles Handy.

Oh yes. Feet in the clouds. Richard Askwith. got into fell running in London. Moved to 100m away from the fells.

Richard Dawkins - The God Delusion
Brian Cox and Jeff Forshaw - Why Does E=mc^2

We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families - Philip Gourevitch.

It was a Pan book I bought this edition

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But I first read it earlier. There were later editions as well, I have one of those too.

Forgot A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess.
The most important of the lot.

The Easy Way - Allen Carr.

This.

Not the most enjoyable, but potentially life saving! 😆

Mefty, the first edition was the best.
The one that told you exactly how to deal with troublesome dogs. 😐

The second one had that passage too - I presume you always carry a long pump.

Yup.

Or a slower companion.

Loved the last chapter too - we're all allowed to dream.

American Psycho.

Mr Greedy.

The Grapes of Wrath - made me understand about human endurance.

Birdsong - awoke a huge interest in the two world wars and I have learned so much about them since.

The Grapes of Wrath

Actually I had forgotten that. It was a bit shocking when I finally 'got' it and a real eye opener onto what good writing really was

another one for:
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Smoked from 13ish to 28ish.
Been smokefree for 8 years and feel TEH AWESUM!

Not Buying It - Judith Levine

Changed my views on money and materialism.

Actually I had forgotten that. It was a bit shocking when I finally 'got' it and a real eye opener onto what good writing really was

Yeah - the one and only book I have read and when I got to the end I was left in such a state - a perfect (if that's what you can call it) ending.

I finished it on the number 73 bus and I had an almost irresistible urge to stand up and read it out loud to the whole bus. I rather wish now that I had.

Without doubt for me - How to win friends and influence people - completely changed my view on everything

Inspirational - Alistair Humphries - moods of future joys

Its not about the bike-Lance Armstrong
That guy is a legend.

That guy is a legend.

Anyone successfully implented the "haul turn" described in Richard Ballantine's book?
I never dared to try it.

Super-Cannes, J.G Ballard

The diving bell and the butterfly, perspective on life.

James and the giant peach. Loved books ever since.

Chasing The Sun

Richard Cohen

Topsy and Tim go on a Train

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I'm a bit embarrassed by this one, but Leon Uris' 'Trinity'.

Also...

A.N. Wilson's 'The Vicar of Sorrows'

And

Leo Tolstoy's 'The Death of Ivan Illych'

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert M Pirsig, I don't necessarily understand all of his musings but it's the one book i'd save if my house burned down.

Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior by Ori and Rom Brafman - a very interesting take on how we are not rational at all

A new earth - eckhart tolle - some love him, others hate him, I found the content life changing

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Seven Pillars of Wisdom - T E Lawrence

Operation and Maintenance Manual - Gardner 6LXB

I think the last time that I read a book all the way through was just over 20 years ago 😳

I have too many other things I want to do or children wanting my time.

he he, funny thread. There's a lot of people here who are either joking or very easily influenced. To Kill a mockingbird? A clockwork Orange? I mean they're good books and I enjoyed them myself but they're hardly life changing.

Anyway, someone has already posted the title of the book that had the biggest impact on me.

American Psycho.

I threw that book away when I finished it. Very well written but jesus! That guy was crazy! I was generally, horrified by the ideas in that book.

But it's not life changing. Life changing books completely impact your whole political perception surely?

Waterlog by Roger Deakin.

I swam outdoors a bit before that, but it really inspired me to get into it a lot (to the point that I'm going down the river in my speedos tomorrow morning!).

Emil and the Detectives - first proper novel I can remember reading
Slaughterhouse 5 - made me realise how futile war is, always
The Lorax - puts capitalism and "progress" neatly in perspective
The Lord of the Rings - just for the immense imagination, incredible
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - big influence on my generally satirical outlook on life
To Kill a Mockingbird - as a child growing up in a white middle class environment this did me so much good and helped me understanding predudice, including my own.

Life changing books completely impact your whole political perception surely?

Not just political, but general outlook on life and the paths you choose.

if one book has influenced me the most its probably the hobbit
had it read to us in lower school
ive never stopped reading ever since really

The Highway Code - Gave me freedom...from buses, trains and parents
The Old man and the Sea - Made me realise that some writing can be beautiful
Lonely Planet Japan gude book - Changed my life, made me change my country in the long term, though oddly not to japan

Rowing It Alone by Debra Veal changed the way I view life.

The Favoured Circle: The Social Foundations of Architectural Distinction, by Garry Stevens. Mostly because it introduced me, in a fairly understandable way, to the work of Pierre Bourdieu.

Books that influenced me:

To Kill A Mockingbird - is there a better book on the subject?
Encyclopdia of science
Mountaincraft and leadership
Eats shoots and leaves
The mythical man month
The Munros
The New Testament
Pretty much everything by Kurt Vonnegut
Lila

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I don't think I could honestly call any book "life changing" but loads of books have changed the way I think.

Hitchhiker's Guide, for so many clever ideas - like the planet where they keep voting for lizards, because if they didn't the wrong lizard might get in.
Snow Crash, for making me think that religion could be a meme or virus.
The Selfish Gene
Augustus Carp, just for being exquisitely, deliciously nasty - and very quotable.
Bicycle Design by Mike Burrows

Flann O'Brien - The Third Policeman - just mind boggling in so many ways

A very difficult question to answer. I have never been inspired to ride a camel to Mozambique after reading a book, for example. An easy choice would be the Roald Dahl staples that are read by most children and managed to instil in me a huge hunger for fiction. As an adult, John Steinbeck is the writer who's characters seem to align closely with my own beliefs.

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Read it from cover to cover, many times over, in my childhood. Gave me a love of the coastline which I continue to harbour 🙄 decades later. My wife can't understand why I just have to visit places like The Lizard, Easdale, The Severn Estuary, Portland Bill, The Bell Rock, The Old Man of Hoy or Luskentyre. There's even a huge picture of Durdle Door on our bedroom wall that I bought after a visit. Just love our coastline, lots still to visit too!

Russel Hoban's [i]The Mouse and his Child[/i], mostly because it was the first book I read which gave me a sense of infinity - an inkling that everything might be slightly larger than my childish mind could comprehend.

This feat was accomplished with the description of a dog food can. The label on the can portrays a dog, looking at a can of food. On the can on the label is a picture of a dog looking at a can of food. On the can in the label is a picture of a dog looking at a can of food, smaller and smaller, but still visible. Ad nausem; almost literally - the concept gave me nightmares for years, but good nightmares!

And later, [i]Ridley Walker[/i] by the same author gave me the shivers for very different reasons. Just read it, please.

+1 Kimbers exactly how I felt and I'm going to read it again now.

Stranger In A Strange land by Robert Heinlein. I read it when I was about 14 & it was revolutionary.

I am only an egg.

I can think of a few books that have deeply moved me but cannot recall one that has been [i]life-changing[/i] although OS maps, whilst not books, have certainly played a big part in my life.

Having said that, there is one possibly...

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8)

Captain Scott's Journal of the Terra Nova Antarctic expedition.
Worst Journey in the World - Apsley Cherry-Garrard.

Both make me feel very humble...

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert M Pirsig, I don't necessarily understand all of his musings but it's the one book i'd save if my house burned down.

Exactly the same here.

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Another vote for that. Read it first when I was 18 and instantly re-read it, to try and get my head around it. I've read it countless times since. I still don't think I'll ever grasp the full meaning. But it changes the way you view things for ever. In a really positive way!

Actually... I'm due another read. Its been a few years

Love Shook My senses, a book of poems that just helped and sorted out loads of stuff in my head. More though was Harry Potter. I know it's not great art or whatever, but this was mine youknow? I qued for the books, I lived them, watched all the films with the same people, got the whole series and they are a part of my heart

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert M Pirsig, I don't necessarily understand all of his musings

Vote 3.

I've read it three times making it the only book I've read more than once. I don't have a copy of it anymore as I passed it on to a friend who passed it on again, it's one of those sort of books.

Perhaps you wouldn't be surpised by mine...

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The Monkey Wrench Gang - Edward Abbey.
First saw it mentioned in a GT ad in MBA in 93. Reading it for the 4th or 5th time now.
One day the white sand beach of Lake Pedder will be free again.

Not a book, but the NME. Reading the NME from the age of 16 formed my brain into a well-rounded shape. (Not literally of course.) It was much much more than just a music rag back then.
Andrew Collins, Steven Wells, Danny Baker, Charles Shaar Murray were the writers (that I can remember off the top of my head).

Nearest books have come are Elmore Leonard's The Switch & Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club because they made me purchase & read all the authors' books.

this

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Mr Woppit - Member
Perhaps you wouldn't be surpised by mine...

I am surprised actually. You needed the book to change your beliefs?

samuri +1 -- I agree theres a lot of good books listed but in terms of ones that have really changed my view on something.

into the wild - Jon Krakauer

really made me think about the way humans live their lives, about what we think is valuable, about homeless people, a rare book that made me change my view on a human topic.

I am surprised actually. You needed the book to change your beliefs?

Nice try. Serviceable rod, wrong bait.

French Revolutions by Tim Moore. The very reason I ever got on a bike of any kind.

On Extended Wings - Diane Ackerman.

She's a poet, and I can't stand poetry, sorry about that. But this is her account of learning to fly light aircraft. The only book I have re-read many times. Especially when I've been feeling as though the world is against you.

The biography of Marcel Duchamp when I was 17....

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee - I was 13, and it taught me how the history we see is often the opposite of truth.

Classics in total synthesis by KC Nicolaou changed my life in a literal sense.

On the fiction side there's no one thing really - read a few that completely redefined what I had though possible in writing, but nothing that I'd call life-changing in a big way. Although a combination of many books and subtle insights is life-changing in aggregate I guess.

Das Kapital - Karl Marx
1984 - George Orwell
Wild Swans - Jung Chang
The Nuclear Survival Handbook - Barry Popkess