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[VistraNorrez]

I don't know if any book changed my life, that's a heavy statement, but there are plenty of books that have stirred something up inside me. They've either made me feel better or worse about my life and the world.

Catcher in the Rye, cliche as it is, really made me understand the power of books. I realized books can be about everyday life, and everyday life is interesting, plus humans suck.

The Stranger, I don't know if it shaped my worldview but I loved the writing and being inside Meursault's head was incredibly different than most of the stuff I'd read.

Vonnegut books in general. Every single book of his is so absorbing, which is largely thanks to his style, but the way he connects all the events is brilliant. The Sirens of Titans is the most brilliant in that regard, but Slaughterhouse 5 and Cat's Cradle, are my other tops. I really wish he could've pulled off one more novel.

Raymond Carver's Where I'm Calling From, just the biggest influence on me wanting to be a writer. And anytime I need a reminder that's all I need.

There are plenty more too. Mark Twain always inspires. Poe is still so fresh.

 

[GhaleonQ]

yesssss!

3 votes already? Woo!

 

[DemiMatt]

I know its not a book by classical standards, but Geoff Johns writing on Green Lantern really did change the way I perceive emotions. All up until about Blackest Night, I dont much read books but comics tend to have a profound effect on me.

As far as book goes. this needs no explanation:

 

[GhaleonQ]

Fair enough, I'm just surprised. I can't say that I've read anything that has fundamentally changed any aspect about my personality

To be fair, I'm sure some of us actively look to books for that (though I think most people should; tradition being the democracy of the dead and all that) and others don't.

 

[Salazar]

Literary Criticism

William Empson: Seven Types of Ambiguity.
James Wood: The Broken Estate.
AC Bradley: Oxford Lectures on Poetry.

Science

Stephen Jay Gould: I Have Landed.
Martin Gardner: Science Good, Bad, and Bogus.
James Gleick: Genius - a biography of Richard Feynman.

Poetry

WS Graham: New Collected Poems.
Ted Hughes: Collected Poems.
WH Auden: Selected Shorter Poems.

Fiction

Kyril Bonfiglioli: The Mortdecai Trilogy.
CS Forester: The Hornblower Omnibus.
John Updike: The Bech books.

The list for history would go on forever.

 

[Esch]

Honestly, there's too many. But fuck me, I love Dune. Never stops being amazing.

 

[Sanic]

Nothing too out of the ordinary, and I wouldn't say they changed my life so much as they made me think long and hard about certain things. There are others and i'm sure i'm forgetting something big as I read fairly often but oh well.

 

[threenote]

 

[Mr. E. Yis]

Ishmael - Daniel Quinn
(and all the rest of his books)

Literally changed my perspective of history.

 

[Paper Tiger]

forgot this one. wonderful choice.

got me through some very hard times.

This book has been hugely influential upon my life. I want to read it again, but I think I'll hold off until I really need it. I keep meaning to read "I am that," which, from what I've heard, is similarly life-changing.

 

[Fuzzery]

 

[Ashes]

Oh, so, perhaps I can think of a book that put me off books for a while.. that is a little life changing, yes?
Jane Austen's Persuasion.

Spoiler

Aplogises to people who like the book, but this is a true story. I had come around to really liking Jane Austen after finally reading Pride and Prejudice in my last year at secondary school. Then I read Persuasion. And at a key time in my life, I was just really put off by books...

 

[Chairman Yang]

Changed the way I looked at evolution completely. Which, as a (current) biology student, is a very important thing.

I didn't really understand evolution (and therefore didn't really understand much about the world) until I read this book. It also sparked my general interest in science.

Made me realize that fantasy novels can be more than popcorn entertainment. I also believe it was the first book to ever make me verbally say, "holy shit." I was glued to the book.

To me, ASOIAF is less fantasy and more like a history written about an alternate, fantastic world. I enjoyed it so much--and was so dissatisfied with the shallowness and "fakeness" of most fantasy--that I gradually turned into an avid reader of actual history.

 

[Pancakes]

Blew my mind.

Really hard to understand (at least for me) but yes my mind was blown.

 

[Varvor]

Gaf! am desapoint!

How come no one mentioned this book? It changed my life! in many more ways than getting me laid on normal basis.

 

[beelzebozo]

because i don't read books to learn to get laid on a normal basis.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Tomás y el Lápiz Mágico Thomas and the Magic Pencil
This was my first reading book when I was a kid, and I love it. It made me love to read, and also made me love drawing and now im here, working as a designer.
The author came to my school and signed me my book, I have it still in my room.

And also, as other people, The Little Prince. What an amazing book.

 

[crazy monkey]

it didn't change my life or something but I liked it and really like Gandhi.
Quran changed me.

 

[Kraftwerk]

currently reading :

Haven't finished it yet but can say its already changing the way i think.

 

[JetBlackPanda]

 

[Weapxn]

 

[RSTEIN]

The greatest book on investing ever written. I still return to it every year and learn something new.

Such a powerful book. Made me totally re examine what I believe in, who I am, etc.

Read this when I was very young. Thanks to this book and a few others I have an insatiable appetite for books and learning. I try to read one book every week and often exceed this goal.

Book encouraged me to look beyond the reification of abstraction that traps so many people.

Another book that elevated my thinking and personal belief system.

 

[braves01]

The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky

The Stranger by Camus

White Noise by DeLillo

But I'm not sure if any of those have changed my life for the better.

 

[m3k]

id say that david malouf books have changed my girlfriends life... i havent read them yet but she swears his books are beautifuly written and seem to have left a big impact on her

 

[Burger]

I don't think a book has literally changed my life, but I've read some ones that have really made my eyes open wide with wonder.

If you read this book, and can still stomach Harry Potter without vomiting all over your goddamn screen, bravo. You're fucking weird.

Fucking this. I had no idea you could write fantasy books like Perdido St Station. One of the most incredible books I've ever had the pleasure of reading.

Also:

I had no idea science fiction like this existed until FnordChan (gaf member) pointed it out to me. Everything I've read since has paled in comparison.

 

[Amir0x]

Fucking this. I had no idea you could write fantasy books like Perdido St Station. One of the most incredible books I've ever had the pleasure of reading.

Also:

*image*

I had no idea science fiction like this existed until FnordChan (gaf member) pointed it out to me. Everything I've read since has paled in comparison.

Good choice!

Yeah, Perdido Street Station was a revelation for me. I had completely given up on this type of novel, having tripped over Wheel of Time's clumsy and never ending plot, and thrown my lot in with a host of poor Lord of the Ring imitators and feeble D&D fetish novels.

Perdido Steet Station pretty much fucks the genre norms and establishes its own, completely believable mythos, with themes as thought provoking and compelling as any I've read. So good.

 

[Burger]

Good choice!

Yeah, Perdido Street Station was a revelation for me. I had completely given up on this type of novel, having tripped over Wheel of Time's clumsy and never ending plot, and thrown my lot in with a host of poor Lord of the Ring imitators and feeble D&D fetish novels.

Perdido Steet Station pretty much fucks the genre norms and establishes its own, completely believable mythos, with themes as thought provoking and compelling as any I've read. So good.

Agreed! I also love how it absolutely must be pigeon holed into a new genre, like 'New Weird Fiction' or some other shit, just to make sure it's never put on the scales with any other fantasy works.

 

[AqueousTransmission]

THIS.

 

[Puddles]

I haven't read Perdido Street Station.

What makes it so great?

 

[Plumbob]

.

Reading this right now, is the

Spoiler

rape scene explained or justified even remotely appropriately?

Also:

Edit: beaten, glad to see some others have read this book.
We should really start a book club on NeoGAF. We have timed writing assignments, why not timed reading assignments?

 

[EviLore]

1984 - shaped my worldview on government, censorship, the status quo, the military industrial complex, etc.

The Demon-Haunted World - I read this way back as a teen, on Hitokage's suggestion. By that point I had recognized "these things people believe in are dumb," but the book helped solidify a structure in my mind for effective skepticism and empiricism.

 

[FiRez]

Reading this right now, is the

Spoiler

rape scene explained or justified even remotely appropriately?

sorry, but no, hence why I hate the parts about Dominique, everything else was superb imho

 

[JaseMath]

The Dark Tower (series). It completely changed the way I look at life.

 

[FiRez]

I think this was a decent book, but The Selfish Gene was more effective in making me an atheist than The God Delusion.

 

[tokkun]

I haven't read Perdido Street Station.

What makes it so great?

I got 120 pages into it trying to find the answer to that question before giving up.

I can tell you this: there was a lot of furry content.

 

[Bowflex]

Wow @ brianjones

What a stupid reaction.

Anywho, the top of my list from recent years would be:

Ernest Becker, The Birth and Death of Meaning
Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death
Tony Duvert, Good Sex Illustrated

 

[Puddles]

Reading Ulysses and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in 12th grade made me really think about writing in a completely different way.

Reading Great Expectations dramatically altered my views on love and relationships (assuming you go with the more pessimistic interpretation of the ending).


Btw, thank you for making this thread, OP. It's given me lots of titles to add to my reading list.

 

[shintoki]

Blindness, Saramago.

If there is any book that shows the decay of civilization in such a self interested way, this is it.

 

[Peronthious]

This book got me thinking about free will, punishment, and morality in general. I would say that the movie is almost better than the book, though. Nadsat is what pushes the book over the edge, it's presented so much better in text.

Anti Utopian literature at its finest. I enjoyed 1984, but the world Huxley proposed here seems so much more likely, at least on a general scale. Sure, we're probably never going to be in a society where individuals have their lives planned out for them from before they are born and are managed so that they are happy no matter what they do, but the concept of society management so that workers at every level are content with their situation still strikes me as oddly prophetic.

I recommend this book as reading for any Christian and any person who wants to understand the gospel foundation of the Jesus phenomenon. I was raised as a Christian, and this book got me thinking about how what I was supposed to believe came into being. While it did push me over the edge to admitting to myself that I was an atheist, it established a respect for religion and a recognition of its place in a person's life.

 

[GillianSeed79]

I'm completely out of my league here compared to Smart-Gaf, but here goes:

1. Dune: Stupid as a life changing book I know, but hell if it didn't it make me interested in writing.

2. Nietzche: I kind of consider him juvenille now, but reading his stuff after spending the first 18 years of my life in a cult that was Catholic school was amazing. (Seems like an angsty emo these days IMO)

3. Jean Paul Sartre: Holy hell is this guy mind blowing. I nearly had an out of body experience reading this guy in college. I once saw a photo of grafiiti saying Sartre was like tripping acid. I agree, though again I'm like Simple Jack compared to the rest of GAF.

 

[∀ Narayan]

Excellent thread. I'll post some of my picks when I wake up. For now, I'm just posting to bookmark the thread.

 

[tokkun]

I assume by this you mean there was interspecies sex in the book? Or people dressed as animals having sex? I'm not sure which I'd find more disturbing.

Well I was sort of joking, but pretty early on there is a sex scene between the main character and a khepri.

The khepri are a race of humanoid scarab beetles. Female khepri possess bodies very similar to those of human women, except that their skin is crimson in colour and they possess large scarab beetles in place of heads. They communicate with each other via movements of their "headlegs" and squirts of chemicals.

There seemed to be a lot of half-human half-animal characters.

 

[finowns]

Intense, dystopian thriller, where people keep "sleeves" which store their memories, to be restored if they die. Only thing is, Catholics arrange not to be resleeved since they believe their soul does not transfer. So people murder Catholics, knowing they can't be testified against.

When they asked how I died, tell them: Still Angry.

 

[cnizzle06]

 

[Thunder Monkey]

I read a few choice bible stories and then laughed that people actually believe that stuff.

I don't read as much as I use too, but back when I did I tended toward tales of weirdness. Stephen King, and his retarded cousin Dean Koontz stories.

Then I started doing art stuff and lost interest.

 

[RumblingRosco]

My favorite book by far, and the one that has stuck with me the most in my life. I read it when I was 8 and then again many times since, so it's hard to say how it shaped me since I read it so young, I just know that I keep it in mind a lot.

Watch the movie first, then found out about and read the book. There's one seen that describes Harry and Marion bumming around in their apartment, in the bed, and on the couch, high on whatever it was they were doing at the time. That scene was amazingly written. In some ways, I'm jealous of it, I guess.

It only changed me in the sense that I read it when I was relatively young (younger, I guess) and thought, "How can people do these awful things? I'm glad it's just a book." Then I grew up, started paying some attention to the news and question why real life can get so awful.

 

[IrishNinja]

shit, i gotta get back to Things We Carried and Selfish Gene soon, too many noms here.

Changed my perception on reading fiction.

Changed my opinion on morality.

this,

then,

damn, good choices.
mine, as far as changing my way of thinking:

(really, its bits of that one + Art of War + Book of Five rings, i have a hard time isolating them in my mind)

 

[lexi]

Down and Out in Paris and London

 

[Karakand]

 

[ClassyPenguin]

Just a few that come to mind:

The only book in elementary school that I actually cared about.

The first "adult" book that I ever read and that was in fifth grade. Pretty much got me started on this whole reading thing.

Blew my mind, especially the one about Virgil

"It only had to happen once"

Got me into morality and philosophy and quite possibly the only non-horror(I read a lot of Stephen King in middle-school) book to give me nightmares.