This one certainly has a haunting feel to it. It stayed with me too when I read it as a teen. I don't really remember the story very well, but the mood of the book lingers on in the back of my mind when I think of it.
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Please recommend me novels that affected you
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This one certainly has a haunting feel to it. It stayed with me too when I read it as a teen. I don't really remember the story very well, but the mood of the book lingers on in the back of my mind when I think of it.
In my opinion this is the ultimate "Dystopia" story.
This I can actually see happening and it's both beautiful and scary
Yeah, also this
I have not. I heard it wasn't as good, so I put it out of my mind. I might check it out down the road, though.
That's what I heard as well. Haven't met anyone who has said it was worth it yet!
The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman is something you might like. It's easy to read, short, very imaginative and really enjoyable. It's one of those stories that instantly hooks you and feels unique. The best description that I saw of it was that it's basically an children's book written for adults. Which it did remind me of. With this book you might get your appetite for reading back. I know it worked for me.
Catach-22 and The catcher in the rye.
Ho, and The Yiddish Policemen Union, by Michael Chabon. It's not the easiest book to get into, but the writing and style are incredibly, incredibly subtle and complex. It's a joy to read.
Ho, and The Yiddish Policemen Union, by Michael Chabon. It's not the easiest book to get into, but the writing and style are incredibly, incredibly subtle and complex. It's a joy to read.
It was a really weird read, even by Robert Rankin's standards. I... I love the cover, but I'm not sure I even liked the book itself (and I usually love Rankin's stuff).
Not sure if in a good or bad way but it definitely affected me.
I usually don't get emotionally affected by books. But I do grow emotionally attached to the ones I really liked and often will pull them out again every 5 years and re-read them.
To answer the OP the only thing I can think of was when I first read Dracula. I was a teenager but I remember actually being creeped out and a little afraid reading it. It is just written in such a realistic fashion that it got to me.
To answer the OP the only thing I can think of was when I first read Dracula. I was a teenager but I remember actually being creeped out and a little afraid reading it. It is just written in such a realistic fashion that it got to me.
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I'll cherish Earthsea forever. Still haven't read Tehanu and Tales from Earthsea, lol. Too precious.
I have The Left Hand Of Darkness waiting though.
I'm due for a Hyperion reread.
Read it, good novel but didn't get to me.
Read it a year or so ago and it fucking wrecked me for reasons I still don't understand.
Reading Dracula right now and finding it surprisingly readable. Prose is both beautiful and easy to parse. Unlike, say, To The Lighthouse.
That fucking book took me in and left me with a sense of weak, exhausted sense of despair and disgust. I don't think I even want to think much about it.
I guess I should mention The Dark Tower books as well since the first are among my favorite books of all time but uhm....yeah. The later books.....uhm
Edit: Another one that stayed in my mind for a long time
Fucked me up good
The Man in Black get's eaten by a man spider and that spider then basically dies because it eats something rotten. What the fuck. King spent an ENTIRE book on the birth of that spider and then it just eats something bad and get's shot. Jesus christ. People like to make fun of how the final boss literally get's drawn away but this was waaaaaaaaaaaay dumber
Edit: Another one that stayed in my mind for a long time
Fucked me up good
Requiem for a dream to stay away from hard drugs especially heroin.
Training Day to make sure to secure the victory then celebrate instead of the reverse.
American Pie 2 because college life should be like this right?? right............ *sighs*
Spider-Man 2 because it is the best superhero movie without being a full superhero movie imho.
Casino as an example of stopping once you've reached the peak and move on to a slower pace in life.
Heat as a prime example of escaping when you have the chance.
Training Day to make sure to secure the victory then celebrate instead of the reverse.
American Pie 2 because college life should be like this right?? right............ *sighs*
Spider-Man 2 because it is the best superhero movie without being a full superhero movie imho.
Casino as an example of stopping once you've reached the peak and move on to a slower pace in life.
Heat as a prime example of escaping when you have the chance.
The book that most recently had me hooked is Straight Ahead by Art Pepper, the story of a jazz musician and his heroin addiction. He was a fantastic storyteller and this book offers a unique perspective on opioid addiction that you're unlikely to find elsewhere. It's actually an autobiography but reads like a novel.
Demian, Wuthering Heights, Crime and Punishment.
I read all of them at the middle-end of my high school ages, but just the last one was necessary for a class; funny, because it's the one who more impacted me.
I read all of them at the middle-end of my high school ages, but just the last one was necessary for a class; funny, because it's the one who more impacted me.
Murakami has a few novels that connect with me a ton on a personal level while wrapping it all in a veil of unique supernatural qualities.
The novels A Wild Sheep Chase and Colorless Tsukuri Tazaki really stuck in my mind. Both are really personal journeys, and both have to do with looking back on old friendships that have been weathered by time and connecting with those who used to be so close to you.
The novels A Wild Sheep Chase and Colorless Tsukuri Tazaki really stuck in my mind. Both are really personal journeys, and both have to do with looking back on old friendships that have been weathered by time and connecting with those who used to be so close to you.
I read so many books (150-200 a year) and more than a few have left me thinking about them when I'm well into my next book, problem is I couldn't tell you the author our title for the vast majority of them, I will pick a series in Sci fi, fantasy mystery etc, read the series then look into the other work the author has done and either read those or move onto the be the next author.
That said one book that really stands out and left me a little conflicted was The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks. The following isn't really a spoiler but I think if you want the full effect of the book you need to go in blind
That said one book that really stands out and left me a little conflicted was The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks. The following isn't really a spoiler but I think if you want the full effect of the book you need to go in blind
the fact that right until the end of the book I really want something bad to happen to the main character till the twist, then I felt sympathetic towards a character who is still a terrible human being.
This is one fucked up read. I really struggled to finish this book due to how messed up it is ans some parts made me feel physically sick.
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C&P is good stuff. I wouldn't be able to discuss it coherently but I especially loved the sheer sense of mania at the end of the first chapter.
Oliver Ready is an incredible translator.
I absolutely adore Murakami's work, he's probably one of my most-read authors (THE most read if we discount YA fiction I read in my earlier teens). I'm trying to spread out his bibliography lol. I think I'll hold out until Killing Commendatore comes out before reading another work of his.
Two books I read as a kid by Jan Terlouw (Dutch writer/former politician):
Winter in Wartime (Orginal Title: Oorlogswinter)
Adolescent boy who lives through the Winter of 1944-1945 gets involved with a big secret. Story is based on the recollection of the author's memories of the war as a kid.
Just one of the many examples how complex war can get and that there's worth in fighting for the things you believe in. If you can write a story about war written for kids and it still sticks with me after all those years, then you wrote a good book.
How to become King (Orginal Title: Koning van Katoren)
Fantasy about how a country lost their king and the ministers takes control. They promise to appoint a new king, but none of that happens. Years later an adolescent boy asks what it takes to become a king and the ministers give him seven impossible tasks to complete.
This book gave me an interest into politics and it was just an amazing read altogether.
Winter in Wartime (Orginal Title: Oorlogswinter)
Adolescent boy who lives through the Winter of 1944-1945 gets involved with a big secret. Story is based on the recollection of the author's memories of the war as a kid.
Just one of the many examples how complex war can get and that there's worth in fighting for the things you believe in. If you can write a story about war written for kids and it still sticks with me after all those years, then you wrote a good book.
How to become King (Orginal Title: Koning van Katoren)
Fantasy about how a country lost their king and the ministers takes control. They promise to appoint a new king, but none of that happens. Years later an adolescent boy asks what it takes to become a king and the ministers give him seven impossible tasks to complete.
This book gave me an interest into politics and it was just an amazing read altogether.
- The Autobiography of Malcolm X
- The Brothers Karamazov - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- Pale Blue Dot - Carl Sagan
- Dune - Frank Herbert
- Nostromo - Joseph Conrad,
Hmm. This is the first time I've seen anyone dislike Kvothe. I can see why someone might not like him though.
I just felt like there was nothing interesting about him. Kvothe is arrogant and more or less flawless. That made him come across off as unrelatable. He's the best looking, the best lute player, the best sympathy user, the most brilliant, the most clever, the bravest, etc. Apart from his frequent money struggles, there were never any real stakes.
Haha, I think that's totally fair. I'm in a similar boat where I love his stuff but I usually space out reading his stuff with a few other types of novels.
Yeah I think Kvothe's biggest problem is that he comes across as flawless in about every respect besides his occasional impulsiveness. I loved Name of the Wind, and I appreciated how down-to-earth it is, but by the end I wasn't sure what kind of scenario Kvothe couldn't scheme or play his way out of.
On the Beach by Nevil Shute. Read it years ago, and the creeping dread almost made me physically ill. Can't bring myself to reread it to see if I still feel the same.
Stoner by John Williams. Such an understated, sad novel. NYRB is my favorite publisher as a result.
Kurt Vonnegut hadd a huge impact on me.
First came I to contact with him in high school.
I often read through the books in the shelves in the back of the class (where I always was, every class) when I was bored out of my mind in english... which was always... possibly because everything we were reading in high school English I already read in the back of the class in jr high....
But I came across a tattered paperback copy of slapstick, the book was open and bent, and I scanned a few paragraphs while looking over it, and it was so cynically absurd, just the most absurd dystopian post apocalyptic depiction of the US, I just had to pick it up.
The part I read was about legislation put in place to help the underprivileged, and u fortunate by assigning everyone in America to a series of families, so everyone would be able to have family to fall back on in hard times, but the way it was pitched, and the way it was inevitably used, was of course not to help others, but to enthusiastically tell people outside their tribe, to go take a flying fuck at a rolling donut. To take a flying fuck at the moon. Because of fucking course it was.
It also really helped with my multitasking, as I was effectively reading Vonnegut while keeping tabs on where we were in hamlet or Othello in case I was called on to read.
Apparently this was the worst Vonnegut book ever written, particularly notable since Kurt himself labeled it as such.
So uh, yeah, apparently the worst fucking book Kurt Vonnegut ever wrote is the one that had the profound impact on my life.
How utterly absurdly appropriate.
So uh.... you want to read one of the worst books ever written according to said author of book and pitched by random guy on internet?
Slapstick is your book.
First came I to contact with him in high school.
I often read through the books in the shelves in the back of the class (where I always was, every class) when I was bored out of my mind in english... which was always... possibly because everything we were reading in high school English I already read in the back of the class in jr high....
But I came across a tattered paperback copy of slapstick, the book was open and bent, and I scanned a few paragraphs while looking over it, and it was so cynically absurd, just the most absurd dystopian post apocalyptic depiction of the US, I just had to pick it up.
The part I read was about legislation put in place to help the underprivileged, and u fortunate by assigning everyone in America to a series of families, so everyone would be able to have family to fall back on in hard times, but the way it was pitched, and the way it was inevitably used, was of course not to help others, but to enthusiastically tell people outside their tribe, to go take a flying fuck at a rolling donut. To take a flying fuck at the moon. Because of fucking course it was.
It also really helped with my multitasking, as I was effectively reading Vonnegut while keeping tabs on where we were in hamlet or Othello in case I was called on to read.
Apparently this was the worst Vonnegut book ever written, particularly notable since Kurt himself labeled it as such.
So uh, yeah, apparently the worst fucking book Kurt Vonnegut ever wrote is the one that had the profound impact on my life.
How utterly absurdly appropriate.
So uh.... you want to read one of the worst books ever written according to said author of book and pitched by random guy on internet?
Slapstick is your book.
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The Man in the High Castle blew my mind when I read it in my mid-twenties. Loved the hell out of its setting and weird alternate history.
My one suggestion for a life-changing book:
1984 by George Orwell (depressing and oppressive setting, eye-opening examination of fascism, and an ending you'll never forget)
My one suggestion for a life-changing book:
1984 by George Orwell (depressing and oppressive setting, eye-opening examination of fascism, and an ending you'll never forget)
Maniac Magee was a book I read at 10 years old, and to this day still impacts the way I view race and racial relations across America.
So that.
So that.
Ulysees is fucking difficult to read if you're not reading it as part of a course.
If you've never read James Joyce, I'd recommend starting with Dubliners, which is very approachable and excellent. Actually, several stories in Dubliners deeply affected me, including Two Gallants, and then another one that I've forgotten the name of chiefly involving a woman, her child, and I believe her alcoholic husband.
My favorite contemporary novel from the last few years is A Gentleman in Moscow, by Amor Towles. I really fucking loved that book.
Otherwise, I have a lot of novels that stick out to me, but none that really deeply affected me. Like others mentioned, a Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin was one of the first novels I read on my own that I remember feeling "wow, I really like this."
I always liked Great Expectations and a Tale of Two Cities, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend either. They're books that were assigned reading that I liked, particularly Great Expectations. A Farewell to Arms and All Quiet on the Western Front similarly affected me in High School as novels that I really enjoyed, or, I suppose, they had a lasting impact on me.
If you've never read James Joyce, I'd recommend starting with Dubliners, which is very approachable and excellent. Actually, several stories in Dubliners deeply affected me, including Two Gallants, and then another one that I've forgotten the name of chiefly involving a woman, her child, and I believe her alcoholic husband.
My favorite contemporary novel from the last few years is A Gentleman in Moscow, by Amor Towles. I really fucking loved that book.
Otherwise, I have a lot of novels that stick out to me, but none that really deeply affected me. Like others mentioned, a Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin was one of the first novels I read on my own that I remember feeling "wow, I really like this."
I always liked Great Expectations and a Tale of Two Cities, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend either. They're books that were assigned reading that I liked, particularly Great Expectations. A Farewell to Arms and All Quiet on the Western Front similarly affected me in High School as novels that I really enjoyed, or, I suppose, they had a lasting impact on me.
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I've read Brave New World and The Kite Runner. Pretty good books.
Ulysses' fuckery with literary forms and what have you interests me quite deeply but I don't aim to understand or even really parse it lol.
No worries, read it twice over even before my school spared a semester's worth of English entirely to 1984. Excellent, glorious book.
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No. It's a book that deals with a person's spiritual path in the backdrop of Brahmin-era India, but much of the context isn't that hard to figure out.
One hundred years of solitude - This is gonna be the book of my life. I was thinking this after finishing the first paragraph of this book. I was already a avid reader in my teenager years, but reading this novel was a completely new experience. Marquez style and narrative are such unique that inspired me to write a book someday.
Never let me go - the definitive coming of age story for me. Follow the growth of the protagonists and her friends, and reflect about life and death, with a hint of sci-fi and horror made this one of my favorite novels.
Never let me go - the definitive coming of age story for me. Follow the growth of the protagonists and her friends, and reflect about life and death, with a hint of sci-fi and horror made this one of my favorite novels.
If you're up for scifi, I suggest "A Fire Upon the Deep" followed by "A Deepness in the Sky" if you like it. They're scifi books that stuck in my head because of the unique approach and massive scale. It felt like my brain was expanding or something just thinking about it.
The author likes making very unusual aliens (e.g. an alien race that are similar to dogs, but have a hivemind intelligence so each "individual" is actually the result of several pack members communicating) instead of the normal different-color-humanoid style aliens. They also like talking about absolutely massive scales of space or time, such as how to plan out a trade empire that still stays in touch with each other despite the vastness of space and travel time.
The author likes making very unusual aliens (e.g. an alien race that are similar to dogs, but have a hivemind intelligence so each "individual" is actually the result of several pack members communicating) instead of the normal different-color-humanoid style aliens. They also like talking about absolutely massive scales of space or time, such as how to plan out a trade empire that still stays in touch with each other despite the vastness of space and travel time.
Jean Genet - Our Lady of the Flowers
In terms of more conventional novels - Dean Koontz's 'Watchers' and any Cormac McCarthy.
In terms of more conventional novels - Dean Koontz's 'Watchers' and any Cormac McCarthy.
This one probably won't affect people the way it affected me, but my favorite book of all time is Microserfs by Douglas Coupland.
It's all about nerdy people growing up and finding themselves. It was funny and sooo, soo relevant to me. It's a lot of nerd stuff, but they also get into deep topics like the meaning of life and love. I try to read it every couple years... now I want to read it again.
Honestly, it was kind of hard for me to read new books after that. Nothing measured up in my mind, even Coupland's other books.
It's all about nerdy people growing up and finding themselves. It was funny and sooo, soo relevant to me. It's a lot of nerd stuff, but they also get into deep topics like the meaning of life and love. I try to read it every couple years... now I want to read it again.
Honestly, it was kind of hard for me to read new books after that. Nothing measured up in my mind, even Coupland's other books.
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I actually bought a "second hand" copy, read 20 pages and was almost delighted with it- then realized it was a bootleg book. Who'd bother to make a copy of an English book and sell it in a cafe in the middle of one of Istanbul's poorest districts I don't know, but I didn't want to read it that way. I'll definitely read it though, his style is special.
Tried the first, loved the idea of the Zones of Thought but that only carried my interest for about 200 pages.
I was coming here to say this. First time I read it I sat in a chair for hours and didn't move until I finished it in one sitting. I have Cat's Cradle in my drawer at work but I haven't found the time to start it.
Hmm, allow me to suggest one more then:
The Truth About Stories by Thomas King. It's a collection of short stories about First Nations in North America. It's pretty damn sad and opens your eyes to a lot of injustices, racism, etc.
Never Let Me Go - It's hard to explain why without ruining the story, but it's basically a coming of age story that takes place in a private school and then leaving said school. I read it about 10 years ago and still think about it all the time.
Johnny Got His Gun - The song One by Metallica is based on the movie of this book. A WW1 solider wakes up after being blown up by a land mind having lost his limbs, ability to talk, hearing, and sight. It's told in first person and deals with him realizing with what happened and flashing back to his life before the war. Obviously deeply affecting and has been an anti-war book since for good reason.
Johnny Got His Gun - The song One by Metallica is based on the movie of this book. A WW1 solider wakes up after being blown up by a land mind having lost his limbs, ability to talk, hearing, and sight. It's told in first person and deals with him realizing with what happened and flashing back to his life before the war. Obviously deeply affecting and has been an anti-war book since for good reason.
A few others that stuck with me over the years:
* Snow Crash, Diamond Age, Altered Carbon -- creative cyberpunk where I still remember some of the characters, scenes, mechanics, or whatever.
* Dresden Files -- not highbrow intellectual books, but very fun if one is into urban fantasy. I loved that the characters didn't constantly get killed off ala Game of Thrones. The author also did another series and likes to subvert tropes.