Whale Done by Ken Blanchard

John Darnielle's Devil House is a GREAT novel. All of his books are but it's particularly great

A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley.

Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl

"Entering Space: Creating a Spacefairing Civilization" by Robert Zubrin. My mother's work when I was growing up had a "free book shelf" that someone had put it on and she'd brought it home because I liked sciency stuff, and I've been extremely interested in space development and futurism ever since.

All Quiet on the Western Front

Tells you everything you need to know about war. First book which made me cry. Everybody should read it.

https://openlibrary.org/works/OL3173311W/Niemand_houdt_mij_tegen

It's more of a short story in a book filled with time traveling short stories.

I'm trying to find what it's called, but I still have the book. After reading it, I had a brief period of time where I was questioning my own freewill and choices.

Basically it starts with a time machine being in a warehouse and scientists all around. The person inside is doing everything backwards and they are attempting to communicate with paper, often getting answers before there is a question. It's a good read and I won't spoil the end.

How to solve it by Polya.

Voltaire's Bastards by John Ralston Saul. It showed me how the world really works. Also The Doubter's Companion as a supplement to that.

Edit to add that after reading through all the comments, it's pleasing what a well-read community we have here.

Learning Perl, 2nd edition

Something Happened, the other, far lesser-known work by Catch-22 author Joseph Heller. It's too apples-to-oranges to throw around "better", but I already love Catch-22 and still prefer Something Happened. It's considerably longer, but in my opinion, it's criminally overlooked.

Unauthorized Bread by Cory Doctorow. Based on a few true stories and set five minutes in the future, telling the story of the poorest in society, the arbitrary restrictions put on them and, the namesake, the way their lives are controlled by corporate surveillance and physical DRM enabled by disinterested legislators. It's a short story from one of his collections.

The technological society by Jacques Ellul. This book introduces a new way of looking at the world.

The Boy Who Was Raised As A Dog.

Growing up? Stranger in a Strange Land

MIchael's way of viewing the world felt so natural to me, and yet so different from almost anyone else around.

Fear of Small Numbers, by Arjun Appadurai

Crime and Punishment.

• The Bell Jar
• Between Two Fires
• The Troop (I just not over Newton 😭)
• N0S4A2

Krabat

A lot but here are the most recent ones (all non fiction)

Immense World : How Animal Senses Reveal the Hidden Realms Around Us by Ed Yong
Essential for understanding how other creatures live in our world and insight on how ours evolved to what it is right now.

How to Be Perfect: The Correct Answer to Every Moral Question by Michael Chur
Really great intro to practical ethics that is incredibly accessible as far as ethics books go. Everyone should at least skim this.

A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy by William B. Irvine
Best introduction to in my opinion the most important philosophy branch of western culture - Stoicism!

'Blindsight' and 'echopraxia' have had some of the longest reach in me, as far as books i read in adulthood.

Horror, but philosophical horror. It's so good.

As a kid I read Paulo Coelho's 'Veronika decides to die' and it kinda reframed some of my thinking. From what I recall, it's a very wholesome and light read!

Ender's Game is the first book that I ever read and then immediately re-read. And told people about how awesome it was. My librarian in middle school actually bought the book for me at a book fair. She saw that I was reading fantasy books to "fit in" but noticed that I seemed way more interested in Sci-Fi.

And Fight Club.

Witness.

(Not the book name, but if you've read the book, good on you).