100 Best Catalog Books of All Time

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Adam Hart-Davis

When Stephen Hawking wrote A Brief History of Time..his publisher told him that every equation he left in would halve the number of readers [source]

Anurag Ramdasan

My first intro into the world of physics and this got me completely hooked!

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Steve Jobs

Founder/Apple

called this book "one of his favorite" and recommended it to the hires. The book also inspired one the greatest TV ad (made by Jobs) [source]

Andra Zaharia

These books and their core ideas have stuck with me the most and continue to guide me when I hit crossroads along the way. [source]

Elon Musk

Founder/SpaceX

As a boy in Pretoria, Musk was un dersized and picked upon, a smart-aleck known as Muskrat. In his loneliness, he read a lot of fantasy and science fiction. “The heroes of the books I read, ‘The Lord of the Rings’ and the ‘Foundation’ series, always felt a duty to save the world,” he told me. [source]

Reid Hoffman

CEO/LinkedIn

The book that I’ve most often read. [source]

Alan Lee

His alternative world and mythological system is totally coherent–it’s a fantastic gift that he has given us. [source]

Whitney Cummings

Whitney Cummings recommended this book on the podcast "The Tim Ferriss Show". [source]

Vlad Tenev

When I was in sixth grade I remember being very upset by the ending of this book. [source]

Heather Brooke

I picked Animal Farm because it is an allegory about power and its seductive and corruptive influence on people regardless of their initial good intentions. [source]

A.J. Jacobs

Great writer. [source]

Carl Zimmer

Yes. This is a fascinating book on so many different levels. It is really compelling as the story of the author trying to uncover the history of the woman from whom all these cells came. [source]

Yuval Noah Harari

Historian

The most prophetic book of the 20th century. Today many people would easily mistake it for a utopia. [source]

Andra Zaharia

These books and their core ideas have stuck with me the most and continue to guide me when I hit crossroads along the way. [source]

Catherine Mayer

It shows the ways in which technology, our need for certain creature comforts and consumer culture can be used to manipulate us. [source]

Andrew Copson

Other children’s books often have children behaving in terrible ways. Philip himself has acknowledged that his His Dark Materials is, to some extent, a response to the Chronicles of Narnia which has children behaving in all sorts of slavish ways, obeying authority because it is authority, and setting all sorts of poor moral examples. The children in Philip’s books are thoughtful, intelligent, and morally concerned. They are motivated by love and loyalty. And they are very complex. He doesn’t shy away from the moral complexity, the difficulties of choice, the lesser of two evils. That is also something that comes up in his books. There is no perfect solution, you struggle to truth. [source]

Kiran Millwood Hargrave

This is one of my favourite books. Lyra feels like a natural successor to Matilda. She is a character of action. She isn’t sitting in a corner reading. She is out there and she is having a real effect on her story. She isn’t being buffeted by forces and having to rebel against them, she is out there actively seeking an adventure. I read this when I was eleven and starting secondary school. I remember her really sticking with me not least because she lies so much. [source]

Lewis Smith

His Dark Materials Series by Philip Pullman is my favourite fictional book of all time. I just love this story so much, it's clever and thought provoking, whilst also being accessible and gripping to read. The audiobook version is fantastic too, and narrated by Pullman himself. It's also inspiring because the main characters are just children, but they are so strong and determined. There is always something new to take from it. I love that Lyra is quite a popular girls name now. [source]

James Altucher

Founder/StockPickr

Excellent novel. [source]

Ann Miura-Ko

I would encourage people to read it because it gives you a sense of Afghanistan’s incredible history and the role women have played within that history [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Fascinating.... Lays a foundation for understanding human history. [source]

Daniel Ek

A brilliant Pulitzer Prize-winning book about how the modern world was formed, analyzing how societies developed differently on different continents. [source]

Simon Sinek

Author

I’m a fan of books that challenge our assumptions, and Diamond offers us a new and remarkably simple way of looking at our world. Learning to challenge existing assumptions is core to effective leadership for it trains us to keep an open mind. [source]

Mark Zuckerberg

Founder/Facebook

Oh, it’s not a favorite book or anything like that, I just added it because I liked it. I don’t think there’s any real significance to the fact that it’s listed there and other books aren’t. [source]

Timothy Ferriss

Author & Entrepreneur

At one point, this was the only book listed on Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook page. If it’s good enough to be the sole selection of the founder of Facebook, maybe there’s something to it. The plot: In anticipation of another attack from a hostile alien race, the search for a brilliant military strategist has led to Ender Wiggin. In space combat school, Ender stands out, demonstrating exceptional leadership and unconventional strategy. But it is lonely at the top for Ender, as he struggles with relentless pressure from his instructors. Through Ender’s journey, you’ll learn how to capitalize on your strengths and those of your teammates, as well as exploit your adversaries’ weaknesses. Ender is a futuristic Level 5 Leader we can all learn from. [source]

Travis Kalanick

About a kid who is trained by the military to play video games … But he realizes at the end that the video games he was playing were an actual war. [source]

Catherine Mayer

Atwood takes all the hard information about gender inequality that she sees around her and then turns it up a few notches. [source]

Cliff Bleszinski

@HandmaidsOnHulu Done. Love the show, book is a classic, can't wait for season 2. [source]

Grady Booch

I read this several years ago but — much like Orwell’s 1984 — it seems particularly relevant given our current political morass. [source]

Max Levchin

Co-founder/PayPal, CEO/Affirm, Investor

One of the finest works of fiction of the last century. [source]

Neil Gaiman

@Slavinskas_art I love that book. [source]

Andi Dumitrescu

If I had to make a more rational choice, I’d go with Ulises or The Master and Margareta, but I think that choice is a bit snobbish. [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

On Bill Gates's reading list in 2012. [source]

Robert Muchamore

A brutal, exciting, action-based sci-fi novel. Hugely popular and excellent fun. [source]

Audrey Penn

My next one is Jane Eyre. She was orphaned and sent to a very rich aunt, who had her own very selfish children. Jane Eyre was not the perfect child and she was sent to live in a girls’ school. She made one friend, but unfortunately the little girl died, so she had to toughen up. She grew up there and learned everything she needed to know about teaching. She was a very good artist, she played a little piano, she learned French. When she got older she became the governess for a little French girl who was the ward of a man who lived in a manor. They fell in love, but it turned out that he had a wife, who was insane and lived in the attic. So Jane Eyre ran away and found out she had an uncle who had left her a great deal of money. But she couldn’t get the man out of her mind, so she went back. She found out that after she left, the man’s wife had set the place on fire. The wife had died in the fire, and it had blinded him. They were still very much in love and they married. And they lived happily ever after. [source]

John Sutherland

There is an interesting debate … that the real heroine of Jane Eyre is not the plain little governess but the mad woman in the attic, Bertha Mason [source]

Lucy Atkins

I think Charlotte Brontë’s most accomplished book is Villette. It’s probably a better book, it’s tighter and more sophisticated in some ways. But there’s something about Jane Eyre that is just deeply emotionally compelling for me. [source]

Barack Obama

Former USA President

When he got to high school, the president said, his tastes changed and he learned to enjoy classics like “Of Mice and Men” and “The Great Gatsby.” [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

Melinda and I really like this book. When we were first dating, she had a green light that she would turn on when her office was empty and it made sense for me to come over. [source]

Marvin Liao

Partner/500 Startups

For Non-Business, I'd have to say Dune (Herbert), Emergency (Strauss), The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald) or Flint (L'Amour). I re-read these books every year because they are just so well written & great stories that I get new perspective & details every time I read them. [source]

Ben Domenech

@SohrabAhmari @li88yinc @jgcrum @BlueBoxDave @InezFeltscher @JarrettStepman Maybe the best book ever written. [source]

Esther Perel

You can reread the Russians. They are timeless. [source]

Irvine Welsh

It is not a crime book in the way that we understand crime fiction today. Instead it is like an existential psychological thriller. [source]

Steve Jurvetson

A gift to all of my Apple II programming buddies from high school and Dungeons & Dragons comrades. [source]

Astro Teller

So much fun. [source]

Brian Burkhart

The last novel I read was Ernest Cline’s “Ready Player One: A Novel,” because my buddy Mike Maddock said, “You gotta read this book!” And I tore it up. I read the whole book in less than two days. It’s something I wish everyone, including myself, did more of. [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

One of my favorite books ever. [source]

Woody Allen

Film Director

It was such a relief from the other books I was reading at the time, which all had a quality of homework to them. [source]

Audrey Russo

So many novels; Lord of the Flies, Great Gatsby, Great Expectations; all the Nancy Drew books; Catcher in the Rye, Books written by Zora Neale Hurston; Pat Conroy – all because of the view about different people who endure despite adversity while kindling the hearts of the human spirit. [source]

Antonio Villaraigosa

It has been over 70 years since The Grapes of Wrath was published, yet the suffering that Steinbeck describes still hits close to home with families across our country still struggling to find work and put food on the table. It reminds us progressives that the day-to-day struggles of Americans should always remain close to our hearts. [source]

Elizabeth Tsurkov

@Maysaloon great book! [source]

John Kerry

While there is a story that takes place between characters, the hardship and unfairness is a central element of the book. It shows how fiction can create progressive change as well. [source]

James Altucher

Founder/StockPickr

Excellent novel. [source]

Ann Miura-Ko

Ann Miura-Ko recommended this book on the podcast "The Tim Ferriss Show". [source]

Magda Marcu

I’m currently reading “The Kite Runner”. I never have expectations from books, I let them surprise me as I get into the story. Learning about characteristics of different cultures, in this case the Afghan one, it’s one aspect I am interested in. [source]

Amy Chua

Marmee is a character that really resonates for me. She’s obviously not Chinese, but she believes that integrity and hard work are the most important things in life. She holds her daughters to very high standards. She doesn’t sugarcoat much. She also reveals to her rebellious daughter Jo, the star of the book and a character loosely modeled on Louisa May Alcott herself, that she had a bad temper too when she was younger. That’s exactly what I did with my own daughter Louisa…….The kinds of mistakes that Marmee allows her daughters to make are very similar to the kinds of mistakes that I allow my daughters to make. [source]

Anne Thériault

@mmarmoset I love that book so much, and then I got to see Patty Smith perform the year I read it, and she made a Little Women reference during the show, and my heart overflowed [source]

Jay Kleinberg

Nancy Drew is another series which follows in those footsteps. The book is all led by her. I think if one looks in the magazine literature it would be hard to find a similar character at that time. These were stories initially published in a magazine and then bound together as a book. [source]

Oprah Winfrey

CEO/O Network

It's got everything that's grabbing the headlines in America right now. It's about race and class, the economy, culture, immigration and the danger of the us-versus-them mentality. And underneath it all, pumps the heart and soul of family love, the pursuit of happiness, and what home really means. [source]

George Monbiot

This is possibly the most important environmental book ever written. It is a thought-experiment that imagines the world without a biosphere. That is the fundamental thought-experiment at the heart of environmentalism. All the horrors of that story arise from the disappearance of the biosphere, leaving people without any means of feeding themselves and without any means of survival. They are thrown into a brutal and fatal competition where the only thing left to eat is each other. [source]

Greg Garrett

There is no creature that has been transformed by leaking chemicals or radioactive satellites. But, on the other hand, there are human beings who consume other humans and that informs the major conflicts of the book. So, you’ve got a post-apocalyptic setting and you’ve got ethical quandaries for the main characters. There’s the sense of menace that permeates the zombie apocalypse. It’s not bad enough that they’re going to kill you, they’re also going to eat you. What I love about this story is its literary quality. We tend to think of the zombie apocalypse as a low-culture, pulp phenomenon. [source]

Bernard Tan

I’m also a Murakami and Vonnegut fan, Kafka on the Shore, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, Norwegian Wood, Slaughterhouse-Five, etc. Now that I look at the books listed, they seem to carry an existential theme. I guess I like to understand humanity and human behaviour ultimately to better understand myself. I find reading a means to connect with people who may have lived before my time, or in a distant country, that I may never have had the chance to connect with in real life. As three-dimensional humans, we are all made up of so many faces and emotional layers that we find it hard to dissect them all, and when we find writers who can explain these thought processes in a way that’s tangible and digestible, there’s this incredibly comforting eureka moment of feeling understood. [source]

Carlos Eire

Even though he is no philosopher Vonnegut is still able to ask the questions that all of us think about – how time affects our lives. [source]

Dan Christensen

@MetaHumean Love that book. [source]

Andrei Maylunas

One doesn’t have to invent the bicycle, there is one: it’s War and Peace. It’s about how Russia won the Napoleonic wars, and moved into the first row of nations who dealt with European history. It’s set during the peak of Russian culture, the age of Pushkin, who created the modern Russian language. It’s the peak…The only thing I would recommend to modern readers is to skip all those parts – which are completely separate from the other parts of the book – where Tolstoy is philosophising about the role of the individual in history. It’s maybe 15 per cent of the book, in separate chapters, and I would definitely recommend to skip those because they are not interesting today. [source]

Cécile Fabre

One of the key questions that Tolstoy asks in the appendix is the central question of War and Peace: how can we explain the fact that, on orders, millions of people go out and kill one another, when they know that killing another human being is morally wrong? [source]

Kate McLoughlin

Tolstoy didn’t fight in the Napoleonic wars, but he did fight in the Crimean war, so he drew on his experiences in that when he wrote War and Peace. [source]

Chelsea Handler

I don't know if I have to expound on why I love this book, but everyone should read this author, and this was the first one of his works I read. So, it's like a first boyfriend. Or my first Cabbage Patch Kid. [source]

Marvin Liao

Partner/500 Startups

My list would be (besides the ones I mentioned in answer to the previous question) both business & Fiction/Sci-Fi and ones I personally found helpful to myself. The business books explain just exactly how business, work & investing are in reality & how to think properly & differentiate yourself. On the non-business side, a mix of History & classic fiction to understand people, philosophy to make sense of life and Science fiction to picture what the future could be like (not always utopian). [source]

Audrey Russo

Question: What books would you recommend to young people interested in your career path? Answer: Anything by Peter Senge. The Hard Thing About Hard Things – Ben Horowitz Once you are Lucky, Twice you are good – Sara Lacey Revolutionary Wealth – Alvin Toffler Black Swan – Taleb Reset: My Fight for Inclusion and Lasting Change, by Ellen Pao. Creative Class – Richard Florida Creativity Inc. by Ed Catmull & Amy Wallace Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis American Government 101: From the Continental Congress to the Iowa Caucus, Everything You Need to Know About US Politics – Kathleen Spears The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. Any book by Herman Hesse The Art of War by Sun Tzu. [source]

Alice Little

I remember being a fourth grader and trying to check out this book and being told it was grossly inappropriate and going so far as to have my parents take it to the school board and petition for me to be allowed to read this book. [source]

Catalina Penciu

I'm a huge fan of personal stories and biographies like this one. [source]

Tim Fargo

@Quixoticnance Good point, Nancy. The museum is a powerful experience, esp. when you've read her book. [source]

Ryan Holiday

Author

Equally allegorical, I read The Little Prince for the first time which for some reason I’d never been exposed to before. If you’re in the same boat, read it. It’s short but great. [source]

Brandon Stanton

Brandon Stanton recommended this book on the podcast "The Tim Ferriss Show". [source]

Evan Goldberg

Phenomenal. [source]

Barack Obama

Former USA President

During a trip to a public library in Washington’s Anacostia neighborhood in 2015, Obama shared some of his childhood favorites with a group of young students. He also read (and acted out) Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak to kids at the White House in 2014. [source]

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Martha Stewart

In this photo, Jimmy Fallon and I enjoy slurping Eggs of Newt together for Season-5 of “The Martha Stewart Show." I am dressed as "Queen of the Wild Things" inspired by the beloved Maurice Sendak children's book, "Where the Wild Things Are." https://t.co/1ZBqXEW7dC [source]

Chelsea Frank

I read everything with an open mind, often challenging myself by choosing books with an odd perspective or religious/spiritual views. These books do not reflect my personal feelings but are books that helped shape my perspective on life, love, and happiness. [source]

Jessica Lauria

I bought this book because I was curious about the title. I loved it and bought it for my entire team. The universe matches the energy you put out. It’s so true. If you put out positivity, you get it back. It’s a great reminder that you are in charge of your destiny. Another point in this book that I love - if someone has a problem with you, it’s their issue. Not yours. We put some much weight on what people think about us, when it really shouldn’t matter. [source]

Stacey Minton

That book helped me realize I wasn’t alone in not necessarily having direction or all of the answers, but as long as I put one foot in front of the other, I would get to where I wanted to be. [source]

Elon Musk

Founder/SpaceX

I guess when I was around 12 or 15... I had an existential crisis, and I was reading various books on trying to figure out the meaning of life and what does it all mean? It all seemed quite meaningless and then we happened to have some books by Nietzsche and Schopenhauer in the house, which you should not read at age 14 (laughter). It is bad, it’s really negative. So then I read Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy which is quite positive I think and it highlighted an important point which is that a lot of times the question is harder than the answer. And if you can properly phrase the question, then the answer is the easy part. So, to the degree that we can better understand the universe, then we can better know what questions to ask. Then whatever the question is that most approximates: what’s the meaning of life? That’s the question we can ultimately get closer to understanding. And so I thought to the degree that we can expand the scope and scale of consciousness and knowledge, then that would be a good thing. [source]

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Michael Arrington

Founder/TechCrunch

Not sure what you’ll learn from HHGTTG, but it’s one of the funniest series of books of all time and if you haven’t read it you pretty much have to. It’s actually a five book series that’s called a trilogy, and if Adams hadn’t died of a heart attack at age 49 in 2001 there would have likely been more books written. HHGTTG and the WWII epic Catch-22 are among my favorite books when contemplating the meaninglessness and hilarity of life (HHGTTG begins with the Earth being destroyed to to make way for a hyperspatial express route). Like Dune, skip the movie, it doesn’t do the books justice. [source]

Chris Anderson

As a child, they exploded my imagination. [source]

Chris Anderson

As a child, they exploded my imagination. [source]

Chris Anderson

As a child, they exploded my imagination. [source]

Barack Obama

Former USA President

As a devoted reader, the president has been linked to a lengthy list of novels and poetry collections over the years — he admits he enjoys a thriller. [source]

Daegan Miller

The novel pinpoints relentlessly, and beautifully, the environment of exploitation. [source]

Dan Barreiro

Riveting time capsule material. Literary giant Ellison on the blues, on race, on his powerful book, Invisible Man. https://t.co/iS6xQ7ojE8 [source]

Danny Meyer

@DearDara My 2nd favorite book growing up, just barely edged out by Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. [source]

Robin Stevens

This is an American book that I read as a young child, and it’s a classic in America. It’s a phenomenal book, and one of the cleverest mystery stories I’ve ever read. [source]

Stephen Dubner

I read it over and over in part because I felt it was describing to me what my parents’ life was like when they were kids. [source]

Tracy Chevalier

It’s about an Irish-American family living in Brooklyn at the beginning of the 20th century. [source]

Michael Arrington

Founder/TechCrunch

Shelley wrote this book as a teenager, and most of us read it in high school. Often credited as the first science fiction novel. You can read just about any political viewpoint you want into the book, and there are strong undertones that technology isn’t all good. But what I get out of it is the creativeness that can come with solitude, and how new technology can be misunderstood, even perhaps by the creator (see Twitter). Key thing to remember: Frankenstein is the name of the scientist/creator, not the Monster. Everybody forgets that. [source]

Adam Roberts

Brian Aldiss has famously argued that science fiction starts with Mary Shelley’s novel, and many people have agreed with him. [source]

Adam Roberts

Brian Aldiss has famously argued that science fiction starts with Mary Shelley’s novel, and many people have agreed with him. [source]

Amanda Palmer

Amanda Palmer recommended this book in the book "Tools of Titans". [source]

David Goldberg

What I really liked about A Short History of Nearly Everything is that it gives an excellent account of a lot of the personalities and the interconnectedness of important discoveries in cosmology and elsewhere. He does such a great job of bringing together our understanding of cosmology, evolution, paleontology, and geology in a very, very fluid way. [source]

Fabrice Grinda

I have lots of books to recommend, but they are not related to my career path. The only one that is remotely related is Peter Thiel’s Zero to One. That said here are books I would recommend. [source]

Eric Weinstein

Managing Director/Thiel Capital

Eric Weinstein recommended this book on Twitter. [source]

Jean Webb

An imaginative, clever and fun fantasy story that satirises nineteenth century England at the same time as celebrating academic thinking. [source]

Larry Doyle

You’d have to be a zombie to miss the humour in it – it’s hilarious. Although the book is ancient, the humour feels modern [source]

Oliver Sacks Fdn.

As a writer, Oliver Sacks found gardens essential to the creative process. Check out our year-end newsletter, devoted to some beautiful books by botanist-writers that would make great gifts for all your plant-loving friends. https://t.co/2U8iEv4L1x https://t.co/IK1cgIMJhE [source]

Sarah Taber

Yeah that's because most of those books are actually just sanctimonious classists pretending they're trying to fix problems. That's why they're depressing If you want a book that's actually about moving forward, "Braiding Sweetgrass" is FANTASTIC. https://t.co/Drr1tmwhSs [source]

Ben Shapiro

Truman Capote's best book. It's a really, really good book. [source]

Lynda La Plante

One of the reasons I like this true crime novelisation is down to the fact it was so out of character for Capote and took everyone by surprise. It is also an excellent, almost biographical, insight into the two young killers’ minds. [source]

R J Ellory

I think in all honesty it is one of the finest books ever written. It took him six years to finish it because he had to wait for the court case and the final verdict which was the two perpetrators being executed. [source]

Bethanye McKinney Blount

I read this for the first time when I was 10 — great parenting at work — but it was almost scarier to reread as an adult. [source]

Rae Paoletta

@sarahpaol Love this book [source]

Andra Zaharia

A copy from 1903 of this book is my most prized possession. [source]

Eric Berkowitz

The Picture of Dorian Gray is now a part of the canon that no one would admit to not having read. Most of us have read it and delighted in its witticisms. It’s hard to imagine, but when Dorian Gray was first published, the book was not well received at all. It was totally panned. It was held against him as being an example of an effete character. It was being serialised by Lippincott’s Magazine, and the serialisation of the novel stopped when it became too inflammatory. [source]

Marc Montagne

My favorite fiction book is the The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. I'm a huge Oscar Wilde fan, he has one of the brightest minds and the Picture is a masterpiece and his unique novel. I consider that you should only read books that you would consider reading again at some point while still enjoying the same pleasure. The Picture is definitely one of those. [source]

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Bianca Belair

For #BlackHistoryMonth I will be sharing some of my favorite books by Black Authors 5th Book: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings By: Maya Angelou Another autobiography classic that will be hard to not find on any must- read book list! https://t.co/mGRG76lLRn [source]

Julia Enthoven

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is beautifully written, and I really enjoy the voice of the protagonist and think it’s sad and fascinating to read about her time in history. [source]

Barack Obama

Former USA President

According to the president’s Facebook page and a 2008 interview with the New York Times, this title is among his most influential forever favorites. [source]

Steve Jobs

Founder/Apple

Jobs told me that "Moby-Dick" was among his favorite books and he reread it a lot when he was a teen. [source]

Adam Haslett

Evil derives from the violent avoidance of the realisation of our own mortality and there could be few better examples of this in literature than Melville’s portrait of Ahab in Moby-Dick. [source]

Clare Morpurgo

The book is about a girl coming to live in England from India. She is a sickly child who had a pretty awful early childhood in India. [source]

M G Leonard

The redemptive power of the natural world and gardening was something that struck a chord with me. [source]

Jack Dorsey

Co-Founder/Twitter

I keep coming back to it. I love the straightforwardness, the tightness, and the poetry. I think it shows a common struggle that is repeated over and over in so many narratives both fictional and nonfictional. [source]

Jordan B Peterson

The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway https://t.co/7dJE4Pfn56, a book from my great books list https://t.co/AxBNX3QpMb [source]

May Witwit

I taught this book to my students in Iraq during the economic sanctions. And I feel like it gave me some kind of strength to continue. [source]

Bianca Belair

@ylc130 I went to the library when I was in the 3rd grade and read Beloved... I remember being so confused and my Mama having to explain it to me... I later read it as an adult and it hit me completely different. GREAT BOOK! [source]

Esi Edugyan

I was shocked by the blunt force of its subject matter and its exquisitely torqued prose. It remains one of my most adored novels. [source]

Farah Jasmine Griffin

Beloved was Morrison’s fifth novel. It’s a gripping story, inspired by a famous abolitionist case, the true story of a woman who runs away from slavery with her children, but when the slave catchers catch up with her, she kills one of her own and tries to kill the others, rather than returning them to slavery. [source]

Johanna Reiss

Elie Wiesel wrote..that he was considering running into the barbed wire once, but he didn’t because his father needed him. [source]

Steven Katz

Probably the best known memoir that has been written about the experience of the death camps. [source]

Brigid Keenan

This is about everything that can go wrong when you are in another country and faced with another culture. It’s about a family – primarily it centres on a father and his four daughters – who move to the Congo from America as missionaries. The book is tragic because the father has the best intentions of making a good life for his family, but he’s too closed-minded and set in his American ways. I identify with the daughters because they have a childish sensitivity to their surroundings that adults don’t always have. It is important if you go to live in other countries to be aware of the cultural differences, otherwise you can upset people. [source]

Michelle Jana Chan

It’s quite an old-fashioned story of sin and redemption, yet a hugely ambitious tale for Kingsolver to take on. It’s about filial responsibility as a wife and as daughters and sisters; it’s about guilt, bitterness and revenge. [source]

Ted Turner

Founder/CNN

When I got to college, I was a classics major, and that was mainly the study of Greek - and to a lesser extent Roman - history and culture, and that fascinated me: the Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid by Virgil. [source]

Charlotte Higgins

It’s a very easy read, and a completely different world from The Iliad. Whereas The Iliad depicts a militaristic and war-wrecked world, The Odyssey is like a fairytale and it’s fascinatingly complex. It’s told in flashbacks, it has time that’s extended and time that’s compressed, and it’s told from different viewpoints. [source]

Janine di Giovanni

The thing I loved about Ulysses was that he’s so in love with adventure and with love. [source]

Bill Gates

CEO/Microsoft

I loved this brilliant book about cancer. [source]

Timothy J. Jorgensen

A tremendous amount of cancer biology comes through in that book through the eyes of the victims and the people up close and personal. [source]

Alex Stojkovic

I don’t. But I would. Books love to be used up. (Related: Middlesex is the best book I read in 2019. If you’re look… [source]

Lisa Feldman Barrett

Eugenides does a really nice job of illustrating the complexity of emotional life, the emotional life that doesn’t necessarily fall into neat categories. [source]

Steve Jurvetson

Steve Jurvetson recommended this book on the podcast "The Tim Ferriss Show". [source]

Seth Godin

Author, Marketer, Entrepreneur

In the last week, I discovered that at least two of my smart friends hadn't read Godel, Escher, Bach. They have now. You should too. [source]

Cory Zue

More recently books like Godel, Escher, Bach and Sapiens have influenced my thinking a lot. [source]

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Walter Isaacson

Author

Read this book. [source]

Michael Voss

I enjoy nearly everything Mark Twain ever wrote, but my favorite is The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. This novel showcases Twain at the top of his game in terms of acerbic wit, sharp societal observations and the use of regional dialects - for which he initially garnered great criticism, before the passage of time enabled critics to understand and acknowledge its authenticity. [source]

Amelia Boone

Remains one my favorites to this day. [source]

Antonio Villaraigosa

As mayor of a large metropolis, the living conditions of our residents are always present in my mind. Every decision I make, I try to evaluate if it will help improve the quality of life of every Angeleno. But Dickens really dissects both the aristocrats and the revolutionaries, to show that change is never easy. As progressives, we value government’s role and power to improve our cities and communities, but at the same time we must never forget that the ends never justify the means. And that the majority cannot deprive the minority of their inalienable rights that come with a democracy. [source]

May Witwit

I started a paper about the historical reality in this book. And as I studied it more deeply I got depressed because the things that were happening were similar to Iraq. How the mob could be turned against people by devious minds. They just killed people without even knowing them. The people who were killed were probably very good people, you never know. You just can’t kill haphazardly, heads rolling everywhere for nothing. There must be a way to check these things [source]

Bryan Callen

So here are my three must read books. I've been reading a lot of great books like: Outsmart Your Instincts, The Culture Code, and Antonio Damasio’s The Strange Order, and sometimes when you read a lot of nonfiction it’s very enriching, sometimes you need a novel. I really believe you should take a minute and read something beautiful. Listen, listen to Lolita by Nabokov. But also listen to Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy and listen to Richard Poe narrate that. Those are two of the greatest feats of the english language that I can think of. Then there’s Fortress of Solitude, an amazing book, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, these are great novels. Cold Mountain is a beautiful novel, Snow Falling On Cedars, I mean they’ve been around for a while. But goddamnit, get those under your belt. Those are the novels I think you should read. You know Love In The Time Of Cholera it just makes you ache. Kind of like a Hemingway thing, where Hemingway “ahh!”, it’s the same thing, you know. So I don’t know, I’m a fan of all those books. Those are my 3 slash 20 books. [source]

Ella Berthoud

Even though it’s wrong, you sympathise with him because he can’t help himself and writes about it in such a passionate and empathetic way. [source]

Richard Cohen

It’s more imbued with references to the sun and using the sun as symbol or metaphor – almost a kind of character in the novel – than any other work in literature. [source]

Adam Roberts

It is a short novel, almost a novella, but it is smoothly and evocatively written, and it manages to open a chink in the reader’s mind that gives a her dizzying, thrilling glimpse down the vertiginous perspectives of long time. My favourite moment comes near the end, after the time traveller has left the Eloi and Morlocks behind him (as it were) and travelled more than 30 million years into the far distant future. He finds himself on a desolate beach, seemingly lifeless but for green slime on the rocks, the sun grown to massive proportions, and witnesses an eclipse [source]

Adam Roberts

It is a short novel, almost a novella, but it is smoothly and evocatively written, and it manages to open a chink in the reader’s mind that gives a her dizzying, thrilling glimpse down the vertiginous perspectives of long time. My favourite moment comes near the end, after the time traveller has left the Eloi and Morlocks behind him (as it were) and travelled more than 30 million years into the far distant future. He finds himself on a desolate beach, seemingly lifeless but for green slime on the rocks, the sun grown to massive proportions, and witnesses an eclipse [source]

Roger Luckhurst

It invents the idea of far-future visions that science fiction writers such as Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke have constantly tried to achieve. [source]

Chris Walsh

The Inferno is the classic moment of people not wanting to talk about cowardice. [source]

Nick Havely

It is a close and reliable translation, with the original text on the facing page, and it also has excellent notes. [source]

Dave Child

In my 20s, it would have been The Secret History by Donna Tartt. It's a shame you can only read a book for the first time once, because this doesn't fare so well the second time around, when you already know what happens. I'm not sure I've found another book quite like it since, but then I'm not really sure what sort of book it is. It isn't a murder mystery, except when it is. It isn't a crime thriller, except when it is. It isn't a love story, except ... you get the idea. [source]

Jess Brammar

@StigAbell Love that book [source]

Kelly Ellis

@elanpin @Nicole_Cliffe Like a favorite song, just thinking about this book immediately takes me back to the point in my life when I first read it. I really enjoyed The Goldfinch, as well. [source]

Bryony Gordon

As a teenage girl, you have to read The Bell Jar. It’s a rite of passage. [source]

The CEO Library Community (through anonymous form)

One of the best 3 books I've read in 2019 [source]

Tim Kendall

Despite its subject matter, The Bell Jar is often a very funny novel. Perhaps we miss it because the pall of Plath’s biography descends across the whole work and reputation. But The Bell Jar is viciously funny. There are people still alive today who won’t talk about it because they were so badly hurt by Plath’s portrayal of them. [source]

Richard Branson

Founder/Virgin Group

Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. [source]

Marvin Liao

Partner/500 Startups

My list would be (besides the ones I mentioned in answer to the previous question) both business & Fiction/Sci-Fi and ones I personally found helpful to myself. The business books explain just exactly how business, work & investing are in reality & how to think properly & differentiate yourself. On the non-business side, a mix of History & classic fiction to understand people, philosophy to make sense of life and Science fiction to picture what the future could be like (not always utopian). [source]

Audrey Russo

So many novels; Lord of the Flies, Great Gatsby, Great Expectations; all the Nancy Drew books; Catcher in the Rye, Books written by Zora Neale Hurston; Pat Conroy – all because of the view about different people who endure despite adversity while kindling the hearts of the human spirit. [source]

Timothy Ferriss

Author & Entrepreneur

This classic work on state censorship remains as relevant in today’s world of digital delights as it was when published in the black-and-white world of 1953. In a futuristic American city, firefighter Guy Montag does not put out blazes; instead, he extinguishes knowledge and promotes ignorance by conducting state decreed book burnings. After an elderly woman chooses a fiery death with her books rather than a life without the written word, he begins questioning not only his profession, but also a society that allows itself to be lulled into complacency by constant exposure to state-controlled, mind-numbing television shows. If you wonder why some people take censorship so seriously, this book will give you the answer. It’s also a fantastically inspiring story of a one-versus-a-million fight that’s worth fighting. Who knows when your turn will come? [source]

Ryan Holiday

Author

I’m not sure what compelled me to pick Fahrenheit 451 back up but I’m so glad I did because I was able to see the book in a very different context. Bradbury’s message (made explicit in his 50th Anniversary Afterword) is much less a warning against government control and much more about a road to hell paved by people attempting to rid the world of offensive speech and conflicting ideas. In a world of microaggressions and outrage porn, this is an important idea to see in such a timeless work of fiction. [source]