These Books Changed My Life

…and stuck with me through the years. Maybe you’ll like them too.

How many a man has dated a new era
in his life from the reading of a book.
— Henry David Thoreau

As a kid I loved technology more than books.

After college I spent years reading books for hours every evening. I didn’t own a TV. I had to catch up on the 20 years of my life that I didn’t care about books. Those cold Minnesota evenings — sitting in my ugly second-hand recliner with a kitten purring in my lap — are some of my fondest memories.

The books I’ve listed below are now a part of me. They’re the ones I find myself going back to long after I’ve read them.

I hope they do the same for you.

My Favorites

• David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
• The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R Tolkien
• Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• The Fault In Our Stars by John Green
• Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson
• A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
• Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson
• Smartcuts by Shane Snow

Fiction & Lies

• East of Eden by John Steinbeck — A mythic exploration of human depravity and freedom.
• David Copperfield by Charles Dickens — My favorite work of literature. Excellent characters, scenery, and plot. It has sustained multiple re-readings.
• The Fault In Our Stars by John Green — Smart, funny, and so many feels.
• Game of Thrones (A Song of Fire and Ice Series) by George R.R. Martin. It’s like Lord of the Rings for adults and with characters with more moral agency.
• Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
• The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R Tolkien — The first book of literature I read after college. It left me with a desire to read more, and began my love of learning things outside of theology. The creativity of the man! It astounds me. The most incredible work of sub-creation I have ever read. I usually read this every year.
• 1984 by George Orwell — The classic distopia.
• The Karamazov Brothers by Fyodor Dostoevsky
• The Lord of the Flies by William Golding — An interesting portrayal of human depravity.
• Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain — Entertaining and witty.
• Ishmael and My Ishmael by Daniel Quinn — Quinn says that mankind enacts a story that makes him the enemy of the world. Through Socratic dialogue he takes the reader through his arguments and presents a creative interpretation of Genesis that is both challenging and intriguing. I don’t agree with many of Quinn’s ideas, but he has a knack for making the reader think which I appreciate.
• The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide by Douglas Adams — Existential humor at it’s best.
• The Harry Potter Series by J. K. Rowling — While not necessarily profound, it is an imaginative and gripping story. Excellent for introducing children into the joys of literature. I enjoyed them all, but I thought the last three were best.
• The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger — In the words of Abraham Piper, “An endlessly amusing, simple yet profound look at what it’s like to be a confused human being.”
• Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card — Impressive sci-fi.

Culture Club

• How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading by Adler & Doren. Essential reading.
• The Low-Information Diet (free PDF) by Tim Ferriss — Why is this in the reading category? Because the section on speed reading almost doubled my reading efficiency. I’ve tried a number of different speed reading programs, but they never worked for me. In two pages, Ferriss gave me something that worked.
• An Experiment in Criticism by C.S. Lewis
• Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by Neil Postman — A good primer on the bias of mediums (oral, typographical, visual). Well written. (Update: I don’t agree a lot of this anymore but it’s definitely worth reading still.)
• Technics and Civilization by Lewis Mumford
• The Art of the Commonplace by Wendell Berry — A good compilation of Wendell Berry’s essays.
• The Unsettling of America by Wendell Berry
• The Image: A Guide to Pseduo-Events in America (1961) by Daniel J. Boorstin — Boorstin’s exposition of imagery, television, magazines, celebrities, pseudo-events, abridgements, travel, tourism, movies, corporate image, and advertising is a classic. Well-written and thoughtful. Includes Boorstin’s usual top-notch bibliography. Highly recommended.
• The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell — Filled with fascinating anecdotes and examples, Gladwell convincingly argues that ideas and behavior spread as epidemics. Easily understandable and very interesting.
• Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell.
• Nation of Rebels: Why Counterculture Became Consumer Culture (2004) by Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter — Excellent analysis of countercultural ideas and insightful explanation of how our desire for distinction drives what we do.
• Made to Stick by Chip & Dan Heath — Explains why some ideas stick and others die. Make your ideas stick.
• Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson. This will change how you think of idea creation and the history of innovation.
• How We Got To Now by Steven Johnson. A fascinating exploration on how ideas like refrigeration, clocks, lenses dramatically impacted the world.
• The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan — Pollan says we have a “national eating disorder” and highlights the irony that our stereotyped unhealthy country is so obsessed with “health food” and diets. He walks through his personal journey with industrial agriculture, organic agriculture, and hunting/gathering. You’ll never look at industrial (or industrial organic) food quite the same way again.
• The Attention Merchants by Tim Wu. Our attention is bought and sold countless times per day… the history of it is fascinating.
• “In Praise of Shadows” by Junichiro Tanizaki — I liked it so much I wrote an essay about it.

Mostly Real Stories

• Shoe Dog by Phil Knight. The engrossing story about the formation of Nike. I couldn’t put this down. Beautifully written and I found myself thinking back to it often.
• John Adams by David McCullough — The book that made me interested in biography and history.
• Steve Jobs by Walter Issacson. Not a great bio to be honest, but it’s all we’ve got on Jobs right now.
• Surprised by Joy by C.S. Lewis

Money Stuff

• ⭐️ Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki. Very inspirational. Give this to anyone who might have an entrepreneurial bent.
• Personal Finances for Dummies by Eric Tyson — This was very helpful to me to get my finances in order. Good advice — when I didn’t take it, I usually regretted it.
• Basic Economics by Thomas Sowell — The best economics book I’ve read. Easy to understand and filled with practical examples.
• Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt — A good defense of free market capitalism.
• Home Economics by Wendell Berry — A warning against the biases of free market capitalism and an exhortation to home economy.
• Eight Steps to Seven Figures by Charles Carlson — See my review.

How to Write Gooder

• ⭐️ On Writing Well by William Zinsser. Every writer should read this.
• The Elements of Style (4th Ed.) by William Strunk, Jr. and E. B. White — The classic guide to writing well.
• The Writing Life by Annie Dillard
• On Writing by Steven King — Interesting and sprinkled with advice from one of our most prolific writers. Don’t do drugs and write every day.
• “Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell
• “Some Thoughts About Writing” by Thomas Sowell
• “A Guide to Writing Well” by me (a compilation)

Science!!!!1!

• A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. Covers an immense amount of material in an entertaining and interesting way, while at the same time being concise. Highly recommended.
• Life is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition by Wendell Berry. A good reminder that science can’t solve everything.
• Evolution: The Triumph of an Idea by Carl Zimmer. I used to not think evolution was true. This helped me change my mind.
• The Science of Good & Evil by Michael Shermer. An attempt to understand morality through our evolutionary origins.
• The Demon-Haunted World (1995) by Carl Sagan. A great rebuttal to pseudoscience and superstition.

Edumacation

• Mastery by Robert Greene — A must read. Learn to become a Master.
• Building a Bridge to the 18th Century by Neil Postman
• Teaching as a Conserving Activity by Neil Postman
• The Well-Educated Mind: A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had by Susan Wise Bauer
• The Intellectual Devotional — Daily readings in history, literature, philosophy, math & science, religion, visual arts, and music. I use this and find it helpful.

Things That Will Make You Laugh

(unless you’re not fun to be around)

• Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson — Genius.
• A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson — It will have you laughing out loud.
• In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson — Hilarious, fascinating, and will make you want to get on a plane to Australia.

The Game of Business

• Getting Things Done by David Allen. I wouldn’t have survived without the techniques in this book. The best book written on personal productivity.
• The Lean Startup by Eric Ries — Go lean. This will change the way you & your business works. Or at least it should.
• The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss — The best, most inspirational business/productivity book I’ve ever read. Read it as soon as you can.
• The $100 Startup — More practical than 4HWK if you’re wanting to start something for the first time.
• Purple Cow by Seth Godin — Make your niche business remarkable.
• First, Break All The Rules by Marcus Buckingham — Great managerial advice.
• What Got You Here Won’t Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith — Stop those bad work habits!
• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey — The classic.
• How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie — Read it early, scan it often.
• The 80/20 Principle by Richard Koch — Read part one and three. Part three alone is worth the price of the book. Skip part two unless you enjoy statistics.
• Manage Your Day-to-Day by 99u — Lots of great short essays on productivity.
• Tools of Titans by Tim Ferris. An encyclopedia of success.
• Scaling Up by Verne Harnish. Once your company starts growing beyond $1m in revenue, you MUST to read this book. It lays out everything you need to know in order to accelerate and scale up fast.
• Traction by Gino Wickman. This really helped me creating an operating system for Brainjolt. Everyone in the company needs to be running on the same business operating system. EOS is a great one to start with.
• High Output Management. A classic on management from the co-founder of Intel. Profoundly affected my thinking.

Business Articles Online

• “Evolution and Revolution as Organizations Grow” in Harvard Business Review — Most companies go through predictable stages of evolution and revolution… and it’s important to know them as your business grows.
• “How Fast Can Your Company Afford to Grow?” in Harvard Business Review — This is financially heavy but very helpful in teaching how to apply levers of growth to your business model.
• “Makers Schedule, Manager’s Schedule” by Paul Graham — Maker’s and managers have different work schedules and habits for good reasons.

Other Stuff

• The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod. Get up early. Center yourself. Exercise. Figure out what’s important and do it.
• Make: Electronics: Learning Through Discovery by Charles Platt. Learn to be a kid again while learning the basics of how electronics work.
• Walden by Henry David Thoreau
• Daily Rituals by Mason Currey. Learn how creatives from the past used daily rituals to achieve success.
• Essays of E. B. White — One of the greatest essayists of the 20th century.
• Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard — Fascinating.
• The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. “Happiness is not having more; happiness is wanting what I have.”
• Smartcuts by Shane Snow. Playing by the rules is dumb.
• Travels with Charley in Search of America by John Steinbeck — An interesting travelogue.
• One Summer by Bill Bryson — A brilliant historical and cultural recreation of the summer of 1927.
• The Art of the Personal Essay by Phillip Lopate — An excellent anthology of personal essays through the centuries.
• The Best Bread Ever. I found this in the library a decade ago. I’ve made the best bread of my life using these techniques (food processor + hot hot oven)
• Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug — Foundational usability principles.