What non-fiction reads have made a lasting impact on you? Looking forward to your recommendations.

Radium Girls. True story of pain and corruption.

Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces

And, once an understanding of Campbell's ideas is achieved, Reflections on the Art of Living: A Joseph Campbell Companion, which, along with James Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, the wife has instructions to bury me with.

1984 and “Brave new world”

The man asked for non-fiction

"The Bible", by God.

H&K-Guy

We're gonna be cute instead of answering the man's question?

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces

An excellent read for anyone interested in storytelling, literature, or film.


"Ordinary Men" made an impact on me back in high school. It takes a look at how "normal" members of a German police unit were coerced/twisted into participating in the Holocaust.


While I dunno if I'd call them "indispensable", I've been greatly enjoying Mary Roach's series of non-fiction books lately, including "Stiff", "Bonk", "Gulp", and "Grunt". Each book takes a humorous but scientific look at a certain subject, like human sexuality, cadavers, the digestive tract, or military science.

The 5000 Year Leap was excellent.

Campbell is great reading, but he derived his study of myth from Carl Jung. If you want to go to the source, I recommend Modern Man in Search of a Soul, and also The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious.

Introduction to Early American Masonry: Stone, Brick, Mortar, and Plaster

by Harley J. McKee (Author); The Preservation Press

Originally published by the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Columbia University, 1973. It may have been Wiley Press in those days.

Anyone with a smidgeon of interest in architecture, restoration, history, or the trades should read this book. It is all-encompassing, covers so many techniques, time periods, dating methods, tools, it is a history book in the finest sense.

Here is a decent review of the book:
https://www.traditionalbuildin...rly-american-masonry

The Gulag Archipelago by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. The original is three large volumes and I highly recommend it.

Anybody who reads the whole trilogy and can still defend communism/socialism/Marxism has a heart of stone.

Plus, you will gain a great understanding of the unbelievable suffering the Russian people have suffered over the past 100 years.

A favorite is:
Stranger in a Strange Land
Robert A. Heinlein

Another is:
The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress
Robert A. Heinlein

And:
The Mote in God's Eye
Jerry Pournelle Larry Niven

The Forever War
Joe Haldeman

Make Room! Make Room! (Soylent Green, but a much better story the the movie)
Harry Harrison

Timeline
Michael Crichton

Sum of All Fears
Michael Crichton

By the Rivers of Babylon
Nelson DeMille

Flight of the Old Dog
Dale Brown

(all I can think off top of my head)


I cut my teeth on Heinlein.

Up until my mid 20s, my life was pretty hectic.

I lived in more than 21 different homes (almost every relative on my mother's side, and many of my step father's side) before I was 8 years old, including 4 foster homes and an orphanage.
My mother was married 5 times and had 2 boyfriends.

That made for a pretty bizarre and often disconnected continuity growing up.
In a very real way, my early life up into my mid 20s was much like a mix of dystopian, time travel and other worldly sci-fi stories, and at times seems/seemed to be like a series or sets of stories written by the same author (running themes and sameness of characters in different story lines).

That said, I identified very much with both Heinlein's stories as well as the characters and their interactions with people as he often made elaborate points of explaining a character, or a character's specific traits, thoughts and motivations.

Funny when one looks back on the things that helped form thinking and perspectives. And it drove home that fact that if one does not provide the many needs of a young person, they will get it where they can, and not always to a good end.

I am more than fortunate, but that is a whole story in it's own.


Did not mean to stream consciousness in the thread, but it sort of fits the "why" I consider them "indispensable non-fiction reading".


(almost any adolescent or young adult centered, stories for great for the younger audience)

Unfortunately, I was so busy with life, raising family running businesses and education to give much time to reading.

But, now I have no excuses.

quote:

Originally posted by justjoe:
Campbell is great reading, but he derived his study of myth from Carl Jung. If you want to go to the source, I recommend Modern Man in Search of a Soul, and also The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious.

Good grief. Campbell is more readable than Jung, but go ahead and correct my reading list, since you know the correct answer for me.

Jesus. Half the responses in this thread don't address the question, and now I'm being told that my recommendations are wrong.

You guys have fun, k? FFS

non·fic·tion
/ˌnänˈfikSH(ə)n/Submit
noun
noun: non-fiction
prose writing that is based on facts, real events, and real people, such as biography or history.

I really enjoyed Gen. Schwartzkopf’s It Doesn’t Take a Hero biography

ETA: McCullough’s biography of John Adams is excellent as well.

The Book of 5 Rings-Mushashi
The Art of War-Sun Tzu
Band of Brothers- An excellent work on leadership and living in hard times, plus it gives you a good appreciation for sacrifice.

One of my favorite books is by Ernest K. Gann, Fate is the Hunter.

It's a memoir based on his adventures as an aviator. It has made a lasting impression on me, but maybe because i really enjoy aviation. It is an excellent read and I recommend it to all pilots and non pilots.

I offer two from David McCullough:

John Adams and Harry Truman.

Very well written and documented. Will shed a light on how this country was formed at its infancy, as well as current day topics.

quote:

Originally posted by ibexsig:
The Gulag Archipelago by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. The original is three large volumes and I highly recommend it.

Anybody who reads the whole trilogy and can still defend communism/socialism/Marxism has a heart of stone.

Plus, you will gain a great understanding of the unbelievable suffering the Russian people have suffered over the past 100 years.

+1 on this.