The Count Of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas
“Life is a storm, my young friend. You will bask in the sunlight one moment, be shattered on the rocks the next. What makes you a man is what you do when that storm comes. You must look into that storm and shout as you did in Rome. Do your worst, for I will do mine! Then the fates will know you as we know you”
The Count Of Monte Cristo is the story that teaches us an important moral lesson. REVENGE IS FUN! This is one of the best revenge stories ever written.
A Clockwork Orange
"Pardon, madam, most sorry to disturb you, but my friend and me were out for a walk, and my friend has taken bad all of a sudden with a very troublesome turn, and he is out there on the road dead out and groaning. Would you have the goodness to let me use your telephone to telephone for an ambulance?"The devotchka sort of hesitated and then said: "Wait." Then she went off, and my three droogs had got out of the auto quiet and crept up horrorshow stealthy, putting their maskies on now, then I put mine on, then it was only a matter of me putting in the old rooker and undoing the chain, me having softened up this devotchka with my gent’s goloss, so that she hadn’t shut the door like she should have done, us being strangers of the night.
This is a dark, compelling read with massive amounts of violent acts and imagery that run throughout the novel. The book doesn’t promote violence but instead explores the idea of violence entwined with youth and the morality of free will.
1984 – George Orwell
“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”
This was the book that started my love affair with the dystopian genre. It is a stark, haunting glimpse at what could be. One of my favorite books of all time.
Pimp – Iceberg Slim
"A pimp is happy when his whores giggle. He knows they are still asleep…all whores have one thing in common just like the chumps humping for the white boss. It thrills em when the pimp makes mistakes. They watch and wait for his downfall.A pimp is the loneliest bastard on Earth. Hes gotta know his whores. He cant let them know him. Hes gotta be God all the way."
Pimp is one of few books that gives readers a view of the ugly side of things, as told from the perspective of a former pimp himself. Beneath the gold and lights and fast music and fun, there is crime, a false sense of materialism, prostitution, junkies and winos, hobos and crooks, corrupt cops and danger at every turn. It’s an often dirty and unsafe environment, where the most vulnerable of people are exploited, and this book captures it all for what it really is, without sugar-coating anything.
100 Years Of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
“He dug so deeply into her sentiments that in search of interest he found love, because by trying to make her love him he ended up falling in love with her. Petra Cotes, for her part, loved him more and more as she felt his love increasing, and that was how in the ripeness of autumn she began to believe once more in the youthful superstition that poverty was the servitude of love. Both looked back then on the wild revelry, the gaudy wealth, and the unbridled fornication as an annoyance and they lamented that it had cost them so much of their lives to find the paradise of shared solitude. Madly in love after so many years of sterile complicity, they enjoyed the miracle of living each other as much at the table as in bed, and they grew to be so happy that even when they were two worn-out people they kept on blooming like little children and playing together like dogs.”
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez is a tremendous piece of literature and the quintessential work of Magical Realism. It’s not an easy book to read, but it is absolutely worth it.
Dune – Frank Herbert
“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
This book is a beloved classic. The sheer magnitude of Frank Herbert’s invention, his monumental world-building tied with an exciting story of betrayal, survival, rebellion and ultimate ascendance are more than enough to guarantee that.
The Grapes of Wrath – Jon Steinbeck
Men stood by their fences and looked at the ruined corn, drying fast now, only a little green showing through the film of dust. The men were silent and they did not move often. And the women came out of the houses to stand beside their men—to feel whether this time the men would break. The women studied the men’s faces secretly, for the corn could go, as long as something else remained. The children stood near by, drawing figures in the dust with bare toes, and the children sent exploring senses out to see whether men and women would break. The children peeked at the faces of the men and women, and then drew careful lines in the dust with their toes.
Horses came to the watering troughs and nuzzled the water to clear the surface dust. After a while the faces of the watching men lost their bemused perplexity and became hard and angry and resistant. Then the women knew that they were safe and that there was no break. Then they asked, What’ll we do? And the men replied, I don’t know. But it was all right. The women knew it was all right, and the watching children knew it was all right. Women and children knew deep in themselves that no misfortune was too great to bear if their men were whole. The women went into the houses to their work, and the children began to play, but cautiously at first. As the day went forward the sun became less red. It flared down on the dust-blanketed land. The men sat in the doorways of their houses; their hands were busy with sticks and little rocks. The men sat still—thinking—figuring.
John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath is not merely a great American novel. It is also a significant event in our national history. Capturing the plight of millions of Americans whose lives had been crushed by the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression,
The Road – Cormac McCarthy
“He walked out in the gray light and stood and he saw for a brief moment the absolute truth of the world. The cold relentless circling of the intestate earth. Darkness implacable. The blind dogs of the sun in their running. The crushing black vacuum of the universe. And somewhere two hunted animals trembling like ground-foxes in their cover. Borrowed time and borrowed world and borrowed eyes with which to sorrow it.”
The Road tells the story of a father and son warily travelling across post-apocalyptic America, hoping to reach a place of sanctuary. This is a book to read slowly, to savor, not one to speed through to hasten ingestion of the plot. There are events that are exceedingly grim in this, focusing on despair, suicide, cannibalism. Yet the love of the father for his son is palpable and despite the omnipresent gray ash, there remain slivers of hope.
Good Omens – Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
“God does not play dice with the universe; He plays an ineffable game of His own devising, which might be compared, from the perspective of any of the other players [i.e. everybody], to being involved in an obscure and complex variant of poker in a pitch-dark room, with blank cards, for infinite stakes, with a Dealer who won’t tell you the rules, and who smiles all the time.”
This novel spoof of THE OMEN is absolutely hilarious!
The Martian – Andy Weir
“He’s stuck out there. He thinks he’s totally alone and that we all gave up on him. What kind of effect does that have on a man’s psychology?” He turned back to Venkat. “I wonder what he’s thinking right now.”
LOG ENTRY: SOL 61 How come Aquaman can control whales? They’re mammals! Makes no sense.”
This book is nothing short of spectacular. It is insanely well-researched, and it’s impossible not to be charmed by Mark Watney’s hilarious sense of humor
Into Thin Air – Jon Krakauer
“It was titillating to brush up against the enigma of mortality, to steal a glimpse across its forbidden frontier. Climbing was a magnificient activity, I firmly believed, not in spite of the inherent perils, but precisely because of them.”
This book was horrifying, shocking, and a show of human heart, resilience and bravery. Jon Krakauer tells all in this book; from the excitement at Base Camp to horrible dangers of altitude sickness and at its core, the strength that humans have when in life-threatening situations, and the lengths that people will go to to save each other.
How To Win Friends And Influence People – Dale Carnegie
“You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.”
This is one of the most profound books to understand others behaviors and in teaching you skills to communicate effectively with others. A lot of the information is quite basic, but the examples and the message is quite profound.
Principles – Ray Dalio
“If you’re not failing, you’re not pushing your limits, and if you’re not pushing your limits, you’re not maximizing your potential”
Ray Dalio, one of the worlds most successful investors and entrepreneurs, shares the unconventional principles that hes developed, refined, and used over the past forty years to create unique results in both life and businessand which any person or organization can adopt to help achieve their goals.
Sapiens – Yuval Noah Harrari
“One of history’s fews iron laws is that luxuries tend to become necessities and to spawn new obligations. Once people get used to a certain luxury, they take it for granted. Then they begin to count on it. Finally they reach a point where they can’t live without it. Over the few decades, we have invented countless time saving machines that are supposed to make life more relaxed – washing machines, vacuum cleaners, dishwashers, telephones, mobile phones, computers, email. We thought we were saving time; instead we revved up the treadmill of life to ten times its former speed and made our days more anxious and agitated.”
This is an excellent book about the history of humans, covering all aspects; evolution, anthropology, geography, psychology, religion, ideologies, and the future of humans.
The War of Art – Steven Pressfield
“The most important thing about art is to work. Nothing else matters except sitting down every day and trying.”
This book is a firece kick in the ass every artist, writer or creative needs. Because we all face the same enemy, fight the same battle every day: Resistance.
