If you had to recommend just three books to anyone — regardless of their age, background, education level, financial situation, or life circumstances — what would they be?<p>Books that you think everyone should read at least once. Not necessarily the "best" or most famous ones, but the ones that left a lasting impact, shifted your perspective, or helped you grow in unexpected ways.<p>Fiction or non-fiction — doesn’t matter. I’m curious what comes to mind.<p>Thanks in advance for sharing
I think "life changing" and "universal" are contradictory.<p>A person who is ready to pick up the bar, for instance, would benefit from Rippetoe's <i>Starting Strength</i> but if you don't pick up the bar it's just another book (you might get something from just plain lifting Schwarzenegger's <i>Modern Weighlifting</i> though, if not the Misner, Thorne and Wheeler book <i>Gravitation</i>.) Similarly <i>Super System</i> will change your life if you are serious about playing poker, otherwise it's just a fun read like the <i>D&D Monster Manual</i> I'd say that Ashcroft and Mermin's <i>Solid State Physics</i> was a great adventure even if I didn't end up doing physics in the end, but I was a grad student in condensed matter and I took Ashcroft's class. When I was wanting to explore the edges of applied philosophy and literature I felt Alain Badiou's <i>Being and Event</i> was meaningful to me but a lot of people would say it is obscurantist French trash like Derrida and if you believe that I can't change your mind.<p>I'd tend to reject categorically that fiction could be life changing but maybe that's harsh. So often people nominate books that to me are trash like <i>Atlas Shrugged</i>, <i>The Illuminati Trilogy</i> or <i>Hitchhiker's Guide</i>. From time to time though I do discover an author with a large body of work that I'm obsessed with for a few months, like last year I rediscovered Poul Anderson (want to see Dominic Flandry have a fight with Kimball Kinnison) and got into Pratchett's Discworld.<p>I think a lot of books that offer simple answers to things like books by Malcolm Gladwell and Robert Greene are often harmful and also I think <i>Man's Search for Meaning</i> by Frankl is absolute poison for 21st century people.
“Sapiens” read it twice, wish I could go back in time and give it to 18yr old me.<p>“The Dosadi Experiment”, probably 5 life-changing concepts just tossed in for flavor.<p>“A Pattern Language” on how spaces inform life and life informs spaces.
1.) The Tao Jones Averages by Bennett W. Goodspeed 1984 (this is the primer before reading Jack Bogle's books).<p>2.) The Democratic Party: A History by Frank R. Kent 1928 (an important read of where both modern USA political parties came from).<p>3.) Native American Anarchism by Eunice Minette Schuster..1970 (bias is a funny thing).
I recommend you 3 books that changed my perception and really helped me during tough times. The Power of Habit" by charles duhigg, "The Forty Rules of Love" by elif shafak and "Man's Search for Meaning" by viktor E. frankl.