Hard to choose one, but others haven't so neither will I.<p>Vasily Grossman's Life and Fate. It's the War and Peace of the second world war. All aspects of society and human relations are touched upon in profound ways. It's been a long time since my last (re)read; a lot of the particulars are missing from my brain now. A book of ideas, punctuated with the starkness of WWII.<p>Moby Dick - mentioning this one always raises some people's ire, I don't know why. I fall into the language, the story is gripping, the long side paths into biology, ships, and so on give so much insight into either life of the time, or scientific understanding of the time. It's an attempt at a great novel. We can argue about whether it succeeds, but the attempt is breathtaking to watch.<p>Robert Penn Warren's All the Kings men. It's a great story of political corruption and ambition in the southern US, the characters are so well done. A story of power. A book of ideas; it discusses original sin, how people are influenced by their circumstance, subjective morality, and much more.<p>Zola's Germinal. Probably my desert island book. I've read it so many times. A soul crushing portrait of life as a miner in France. I'm sitting here typing, getting tears in my eye just over the poor donkey that lived it's entire life in the mine, and that is probably one of the least sad things in the book.<p>Les Miserables. What is there to say about this one? History, Paris, the nature of love, redemption, politics, justice, everything important to being human is in this book.