h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

There are a few here for me:
To Kill A Mockingbird, read it when I was 15 and going through a rough time and it taught me to try and see things from the POV of others, making me less of a self-centered drama queen
The Times Atlas, 1989 edition, when I was only 5 because it made me realise the world was BIG
Nausea by Sartre because it made me realise my place is in the world, not hiding from it
Lord of the Rings: although it didn't really change my life it reinforced the idea that anyone can be a hero and general optimism

Has anyone read anything by Chuck Phalunick? (I bet I've spelt that wrong). I think he's the person who wrote Fight Club

Oh gosh. I hope I wasn't being a snob..

One of the things that's lovely about this thread is the amount of people whose lives were changed by books that aren't considered to be 'Good Books'.

And on the subject of not 'good books'

One that I think every male thats read it has tried to some degree - and which has the potnetial for unbelievable life change - however I'm a wimp, and bottled out when a 'big one' came up.

The book ?

The Dice Man - Luke Rheinhart.

Nah, I've read that and it didn't change me or make me try anything on the whim of a die.

My favorite books list is different from my life changing books list.

To Kill A Mockingbird is one of my top favorites.
Timeless
*thankful for books*

The Dice Man?

When I first heard of it, I thought it was an exciting piece of art. More recently, I read it, and found myself frightened, not by the book, but by the certain knowledge that many of its readers had actually tried acting in that way.

Just like the Hungerford gunman -- UK, some years ago -- who was playing a by-mail swords and sorcery game, and received his orders: 'kill all the humans'. He tried, and got several.

People who can't distinguish art fantasy from reality are the best argument I know for censorship and the 'nanny state'. 'Anti-social behaviour' is too small a phrase for this, isn't it?

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

The Dice Man is a clever and funny condemnation of psychoanalysis, and the story itself exemplifies why it's both inadvisable and philosophically untenable to decide to live your life like the dice man.

I've just finished reading 'The Jigsaw Man' by Paul Britton. It's an account of the career of a criminal psychologist. Fascinating reading, but the cases are truly grim. Now I feel like going around in a yashmak for the rest of eternity.

Amazon delivered my copy of "The Tao is silent" yesterday. , I forget who recommended it. First impression: very readable.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"

Apparently there's a compainion book to the Dice Man available which tells you exactly how to lead your life according to the whim of the die.

Does it tell you how to ascertain what choices you give the die in the first place?

It's all free will in the end.

I got a copy of The Dice Man shortly after a friend recommended it... That was 2 or 3 years ago, I'll get around to reading it eventually.

I've never been a different person at the end of reading a book, but I wouldn't be the same as I am now without:

Hitchikers. Sorry. Dad read it and loved it first. There were all sorts of things around the house when I was young to do with it: the dingy's called Don't Panic sort of thing. But then I read it and loved it too, and essentially there's no way I cannot notice the number 42 and I can't get on a plane without sniggering every time they bring round the lemon scented napkins. I strongly suspect it shaped my sense of the rediculous.

Heinlein. Not time enough for love: never been a fan of Lazerus Long, but I'm pretty sure you can trace my rather trenchant views about social and personal responsibility to their beginnings there. Heinlein's doing quite well here, isn't he? Superb writer as long as you stick to the kids stuff in my opinion!

Humanity: a moral History of the 20th Century (Jonathan Glover) and The Gulag Archipeligo (Solzenitzin). I spent a lot of time thinking about these two books in relation to ethics and what is morally right, and both gave me also a much better insight into what makes people do appalling things, which had been puzzling me and probably made me a nicer person. I also find I'm coming round to S's view that it's better to struggle and be a better person for it than to live like a pudding forever.

"To Kill A Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, it really opened my eyes to so much when I was younger.

Cheesy I know, but the HHGTTG anthology. After my first husband died, I went through his stuff and came across it. It looked appealing, so I read it through. It just..cheered me up so much in all sorts of ways that I needed and I felt compelled to see if there were others online who liked it as much. Do a google search for 'hitchhikers guide to the galaxy community' and what site comes up? The life-changing part was yet to come--it was on h2g2 that I met this lovely British character called Njan, who would later become my husband. Many thrills, joys, and trials later, I'm now living in Scotland with him in a happy little attic flat with two kids and two kits.

Proust's 'Remembrance of things Past' It was a fantastic almost spiritual experience to get through all the thousands of pages. Took me 3 months. The amazingly long sentances which when you got to the end of one, you forgot the beginning, seem to be part of my dreams, as I mostly read it in the evenings before going to sleep.

Currently re-reading Roald Dahl's Charlie and The Great Glass Elevator. We started this in school YEARS ago (I'm 20), but we never got past the first chapter.

I loved the new movie with Johnny Depp

*Japanese Inn* by Oliver Statler
Because it opened my eyes to Japanese history and because I *borrowed* it from a stranger and felt so bad I returned it and apologised.

*Fermat's Enigma* by Simon Singh
Because it is a story of dedication and fascination that I can relate to if not live up to.

I'm now half way through "The Tao is silent" by Raymod Smullyan. I can see why Potholer (?) felt it changed his life. If I'd read it twenty years ago, it would've changed mine too. As it is, I'm already heading in the general direction it would've nudged me in. A delightful book.

Pattern-chaser

"Who cares, wins"