Ask HN: What book do you recommend everyone should read?
Hi HN,
Every person I've come across always has one book that sits at the top of their book list that they would recommend to everyone. For me, it's "How to win friends & influence people" by Dale Carnegie. What's your book? Another book I recommend: On the shortness of life, by Seneca I's life changing, it teaches you the importance to do not waste our most precious finite resource. A Guide to the Good Life, by William B. Irvine Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise http://peakthebook.com/index.html It is on deliberate practice. Together with "Deep Work" can help to build a personal system to achieve the goals in study, work, etc. If you want to play the game: The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene And if you don't: How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman: Adventures of a Curious Character. It is very motivating, witty and just great fun to read! Non Fiction: Godel Escher Bach Fiction: Seveneves Both of these I've read several times and glean new things each reading. And those things I've learned have formed essential parts of the heuristics I use on a day to day basis to deal with the dark ambiguities of life. Fiction: War and Peace; the more everything changes the same humans stay. 200 years old and yet you can empathise with every character Non-fiction: Letters from Seneca; the only philosophy book I enjoyed and whose tenets I aim to practise every day. Did you mean "Letters from a Stoic" by Seneca? Yes, you're right. Thanks for pointing that out! Death and Life of Great American Cities, by Jane Jacobs. If you ever think about the design of your town or city or wonder why it's not safe to go out after dark in parts of your city, among many other things, it's applicable to you. Reading Jacobs' most famous book, you're hit with this feeling that she possessed the perfect balance of humility and knowledge. That we still make the mistakes she described half a century ago is quite unfortunate, especially once you realize the we do and for a long time, have, known better. Deep work is one of the best book I had read in this year https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1455586692/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=... 1. How to Win Friends and Influence People - Dale Carnegie 2. Deep Work - Cal Newport 3. Personal MBA - Josh Kaufman wouly you say it's enough to read the wikipedia page on the first one?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Win_Friends_and_Influen... The only section where I would use an example is with "Let the other person feel the idea is his or hers.". It's also one of the few that are not just about being positive and honest. How to win friends and influence people Man's search for meaning Architecture of happiness Eternal Golden Braid The Mythical Man Month: Essays on Software Engineering - Frederick Brooks The HP Way: How Bill Hewlett and I Built Our Company - David Packard I have read countless books and articles and have attended countless discussions and talks on software engineering and business practices and it never ceases to amaze me how many of the principles tie right back to these two books. Each is short and can be easily tackled together in a day or less. 1. Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance by Angela Duckworth - http://amzn.to/2mLuQyU 2. The Startup of You by Reid Hoffman - http://amzn.to/2mXSlFB 3. Strengths Finder by Gallup Press - http://amzn.to/2mqDNuY Sun Tzu - The Art of War. You can breeze through it in an afternoon and it ends up being strangely applicable to life. TBH if you read it in an afternoon you're probably missing on a lot of things. I find that the original text on its own is very hard to fully understand. Usually better to read a commented/detailed edition. At least that's my experience. But yeah, it is amazing how it can apply to so many things. 1. Prithvivallabh (Gujarati Book) by K.M. Munshi
2. Glimpses of World History[0] by J. Naheru [0]. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glimpses_of_World_History Technical - Hacker's Delight by Henry Warren Fiction - The Master and Margarita - Mikhail Bulgakov "Economics in one lesson" I found it on a libertarian website, free to download, its about free market, against government intervention. It gives many examples of how "anything that the government touches, it dies" The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl Bogleheads for investing Health Related: 1. The Obesity Code: Unlocking the Secrets of Weight Loss Jason Fung 2. Tripping Over the Truth: The Return of the Metabolic Theory of Cancer The bible. A bit dry but worth a read. You will know more about Christianity than a lot of Christians. It's definitely a good book if you are looking for common sense morality. I think the Jefferson Bible is a better book if you are looking for moral teachings (never read it, only heard about it) On the Bible front, I'd recommend a story bible. There's a good reason so many people fail to read the Bible: it's full of motivational landmines such as genealogies. Even reading a story bible would put one far ahead in terms of understanding. The one I read is the Ritchie pruehs story bible, which is free as a Kindle book. I recommend a book only recently I could read, the classic: 1984 by George Orwell Every citizen should read it, on my opinion. Rich Dad Poor Dad, by Robert Kiyosaki I've heard that book isn't very good. It is full of stories that didn't happen and are just Robert's ideas about what makes a rich person rich. Basically, Robert got rich from telling others how rich people are. I've read plenty of books about finances that are just mind-numbingly obvious that it is a skip for anyone with common sense. Would you agree RDPD is that kind of book? https://www.johntreed.com/blogs/john-t-reed-s-real-estate-in... > It is full of stories that didn't happen and are just Robert's ideas about what makes a rich person rich. If you read it like a parable similar to The Richest Man in Babylon or The Alchemist you can still gather some useful info and refreshers from this book. Fiction: The Baroque Circle + Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson Non-Fiction: Presence - Amy Cuddy Fiction: The Martian - Andy Weir Non fiction: Predictably Irrational - Dan Ariely Asimov's Foundation Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb Peter Thiel - Zero to One I read it in one sitting. I wouldn't say it is a must read, but it brings up a few good points. It isn't a heavy thinking book, it is like an extended Medium post. If you want to hear Thiel's ideas, it is worth a read but otherwise I wouldn't really recommend it. reading these days... Transylvania Sunrise 1. Cosmos 2. Demon Haunted World Both by Carl Sagan Commenting so that I can come here later The reason folks here are downvoting you is because you can favorite a submission or a discussion and see it in your own profile. No need to comment so you can come back. :) Well, thanks for telling the reason. I'll take care from next time