Fiction Books

House of the Scorpion

I read it in high school when I was rather conservative and it gave me a different perspective on politics and taught me the nature of how the environment you grow up in affects your personal biases. I won't go into details to avoid spoilers but I will say it's a sci fi set in the not too distant future about a boy who is born in a cartel in a border nation that formed between the United States and Mexico. It opened my own perspective about culture shock and the blinders that one can have when raised in an environment that protects you from outside information. I feel this book was part of how I deprogrammed myself while I was being raised in the Mormon church. I can relate to much of what the protagonist went through finding out that most of the world might not have a very positive view of the group you grew up in and were taught to embrace. It's a story about processing hard truths and learning from them. It's also about finding your own identity in an environment that expects you to be something you don't want to be.