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What books do you consider must reads? (beehaw.org)

submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by Alice@beehaw.org to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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So basically I was unschooled, and the amount of books I've read in my life is embarrassingly low. It was never emforced like in a school, and with my family's religious hangups, I never tried getting into new things because I never knew what would be deemed "offensive".

But I'm always interested when I hear people talk about both storycraft and also literary criticism, so I want to take an earnest stab at getting into books.

No real criteria, I don't know what I like so I can't tell you what I'm looking for, other than it needs to be in English or have an English translation. Just wanna know what y'all think would make good or important reading.

ETA holy shit thanks for all the suggestions! Definitely gonna make a list

ETA if I reply extremely late it's because it took me this long to get a library card in my new locale.

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[–] Bophades@midwest.social 5 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Lots of great suggestions involving story craft and the like, so I'll target the "religious hangups" bit with a couple non-fiction books:

Sentience by Nicholas Humphrey (great to get a perspective on consciousness and sentience that isn't marred with religious doctrine)
Determined by Robert Sapolsky (a primatologist with a knack for getting you comfortable with the notion that we don't have as free a will as religion tells us)

And just to include a bit of fiction:

Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky (about life as we know it, or maybe as we don't)
Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros (deals with overwritten cultures. Also dragons.)