10 reviews
Daniel Kahneman
Important ideas but dry writing. I'd recommend a good summary instead of the full book for most people.
Bram Stoker
Jonathan Harker's journal entries at Castle Dracula are some of the most suspenseful pages in all of literature.
Charlotte Brontë
I am no bird; and no net ensnares me. Every page is a declaration of independence.
Herman Melville
Starbuck is the most tragic character - the only sane man on a doomed ship, unable to change its course.
Mary Shelley
The DeLacey family subplot is crucial - it shows the creature capable of love and kindness before rejection hardens him.
J. P. Steed
Read between the lines - this isn't about a whiny teen, it's about grief and trauma. Holden is broken.
Jane Austen
The irony! Austen was doing social satire before it was cool. Mrs. Bennet is comedy gold.
Emily Brontë
Not a love story - a story about obsession and destruction. All the more powerful for it.
J.R.R. Tolkien
Read it at 12, re-read at 30. At 12 I loved the adventure. At 30 I understood the themes of loss and sacrifice.
Aldous Huxley
Pairs perfectly with 1984. Where Orwell feared banning books, Huxley feared no one would want to read them.