# Your favorite books?



## ResistMuchObeyLittle

What are your favorite, life changing books?

For me it was actually Man's Search For Meaning, Walden, The Freedom Manifesto abd How I found freedom In an unfree world.


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## Crash

ResistMuchObeyLittle said:


> What are your favorite, life changing books?
> 
> For me it was actually Man's Search For Meaning, Walden, The Freedom Manifesto abd How I found freedom In an unfree world.


Man search for meaning is an awesome book. I love the Tao te Ching. Fight Club book is great and almost anything I've read by Bukowski.


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## Deleted member 125

Childhoods end, Johnny got his gun, Siddhartha, sirens of titan and no exit by Jean Paul Sartre but that was a play so not sure if it counts. All definitely worth a read if you like books.


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## Deleted member 24029

I'd have to say "Cat's Cradle", by Vonnegut. Also, try to find an edition of the Dao De Jing that explains the text, character by character.


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## Shaggy Rogers

I'm from a weird spectrum. My fave book, One Second After, is about the US getting bombed; not nukes but EMP. Ever since getting this book my life turned around into prepping and what if's. You could even say my whole view on life changed with it, and probably what led me to this website.


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## Honey Crust

Reading Into The Wild in high school is partly what inspired my wanderlust, and made me feel like lit was actually possible to travel like that.

Laura Jane Grace’s memoir Tranny was perfect and gave me hope for the future, and I was able to relate to about 60% of the entirety of that book.

Currently reading The Dispossessed by Ursula K Le Guin and holy fuck it’s amazing. Only about a 3rd of the way in but I would still heavily recommend it, honestly.


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## AAAutin

CATCH-22 shaped my humor.

ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE shaped my writing.

A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES shaped my politics.

AMERICAN PSYCHO shaped my...uhhh..._late-night predilections._


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## CelticWanderer

Planetwalker by John Francis. such an awesome story, the dude is a constant source of inspiration for me.


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## Crazy Hobo Johnny

*The post-apocalyptic book series Deathlands by James Axler (written by different authors) the book publishing ended it is continued as audio books. About a group of survivalists nomads that travel around the United States 100 years later after the January 20th, 2001 nuclear war.
www.jamesaxler.com *


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## shannanagans

ResistMuchObeyLittle said:


> What are your favorite, life changing books?
> 
> For me it was actually Man's Search For Meaning, Walden, The Freedom Manifesto abd How I found freedom In an unfree world.


‘fear and loathing in las vegas’, as wild as it is, really sparked my interest in living life as freely as possible; and a book written by a distant cousin of mine named ed morris called ‘born to lose’ about the realities of life as a neglected child, the prison and foster care systems and how the system fails us every day exactly as it is designed to do.


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## ClashCityRkr

I'm a huge fan of anything by Vonnegut or Irvine Welsh, but Steinbeck's East of Eden is probably my favorite book of all time.


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## Hazardoussix6six

Idk about life changing but top 3 are

Shantaram by Gregory something if I recall

Number of the beast by heinlen

And


Starship troopers by heinlen.

Just said fun reads


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## Deleted member 20065

shannanagans said:


> ‘fear and loathing in las vegas’, as wild as it is, really sparked my interest in living life as freely as possible; and a book written by a distant cousin of mine named ed morris called ‘born to lose’ about the realities of life as a neglected child, the prison and foster care systems and how the system fails us every day exactly as it is designed to do.


 I had read fear and loathing before but when my dad passed away last year I found 3 copies of it in his books so had to read it again. I've always wanted to re enact the story.


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## Deleted member 20065

ResistMuchObeyLittle said:


> What are your favorite, life changing books?
> 
> For me it was actually Man's Search For Meaning, Walden, The Freedom Manifesto abd How I found freedom In an unfree world.


Read it about 10 years ago but Dharma Punx by Noah Levine and Against the Stream. And Eating Animals by Foer


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## Deleted member 21429

Shaggy Rogers said:


> I'm from a weird spectrum. My fave book, One Second After, is about the US getting bombed; not nukes but EMP. Ever since getting this book my life turned around into prepping and what if's. You could even say my whole view on life changed with it, and probably what led me to this website.


That's not weird. That's just science and common sense. The sun can fart in our direction any day and BAM! we're in the stone age. ~ peace and the power of the universe


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## noothgrush

Twilight of the Idols by Nietzsche. Demons by Dostoyevsky and Hunger by Knut Hamsun


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## Glass Roads

Not trying to toot Matt's horn or anything, but the Anarchists Guide to Travel is a very useful book that I have enjoyed since receiving it.
I'm also finishing Evasion from Crimethinc right now. A slight over romanticized I feel, but still a decent read. Would really recomend anything from crimethinc.
Rule of the Bone by Russel Banks was a great coming of age story involving lots of hitchiking and travel. I would reccomend that to any young person.
And yes, Vonnegut is great. Really like Breakfast of Champions. Shout out to the Bokonists on here!
Microcosm publishing also has a great book on traveling via floating down river all Huck Finn status. It's called "Unsinkable: How to build plywood pantoons and longtail boats out of scrap."


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## ResistMuchObeyLittle

So many great books! Definitely going to check out One second after. 
I've read quite a bit Vonnegut, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Sartre, etc. 
Something Vonnegut said in Cat's Cradle has always stuck with me-
"There's enough love in this world for everyone". 
Bukowski is always great. He didn't sit around awaiting to be inspired, he just wrote like clockwork. 
I should have listed Ed Abbey-Desert Solitaire, as that's definitely a favorite book I always go back and read. It gives me a push to get moving.


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## Jake Pemberton

The Myth Of Sisyphus by Albert Camus (technically an essay)

Underworld by Don DeLillo

A Farewell To Arms by Hemingway


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## roguetrader

The Great War For Civilization - Robert Fisk / Shantaram - Gregory David Roberts / Cryptonomicon - Neal Stevenson (and most of his other books).... and about a million others when I've got more time to post - I spend hours reading everyday...

EDIT : also anything by Rohinton Mistry - he's a Canadian Parsi who writes about Bombay... and Tim Powers - The Anubis Gates / On Stranger Tides...


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## train in vain

shannanagans said:


> ‘fear and loathing in las vegas’, as wild as it is, really sparked my interest in living life as freely as possible




I love that book. Annoying when folks just think of it as two dudes fucked up on drugs blowing it. I was still sxe when i came across it haha. 


I dont think ive ever read a "life changing" book to be honest.

Sand and Foam and the Prophet were/are pretty high on the list. 
I wonder how many folks arr gonna mention into the wild in here haha.


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## roguetrader

@train in vain - yeah know what you mean I'm a big reader but I never had a life changing experience through books, only from serious psychedelic drugs ! but every now and then a book has me grinning from ear to ear and I can't put the fucking thing down.....


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## roughdraft

Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller

Black Spring by same ^^

The Dead Father by Donald Barthalme

The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera

On the Road by Jack Kerouac (i actually love it)

The Fall by Albert Camus (The Stranger ((a.k.a. the outsider)) is also worth time

The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe

Train Dreams by Denis Johnson

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho 

Tao Te Ching.....you can´t go too wrong with this one...but I've witnessed many translations are meh compared to others...

on that note, The Art of War is solid!

Bonus;;;;; favorite play: Rhinoceroses by Eugene Ionesco (swear on everything this one is a belter, people)


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## ResistMuchObeyLittle

Moral letters to Lucilius by Seneca and
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius should be required reading. There's more wisdom in those 2 books than all the other books I've ever read- including the great religious texts-The Bible, Rig Veda, etc. 

"Most men ebb and flow in wretchedness between the fear of death and the hardships of life; they are unwilling to live, and yet they do not know how to die. 6. For this reason, make life as a whole agreeable to yourself by banishing all worry about it. No good thing renders its possessor happy, unless his mind is reconciled to the possibility of loss; nothing, however, is lost with less discomfort than that which, when lost, cannot be missed. "

"
No man can have a peaceful life who thinks too much about lengthening it, or believes that living through many consulships is a great blessing.
Show me that the good in life does not depend upon life's length, but upon the use we make of it; also, that it is possible, or rather usual, for a man who has lived long to have lived too little."


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## train in vain

roguetrader said:


> @train in vain - yeah know what you mean I'm a big reader but I never had a life changing experience through books, only from serious psychedelic drugs ! but every now and then a book has me grinning from ear to ear and I can't put the fucking thing down.....


I used to read A LOT. Pretty rare these days. I usually pack a book when i go ride trains but it just takes up space most of the time. When i read its almost always non fiction now.


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## ResistMuchObeyLittle

Thanks for all the great recommendations!


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## Omightydarkone

Pretty much anything written by James Patterson Gary Paulsen C.S. Lewis J.K. Rowling.


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## Tongtwisted

ClashCityRkr said:


> I'm a huge fan of anything by Vonnegut or Irvine Welsh, but Steinbeck's East of Eden is probably my favorite book of all time.


If you liked that brotherstory from Steinbeck, you might read "sometimes a great notion" by Ken kesey, it was my best littérature ever, although I read a translation. I would be curious to know if the original is as good as it was in french. A bit heavy in a bag though.


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## Undercity

I personally love Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, and the Lord of the Rings trilogy by JR Tolkien. Both books are a bit hefty to carry around, but it took me a good six months to get through each of them.


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## Ivy Vines

Personally, I love Howl's Moving Castle, both the book and the movie. That story just stuck with me since I was little. 

But, Into the Wild was the book that first opened me up to the idea of vagabonding. I never thought that sort of lifestyle was possible until I was introduced to it by that story, and now that I know that it is, I feel freer than I've ever felt in my life.


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## Deleted member 21003

People of the Deer or maybe the Fellowship of the Ring, I could definitely read both over and over again, also it's already been mentioned, but I liked Matt's book as well.


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## blank

roughdraft has good taste. The Air-Conditioned Nightmare and Colossus of Maroussi are better though. 

Escape from Freedom by Fromm
Kafka on the Shore by Murakami
Blood Meridian by McCarthy


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## beersalt

I read "Expect Resistance" which was released by crimethinc shortly before I got rid of my lease, and started travelling full-time. I just really dug the way it was written, because I'm a sucker for memoirs.

Which brings me tooooo- Electroboy, by: Andy Behrman. Which he refers to as "A Memoir of Mania". Should be self explanatory..

NAKED LUNCH - by the one and only, William S. Burroughs. I read this book for the first time in 8th grade. Didn't really understand what the fuck was happening on ANY of the pages; yet read them all, and enjoyed every minute of doing so.

Aaaaand last, but not least.. Invisible Monsters, by: Chuck Palahniuk 
Being my favorite novel I've ever read of his.


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## HitchBiker

1. 500 Years of Indigenous Resistance
2. Against His-Story, Against Leviathan
3. An Indigenous People's History of the United States

Those three changed me the most in the last year.

I've read a lot of the books listed here. Man's Search For Meaning is something I think about a lot. Not so much into fiction anymore, but I read a great deal of everything from the beatniks to Vonnegut to Palahniuk. From Salinger to Wallace. There's a little something in all of them. I enjoyed the books by John Francis listed here. If you like him I recommend Daniel Suelo and Peace Pilgrim. Read all the CrimeThinc books. Evasion was the first one that pulled me in. Some alternative travel books I'd recommend are Walden On Wheels, Thru-Hiking Will Break Your Heart, and SunHitcher. All different, all great. I feel like I took an important thing from each. Also funny: Noah Levine gave a Buddhist blessing to my touring bike, since it is the punkest to ever exist.


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## troublefunk

Vagabonding by Ed Buryn is one i always go back to.Written in 1973 but i love his ideas and his philosophy of travel.
Can find you tube vids of him reading excerpts from it.Inspiring stuff.


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## terpentinersatz

Down and out in Paris and London by George Orwell, probably his best book!


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## ResistMuchObeyLittle

@BikePunky great selection of literature. Man's search for meaning is always on my mind. Walden on wheels was a great read. Daniel Suelo is an inspiring guy, read the book The Man who quit money.


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## HitchBiker

ResistMuchObeyLittle said:


> @BikePunky great selection of literature. Man's search for meaning is always on my mind. Walden on wheels was a great read. Daniel Suelo is an inspiring guy, read the book The Man who quit money.



Yeah, that book stuck with me a lot. I feel like I do so much with very little money and it's probably that direction of reading I took to thank for it. Daniel is a great person. If you use the Facebook still, he has a personal account on there and posts lots of interesting things to discuss. He just did a TedX talk that was neat as well.


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## MFB

Down and Out in Paris and London by Orwell is a great read for bum type people. 

For Whom the Bell Tolls by Hemingway is beautifully written.


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## Sal1234569

S


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## roughdraft

blank said:


> roughdraft has good taste. The Air-Conditioned Nightmare and Colossus of Maroussi are better though.
> 
> Escape from Freedom by Fromm
> Kafka on the Shore by Murakami
> Blood Meridian by McCarthy



thenx yo... i havent read either of those from Miller >_< nor any of the other three.. you have any other favorites?


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## BusGypsy

A Song of Ice and Fire series
I've read every book at least once, most twice. I'm obsessed with the intricacies of the storylines.


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## Oddy

Just for enjoyable reading, the entire discworld series by Terry Pratchett. All his characters could be someone you will meet/ have met on the road.


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## Mj23

In chronological order

Aldous Huxley's doors of perception, William Blake's marriage of heaven and hell, Goeth's faust, Fredrich Nietzsche's birth of tragedy, Robert Anton Wilson's prometheus rising, Ramon Sender's seven red sundays, Barbara Meyhoff's peyote hunt, Herman Melville's moby dick, Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's legacy of cain, Walt Whitman's leaves of grass, Celine's journey to the end of the night, Isabel Fonseca's bury me standing, Octavio Paz's labyrinth of solitude, Dominique Lapierre's or I'll clothe you in mourning, William Bateson's ecology of mind, Eric Fromm's selected works of karl marx, PKD's we can build you, Bukowski's women, Jorge Borges' collected nonfictions, Lawrence Durrell's black book, Henry Miller's black spring and both tropics, Ernest Hemmingway's for whom the bell tolls, old man and the sea and a sun also rises, Fernando Pessoa's book of disquiet, Cormac McCarthy's blood meridian and suttree, William Faulkner's the sound and the fury and as I lay dying, Kahlil Gibran's the prophet, Kurt Vonneguts cat's cradle, Garcia Marquez's autumn of the patriarch.

Forgot Ed Abbey's desert solitaire, Terry Mort's reasonable art of fly fishing, and of course all of Poe's short stories.

Sartre's no exit was good, too. And Dostoyevsky of course, but then georg lucaks or bifo berardi or nokolai golgol and pushkin's works would have to be brought up as well as a host of others... not so lifechanging as the above, though.

Was very surprising to see Henry Miller already mentioned here, browsing up after posting. Almost nobody I bump into has even heard of him, and yes black spring was terrific, and would totally recommend his greece travelogue as well 'collussus'.


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## Chazten

The alchemist 
Zhuangzi chapters
Fear and loathing in vegas
Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy


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## Older Than Dirt

_The Sheep Look Up_ by John Brunner, amazing '60s science fiction about future eco-disaster, and resistance- the Trainites are like if dirty kids or Philly MOVE had actual political traction. Pretty much describes modern America, except overoptimistic about humanity's chances of survival (& it is not an optimistic book)

_You Can't Win_ by "Jack Black", 1920s autiobiography of crime and riding the rails on the lam from the law. Anyone on this site will LOVE this book.

_Discipline and Punish_ by Michel Foucault- somewhat hard to read but amazing history of how and why we all live in prison in the modern world. Reading this book led me, at the time a bike messenger and weed dealer, to get a PhD and have a career as a scientist studying drugs and crime (that i'm now retired from).

And also, like others here, _Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas_, _Down And Out In Paris And London, Naked Lunch_ (and _Junkie_ by burroughs)


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## Deleted member 24782

RFK Funeral Train, Paul Fusco

American Pictures, Jacob Holdt

In the American West, Richard Avedon

Cocaine True Cocaine Blue, Eugene Richards


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## Deleted member 24782

Older Than Dirt said:


> _You Can't Win_ by "Jack Black", 1920s autiobiography of crime and riding the rails on the lam from the law. Anyone on this site will LOVE this book.



10 or so years ago, there was talk of this being made into a movie, big actors too. Producer was actually trying to cast some real hobo/street kid types, some of my friends actually, I don't know what happened, the movie didn't go anywhere as far as I know.


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## SaltyCrew

Ya'll got a great list going here! It's awesome to see we all read similar literature, to be expected here of course. I have read tons of the books/authors here, and I highly recommend anyone want to geek out on a great selection, go to the Lizzard Tree Library. I will try highlighting some of my more memorable reads, the ones that had something to say worth while, IMO;
*Great Classic Stuff *
-Vonnegut, Orwell, Stienbeck, Huxley, Kessel, "A clockwork Orange" by Anthony Burgess
*Anti-war stuff *
- Jonny got his gun, A day in the life of Ivan Dennisovich, We the living, Slaughterhouse Five,
*Inspiring adventure biography type?*
- Indian Creek Chronicles, into the wild, The man who quit money (Daniel Suelo story) , the tarnished shooter, to be frank Diego ,
*My personal favorite*
- Ayn Rand is probably my favorite author. I didn't see any of her work listed here. So I will;
- Atlas Shrugged (1957)
-Fountainhead (1943)
- Anthem (1937)
- We the Living (1936)

I tried listing some I didn't see already listed, I hope this continues to grow!


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## ResistMuchObeyLittle




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## T Paradise

Brodiesel710 said:


> 10 or so years ago, there was talk of this being made into a movie, big actors too. Producer was actually trying to cast some real hobo/street kid types, some of my friends actually, I don't know what happened, the movie didn't go anywhere as far as I know.


It was made into a movie, said to be released this year.


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## tchavers

Walden on Wheels by Ken Ilgunas is the book that got me excited about hitting the road while sleeping in the van and looking in to "alternative" styles of travel. 

Into the Wild and A Walk in the Woods, both are common re-reads from me too.


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## AwakenedAdele

I'm not sure about life changing, but the Chronicles of Ancient Darkness by Michelle Paver are awesome fictional reads if you're into primitive skills like me


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## dingo dave

the monkey wrench gang, we like it wild, and the last season have all inspired me


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## ResistMuchObeyLittle

I just finished reading Peace Pilgrim. WOW. She is one of the most inspiring people I've ever read about. Totally makes me want to do more for people. Daniel Suelo is another amazing human being who writes some very thought provoking material.


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## SmokinToes

Favorite book might be a short but good one: I am Legend. Far surpasses the movie (although I think the movie was good in its own right.)

Life changing? A little thick book (one of many but the most common) called The Wiccan Bible. I'm not Wiccan but its got a lot of good practices and eye opening entries.


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## WyldLyfe

*AMI CHILD OF THE STARS
FULL BOOK PDF:* https://www.infiniteunknown.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/amibook.pdf






*AGHORA AT THE LEFT HAND OF GOD
FULL BOOK PDF: http://avalonlibrary.net/ebooks/Robert Svoboda - Aghora.pdf*


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## BradKajukenbo

I think my favorite book was the one I read while I was in Jail in Missouri. 

Nathan's Run by John Gilstrap





Its about a 12 year old who escapes Juvenile Hall but has a hitman after him.


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## xjamestravisx

Not sure what I’d consider to be my life changing books. When I was younger, Sartre’s writing got my brain working with Philosophy. I tend to read fiction, though. Anne Rice’s Memnoch the Devil definitely impacted the way I look at/feel about religion. Watchmen was highly influential to me. Early-mid 20th Century Weird Fiction is my favorite thing to read. 

I think the best book I’ve read as an adult was Carson McCuller’s The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. It’s essentially about moral isolation in a deep southern town in the 30s. Lots of talk on labor and race issues, loss and growth.


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## scutellaria

Mutant Message Down Under - marlo morgan
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test - Tom Wolfe
The Way of Zen - Allan Watts
-- these three books i read when i was like 17 and 18 and were kinda like the first exposure i had to ideas about living and consciousness, etc that were different from what i grew up with as the norm. definitely are reasons my life went the way it did. i started travelling within the year.

Decolonizing Transgender 101 - b. binaohan
this is a book i read a few years ago when my understanding of white supremacy and colonialism were kinda cementing with the basic anarchism id been exposed to while also going through ""transitioning"" or whatever and really tied everything together for me

also super stoked to hear about the you can't win movie. gonna have to keep an eye out for it.


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## Lichenthropy

one book i always will remember and recommend over and over again is the autobiography of malcolm x. its an important one, a life affirming book. as a native to the north amerikas, all i knew growing up was white culture, and my family urging me to learn what was offered outside of our culture. a sweetheart of a person told me to read that book; when i did i learned that i am so blessed to have a culture that doesnt have a starting date, and isnt gone. go read that book! 
the wall by sartre is killer too! 5 stories about insanity, frail mental stability, and 2 way wills.
the world withoutus. awesome read as well! a beautiful book about man made structures crumbling and disintegrating because people are no longer around to maintain them.
the darth bane trilogy! the sith lord who overcame himself and established the rule of two; a rule which decrees there should only be 2 siths in the universe at any given time. one master and one apprentice; and the only way for the apprentice to claim master is for them (the apprentice) is to murder their master in hand to hand combat. killer shit.
as far as 'life changing' books go i gotta hand it to my little brother (rip) who got me to read all the harry potter books and those fuckers started my love for reading.


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## ResistMuchObeyLittle

I just finished this book. I highly recommend it.


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