The Jungle Book
The adventures of Mowgli, a man-child raised by wolves in the jungle, have captured the imaginations not just of children, but of all readers, for generations.
Stats for nerds
8recommend
18mentions
18people
2010–2025years
44% recommend44% neutral11% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- I've not read enough Corey to form a judgement, but I don't think Jordan has nearly enough literary "heft" to satisfy close reading. Don't get me wrong: the story is fun - I enjoyed every bit of Wheel of Time - and would recommend it to anyone who likes that sort of thing, but the deeper stuff (characters, prosidy, world-building, thematic "meaning") don't bear much examination.
In fantasy / sci-fi, I'd unreservedly recommend:
- Ursula K LeGuin
- Steven Erickson
- Gene Wolfe
With reservations, I'd recommend:
- Patrick Rothfuss (unfinished)
- George RR Martin (unfinished; sometimes dodgy prose, but occasionally transcendent character and theme)
- Dune (just know it goes downhill fast after the first book)
Elsewhere, but still genre (ie: meant to be entertaining, not uber-serious, self-conscious "literature"):
- Patrick O'Brian
- Arthur Conan Doyle
- Dorothy Dunnet
I'd recommend Rudyard Kipling's short stories, but they're hit and miss, and sometimes out of step with modern mores. Maybe stick with the Jungle Book, and Just So Stories, and if you like those make sure you read Without Benefit of Clergy, They (short stories), and Kim (a masterpiece of a novel).
Once you've got through those, Hemingway is approachable, and the true modernist master. Fiesta / The Sun Also Rises (same book, known by different names in different parts of the world) is ironic and beautiful; A Farewell to Arms is beautiful and almost unbearably sad; his short stories are impeccable.
- Have Space Suit Will Travel (Heinlein)
Stranger in a Strange Land (Heinlein)
Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption (one story in the book "Different Seasons" by Stephen King)
Of Mice and Men (Steinbeck)
The Martian Chronicles (Bradbury)
Roadside Picnic (Strugatsky)
Frankenstein (Shelley)
Brave New World (Huxley)
Farenheit 451 (Heinlein)
Never Cry Wolf (Mowatt)
A Whale for the Killing (Mowatt)
The Machine Stops (Forster)
Heart of Darkness (Conrad)
Starship Troopers (Heinlein)
The Jungle Book (Kipling)
Lost in the Barrens (Mowatt)
The Republic (Plato)
Rendezvous with Rama (Clarke)
Ringworld (Niven)
The Stainless Steel Rat (Harrison)
The Hobbit (Tolkien)
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (Stevenson)
The Odyssey (Homer)
The Man who Would be King (Kipling)
The Pearl (Steinbeck)
Thus Spake Zarathustra (Nietzsche)
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (Dick)
A Scanner Darkly (Dick)
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Adams)
Dracula (Stoker)
To Kill a Mockingbird (Lee)
The Count of Monte Cristo (Dumas)
Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare)
The Wind in the Willows (Grahame)
A Christmas Carol (Dickens)
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass (Carroll)
Watership Down (Adams)
Gulliver's Travels (Swift)
Animal Farm (Orwell)
- This list of books may sum up my entire personhood, some I read at a young age.
Thinking Fast and Slow. After you read it take a course on statistics & probability.
The Art of Strategy
The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance
Armor by John Steakley Great book of fiction, helped me understand PTSD.
Read a lot of Asimov, robot series, foundation and short stories starting with The Last Question.
Jules Verne
Mark Twain, various stories but particularly the Diary of Adam & Eve
The Jungle Book by Kipling
Lost Horizon
Robinson Crusoe
Dune Series
Enders Game and sequels.
The Odyssey
The Count of Monte Cristo
Seventh Son by Orson Scott Card because it helped me understand that a cultures internally consumed fiction tells you about its values.
The book of Ecclesiastes. The book of Job. Leviticus 25. Galatians 5:22-23. Romans 2:15. Luke 18:1-8. The minor prophets. Bible generally if you want to deep dive, I did once upon a time.
25th chapter of the First Epistle of Clement of Rome
Aristotle, Socrates.
Thus Spake Zarathustra
Through Gates of Splendor Peace Child
Let Freedom Ring. I was working illegally (as I recall) as a 15 year old teenager for Sean Hannity (as a w2 employee through a proxy) when this book came out and along with my personal interactions with him at the time it helped clarify that he is not a person whose opinion holds any weight or even much thought. I remember at the time thinking it was unbearably poor reading.
Farmer Giles of Ham. If you've already read the hobbit, LOTR, etc. it helped me understand the framing of Tolkien way better.
Then read Pride and Prejudice through the lens of Farmer Giles of Ham. Calling it a romance novel is a disservice.
A James Bond Novel. I can't remember the name but there is one in particular that describes why he always acts so overtly and not spy-ish at all. The explanation helped me understand why you should throw yourself fully into work projects and helped me get over fear of mistakes. It made me a far better consultant as well while I was doing that.
So good they can't ignore you & deep work.
How to win friends and influence people.
Run Silent, Run Deep.
The Communist Manifesto
The Christian Manifesto
From Dawn to Decadence.
Romance of the 7 kingdoms.
Life together.
There's a big yellow book about the 6 day war, it's very detailed and blow by blow, I can no longer remember its name but it impressed upon me the chance and vagaries of war.
The Free Will Defense. Alvin Plantinga (and the various philosophic revuttals/conversations)
In Defense of the Kalam Cosmological Argument. William Lane Craig (and the various philosophic revuttals/conversations)
No little people. Francis Schaeffer
The Rise and Fall of the 3rd Reich.
The Rails Way. 1st edition.
Javascript. The good parts.
Visual quick start guide to SQL.
^These three are probably the most important books I ever read, they probably changed the trajectory of my life more than any others on the list.
Midnight's Children. Rushdie
Roberts Rules of Order.
The four loves
Love languages
A once popular anti catholic tract called "The Trail of Blood".
Basically there is truth, falsehood, history, emotion and understanding in all these works, synthesizing these particular books made me who I am today. There are many others but these are the ones that come quickly to mind and whose titles I can still mostly recall.
- Not 100% sure what aspect of thinking you mean, but in general, Read, read, read. Figure out how best to do for your family, but for ours (4,8,11yo, but we've done this since the first was ~3):
* Every night, read them out loud classic books slightly over recommended reading age. We started with Jungle Book, Riki Tiki Tavi, other Kipling, Bears on Hemlock Mountain, etc. These days we just finished Lord of the Rings and are doing Silmarillion. Jules Verne is another favorite.
* Audio books. We use Audible and always play something when traveling to swim practice, etc. Boxcar Children, Historical fiction, Paddington, etc.
* Encourage imaginative play based on the stories. Ours have an ongoing play containing Hobbits, bears, elves, Harry Potter and Star Wars ;) Encourage them to make up and tell their own stories.
* Go to the library weekly (ours just reopened on a limited basis). We let ours check out 5 books of whatever they want, but say 2 must be history, science, literature, etc. Get them their own card as soon as possible.
While fiction might not seem at first to "teach kids how to think", it really can. It simulates what people are thinking in various situations the kids can relate to. Storytelling can help them reinforce that and extrapolate to new scenarios in fun, safe ways. Mensa has some great reading lists: https://www.mensaforkids.org/achieve/excellence-in-reading/
Not reading, but we also:
* Discuss and research together in depth things that interest us and them. For example, I talk to mine about the latest space news over dinner. They love hearing about various missions, challenges to space travel, etc.
* Play chess and/or other strategy games.
* DuoLingo on a regular basis. We let ours choose what language - I have one doing Dutch and one doing Latin.
* Code.org, youtube DIY and educational channels
Again, I believe in aiming slightly over their heads. Not so much you bore them to death, but enough to get gears turning. Even if they don't retain details, it builds a framework for them to build on. Susan Wise Bauer in The Well Trained Mind talks about how doing this can provide "coat hangers" for them to hang bigger thoughts and more details on in later years.
- The fun for me's in getting all the intonation and emphasis just right. You don't have to "do the voices" or anything over the top, but just try to read it how a good narrator might.
Try reading them adult books (if you're not already—and especially classics, they tend to have really nice prose that you want to run your eyes over several times just for the sensation, anyway) or classics of children's literature (e.g. The Jungle Book). Might help. Lots of childrens' books are just plain bad.
- I made this single page app (responsive) of this awesome book by Rudyard Kipling -- The Jungle Book. It's a great read for children.
The repo is available on Github[1]--under MIT license--for anyone to fork and republish with an alternative take/ newer illustrations. Hope you like it! :-)
