I’ve selected 5 simply because I started making a list and came up with almost 30 amazing books I have been introduced to. It’s a tough call, but here goes.
1. Sapiens — Yuval Noah Harrari
“Culture tends to argue that it forbids only that which is unnatural. But from a biological perspective, nothing is unnatural. Whatever is possible is by definition also natural. A truly unnatural behaviour, one that goes against the laws of nature, simply cannot exist, so it would need no prohibition.”
Besides all of the many great things I have already said about this book, Yuval takes us on a journey through the history of humankind, from our origins to our current state. This comprehensive guide has finally provided a definitive route through history and some much needed perspective.
2. Ubik — Philip K Dick
“From the drawer beside the sink Joe Chip got a stainless steel knife; with it he began systematically to unscrew the bolt assembly of his apt’s money-gulping door.
“I’ll sue you,” the door said as the first screw fell out. Joe Chip said, “I’ve never been sued by a door. But I guess I can live through it.”
What is Ubik? Is it a breakfast cereal, a coffee, a kitchen cleaner or an elixir? This fun take on death and the afterlife was something I could not put down. PKD has excellent pacing, deliciously full-characters and some crazy ideas, which work together perfectly here.
3. God is Not Great — Christopher Hitchens
“Violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism and tribalism and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children: organized religion ought to have a great deal on its conscience.”
RIP Hitchens. Your argument style is always engaging and shrouded in more facts and tales than I will ever be able to remember. This man hated religion and could tell you a million reasons why. However you feel on the topic, this book will teach you how to frame a solid argument, and that’s a useful skill.
4. Annihilation — Jeff Vandermeer
“I told him point-blank so there would be no mistake: This person he wanted to know better did not exist; I was who I seemed to be from the outside. That would never change.”
Part 1 of 3 — the rest I still have to read. A strange place has developed on earth, and teams of scientists are being sent there; never to return fully. We join a Biologist as she experiences it for herself. Sci-Fi horror at it’s finest, and the first book I’ve read by Vandermeer.
5. The Naked Sun — Isaac Asimov
“The Solarians have given up something mankind has had for a million years; something worth more than atomic power, cities, agriculture, tools, fire, everything; because it’s something that made everything possible (…) The tribe, sir. Cooperation between individuals.”
Asimov uses his fiction to comment on the real world, without losing any of the brilliant imagination that science writers have. Here, a detective has to travel to another world to investigate a murder. Getting used to another culture helps you to understand your own, but which will he prefer?
How about you guys?
