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One book that really spoke to you

M

mousey

Shiny_Rock
Joined
Feb 9, 2009
Messages
432
OK, so how about this for a topic starter?
I think that when you really enjoy a book it has something to do with the writing, but it is mostly to do with the place you are in your life. I really think that I might read an amazing book, but it won't effect me in the same way as a lesser book that I happened to read at the right time in my life.
The one book that I remember really effecting me was The Razor's Edge by somerset maugham. I had just failed my first year in college. I was lucky enough to get good points in school and had entered college to do a business degree (mainly because my Mother wanted me to). I HATED it, and was really bad at it, and failed spectacularly! I felt completely lost. The Razor's edge is about a man who comes back from war, and sees his pre-war life as totally meaningless. He then goes searching for a life with meaning. I know my failing exams is laughably not in the same league as fighting a war (!), but it was the wake up call I needed to begin searching for something a little more meaningful to me. I changed course to philosophy (My Mom was REALLY happy), and haven't felt that lost meaningless feeling since (though I do feel fear at the prospect of never getting a job). For some reason I could really identify with the Razor's Edge character.
So, do you have a book that you happened to read at the right time? If so, what was the book, and why did it speak to you at that time in your life?
 
Or- it could also be a song.
Mine is the Smiths How Soon is Now
I was single and REALLY wanted to meet someone.
Some how these lyrics made me see that what I was going through was not the end of the world
Theres a place where you can go
You might meet someone who really loves you
So you go and you stand on your own
And you leave on your own
And you go home
And you cry
And you want to die

The melodrama really made me laugh, and put things in perspective. I love Morissey.
 
Book=Many Lives, Many Masters by Brian L. Weiss. It is the only spiritual book I have ever read that completely made sense to me and it left me feeling like I had an epiphany.

Song=What Sarah Said by Death Cab for Cutie. Most songs by DCFC feel important to me and I can't put my finger on why What Sarah Said is so important to me, but it is.
 
The eternal classic, Catcher in the Rye. My heart understands that book, I just love it. I know I'm not alone in saying that!

Film wise, as evident by my avatar, Eraserhead really spoke to me and all my insecurities about becoming a parent.

Music wise, Beethoven will always be my main man.
 
For me the book would be Dance of the Dissident Daughter. I read it after coming out of an abusive relationship. It is about finding strength in yourself as a woman. I plan on re reading it very soon.

Song - right now. RIGHT NOW. The moments that take your breath away - George Strait
 
Finding strength in myself as woman sounds fabulous right about now!!! I think I ll give that one a try!
Hi Step! Nice to see you. Did I tell you how much I love that sapphire? Its so beautiful, I hope you are getting great pleasure out of it.
Nashville I like a bit of classical too. I love Rachmaninoff, esp his second piano concerto.
 
I have a very hard time speaking about my feelings and about things that are very important to me. I sometimes take 15 minutes to speak one sentence on certain subjects. One book that nearly broke my heart was "On Chesil Beach", when
the two main characters are arguing on the beach and neither of them can really say what they are thinking and feeling and, instead, they say more and more hurtful things and turn their back on each other, ruining their lives. As I read it, I could see myself in that situation and that was the motivation for a lot of self-improvement. It still isn't easy, but I won't lose important people in my life because of this weakness. Or, at least, so I hope.
 
Mousey - the book is by Sue Monk Kidd, the author of The Secret Life of Bees. It is a nonfiction that covers her journey to self discovery and how it changed her life and her marriage. It really helped me a lot to find my own strength and independence and to remind myself to never let anyone take advantage of me, or be abusive towards me again.
 
Great thread!!
The books that had the greatest influence on me and pretty much shaped my personality are:
As a child: The Jungle Books (Rudyard Kipling)
As a teenager: Dandelion Wine (Ray Bradbury)
Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
As an adult: The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
All of F. Scott Fitzgerald's writing
All of Tennessee Williams' writing

One song stands out for me and says it all: Turtle Blues (Janis Joplin)
One movie: West Side Story - I fell in love with the arts because of this film.
 


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I'll add a movie too, Memoirs of a Geisha.
 
I've been reading "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett all summer. It's a fabulous book. It's told from the point of view of white and African-American women living in Jackson, Mississippi in the early '60s. I love learning about the history of the Civil Rights movement, and this book taught me a lot about that period. Stockett's writing is wonderful, and I loved reading the stories her characters told throughout the book. I don't share Stockett's (or her characters') experience of living in the south at that time, and my family has never had a maid, so I can't say that I related to this book all that much. I loved it because of the writing and the character development. I really hope she writes more because future books of Stockett's will definitely be on my list.
 
Mousey, great thread! I too love Morrissey. :cheeky: Weirdo that he is.

I am not sure I can come up with just one, but I do think there is something magical about the right book that you read at the right time.
 
Oh I love this thread.

It's hard for me to identify just one book that spoke to me, because I've had a love affairs with books since childhood.

As a child I loved The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster and Madeleine L'Engle's time quintet. And anything by Roald Dahl.
As a middle grader, I loved The Giver by Lois Lowry.
I fell for Will Shakespeare while in high school, and haven't stopped loving him since.
A Clockwork Orange was my favorite book for a long time because it provoked so much thought.

Most recently, I have cried while reading Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout, and Like Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen.

And of course, I've been a Jane Austen fan for many, many years.
 
I recently read Olive Kitteridge and thought it was very moving. It made me really think about how everyone's perspective is very different and that it's really hard to know what someone else is thinking, feeling, or what their motivation is. It made me think about my parents, my friends and people I know casually.. or maybe not at all. It also made me think about how we see ourselves so differently than others see us. Hilary & Jackie is a movie that made me think about some of the same things, but a little differently. It is about two sisters, first told from one point of view and then the other.

Another book that I found very moving was The Reader.
 
Johnathan Livingston Seagull. My father had the book -when he was in college he went to see Richard Bach do a live reading of it and years later I found it on the shelf and was curious. I think I was 15 or so and it was the first book I'd read that let me know that other people actually thought in those terms. I reread it several times after... once to a friend in the hospital, once over the phone to another friend far away. I gave a copy of it to my daughter for her 1st birthday (gave a copy of the little prince to my son for his 1st and a copy of the alchemist to my 2nd son for his 1st birthday) and she has read it a few times. The last time I attempted to read it was to my mother on her deathbed. She loved the idea. But she just got too dang relaxed and she would skip breaths and these enormous waves of anxiety and apprehension would just well inside of me and I just couldn't do it and haven't picked it up in 11 years.
 
Thomas Hardy's JUDE THE OBSCURE

I had just entered college at the age of 31. I had divorced and had lost a child. I had always dreamed of going to college but never thought I would. When I went to the school for classes I had shivers down my spine at the splendor of it all. I was euphoric.

This book was assigned for English and it paralleled my life in so many ways and inspired me to go on.
It deeply moved me.
Thanks,
Annette
 
Actually, I came across mine not too long ago. Faced with the end of a relationship that had just kind of gone downhill (but I was still upset about it since I still cared for him and we'd been together for three years), I was rereading Komarr, by Lois Bujold (it's a sci-fi book) and the way one of the characters was talking about leaving her marriage and how trapped she felt but still so reluctant to let go... well it really resonated with how I was feeling at the time.
 
Animal Farm by George Orwell and The Handmaid's tale by Margaret Atwood.

Animal Farm because in a sense, I see it happening all the time. The Handmaids Tale because I can see it happening in the future.
 
Cehrabehra said:
Johnathan Livingston Seagull. My father had the book -when he was in college he went to see Richard Bach do a live reading of it and years later I found it on the shelf and was curious. I think I was 15 or so and it was the first book I'd read that let me know that other people actually thought in those terms. I reread it several times after... once to a friend in the hospital, once over the phone to another friend far away. I gave a copy of it to my daughter for her 1st birthday (gave a copy of the little prince to my son for his 1st and a copy of the alchemist to my 2nd son for his 1st birthday) and she has read it a few times. The last time I attempted to read it was to my mother on her deathbed. She loved the idea. But she just got too dang relaxed and she would skip breaths and these enormous waves of anxiety and apprehension would just well inside of me and I just couldn't do it and haven't picked it up in 11 years.
Click to expand...

Fun thread!

I'm having trouble thinking of anything though. Jonathon Livingston Seagull WAS a huge favorite though. That, and Adventures of A Reluctant Messiah. Come to think of it, most of the books I've read that had meaning to me, were related to where I was spiritually at the time. At the time (early 30's) I read almost everything by Starhawk, and her thoughts were very insightful and resonated with me. Later I read most all of the Conversations With God books, and they too had insights. However, since the death of my mother, I've moved so far away from any belief in that area. It's really weird. Oh, and The Power of Now, that was good. Lost my copy though - I think I loaned it out...

I don't read novels much, although I have read lots of science fiction and fantasy. One series that I love just for what I consider its elegance of style, is The RiddleMaster of Hed trilogy. I love McKillip's way with words. You can hear the silences in her books, if that makes any sense.

I won't go into music, since that is another HUGE topic, but I will say that one favorite piece is the largo of The American Quartet by Dvorak. Of course I love the all the movements, but the largo is melancholy in a way I can't quite put my finger on. I heard it one evening on the radio and was just pierced to the heart. It's not a big, important work, but I adore it.
 
ksinger said:
Cehrabehra said:
Johnathan Livingston Seagull. My father had the book -when he was in college he went to see Richard Bach do a live reading of it and years later I found it on the shelf and was curious. I think I was 15 or so and it was the first book I'd read that let me know that other people actually thought in those terms. I reread it several times after... once to a friend in the hospital, once over the phone to another friend far away. I gave a copy of it to my daughter for her 1st birthday (gave a copy of the little prince to my son for his 1st and a copy of the alchemist to my 2nd son for his 1st birthday) and she has read it a few times. The last time I attempted to read it was to my mother on her deathbed. She loved the idea. But she just got too dang relaxed and she would skip breaths and these enormous waves of anxiety and apprehension would just well inside of me and I just couldn't do it and haven't picked it up in 11 years.
Click to expand...

Fun thread!

I'm having trouble thinking of anything though. Jonathon Livingston Seagull WAS a huge favorite though. That, and Adventures of A Reluctant Messiah. Come to think of it, most of the books I've read that had meaning to me, were related to where I was spiritually at the time. At the time (early 30's) I read almost everything by Starhawk, and her thoughts were very insightful and resonated with me. Later I read most all of the Conversations With God books, and they too had insights. However, since the death of my mother, I've moved so far away from any belief in that area. It's really weird. Oh, and The Power of Now, that was good. Lost my copy though - I think I loaned it out...

I don't read novels much, although I have read lots of science fiction and fantasy. One series that I love just for what I consider its elegance of style, is The RiddleMaster of Hed trilogy. I love McKillip's way with words. You can hear the silences in her books, if that makes any sense.

I won't go into music, since that is another HUGE topic, but I will say that one favorite piece is the largo of The American Quartet by Dvorak. Of course I love the all the movements, but the largo is melancholy in a way I can't quite put my finger on. I heard it one evening on the radio and was just pierced to the heart. It's not a big, important work, but I adore it.
Click to expand...

I'm reading this now!
 
"The Power of One."
 
I recently read a book called Arthritis, Pregnancy and the Path to Parenthood.

http://www.suzieedwardmay.com/

It's written by a Aussie woman who has Rheumatoid Arthritis and it tells of her trials and tribulations over having a trying to have a baby while living with a chronic illness. As some of you may know, women with RA need to go off their medications for at least 3 months before TTC, the whole pregnancy and the time they chose to breastfeed. It's an incredibly scary and emotional time. Without medication, many suffers get symptoms of their illness back in weeks so the thought of getting sick to have a baby can be terrifying. Many women have to give up fulltime work without meds as their disease is so uncontrolled and their are so sick. They also risk permanent joint damage by allowing their arthritis to be uncontrolled for 12 months. Trust me, 12 months could seem like a lifetime when have have pain and fatigue everyday.

This book touched me as I too have RA, and want to have kids in the future. It really has been a fabulously inspiring book, well worth a read for anyone that has a chronic illness and wants to have children.
 
I think Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe would be it for me, the book made me want to go to Africa, made me interested in the world in fact. More recently, i read The Famished Road by Ben Okri, and re-read Things Fall Apart - my preference skewed to Okri's novel, i think because of the style.

That said, though they were thought provoking reads for me, for pure enjoyment i can re-read Wuthering Heights and Austen's and Gaskell's novels in pure bliss =)

Another book i found highly enjoyable and thought-provoking was Italo Calvino's If On A Winter's Night a Traveller - and ive been meaning to re-read it!
 
I think the first book I really remember speaking to me was The Giver by Lois Lowry. Even now I re-read it every few years - the first time I read it I felt like it slipped into a little hole in my soul I hadn't known was there and shone a light down into it.
 
oh so many books that I have enjoyed...

but, those that have truly touched me...and I cannot choose just one...

When Rabbit Howls by Troops for Truddi Chase and Truddi Chase - so poignant, and not an easy read, but it held me from the first page, and I cheered out loud after the final pages...I returned to this book again, and re-read it...such is the impact of one woman's triumph over 'shattering' - almost literally.

Deep Green Sea by Robert Olen Butler - a book almost entirely told from just two characters perspective. The ending took me and shook me by surprise. I was not expecting it...and it just drew the tears out.

Four Letters of Love by Niall Williams - Love, destiny...chances missed and chances lost. Then follow your heart, no matter where it takes you. I loved this book so much.

Lastly...from way way back...this book has stayed in my mind for over 40 years...

Silver Sword by Ian Seraillier - a children's book, written many years ago, but as valid today as when it was written. We had this read to us in Junior School, and I was spellbound through every Friday afternoon. I bought it with my pocket money and read it several times throughout many years, and then read it to my own kids!

Those are the books that have stayed with me... :))
 
The Bell Jar! I have a BA in English Lit and got it because my original plan was to get a Doctorate and teach at the college level. I got toward the end of my degree, realized that it wasn't what I wanted to do anymore but finished the degree anyway because I was so close to being done that I just didn't want to start over again in another field, and I've been regretting that decision ever since. I really related to the feelings of being lost to the point that it's maddening, to feeling disillusioned because the things people tell you that you SHOULD do aren't the things you want or care about, to the depression.

I also loved The Fountainhead, Madam Bijoux! Oh, and I must have read Anne of Green Gables two million times when I was young. I still love it to this day!
 
These books were early influences on my life:
by Hermann Hesse~~Siddartha and Demian
by Robert Heinlein~~Stranger in a Strange Land
 
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