I asked this to my Facebook and Instagram followers. They responded. I am listing down all the recommendations that I received (arranged by categories).
I have added few from my own experience too (* marked). From the recommended list, unless otherwise stated, I’ve not read them. That also means my categorization could be faulty in some places. If you spot such categorization errors, please do point them to me and I will rectify.
Also, ideally you should buy a book to read but if money is an issue, here is the torrent of bookstores where you will find 99% of the books.
Though I recommend don’t download all of the books below (you will just save them in a nice folder and then never read anything). Download & read one (or few) at a time.
And one last thing – if there is a perspective-altering book that you think must be in here, let me know; will add.
Category 1: Why the world is the way it is / why we act the way we do
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (2014) by Yuval Harari (have read)
Irrational Man (1990) by Bill Barrett
Guns, Germs and Steel (1999) by Jared Diamond (started)
Factfulness (2019) – Ten Reasons We’re Wrong About the World—and Why Things Are Better Than You Think by Hans Rosling (have read)
The God Delusion (2006) by Richard Dawkins (started)
*Debt: The First 5,000 Years (2011) by David Graeber
Sub-category: theories
on how brain works – Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahnemann (started)
on how nature works – The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben
Conscious: A Brief Guide to the Fundamental Mystery of the Mind by Annaka Harris
on how randomness works – The Black Swan – The Impact Of The Highly Improbable by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
on creativity – The Courage to Create (1975) by Rollo Reece May
on how morality works – *The Righteous Mind by Jon Haidt
The Art of Dying – by S. N. Goenka & others
The Mind Body Problem by Rebecca Goldstein
How we die by Dr Sherman Nuland
Ways of seeing (1972) by John Berger
The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx
The Power of Moments by Dan & Chip Heath
*Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker
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Category 2: Life Philosophy
Man’s search for meaning by Viktor E. Frankl
Sidhartha, Narcissus and Goldmund by Herman Hesse
Sub-category: the ones where the author writes whatever needs to be written to propagate his theories on the right way to live life (generally put together from a mix of existing theories)
Blessing or Curse – you can choose, by Derek Prince
Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu (Stephen Mitchell’s translation)
Life is beautiful by Tony Martin
The subtle art of not giving a fuck by Mark Manson
The power of intention by Dr. Wayne W. Dyer
The Heartfulness Way: Heart-Based Meditations for Spiritual Transformation by Kamlesh Patel
Inner Engineering by Sadhguru
Jinnsutra volumes 1,2 & 3 by Osho Rajneesh
Gyanyog by Swami Vivekananda
Sub-category: religious
The Bible
Bhagwad Gita
Note: Personally, I am not very interested in the last two sub-categories. They tend to become preachy and their only basis are stories and storytelling. But may be if I read enough, I may change my opinion.
Category 3: Science
The Baloney Detection Kit by Carl Sagan (or any other book by the same author)
The Body: A guide for occupants by Bill Bryson
Surely you’re Joking Mr Feynman: Adventures of a Curious Character – by Richard Feynman
*A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
Physics problems by IE Irodov
Note: I know the last one is an odd one out, but those who needed to solve the problems in the book (especially mechanics), would recall that once you learn how to solve those problems, you do end up developing a new perspective of looking at things.
Sub-category: intersection of science and philosophy
Tao of Physics by Fritjof Capra
Category 4: Fiction
Pre 1900:
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Anna Karenina by Tolstoy
First published between 1900-1950:
The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran
The Outsider by Albert Camus
Animal Farm by George Orwell
Street of Crocodiles and Other Stories by Bruno Schulz
Brighton Rock by Graham Greene
The Trial by Franz Kafka (have read)
Of Mice and men by John Steinbeck
As I lay dying by William Falulkner
Zorba the Greek – Nikos Kazantazakis
The Heart of the Matter by Graham Greene
First published between 1950-80:
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Post Office by Charles Bukowski
The War of the End of the World by Mario Vargas Llosa
Things fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Kiss of the Spiderwoman by Manuel Puig
One hundred years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez (have read)
Post 1980:
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts (have read)
Mars trilogy by Kim Robinson (Sci-fi)
Dark Forest trilogy by Cixin Liu (Sci-fi)
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
*Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig
*Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie
Category 5: Health
Pure, White and Deadly: How sugar is killing us and what we can do to stop it by John Yudkin
Fat Chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar, Processed Food, Obesity, and Disease by Robert Lustig
Lies My Doctor Told Me: Medical Myths That Can Harm Your Health by Dr. Ken Berry
The Obesity Code by Dr. Jason Fung (also Life in Fasting lane)
Note: this is not my area of interest in the present; may be will dive into these in the future.
Category 6 – How to…
be more productive – Four hour week by Ferriss Timothy
do good parenting:
Bringing Up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting – by Pamela Druckerman
The Awakened Family by Dr. Shefali Tsabary
get what you want – The Secret by Rhonda Byrne (have read)
unclutter your life – The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing by Marie Kondo
Category 7 – Comic Books
Calvin & Hobbes by Bill Watterson (who has not seen at least some strips?)
The Sandman by Neil Gaiman
Category 8 – History
Freedom at midnight – by Dominique Lapierre
Africa: A Biography of the Continent by John Reader
Ten thousand Miles without a Cloud by Sun Shuyun
After Tamerlane: The Rise & Fall Of Global Empires by John Darwin
Nicholas and Alexandra: The Classic Account of the Fall of the Romanov Dynasty by Robert K. Massie
*India After Gandhi – Ram Guha
Sub-category: autobiographical that tell us something about history / historical events
King Rat by James Clavell (World War 2)
*Our Moon has Blood Clots by Rahul Pandita (a Kashmiri Pandit’s take on his exodus).
By this time, if you have forgotten what * is for – it is to denote the books that were not recommended to me by anyone, but I’ve added to the list based on my personal experience.
Category 9 – Theories on society, its biases, its beliefs etc.
Why I Am Not a Hindu: A Sudra Critique of Hindutva Philosophy, Culture and Political Economy by Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd
Everyone Loves a Good Drought by P. Sainath
*The Republic of Religion by Abhinav Chandrachud
Category 10: Business
Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big by Bo Burlinghamis
Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh
Ben Jerry’s Double Dip: Lead With Your Values and Make Money by Ben Cohen
Made In Japan by Akio Morita And Sony
*Bottle of Lies by Katherine Eban (on Ranbaxy fraud)
There are two more categories in which nobody recommended me anything, but I would like to recommend them to everybody.
11 Communication & storytelling
The Communication Book: 44 Ideas for Better Conversations Every Day by Mikael Krogerus.
Story: Style, Structure, Substance, and the Principles of Screenwriting by Robert Mckee
Made to Stick – by Dan & Chip Heath
12 Relationship – The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman
***
Update – found a recent thread on Twitter asking the same thing – this may give you few more recommendations (may update my list with the extra suggestions below).
What’s one book that made you think about the world differently? I’ll start. Daniel Kahneman’s “Thinking, Fast and Slow”.
— Gyandemic expert (@bhalomanush) September 3, 2020