One novel that I think is an overriding influence in my life is 'All the King's Men,' the most beautiful book written in the U.S.
The Great Gatsby' [...] was my 'Tom Sawyer' when I was twelve [....]
I read On the Road in maybe 1959. It changed my life like it changed everyone else's.
I mark the reading of 'Look Homeward, Angel' as one of the pivotal events of my life. It starts off with the single greatest, knock-your-socks-off first page I have ever come across in my careful reading of world literature.
When I read Rush Limbaugh's 'The Way Things Ought to Be,' it was like a page-turning thriller to me. Every page was like some new revelation.
I was about 21 when I read that [Mere Christianity], and my faith was really being shaken during those days. Its a great, classic book.
WE'VE BEEN READING THE MÖTLEY CRÜE BOOK. THATS OUR HOLY BIBLE.
It was very interesting [book Fast Food Nation] because all my friends who were in college, [and] this book became almost mandatory for them to read.
I think I was 13 years old when my father put in my hands 'The Spy Who Came in from the Cold.' It was the first real adult book I ever read, and it opened a new world.
[The Women's Room by Marilyn French] was in my house somewhere, blew my mind, I was changed forever. And then I continued to read it at various points in my life, and it sort of opens up in a different way.
When I was seven or eight, I was bought a fantastic book called 'The Movie Treasury of Horror Movies' by Alan G. Frank; it became my bible. It's packed full of the most amazing photos and is still fantastic to look at.
I can't pick out one single book that had such a profound personal impact.
The Wealth of Nations may not be an original book, but it is unquestionably a masterpiece.
The overwhelmingly successful trial book of my early adolescence had been To Kill A Mocking Bird.
'Island of the Blue Dolphins' by Scott O'Dell had a huge impact on me.
One of the books we read a few years ago that had a big effect on us was Repeated Takes by Michael Chanan.
'The Man in the High Castle' was not the first alternative history novel, nor even the first Nazis-win-the-war novel, but it is still probably the most influential book in the genre.
When I was eleven, my mother gave me Robert K. Massie's 'Nicholas and Alexandra.' It was the first 'grownup' book I read, and I loved it.
