The Top 100 Books I Highly Recommend

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The reality? This is take two of this blog post.

Many years back when I first started building Peace to the People, I decided to make a "Top 100 Book List" of books I'd read, loved, and highly recommended... I was twenty-something, whipped up a list, and posted it to Pinterest.

Several years later I realized that comments existed on Pinterest. (😬👵🏼) I had never noticed or read the feedback.

I clicked and found myself a bit bewildered, remembering that I was in fact putting things out onto the world wide web in live time, which can be at once fascinating and a bit dismaying. (#people #amiright 🤣)

"There are only 99 books on this list! You repeated one."

"A Wrinkle in Time?! This book SUCKS."

"No FILL IN THE BLANK AUTHOR?! This person has no credibility."

“What about FILL IN THE BLANK BOOK?! Two thousand thumbs down.”

“This person has both secular AND spiritual books listed—so stupid!!!”

What more to do but laugh, leave it out there, and try, try again.

Thus, to clarify: these are one hundred books, in somewhat but not particularly relevant order of my very favorites top to bottom.

Not the best books of all time (as a declaration of objective truth)—but my personal top 100 I'd recommend.

(I'll try to get all one hundred this time.) 😬😂

1. The Alchemist: A Fable About Following Your Dream — Paulo Coelho

2. Fight Club — Chuck Palahniuk

3. Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life — Thich Nhat Hanh

4. 1984 — George Orwell

5. Leaves of Grass — Walt Whitman

6. This is It — Alan Watts

7. Bhagavad Gita: The Authentic English Translation

8. The Great Gatsby — F. Scott Fitzgerald

10. The Five People You Meet in Heaven — Mitch Albom

11. The Greatest Salesman in the World — Og Mandino

12. Anger — Thich Nhat Hanh

13. Become What You Are — Alan Watts

14. Being Nobody, Going Nowhere — Ayya Khema

15. The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom — Don Miguel Ruiz

16. The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety — Alan Watts

17. The Great Work of Your Life: A Guide for the Journey to Your True Calling — Stephen Cope

18. You Are Here: Discovering the Magic of the Present Moment — Thich Nhat Hanh

19. A Wrinkle in Time — Madeleine L'Engle

20. Invisible Monsters — Chuck Palahniuk

21. The Way of Zen — Alan Watts

22. Die Wise: A Manifesto for Sanity and Soul — Stephen Jenkinson

23. A Fine Balance — Rohinton Mistry

24. Brave New World — Aldous Huxley

25. Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close — Jonathan Safran Foer

26. Ask and It Is Given — Esther Hicks

27. The Hours — Michael Cunningham

28. The Power of Now — Eckhart Tolle

29. The Radiance Sutras — Lorin Roche

30. At Hell's Gate: A Soldier's Journey from War to Peace — Claude Anshin Thomas

31. The Glass Castle: A Memoir — Jeannette Walls

32. Tuck Everlasting — Natalie Babbit

33. I Know This Much Is True — Wally Lamb

34. In the Company of Women: Inspiration and Advice from over 100 Makers, Artists, and Entrepreneurs — Grace Bonney

35. The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching: Transforming Suffering into Peace, Joy, and Liberation — Thich Nhat Hanh

36. To Kill a Mockingbird — Harper Lee

37. The Things They Carried — Tim O'Brien

38. Living Buddha, Living Christ — Thich Nhat Hanh

39. Ideaship: How to Get Ideas Flowing in Your Workplace — Jack Foster

40. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing — Marie Kondō

41. Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West — Gregory Maguire

42. House of Sand and Fog — Andre Dubus III

43. The Book — Alan Watts

44. Yoga in the Kashmir Tradition: The Art of Listening — Billy Doyle

45. Think Like an Artist: How to Live a Happier, Smarter, More Creative Life — Will Gompertz

46. Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort of Joy — Sarah Ban Breathnach

47. The Book Thief — Markus Zusak

48. Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life — Winifred Gallagher

49. She's Come Undone — Wally Lamb

50. Loving Frank — Nancy Horan

51. The Time Traveler's Wife — Audrey Niffenegger

52. The Perks of Being a Wallflower — Stephen Chbosky

53. Water for Elephants — Sara Gruen

54. White Oleander — Janet Fitch

55. Taking the Leap: Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears — Pema Chodron

56. Don't Sweat the Small Stuff: Simple Ways to Keep the Little Things from Taking Over Your Life — Richard Carlson

57. The Artist's Way — Julia Cameron

58. The Bright Forever — Lee Martin

59. Meditation Secrets for Women: Discovering Your Passion, Pleasure, and Inner Peace — Camille Maurine, Lorin Roche

60. The Power — Rhonda Byrne

61. Tuesdays with Morrie: An Old Man, a Young Man, and Life's Greatest Lesson — Mitch Albom

62. The Meaning of Happiness: The Quest for Freedom of the Spirit in Modern Psychology and the Wisdom of the East — Alan Watts

63. The Way to God — Mahatma Gandhi

64. The Wisdom of Yoga — Stephen Cope

65. The Two Hands of God: The Myths of Polarity — Alan Watts

66. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe: The Chronicles of Narnia — Michael York

67. Mrs. Dalloway — Virginia Woolf

68. Cutting for Stone — Abraham Verghese

69. The Kite Runner — Khaled Hosseini

70. The Book of Lost Things — John Connolly

71. Woman: An Intimate Geography — Natalie Angier

72. The Body Keeps the Score — Bessel van der Kolk M.D.

73. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity — David Allen

74. Their Eyes Were Watching God — Zora Neale Hurston

75. So Far from God — Ana Castillo

76. The Wizard of Oz and Other Narcissists — Eleanor Payson

77. Timeless Healing — Herbert Benson

78. Savor: Mindful Eating, Mindful Life — Lilian Cheung, Thich Nhat Hanh

79. To the Lighthouse — Virginia Woolf

80. I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World — Malala Yousafzai

81. A Thousand Splendid Suns — Khaled Hosseini

82. See Jane Run — Joy Fielding

83. From Suffering to Peace: The True Promise of Mindfulness — Mark Coleman

84. In Defense of Food — Michael Pollan

85. The Heart of the Yogi — Doug Keller

86. How to Love — Thich Nhat Hanh

87. How to Fight — Thich Nhat Hanh

88. Psychotherapy East & West — Alan Watts

89. The Gloria Anzaldúa Reader — Gloria Anzaldúa

90. The Girl with the Louding Voice — Abi Daré

91. Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth — Chris Ware

92. The Book of Beginnings and Endings — Jenny Boully

93. The Elegance of the Hedgehog — Muriel Barbery

94. Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic — Alison Bechdel

95. Everything Is Illuminated —  Jonathan Safran Foer

96. The Namesake —  Jhumpa Lahiri

97. The Art of Racing in the Rain —  Garth Stein

98. A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose — Eckhart Tolle

99. Night — Elie Wiesel

100. Resilience: Powerful Practices for Bouncing Back from Disappointment, Difficulty, and Even Disaster — Linda Graham