I try to pick books that I believe I will get more from than just enjoying the story. So, for example, I wouldn't read an airport book-bin crime, romance or adventure novel as generally there is only the story and as enjoyable as it might be it's just not worth the investment that goes into reading a book for me. I would watch a movie of a book like that, no problem as movies are usually under 2 hours and you don't really have to pay attention nor use your imagination. Obviously, the story needs to be good and well written as well.

Often books have been so popular and influencial that their concepts become part of everyday language like with 1984 and Big Brother, or with Catch 22 and catch 22. It is obvious that books this influential do more than just tell a story.

And, sometimes I have read books that are not fun to read just so that I can enter a dialogue with the other. Like The Bible. I read it just so that when in debate with Christians I can point out that I have actually read The Bible but they have not (most haven't)... man, they don't even know the details of what they claim to believe in.

Off the top of my head, books I would recommend to almost anyone...

1984, Animal Farm, Down and Out in Paris and London... Fuck it, let's just say anything by George Orwell.
Anything by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Anything by Kurt Vonnegut.

On the road, Jack Kerouac
Fear and loathing in Las Vegas, Hunter S Thompson
Catch 22, Joseph Heller
American Psycho, Brett Easton Ellis
Steppenwolfe, Hermann Hesse
Catcher in the rye, J.D Salinger (This book affected people so much that John Lennon's killer was found calmly reading a copy and had written "This is my statement' in the sleeve, later Salinger went into hiding).
The Stranger, Albert Camus
Lord of the flies, William Golding
The Raw Shark Texts, Steven Hall
A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess

P.S. Every single library in the world will have at least one copy of The Brothers Karamazov... maybe with the exception of libraries in Communist dictator states like the bad Korea.


Peace,

kowalski