I read a lot, probably more than most. As a ghostwriter, I need to read deeply on a given topic so I can ask better questions of my clients and support their arguments. As a content developer, I study book structure, the management of a narrow topic, and the uniqueness of a point of view. I also read as a businessperson, one who needs to learn, grow, and scale; to better serve clients and manage team members. I always read as a human who savors words and craft, who wants to feel, to experience life through a different lens.

Which is why I thought I would share the 10 books that mattered most to me this past year, in the order in which they most impacted me.

Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts

Jeff Walker, a mentor and connoisseur of great books, mentioned this novel in passing during a mastermind meeting this past summer. He was shocked that I had yet to read it, told me he was jealous of me because I was about to experience it for the first time as he wished he could relive that moment. Like I said, Jeff has introduced me to some of my favorite books. Including Reboot, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, and This is Happiness, some of my all-time favorites.

But we’re talking Shantaram here.

In 1978, Gregory David Roberts, the author of Shantaram, escaped from a maximum-security Australian prison and hid from authorities in Bombay, India. There he established a free medical clinic for slum-dwellers and worked as a counterfeiter, smuggler, gunrunner, and street soldier for the Bombay mafia. This is the basis of his novel, which could best be described as auto-biographical fiction.

Novelists often base their stories on their past but can easily succumb to the temptation of sticking too closely to the events, instead of plotting for a solid narrative arc. Gregory David Roberts, however, turned his insane life into a beautifully structured book. His writing is so exquisite in punches you in the heart.

This is a 933-page book, and I would not have cut a SINGLE word. I wish I could experience for the first time again and again.

 

The Beauty of Dusk by Frank Bruni

I’m first going to cut and paste a description of this book from Frank Bruni’s website, then weigh in below.

One morning in late 2017, New York Times columnist Frank Bruni woke up with strangely blurred vision. He wondered at first if some goo or gunk had worked its way into his right eye. But this was no fleeting annoyance, no fixable inconvenience. Overnight, a rare stroke had cut off blood to one of his optic nerves, rendering him functionally blind in that eye—forever. And he soon learned from doctors that the same disorder could ravage his left eye, too. He could lose his sight altogether.

In The Beauty of Dusk, Bruni hauntingly recounts his adjustment to this daunting reality, a medical and spiritual odyssey that involved not only reappraising his own priorities but also reaching out to, and gathering wisdom from, longtime friends and new acquaintances who had navigated their own traumas and afflictions.

The result is a poignant, probing and ultimately uplifting examination of the limits that all of us inevitably encounter, the lenses through which we choose to evaluate them and the tools we have for perseverance. Bruni’s world blurred in one sense, as he experienced his first real inklings that the day isn’t forever and that light inexorably fades, but sharpened in another. Confronting unexpected hardship, he felt more blessed than ever before. There was vision lost. There was also vision found.

Frank Bruni is a gifted writer, which you’d expect from a journalist. But he’s also a gorgeous human being. This book is a reminder that there are “little tragedies” all around us. And the ability to cope and adjust is worthy of studying. As a writer, I can’t begin to understand how one copes with the loss of vision.

 

 Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner

I went to grad school with the intention of studying and writing personal essay and memoir, thus I consider these genres my first love. This year, I’ve gone back to the memoir I began years ago, the one about my years in Iran. I could never seem to drive it to completion–the ole’ cobbler and shoe thing–but I’m getting a foothold once again. Which has me reading deeply in the genre.

I’d heard mention of Crying in H Mart, which comes as no surprise since it was #1 on the New York Times bestseller list for, like, a year. But it wasn’t until an agent friend mentioned wanting to find another “H Mart” that I decided it was time to study the thing.

I culled the description of Crying in H Mart from Amazon:

In this exquisite story of family, food, grief, and endurance, Michelle Zauner tells of growing up one of the few Asian American kids at her school in Eugene, Oregon; of struggling with her mother’s particular, high expectations of her; of a painful adolescence; of treasured months spent in her grandmother’s tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond, late at night, over heaping plates of food.

As she grew up, moving to the East Coast for college, finding work in the restaurant industry, and performing gigs with her fledgling band–and meeting the man who would become her husband–her Koreanness began to feel ever more distant, even as she found the life she wanted to live. It was her mother’s diagnosis of terminal cancer, when Michelle was twenty-five, that forced a reckoning with her identity and brought her to reclaim the gifts of taste, language, and history her mother had given her.

Unlike a lot of memoirs, Crying in H Mart is written more in expository—telling—rather than in scene—showing, which came as something of a surprise in that it breaks some old rules.  And yet the story holds together in such a powerful manner. If you’re playing with the idea of writing a memoir, this would be a great model.

Lastly, I’ve always been fascinated with borderland narrators–not borderline, the personality disorder, but a person who straddles the border between two worlds. In fact, I explored this kind of narrator in my graduate thesis. Zauner straddles the border between Korea and America. She knows enough about each culture without fully belonging to either and that makes for one hell of an observer.

The Psychology of Money: Timeless Lessons on Wealth, Greed, and Happiness by Morgan Housel

I should probably mention that this is another Jeff Walker recommendation. And, man, is it compelling.

Here’s how Amazon describes it:

Doing well with money isn’t necessarily about what you know. It’s about how you behave. And behavior is hard to teach, even to really smart people.

Money―investing, personal finance, and business decisions―is typically taught as a math-based field, where data and formulas tell us exactly what to do. But in the real world people don’t make financial decisions on a spreadsheet. They make them at the dinner table, or in a meeting room, where personal history, your own unique view of the world, ego, pride, marketing, and odd incentives are scrambled together.

In The Psychology of Money, award-winning author Morgan Housel shares 19 short stories exploring the strange ways people think about money and teaches you how to make better sense of one of life’s most important topics.

I’m fascinated with money mindset, basically because I see how it affects (or infects) every business decision I make. There are an awful lot of good books out there on this topic, including The Big Leap, Get Rich, Lucky Bitch, and The Abundance Code, but Morgan Housel differentiates his book by the use of unusual stories as a set up for each chapter and its associated concept. For instance, compound interest may be hard to wrap your head around if you don’t understand how it works, but Housel enters into the topic by recounting the various ice ages our planet experienced, first how they really happened, then how that relates to compounding. These stories/analogies aren’t just memorable, they’re effective and creative. I freaking LOVED this book.

101 Essays That Will Change the Way You Think by Brianna Wiest

I have a hard time accepting that one person—in this case, Brianna Wiest—can be everything in one nice, neat package. You know, young, beautiful, a gifted entrepreneur, an insightful writer, and, to wrap it all up with a bow, way wiser than the average bear.

Over the past few years, Brianna Wiest has gained renown for her deeply moving, philosophical writing. This compilation of her published work features pieces on why you should pursue purpose over passion, embrace negative thinking, see the wisdom in daily routine, and become aware of the cognitive biases that are creating the way you see your life.

After embarking upon her own journey of self-healing over a decade ago, Brianna turned to writing as a way of processing. She has since touched millions with messages of empowerment, self-reflection, and hope. Read 101 Essays and you’ll see why.

At the beginning of her career, Brianna began sharing her writing with the world on Thought Catalog, where she is now a partner. Many of her original viral essays were put together into this international bestseller. And I’m pretty sure that she’s, like, twelve-years old.

Gorgeous, gorgeous writing. Which explains my green-eyed envy. Last time I felt that way about a writer was when my classmate finished her memoir Barnflower, and her craft just blew me away.

33 Strategies of War by Robert Greene

I first heard of Robert Greene in some Ryan Holiday book; I’m guessing it was The Obstacle is the Way. From Robert Greene, Ryan learned how to conduct research for a book. Greene also warned his mentee about banking on others for success, which Ryan failed to heed until way too late.  I became an instant Greene fan when I read his 48 Laws of Power. Then I moved on to The Laws of Human Nature, Mastery, and The Art of Seduction. Each of these books primarily covers power brokers throughout history, how they thought and acted as they pursued their objectives and goals, how to spot a similar “move” in the here and now and respond to it.

As a recovering people pleaser, I want to understand this stuff, not be offended by it.

33 Strategies of War is a comprehensive guide to the subtle social game of everyday life, informed by the most ingenious and effective military principles in war. It’s the I-Ching of conflict, the contemporary companion to Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, and is abundantly illustrated with examples from history, including the folly and genius of everyone from Napoleon to Margaret Thatcher, Hannibal to Ulysses S. Grant, movie moguls to samurai swordsmen.

Greene’s books all follow a formula—primary historical case study, followed by a teasing out of a relevant play, then an assortment of shorter historical cases as support. This formula works to orient the reader, and to give a consistency to his body of work.

 

The Hungry Tide by Amitav Ghosh

I’m one of the lucky few who have great writer friends to lean on whenever I’m looking for a good read. I was telling the author Anne Batterson about Shantaram over dinner one evening and she told me that I had to read The Hungry Tide, another novel set in India.

Anne wrote the book The Black Swan: Memory, Midlife, and Migration, which is a crazy good book about her summer-long quest to follow migratory birds as a way of dealing with and integrating her past. I mean, if you’re going to have a midlife crisis, following birds is so much better than buying a Ferrari. Anne is deeply connected to nature and adventure, so when I cracked open this novel, I understood the draw immediately.

Internationally best-selling author Amitav Ghosh, winner of the Pushcart Prize and numerous other prestigious accolades, pens a sweeping novel full of romantic adventure. Favorably compared to the masterworks of Joseph Conrad and V.S. Naipaul, The Hungry Tide is an atmospheric tale set in a world of wondrous sights…and terrible danger.

Off the eastern coast of India lies an extraordinary cluster of islands known as the Sundarbans. It is a raw but beautiful area, a place of man-eating tigers, river dolphins, huge crocodiles, and devastating tides that sweep across the terrain without remorse. In this exotic land, marine biologist Piya, fisherman Fokir, and translator Kanai meet. As they travel deep into the remote archipelago, they experience a territory at risk not only from natural disaster, but also from human foolishness and volatile politics.

If I were to sum this book up into one life lesson, it would be this: We’ve completely forgotten about Man vs. Nature as the ultimate struggle. We may fear shady characters lurking in alleyways or getting into a four-car pileup on our way to work, but we have zero imagination for the forces of nature, like tigers and typhoons, because we’ve all become house cats. That naiveté is  worth examining.

 

  Die with Zero: Getting All You Can from Your Money and Your Life by Bill Perkins

I can’t remember how I tripped over this book. I thought I’d read it before, way back when, until I realized Die Broke, the book I had it confused with, was a different animal. Die Broke, if I remember, was a real paradigm-shifter in that it encouraged my generation to stop obsessing about leaving behind an inheritance, in favor of living one’s life to the fullest, skidding into home plate with nothing left.

That being said…

Die with Zero is a common-sense guide to living rich . . . instead of dying rich.

Imagine if by the time you died, you did everything you were told to. You worked hard, saved your money, and looked forward to financial freedom when you retired.

The only thing you wasted along the way was . . . your life.

Die with Zero presents a startling new and provocative philosophy as well as practical guide on how to get the most out of your money—and out of your life. It’s intended for those who place lifelong memorable experiences far ahead of simply making and accumulating money for one’s so-called “golden years.”

In short, Bill Perkins wants to rescue you from over-saving and under-living. Regardless of your age, Die with Zero will teach you Perkins’s plan for optimizing your life, stage by stage, so you’re fully engaged and enjoying what you’ve worked and saved for.

You’ll discover how to maximize your lifetime memorable moments with “time-bucketing,” how to convert your earnings into priceless memories by following your “net worth curve,” and how to navigate decisions about whether to invest in, or delay, a meaningful adventure with your “fulfillment curve” and “personal interest rate.

Using his own life experiences as well as the inspiring stories and cautionary tales of others—and drawing on eye-opening insights about time, money, and happiness from psychological science and behavioral finance—Perkins makes a timely, convincing, and contrarian case for living large.

I’ve recommended this book numerous times over the course of this past year, mostly because I swim in entrepreneurial circles. Entrepreneurs are typically reluctant to take a trip or go on some grand adventure because stepping out of our business for any length of time costs us real money. The problem is, we may amass money, but then we’re too ill or old to enjoy the fruits of our labor. And where’s the sense in that? The question is always: when is that trip worth it, and when does stocking away money for “retirement” make more sense? Because none of us wants to Die Broke, as catchy as that other title is. Die with Zero helps to calculate the answer.

 

The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace by Scott Peck

This past year, I worked on a project about experiential learning within a community as a way of building a child’s resilience and sense of belonging. I probably don’t need to tell you that, given our isolating society, kids are even more susceptible to loneliness, addiction, and polarization than we were, which is not only sad but dangerous.

I read a ton while doing research for this project, including Camp and What Happened to You. But the book that resonated most deeply with me was The Different Drum.

I’m something of a lone wolf, one who considers it a weakness to ask for help or to bank on anybody but myself. In the pages of The Different Drum, I learned that this mindset isn’t unique to me, but very American. In fact, in 1831, French philosopher Alexis de Tocqueville observed and wrote on the American tendency toward rugged individualism: the practice or advocacy of individualism in social and economic relations emphasizing personal liberty and independence, self-reliance, resourcefulness, self-direction of the individual, and free competition in enterprise. In other words, we’re a nation of lone wolves.

Which is why The Different Drum is so important.

A society of rugged individualists and economic competitors…. A world of nuclear politics and uncontrollable forces…. For many, modern living means loneliness, disaffection, apathy and isolation.

Is there an escape? In a startling, life-affirming work by one of America’s foremost thinkers, Dr. M. Scott Peck examines the concept of community, its roots, its development and, most importantly, its rewards for contemporary America.

‘The overall purpose of human communication is – or should be – reconciliation. It should ultimately serve to lower or remove the walls of misunderstanding which unduly separate us human beings, one from another…’ Although we have developed the technology to make communication more efficient and to bring people closer together, we have failed to use it to build a true global community. Dr M. Scott Peck believes that if we are to prevent civilization destroying itself, we must urgently rebuild on all levels, local, national, and international and that is the first step to spiritual survival. In this radical and challenging book, he describes how the communities work, how group action can be developed on the principles of tolerance and love, and how we can start to transform world society into a true community.

Just open up any newspaper, and you’ll see why we need to build communities, then lean on them, more than ever before.

 

Hey Hun: Sales, Sisterhood, Supremacy, and the Other Lies Behind Multilevel Marketing by Emily Lynn Paulson

In my line of work, I get to see a ton of business models up close and personal. We’ve got the solopreneurs, the service providers running an office with leveraged underlings, the agency model…And then there’s the MLM—multi-level-marketing—model, which includes (or included) Amway, Mary Kay, and Tupperware. People who swim in these waters are writing books far more frequently than I would have ever guessed.

Years ago, I had a girlfriend who got all caught up in multi-level marketing the second she stepped out of the military. This was back in the early oughts. According to her, MLM’s were to military bases as pews were to churches. You just couldn’t avoid them. Her seriously negative experience–OK, she pretty much went broke after alienating everyone in her friend and family circle– dissuaded me from ever considering MLM “opportunities” as a source of income. This coming from someone whose mother sold Avon back in the day. (According to Dad, any money that came in from that venture had to be pumped straight back into the car Mom used.)

I must have found Hey Hun on BookBub. The description and my familiarity with the topic had me at hello.

This is how the book is described on Amazon:

She signed up for the sisterhood, free cars, and the promise of a successful business of her own. Instead, she ended up with an addiction, broken friendships, and the rubble of a toppled pyramid . . . scheme.

Hey, Hun: Sales, Sisterhood, Supremacy, and the Other Lies Behind Multilevel Marketing is the eye-opening, funny, and dangerous personal story of author Emily Lynn Paulson rising to the top of the pyramid in the multilevel marketing (MLM) world, only to recognize that its culture and business practices went beyond a trendy marketing scheme and into the heart of white supremacy in America.

A significant polemic on how MLMs operate, Hey, Hun expertly lays out their role in the cultural epidemic of isolation and the cult-like ideologies that course through their trainings, marketing, and one-on-one interactions.

Equally entertaining and smart, Paulson’s first-person accounts, acerbic wit, and biting commentary will leave you with a new perspective on those “Hey Hun” messages flooding your inbox.

 

Since reading Hey, Hun, I see multi-level marketers everywhere That chick who’s raving about losing 30 pounds—Ask me how—is a multi-level marketer. That woman on Facebook who always looks so put together—the one who invites you to online parties “you’ll just love”—she’s a multi-level marketer as well. And when you discover that there is absolutely no money to be made by the average owner/dealer/sucker, your toes will curl the second you catch the faintest whiff of this proliferating business model.