The Most Influential Books / On My Life and Career / Fiction
Les Miserables / Victor Hugo / Nothing has ever moved me so much / I have re-read this book several times and I grow from each each time.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings / Maya Angelou / I can add nothing that hasn’t already been said about Maya Angelou / She sings to me daily.
Waiting for Godot / Samuel Beckett / Everybody needs someone to push their thinking and to make them laugh / Samuel Beckett does that for me.
The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane / Kate DiCamillo / Some say it is a book for children / They can keep thinking that.
The Old Man and the Sea / Ernest Hemingway / Somewhere there are several copies floating in the ocean for all the times I’ve read this on vacation.
Their Eyes Were Watching God / Zora Neale Hurston / The poetry of the title says enough / The whole notion of struggle and what it reveals about us appeals to me.
Death of a Salesman / Arthur Miller / I discovered this play at a time when I really needed it / It helped me become a man.
The Diving Bell and The Butterfly / Jean-Dominique Bauby / Not fair to call this fiction but a better fit for this list / I have suffered along with Bauby from being locked-in and alone.
A Raisin in the Sun / Lorraine Hansberry / I am always inspired by those who believe that the best things are just around the bend.
The Grapes of Wrath / John Steinbeck / Another book that I re-read from time to time, for the writing mostly, and to be proud again.
Oliver Twist / Charles Dickens / Sometimes we search for an escape in our books and sometimes it is best to know the truth, that there is no escape.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory / Roald Dahl / There is no author who I have read more than Roald Dahl, as a child and an adult / Sometimes the underdog does win!
