Books that have changed your life?

[Lief Erikson]

One book, "The History of the American People" had impact on me by showing me how bad history books can be. It was so biased, so one-sided, and so poor at choosing what subjects were worthy of attention, that I was strongly revolted by the book.

The problem is, I didn't know very much about the earlier periods of American history when I started reading the book. I knew more about later on events. Therefore it was only after I got to the later parts of the book that I realized how poorly the historian chronicled things. I read the whole book, all its hundreds of pages, and I did learn some interesting things. However, I also have trouble now because I don't know how much of my education I'm able to trust. Sometimes I have information in my head about an issue, but I don't know whether that information is reliable or not, or whether it's biased or not.


The Bible had a mighty impact on me when I was fifteen, and since then has been greatly important in my life. Before I was fifteen, I wasn't interested in the Bible much at all, and never read it of my own accord. Some ugly events in my life led to a dramatic encounter with God, and that completely changed my outlook on the Bible.

My other favorite book is "The Case for Christ," even though it's nonfiction.


I really like fantasy and science fiction books, but I can't think of any of them that made me think .

Nerdanel, you really should read "The Grapes of Wrath". It's excellent.