Recommendations

Ten books I have read

Prajwal Sai
Aug 22, 2017 · 9 min read
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When everyone and everything fails you where do you turn to? Where do you go? Everyone has their choice and mine is Books. Whenever I want to learn something or understand something and improve myself in anyway books always seem to be there, waiting to be picked up and dive deep into it to eventually find whatever you are in search of. They are just a treasure trove of knowledge, wisdom, and fun.

So, in that context I’ve read few books and I am recommending them hoping that it does the same to you. Just like earlier recommendation they are mix of fiction and non-fiction, many of which you might have read, so here’s the list….

1. Taming Our Monkey Mind by Phyllis Krystal

This book was given to me by my dad seeing my reckless antics trying to do something which he thought… let’s say I was not ready for. And I read it.

The book is divided into two parts, in the first part, as the title says, the author compares our mind to a monkey. She explains through her own experiences and various analogies how our minds behaves, always jumping from one thought to another just like a monkey does jumping from one branch to another to find things to munch on. In the second part she explains how to control or tame that monkey mind through Ceiling on Desires and go about achieving that.

It’s a very good book to calm and control your mind if you have concentration problems and your mind is constantly bombarded with thoughts and ideas.

2. The Peripheral by William Gibson

This is a science fiction thriller with a touch of noir elements in it. The book alternates between two futures, one is a near future from us and the other very far dystopian future which takes place after an incident called Jackpot, which is a slow progression of humanity towards apocalypse due to famine, diseases etc. In the story the people can travel in time, but just not physically, only the mind in real time. The story is basically what happens when someone from near future witnesses a murder that happens in the far future and made a witness so that the perpetrator can be caught. It shows cool new tech like nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, micro-drones etc.

If you ever wondered what the future might look like this is a great speculative fiction for you.

3. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill

This book is the father mother of all self help books. The book was written almost eighty years ago and every other self help book after this just seems to be a derivative, an extrapolated and in-detail versions of all the topics covered in here. It should be because the author spent twenty years of his life researching all the successful, influential and wealthy people of his time like Henry Ford, Thomas A. Edison and others to eventually write this book, so he must have covered all that is there to make a person successful. When you look at the qualities he writes of all successful people even in the present it still seems to hold good.

However, if you ask me if I’ve become rich now that I have read the book, you are wrong. This book is not some sort of instruction manual to get rich. It is a pointer, it helps you understand and identify qualities, actions among other things that made all the successful people successful.

So, if you want to become rich and successful work hard for it, but if you want to know what makes someone successful read this book. As usual in all self-help books, this too has some weird outlandish ideas but take what you like.

4. The Day of The Jackal by Frederick Forsyth

I even came to know about this book through a prime-time television news anchor. It was more of a passing comment he did trying to dis an argument, but somehow the name of the book stuck with me and I ended up reading it. As the book cover says the book is really ‘unputdownable’. The last fifty pages or so just breezes through, I was reading it in the bus and I missed my stop. True story bro!

This book is a spy thriller. The story is that a small political party in France wants its dictator president to be assassinated, after many failed attempts by themselves they hire a foreign mercenary to do the job and now the mercenary has to plan and execute the operation. Book is totally worth it.

5. Sai Baba- The Ultimate Experience by Phyllis Krystal

Yes, this book is written by the same author as Taming our monkey mind. But this is an autobiographical account of her search for spirituality, first visit to India and how she came into the folds of Baba. Very inspiring and very touching. The book is written well and I don’t want to say much about this book other than that it has helped me strengthen my faith and it might do the same to you. So go pick this up.

6. The Promise by Robert Crais

This book I found when a colleague of mine was leaving and was giving away books. Along with the couple of work related books I took from him, this was one fiction book I took out of curiosity. Guess what! This book is just fab.

The book is a police procedural drama. A private detective on a case investigating a disappearance of a chemical engineer who works for the government lands himself into a complete police take down where he befriends an unlikely duo, a police dog trainer and his dog. Along with these two and others he solves the case he is on and much more.

Read this if you are interested in police procedures or you do not want to keep a book down with out finishing it cover to cover.

7. Deep Work by Cal Newport

The book expounds on the idea that if you want to produce some really good work you need to be in a limitless distraction free environment. The author describes this state of being in a distraction free environment to produce quality over quantity as Deep Work.

In the book the author starts by explaining what Deep work is and tries to convince us the importance of it.

Deep Work: Professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate.

Then he goes on to explain how to achieve that distraction free environment and get into the ‘flow’ of deep work to produce work that is of the highest quality. The book is filled with examples and the author’s own personal experiences.

So, if you are anything like me , always distracted from the work that needs to be done, this book is just what you want.

8. 1984 by George Orwell

“War is peace

God! this book is one of a kind. It is dystopian fiction pushed to the extreme, also it is a political commentary. It is from here that we get words like big brother or big boss, thought crime, thought leaders etc. This book was written in the year 1949 about 1984 as the future. It tells a scenario where after the World War II the world is divided into three parts and they are always in war with each other. To be in constant war these nation states have totalitarian regimes where, its citizens are constantly watched and regulated in the most extreme ways, so much so that eating, sleeping, talking and even thinking is under complete control of the government.

The book is depressing in the every level possible, but if you are intrigued by the idea of what might happen if a government goes around spreading propaganda, controls the actions of its citizens and freedom of expression is taken away, or if you just like political ramblings go get yourself this book.

9. Who Will Cry When You Die by Robin Sharma

No, I did not read it because I was depressed or anything, I just read it because the title was interesting and also that it was written by Robin Sharma. I took this book without any expectations and it turned out to be a self help or rather a book of life lessons. It contains hundred short chapters almost a single page each explaining some valuable lessons one has to follow for happy, productive and contended life. The book does not talk about some philosophy or anything it just tells you simple actions you can do for far more happier life, which many of us tend to ignore.

The book is not difficult to read at all, it’s written in simple English and contains lot of value. Read this if you want to make your life more enriching by doing simple actions everyday.

10. Fiction Writing for Dummies by Randy Ingermanson and Peter Economy

For some reason I really like For Dummies series. For whatever new I want to learn the first place I go to is the for Dummies books. And just like that, since I was trying to write some fiction, my first choice was this. Well hey, they are for dummies of course!

These books are made specifically for beginners to understand any concept and build a foundation. They go all the way from the basics to advanced levels the subject has to offer. These books are like the condensed version of info on whatever the subjects you are looking for. They come for myriad subjects, right from how to solve jigsaw puzzles to most advanced subjects like string theory, they cover it all. They are easy to read, understand and are filled with little tips and tools which you otherwise would not know if you are a beginner. Usually these books are written by some of the highest authority in the subjects so it is a added bonus to learn from the best.


That’s the end of this list, hope you found some book interesting enough to go read. If you did, good for you. And if you liked the post click that little clap button — yes clap, apparently you get to clap now — as many times as you want to show your love. Follow me and share this post.Also don’t forget to let me know your thoughts. Thank you. Help Ever, Hurt Never.

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Prajwal Sai

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Engineer by day, Writer by night. #LearnEverything

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