I was browsing in the memoirs and found this little gem Morningstar: growing up with books written by Ann Hood and it took me down memory lane to the 1960s and 70s.  Hood explains how the books she read shaped her life and made her who she is.  The book is divided into the ten lessons she learned from books.  It is interesting to think about the effect these same books had on me.  Why didn’t I become Ann Hood if I read all the same books?  I think the order in which you read a book and the time in your life when you read a book can change completely the effect that the book might have.

Even more surprising perhaps is the books that did have the same influence on a girl growing up in a mill town in Rhode Island and one on a farm in Montana.  Books speak personally to each of us and yet the emotion they evoke in the reader is a common one.  That is the beauty and the power of a story told well.  Books won’t always have the answers you are looking for but just finding a book that asks the same questions that you are pondering can make one feel understood.

Another memoir available on eBook and audio download is Endurance written by astronaut Scott Kelly.  As an 18 year old boy Scott Kelly read a book written by Tom Wolfe titled The Right Stuff and it changed his life.  Read a book and change a life that is powerful.