Here is a selection of the books I love. I’ve been lucky enough to develop a passion for reading quite early in life. When I was (much) younger, I used to eat horror, thriller and action-packed books for breakfast. Since high school times, I started shifting into non-fiction.
Amongst the non-fiction titles that I choose to read, I try to dig back in the past most of the times.
I have my reasons for it. I find most modern writers (especially the American authors in the last decade) to be quite repetitive in their narrative: to my disappointment, I often end up reading long books which could have been summarised in a blog post. Also, for the type of topics I’m interested in, I find that the truly original material was written decades ago – everything else that came up later is, often, simply a re-hash of old thoughts.
When thinking of books to recommend, I would encourage the reader to start with the titles below (sorted in alphabetical order!). I believe each of these books has had a profound impact on my life and has shaped my thinking in significant ways.
Of course, this list will keep evolving as I come across more titles. Enjoy!
- Antifragile – Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2012)
- Atomic Habits – James Clear (2018)
- De Brevitate Vitae – Seneca (~49 AD)
- Fooled by Randomness – Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2001)
- How I found freedom in an unfree world – Harry Browne (1973)
- How to win Friends and influence people – Dale Carnegie (1936)
- Praise of Folly – Erasmus (1509)
- Meditations – Marcus Aurelius (161-180 AD)
- Psycho-Cybernetics – Maxwell Maltz (1960)
- Rich Dad, Poor Dad – Robert Kiyosaki (1997)
- Siddhartha – Herman Hesse (1922)
- Skin in the game – Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2018)
- The Art of Happiness – Dalai Lama and Howard Cutler (1998)
- The art of Learning – Josh Waitzkin (2007)
- The Bitcoin Standard – Saifedean Ammous (2018)
- The Black Swan – Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2007)
- The lessons of history – Will and Ariel Durant (1968)
- The 7 habits of highly effective people – Stephen R. Covey (1989)
- The sovereign individual – James Dale Davidson and William Rees-Mogg (1997)
- Thinking Fast and Slow – Daniel Kahneman (2011)