Ask HN: Great fiction books that have had a positive impact on your life?

see my nick, but in addition to stephenson, the books i come back to over and over again for comfort and wisdom include:

- Lord of the Rings: The other bible. Not even the very wise can see all ends; be of good cheer.

- A Wrinkle In Time: 9 year old me, there is such a thing as a tesseract, and there is also Mrs. Beast.

- The Master and Margarita: apocalyptic reading from someone who knew, and a cat who always pays his way.

- the Discworld series: Sir Terry knew our hearts better than most, and sin, young feller, is treatin’ people as things.

- If On A Winter’s Night, A Traveler: a perfect joke that you can tell once, plus a love story.

- Good Omens: Gaiman and Pratchett team up, what’s not to love?

- Moby Dick: And so the universal thump is passed round, and all hands should rub each other’s shoulder-blades, and be content.

- Lucky Jim: grad school, a survival guide. Come in on the fa la la las, there’s a good chap.

This doesn’t include poetry, which is also in my head constantly.

In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust and the short stories of Borges

I really enjoyed the Martian and have found it to be a nice distraction if I'm bored - it's not too heavy and short enough to read in one sitting, but has plenty of entertainment nonetheless.

Otherwise, the Hitchhiker's Guide is always a great read.

Anything by Dostoevsky.

> Good Omens: Gaiman and Pratchett team up, what’s not to love?

It's a good book, but aesthetically it suffers in my mind because it's a rewrite of Pratchett's earlier book Sourcery.