Dune by Frank Herbert. This is a book I first read as a young teenager, but every time I re-read it every few years at a somewhat different point in my life, I get a different sense of it, maybe more based on where I am in my life and what is going on in the world. That for me is what makes a book endlessly re-readable: you always find something new in it. It is packed with all kinds of references and allegories to so many parts of our world, but in a way that still seems like its own world.
Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
31–40 of 111 posts
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#32Good Night Moon - 187 times The Cat In The Hat - 200 times The Very Hungry Caterpillar - 85 times But seriously, im on my third re-read of Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin, In my opinion its the best book about leadership ever written.
Hah, I hadn’t even thought about children’s books! When my son was 1-2 years old I had probably 3-4 books like this completely memorized for bedtime. He did too, as occasionally if I would change a phrase for effect “they went to” to “they all went to”, he would often correct me.
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#33Man's Search for Meaning - Viktor Frankel, it is his experience of how he managed to survive the concentration camps.
Book of Mormon
The Stormlight Archive series (Way of Kings, Words of Radience, Oathbringer) - Brandon Sanderson, I've heard it compared to the Kingkiller Chronicles in terms of depth, intricacies and overall masterfully executed plot but Sanderson is also one of the best authors at making characters real and captivating that I've ever met.
Mistborn Series (The Final Empire, Well of Ascension, Hero of Ages) by the same author as The Stormlight Archives and for the same reasons.
The Screwtape Letters - C.S. Lewis, even if you aren't religious it has helped me see so much clearly the tactics and obstacles that prevent me from being the person I want to be.
I've read quite a few more books more often but these are the books that I have reread multiple times because they have changed who I am and helped me recognize that each time I fall I can rise again a better man.
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#34The Art of Electronics
The Hitchhiker
The Idiot
The Wealth of Nations
and sadly Concrete Mathematics... not because it is a bad book but because I suck at math.
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#35There are a handful of books I have read more than once, and which I may still read more times. Offhand, I can think of:
1. The Mysterious Island - Jules Verne - read 6 or 7 times if not more, dating back to when I was in about 6th grade
2. False Memory - Dean Koontz - read probably 4 or 5 times
3. Neuromancer - William Gibson - read 3 or 4 times, at least
4. Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell - read at least twice
5. The Four Steps to the Epiphany - Steve Blank - read 2 or 3 times, skimmed parts many other times
6. Mastering The Complex Sale - Jeff Thull - read 2 or 3 times
7. Crossing the Chasm - Geoffrey Moore - read 2 or 3 times
8. Wellsprings of Knowledge - Dorothy Leonard-Barton - read 2 or 3 times
9. Common Knowledge - Nancy Dixon - read 2 or 3 times
10. Winning the Knowledge Transfer Race - Michael English & William Baker - read 2 or 3 times
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#36So I know this is the opposite of what OP is asking, but I've taken the stance recently that I won't re-read another book. There are books that I would like to re-read, but they come at the opportunity cost of reading others.
A fellow traveler in a Guatemalan hostel broke it down to me like this: - let's say as an avid reader, you're able to read 12 books a year. - let's say you have 50 years of reading left in you, that means you have 600 books left to read in your lifetime
That back-of-the-napkin-math put things into perspective for me. So many great books to read, so little time. It's also for that reason that I have no qualms about putting a book down that I'm not into.
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#37"The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress" by Robert Heinlein
"Neuromancer" and sequels by William Gibson
"Slaughterhouse 5" by Kurt Vonnegut
I've read all of them dozens of times over. Hard to explain why, they speak my language, and help me understand myself and the world around me, kind of like my favorite bands do. Hard to put into words.
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#38The Dog Stars by Peter Heller and Neuromancer by William Gibson. Both of these I've read twice.
The Dog Stars held up well on my second reading. Neuromancer did not.
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#39The Kingkiller Chronicle. Firstly, they're good books and are enjoyable to read a second time round. Secondly, Rothfuss has laid down plot points like a Go player places stones. The second time reading through will join together disparate pieces of information that you wouldn't have connected together before, starting from very large revelations in the second reading of the first few chapters. I know of other books t…
By the time book three comes out, I'll have to re-read the first two, because I won't remember anything about what was going on at the end of book two.
Re: Ask HN: Which books have you read more than once?
#40"The problems of philosophy" by Bertrand Russell. ~8 times. "The abolition of man" by "C.S. Lewis" 3 times. "The Reign of Quantity and the Signs of the Times" by René Guénon. 3 times, and planning to set a weekend for another re-read soon.
I've reread the Abolition Of Man recently and found his conjecture that there may yet come a time when using psychology and technology a small group of people may be able to control everyone else eerily reminiscent to the way ML is being used to custom craft ads that push one opinion or another.