Behold: The Jacked Nerd Library

Every book I've ever read so far

The Library of Babel, Erik Desmazieres, 1997

“I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.”

―Jorge Luis Borges

I recently visited my brother in California, and between working out, laughing, and feasting at Mexican restaurants, we watched a few movies together. I ended up adding the films to my Letterboxd, which, if you’re not familiar, is like Goodreads for movies.

Pat laughed at how many films were on my profile, but that is because I include every single movie I can remember watching. Shrek is there alongside The Godfather.

I do the same regarding books on my Goodreads, which is the source of the list below. So if it is jarring for you to see The Magic Tree House series next to the works of George Orwell, deal with it. Besides, it shouldn’t matter. Kids books are some of the most important anyway, not only because they often contain great stories, but because they ingrain the beautiful habit of reading into young minds.

Before engaging with the list, recall that I encourage readers to be criminally curious, which means reading books you disagree with, and even find disgusting. For example, you’ll see the infamous abomination The Communist Manifesto, and the ridiculous How To Be An Antiracist.

So, without further ado, enjoy.

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• Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse

• Brave New World, Aldous Huxley

• Brave New World Revisited, Aldous Huxley

• The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams

• East of Eden, John Steinbeck

• The Pearl, John Steinbeck

• Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck

• The Idiot, Fyodor Dostoevsky

• The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky

• Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky

• The Myth of Sisyphus, Albert Camus

• The Stranger, Albert Camus

• Letters from a Stoic, Seneca

• On the Shortness of Life: Life Is Long if You Know How to Use It, Seneca

• Man's Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl

• Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Friedrich Nietzsche

• Twilight of the Idols / The Anti-Christ, Friedrich Nietzsche

• Beyond Good and Evil, Friedrich Nietzsche

• Greenlights, Matthew McConaughey

• Meditations, Marcus Aurelius

• Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury

• Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis

• Late Admissions: Confessions of a Black Conservative, Glenn Loury

• Believe: Why Everyone Should Be Religious, Ross Douthat

• What Is It Like to Be a Bat?, Thomas Nagel

• What Does It All Mean?, Thomas Nagel

• The Hobbit, or There and Back Again, J. R. R. Tolkien

• What's Our Problem?: A Self-Help Book for Societies, Tim Urban

• On Democracies and Death Cults: Israel and the Future of Civilization, Douglas Murray

• The War on the West, Douglas Murray

• Jack “the Shot” Foley-A Legend for All Time, Mark Epstein

• The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins

• The 48 Laws of Power, Robert Greene

• The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli

• The Aleph and Other Stories, Jorge Luis Borges

• The Library of Babel, Jorge Luis Borges

• Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges

• The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion, Mircea Eliade

• The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom, James Burnham

• Social Justice Fallacies, Thomas Sowell

• Economic Facts and Fallacies, Thomas Sowell

• A Personal Odyssey, Thomas Sowell

• The Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common Sense, Gad Saad

• On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King

• It, Stephen King

• The Shining, Stephen King

• To Sell is Human: The Surprising Truth About Moving Others, Daniel Pink

• The Power of Babel: A Natural History of Language, John McWhorter

• The Open Society and Its Enemies, Karl Popper

• The Outsiders, S.E. Hinton

• Dragon of the Red Dawn (Merlin Missions, #9)

• The Adventures of Captain Underpants (Captain Underpants, #1)

• The Last Straw (Diary of a Wimpy Kid, #3), Jeff Kinney

• Rodrick Rules (Diary of a Wimpy Kid, #2), Jeff Kinney

• Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Diary of a Wimpy Kid, #1), Jeff Kinney

• Hatchet, Gary Paulsen

• The Way of the Superior Man, David Deida

• Stories of Your Life and Others, Ted Chiang

• Exhalation, Ted Chiang

• Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson

• The Shortest History of Israel and Palestine: From Zionism to Intifadas and the Struggle for Peace, Michael Scott-Baumann

• The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety, Alan Watts

• Why Buddhism Is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment, Robert Wright

• The Dhammapada

• The Art of Worldly Wisdom: A Pocket Oracle, Baltasar Gracián

• Leonardo da Vinci, Walter Isaacson

• The Immortality Key: Uncovering the Secret History of the Religion with No Name, Brian C. Muraresku

• Man and His Symbols, Carl Jung

• Memories, Dreams, Reflections, Carl Jung

• Animal Farm, George Orwell

• 1984, George Orwell

• Tonight on the Titanic (Magic Tree House, #17), Mary Pope Osborne

• Sunset of the Sabertooth (Magic Tree House, #7), Mary Pope Osborne

• Revolutionary War on Wednesday (Magic Tree House, #22), Mary Pope Osborne

• Hour of the Olympics (Magic Tree House, #16), Mary Pope Osborne

• I Survived the Attacks of September 11th, 2001 (I Survived, #6)

• I Survived the Sinking of the Titanic, 1912 (I Survived, #1)

• One Day at Horrorland (Goosebumps, #16)

• Revenge of the Living Dummy (Goosebumps HorrorLand, #1)

• The Werewolf of Fever Swamp (Goosebumps, #14)

• Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak

• Green Eggs and Ham, Dr. Seuss

• The Underdogs, Mike Lupica

• Summer Ball, Mike Lupica

• The Mamba Mentality: How I Play, Kobe Bryant

• The Bhagavad Gita

• The Essential Rumi

• How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking, Jordan Ellenberg

• The Republic, Plato

• The Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle

• The Art of Rhetoric, Aristotle

• The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle, Avi

• The Pathless Path: Imagining a New Story For Work and Life, Paul Millerd

• The Ape that Understood the Universe: How the Mind and Culture Evolve, Steve Stuart-Williams

• The Sovereign Individual: Mastering the Transition to the Information Age, James Dale Davidson

• Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, Greg McKeown

• Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder, and One Man's Fight for Justice, Bill Browder

• A Man Called Intrepid, William Stevenson

• Strange Stories, Amazing Facts

• The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking, Saifedean Ammous

• On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction, William Zinsser

• Principles: Life and Work, Ray Dalio

• Great American Short Stories: From Hawthorne to Hemingway

• She Comes First, Ian Kerner

• Una historia de España, Arturo Pérez-Reverte

• El Nacimiento De Los Estados Unidos, Isaac Asimov

• Louder Than Words: Take Your Career from Average to Exceptional with the Hidden Power of Nonverbal Intelligence, Joe Navarro and Toni Sciarra Poynter

• The Last Night of the Earth Poems, Charles Bukowski

• $100M Offers: How To Make Offers So Good People Feel Stupid Saying No, Alex Hormozi

• The Heretic's Handbook of Quotations: Cutting Comments on Burning Issues, Charles Bufe

• The Elements of Eloquence: How to Turn the Perfect English Phrase, Mark Forsyth

• Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth, Reza Aslan

• The Elements of Style, E. B. White and William Strunk Jr.

• Novelist as a Vocation, Haruki Murakami

• The Case Against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money, Bryan Caplan

• Latin Proverbs: Wisdom from Ancient to Modern Times

• Troubled: A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class, Rob Henderson

• Karma: A Yogi's Guide to Crafting Your Destiny, Sadhguru

• Inner Engineering, Sadhguru

• The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America

• Ego Is the Enemy, Ryan Holiday

• The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living, Ryan Holiday

• The Wit and Wisdom of Mark Twain: A Book of Quotations

• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain

• Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger

• Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers, Tim Ferriss

• The 4-Hour Workweek, Tim Ferriss

• The Power of Language: How the Codes We Use to Think, Speak, and Live Transform Our Minds, Viorica Marian

• The Status Game: On Human Life and How to Play It, Will Storr

• Crypto Confidential: Winning and Losing Millions in the New Frontier of Finance, Nathaniel Eliason

• Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life, Luke Burgis

• The Anthology of Balaji: A Guide to Technology, Truth, and Building the Future, Eric Jorgenson

• The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness, Eric Jorgenson

• The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, Nassim Taleb

• The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms, Nassim Taleb

• Skin in the Game: The Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life, Nassim Taleb

• ESV Study Bible

• How to Change Your Mind: The New Science of Psychedelics, Michael Pollan

• Maxims, La Rochefoucauld

• Essays and Aphorisms, Arthur Schopenhauer

• Maxims and Reflections, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

• Languages of Truth: Essays 2003-2020, Salman Rushdie

• East, West, Salman Rushdie

• The Age of Reason Begins (The Story of Civilization, #7), Will Durant

• The Renaissance (The Story of Civilization, #5), Will Durant

• Caesar and Christ (Story of Civilization, #3), Will Durant

• Our Oriental Heritage (The Story of Civilization, #1), Will Durant

• The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the World's Greatest Philosophers, Will Durant

• The Lessons of History, Will Durant

• The Last Lion: Winston Spencer Churchill, William Manchester and Paul Reid

• Lenin the Dictator, Victor Sebestyen

• American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America, Colin Woodard

• A History of the World in 6 Glasses, Tom Standage

• Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, Malcolm Gladwell

• Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell

• The Blood of Olympus (The Heroes of Olympus, #5), Rick Riordan

• The House of Hades (The Heroes of Olympus, #4), Rick Riordan

• The Mark of Athena (The Heroes of Olympus, #3), Rick Riordan

• The Son of Neptune (The Heroes of Olympus, #2), Rick Riordan

• The Lost Hero (The Heroes of Olympus, #1), Rick Riordan

• The Last Olympian (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #5), Rick Riordan

• The Battle of the Labyrinth (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #4), Rick Riordan

• The Titan’s Curse (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #3), Rick Riordan

• The Sea of Monsters (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #2), Rick Riordan

• The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #1), Rick Riordan

• The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1), Suzanne Collins

• Catching Fire (The Hunger Games, #2), Suzanne Collins

• Mockingjay (The Hunger Games, #3), Suzanne Collins

• Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad

• The Declaration of Independence / The Constitution of the United States

• Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, Yuval Noah Harari

• 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, Yuval Noah Harari

• Homo Deus: A History of Tomorrow, Yuval Noah Harari

• The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne

• Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut

• Lord of the Flies, William Golding

• The War of Art, Stephen Pressfield

• Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative, Austin Kleon

• Walden, Henry David Thoreau

• How to Be an Antiracist, Ibram X. Kendi

• The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life, Mark Manson

• Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action, Simon Sinek

• The Tell-Tale Heart, Edgar Allan Poe

• Death of a Salesman, Arthur Miller

• Beowulf

• The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, William Shakespeare

• The Sun Also Rises, Ernest Hemingway

• A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway

• The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway

• Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, Robert Cialdini

• The Upanishads

• Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World, Jack Weatherford

• 1776, David McCullough

• John Adams, David McCullough

• The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels

• The Analects, Confucius

• The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger

• The Death of Ivan Ilych, Leo Tolstoy

• Discourses and Selected Writings, Epictetus

• 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos, Jordan Peterson

• Beyond Order: 12 More Rules For Life, Jordan Peterson

• We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine, Jordan Peterson

• The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason, Sam Harris

• Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion, Sam Harris

• Letter to a Christian Nation, Sam Harris

• Making Sense, Sam Harris

• Tao Te Ching

• The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom, Don Miguel Ruiz

• The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

• The Psychology of Money, Morgan Housel

• Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art, James Nestor

• The Origin of Species, Charles Darwin

• Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman

• Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, Jared Diamond

• Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones, James Clear

• The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho

• The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin

• The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform the World, David Deutsch

• Self-Reliance, Ralph Waldo Emerson

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