I am in one of lowest points of my life and I just need some books to relate to. I have made similar posts on so many platforms so many times but I just can't get any decent recommendations. I beg you guys to please take a moment and suggest any books you guys might know of- books that make adulthood understandable.
Please recommend any books where the characters recover from lost friendships, failed dreams, disappointing phases, heartbreaks-all of that. I want to read about characters kinda isolating and focusing on themselves- instead of looking for pleasures, love and validation from others, they find it within. Stories about how they pick themselves up, fix their lives, and rebuild their dreams.
Some recommendations I have come across only ever slightly touch/cover this criteria with focus on some other plots-not what I am looking for. Fictional only. Thanks!
by somephilosophershit
8 Comments
The power of now – Eckhart Tolle
it’s a manga but goodnight punpun is really really good and talk about adulthood, friend loss, death and r*pe and a lot of other problems. it is kind of weird however but worth the shot. it can be easly find online for free.
Nothing is coming to mind. No offense, but as a work of fiction, this sounds quite idealistic. Just the idea of realizing a dream is hard for me to fathom. I’m not sure I know what it means to realize a dream. If I’ve known people who have realized a dream, they’ve been precious few in number. People in the U.S. who are moving into adulthood now have a very rough crossing ahead of them. Books on stoicism or mental toughness seem to me to be in order. Fiction for Americans becoming adults in 2024 should be about mere survival, not about dreams, success, happiness and so forth.
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig
The Magus by John Fowles
Both are about finding your place in life. Pirsig is notoriously difficult to get in to, but don’t give up! You’ll be handsomely rewarded if you stick it out.
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine is a wonderful read and I think what you’re looking for.
You might be interested in The Last of Her Kind by Sigrid Nunez. It’s about a friendship, and the paths their lives take, how different they ended up. I wish I had read it when I was in my 20s, Nunez is such a special writer.
This is hard, because in this kind of category what resonates with one person could be completely irrelevant to someone else. But these are a few books that have been really special to me in the past few years as I’ve turned 30 and had to reconcile my life as it is with what I thought it would be or was supposed to be. All of these are fiction, I’ve never connected much with self-help or nonfiction when it comes to this kind of topic.
* Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop
* A Psalm for the Wild-built
* The Lost Ticket (probably not what you’re looking for, it’s very sweet and wholesome, but the main character is just at a complete low and rebuilds her life into something lovely and new)
Zorrie by Laird Hunt