100 Books Like Drop The Rock

A timeless meditation on purpose, suffering, and the human spirit. While not about entrepreneurship, this book is essential for anyone seeking to understand the deeper meaning behind their work. Frankl’s insight—that we can find meaning even in suffering—is profoundly relevant for founders navigating hardship and uncertainty. 

What struck me most about it was how Frankl captured the Holocaust not just as a historical event, but as a raw, existential landscape. I’ve seen many films and documentaries about that era, but Frankl’s account stands apart. His lens is philosophical, not just historical. His insight that meaning, not pleasure or power, is the primary driver of human life resonated deeply.

I've focused on the idea myself that many entrepreneurs pursue ventures not for wealth or control, but as a way to fill a deeper existential hole. Frankl’s writing felt honest, profound, and necessary. This is a serious and enduring book I’ll return… show more.

I found this to be a classic grassroots approach to spirituality and a very practical approach to life as well as recovery.

Early AAers used this as one of their texts. In the 12 Step based recovery programs, members recommend that you find a Power greater than yourself to rely on. Emmet’s book is inspired by the wisdom of the ages and led me to a simple, strong concept of a Higher Power that has become my Sobriety Super Power.

It reveals the reasons why living by principle, guided by my Super Power, keeps me from picking up that first fix, pill, or drink. I have never looked back.

It may not seem relevant to sobriety to recommend a book on how evil is rooted in man’s very existence, yet I find that both alcoholism and recovery are also rooted in my existence.

It’s a monolithic book, but more than half is Bloom citing his sources. The book challenged my view of the world thus influencing my view of recovery. The 12 Steps taught me that problems are basically of my own making and that self-responsibility is the only path to find my way out.

It is not possible to read his book and not see how we humans lay the seeds of our own destruction, not only in a small personal life, but in all of human history. 

Full disclosure, I know Bill Hanlon and we exchanged books at one of several speaking engagements together.

I cherish this book and have a signed copy featured in my collection. It is a simple straightforward ingenious way to disrupt destructive patterns in all relationships. And it works! Being in the mental health field, I would make this wonderful book mandatory for all counselors to read, if I had that power.

Full of examples on how to modify micro-behaviors, results could not be more life-changing. I found that I had the power to alter destructive patterns in my life by reacting differently in any given situation! Bill’s book explains how to do it.

This book was an absolute joy for me! It was not just a guide; it was a vibrant and relatable companion, filled with wit and unwavering honesty. With every page, it opened up a world of possibilities, offering a roadmap to live my best life, liberated from the suppression of ethanol.

Holly transformed the way I viewed the drinking culture, and the journey it took me on was utterly exhilarating. I adore this book for its genuine approach and the sheer excitement it brought for me to embrace an alcohol-free life.

I am a secular Jew and Anne Lamott is a church-going Christian, but I feel she is my soulmate.

She is so honest, and vulnerable, and hysterically funny that reading her work feels like listening to a good friend sharing her innermost thoughts. I gave this book to someone whose mother was dying, and she claimed that reading it helped get through that dark period.

I would love to have that kind of power as a writer: the power to change people’s lives for the better. I have secretly always wanted to run the world. After all, I couldn’t do a worse job than the jerks that are running things now.

Before I knew Leslie Jamison as one of my favorite contemporary essayists and spotted bylines in the New Yorker, she wrote this memoir/cultural biography of alcoholism, which, if you’ve ever read books about alcoholism, is different and bold and brave and shining like a new dime different than all of them. 

Jamison and I are both veterans of 12-step programs. And most of our tribe has read enough memoirs of addiction and seen enough movies of the same to last us about 3 lifetimes. But Ms. Jamison goes one very important step further, telling the stories of famous authors she idolized who made being drunk all the time part of their image and work and then asks the very important question “Why are only male authors allowed to be sloppy drunks and have it be charming instead of dangerous and pathetic?” 

I love these kinds of questions, and I love… show more.

I sat on a twin bed in rehab, turned to the back of the book, one of the personal stories published in the book, and felt like the narrator came out of the book, sat across from me, and told me her story.

Bill W. and Dr. Bob started a miracle fellowship that led millions like me to recover. However, every chapter in the book can be anyone’s story. Unfortunately, many people feel that if they don't have a drug or alcohol problem, then they have “no problems.” 

I read every story; I wanted to believe I had a chance if these people had straightened out their lives and were happy about it. In the beginning, the chapters were tough-hitting in defining how we honestly forget humility, gratitude, and simple service that leads to fulfilling lives.

I can read this book over and over again, and I do. 

This is the first book I read by a mom admitting to alcoholism after I stopped drinking. It was recommended to me when I only had about 30 days sober under my belt, and I devoured it in one sitting.

I found it revelatory to hear someone say the things out loud that I was holding inside too embarrassed to share. Her writing style is conversational yet lovely, and made me feel like I wanted to find her and make her my bestie.   

Besides the fact that Laura and I have so much in common (our first name, our publication date, our genre), I am a huge fan of the way she makes recovery accessible to everyone. 

In Push Off From Here, Laura uses her experience to encourage the reader to explore their relationship with substances. Her ‘nine essential truths to get you through sobriety and everything else’ are simple, spot-on, and user-friendly.