Here are 100 books that I and Thou fans have personally recommended if you like
I and Thou.
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I’ve spent most of my life fascinated by what happens when women stop editing themselves. As a former television reporter, health educator, and memoirist, I’ve lived on both sides of the polished story and the private reckoning in my search for truth. Writing my own memoir forced me to confront how often women are encouraged to soften conflict, spiritualize pain, or tidy up the truth to make it more palatable. I’m drawn to books that refuse that impulse—stories where healing isn’t performative, and transformation isn’t neat.
I loved this book because it gave language to instincts I didn’t yet trust.
I read it long ago, and its stories stayed with me—not intellectually, but somatically. This book doesn’t explain women; it remembers us. Through myth and archetype, Clarissa Pinkola Estés reclaims the wild, intuitive self that so many women are trained to domesticate.
It taught me that messiness isn’t a flaw—it can be the sign of something alive trying to return.
First published three years before the print edition of Women Who Run With the Wolves made publishing history, this original audio edition quickly became an underground bestseller. For its insights into the inner life of women, it established Dr. Clarissa Pinkola Estes as one of the most important voices of our time in the fields of Jungian psychology, myth, and women's mysteries.
Drawing from her work as a psychoanalyst and cantadora ("keeper of the old stories"), Dr. Estes uses myths and folktales to illustrate how societies systematically strip away the feminine spirit. Through an exploration into the nature of the…
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
I had been a long-time screenwriter in March of 2003 when the US invaded Iraq with overwhelming air power, and the TV news showed footage of the “shock and awe.” But I remember thinking, what is it like for the Iraqi people? Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, your country is at war. What is your life now like? Seeking to focus on an ordinary Iraqi family caught up in the war, I soon realized it was too layered for a spec screenplay and wrote it as a novel. It was the most rewarding experience I’ve ever had.
Set at the end of WWII, when the UN authorized the founding of the State of Israel, I thoroughly enjoyed the merging of historical facts with fictional characters to depict the birth of a nation from the Jewish point of view.
I loved the diverse characters, including an American gentile female nurse and teenage Jewish children orphaned during the war as they settled in a hostile land.
It was eye-opening to see what it means to be constantly under attack, on the one hand, fighting militants physically and, on the other hand, fighting various countries politically in order to be acknowledged worldwide.
I also love that the author gives me an authentic look at the behind-the-scenes decision-making by British officials during this chaotic time.
“Passionate summary of the inhuman treatment of the Jewish people in Europe, of the exodus in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to Palestine, and of the triumphant founding of the new Israel.”—The New York Times
Exodus is an international publishing phenomenon—the towering novel of the twentieth century's most dramatic geopolitical event. Leon Uris magnificently portrays the birth of a new nation in the midst of enemies—the beginning of an earthshaking struggle for power. Here is the tale that swept the world with its fury: the story of an American nurse, an Israeli freedom fighter caught up in a glorious, heartbreaking,…
I love to read. A life-changing event in 1997, started my journey into writing and eventually into my conversion to Judaism. Many years later, I’ve come to realize that there are grains of truth in every faith tradition and I search for those truths in my own life. Currently, I have four books in print, writing under the pen names of Brenda Ray (The Hebrew Midwives Trilogy) and B. K. Ricotta (Two of a Kind and A Love So Sweet). Two other novels (Book 1 and 2 of the Econfina Creek Series) are in the works.
This book was part of my women’s studies in nurse-midwifery school at the University of Florida. It affirmed what I already knew on a soul level about how women’s senses hold unique sub-strata. We “know” but have been unable to define the “why” over the centuries. As an empath, this book resonated with me and helped me understand how my gift brought to the bedside when caring for women at the most primal moments of their lives, was innate. It taught me how to trust my instincts.
Despite the progress of the women's movement, many women still feel silenced in their families and schools. This moving and insightful bestseller, based on in-depth interviews with 135 women, explains why they feel this way. Updated with a new preface exploring how the authors' collaboration and research developed, this tenth anniversary edition addresses many of the questions that the authors have been asked repeatedly in the years since Women's Ways of Knowing was originally published.
The Year Mrs. Cooper Got Out More
by
Meredith Marple,
The coastal tourist town of Great Wharf, Maine, boasts a crime rate so low you might suspect someone’s lying.
Nevertheless, jobless empty nester Mallory Cooper has become increasingly reclusive and fearful. Careful to keep the red wine handy and loath to leave the house, Mallory misses her happier self—and so…
I love to read. A life-changing event in 1997, started my journey into writing and eventually into my conversion to Judaism. Many years later, I’ve come to realize that there are grains of truth in every faith tradition and I search for those truths in my own life. Currently, I have four books in print, writing under the pen names of Brenda Ray (The Hebrew Midwives Trilogy) and B. K. Ricotta (Two of a Kind and A Love So Sweet). Two other novels (Book 1 and 2 of the Econfina Creek Series) are in the works.
Rabbi Cooper, through easy-to-follow and deeply human instruction, guides you through a soul-changing journey in this book. His own journey leads the way for anyone who wants to understand how meditation can change your life and the world. He taught me so much about how to express my faith in daily living. A must-read.
A comprehensive guide to meditation for people of all faiths, from the best-selling author of God Is a Verb.
The only complete nonsectarian guide to meditation, A Heart of Stillness is a comprehensive guidebook to its basic principles and practices.
By showing the way to what mystics have experienced for thousands of years, David Cooper's accessible, clear advice provides invaluable guidance both for students already studying with a meditation teacher, and for those who want to develop a meditative practice on their own.
Drawing from the wisdom of the world's great spiritual traditions, Cooper teaches basic meditative principles and practices…
All my life, I struggled to connect with people, but love and friendship evaded me. I constantly hurt others. Relationships were like a language I couldn’t understand. When people loved me, I knew that they were mistaken, because I was unlovable. Then, a neuroscientist told me something that changed my life: The way we connect with others—the oxytocin response—is wired into our brains in the first few years of life, before we can form conscious memories. That set me on the path of studying the neuroscience of love and connection. And I learned something amazing: I could change that wiring and learn to love.
Are you like me? A people pleaser? So concerned about what the other person is feeling that I’m not even aware of my own feelings? Then this book is for you. Don’t be put off by the awkward title; it’s not about high-IQ kids. The drama is the way children must hide their true selves to please their parents; the gift is the ability to suppress our own needs.
Miller writes, “There are many children who have not been free, right from the beginning, to experience the very simplest of feelings, such as discontent, anger, rage, pain, even hunger—and, of course, the enjoyment of their own bodies.”
I feel that! Miller explains how therapy can help us confront and heal from that rage and pain. I get mad and cry every time I reread this book.
Why are many of the most successful people plagued by feelings of emptiness and alienation? This wise and profound book has provided thousands of readers with an answer,and has helped them to apply it to their own lives.Far too many of us had to learn as children to hide our own feelings, needs, and memories skillfully in order to meet our parents' expectations and win their "love." Alice Miller writes, "When I used the word 'gifted' in the title, I had in mind neither children who receive high grades in school nor children talented in a special way. I simply…
I am a retired psychotherapist and teacher, but if someone asked me what the purpose of life is, I’d say, “to become aware.” Awareness is the capacity to see without prejudice, bias, or conditioning. I don’t like being in the dark, and so I have been on a lifelong journey to become aware. I have stepped into seeing several times in my life, so now my task is to teach others. It’s who I am—my essence is to continue teaching, to set people free from societal conditioning and their upbringings. Growing up means losing certain comforting illusions, but greater understanding fills their place.
I liked the concept of man being small and adrift in the darkness of the wide world. This book taught me to see through politics, grandstanding, and the grandiose nonsense of man. Swift is my kind of guy, brutally satirical and profound. This book is really not for children. We see Gulliver travel on many adventures and experience Swift's disappointment as he engages different cultures, small and large, rational and irrational.
His adventures demolish Gulliver’s sense of humanity to the point that when he is about to be rescued, at first, he rejects the offer like a misanthrope before finally climbing aboard. Swift is very dark here. Why would anyone want to return to the same old life after having their eyes opened?
'Thus, gentle Reader, I have given thee a faithful History of my Travels for Sixteen Years, and above Seven Months; wherein I have not been so studious of Ornament as of Truth.'
In these words Gulliver represents himself as a reliable reporter of the fantastic adventures he has just set down; but how far can we rely on a narrator whose identity is elusive and whoses inventiveness is self-evident? Gulliver's Travels purports to be a travel book, and describes Gulliver's encounters with the inhabitants of four extraordinary places: Lilliput, Brobdingnag, Laputa, and the country of the Houyhnhnms. A consummately skilful…
Don’t mess with the hothead—or he might just mess with you. Slater Ibáñez is only interested in two kinds of guys: the ones he wants to punch, and the ones he sleeps with. Things get interesting when they start to overlap. A freelance investigator, Slater trolls the dark side of…
I am a retired psychotherapist and teacher, but if someone asked me what the purpose of life is, I’d say, “to become aware.” Awareness is the capacity to see without prejudice, bias, or conditioning. I don’t like being in the dark, and so I have been on a lifelong journey to become aware. I have stepped into seeing several times in my life, so now my task is to teach others. It’s who I am—my essence is to continue teaching, to set people free from societal conditioning and their upbringings. Growing up means losing certain comforting illusions, but greater understanding fills their place.
This book doesn’t allow for any preparation—it bites you right away! The beauty of it lies in how Kazantzakis deals with human experiences from moment to moment. He shows us how to live in the moment. For instance, in the end, Zorba and his friend have lost all their money, but Zorba says, “Let’s dance.”
They aren’t defeated but go on to the next experience. It touched me to see how they could live in the now, for life is rich.
This moving fable sees a young Greek writer set out to Crete to claim a small inheritance. But when he arrives, he meets Alexis Zorba, a middle-aged Greek man with a zest for life. Zorba has had a family and many lovers, has fought in the Balkan wars, has lived and loved - he is a simple but deep man who lives every moment fully and without shame. As their friendship develops, he is gradually won over, transformed and inspired along with the reader.
Zorba the Greek, Nikos Kazantzakis' most popular and enduring novel, has its origins in the author's…
I am a retired psychotherapist and teacher, but if someone asked me what the purpose of life is, I’d say, “to become aware.” Awareness is the capacity to see without prejudice, bias, or conditioning. I don’t like being in the dark, and so I have been on a lifelong journey to become aware. I have stepped into seeing several times in my life, so now my task is to teach others. It’s who I am—my essence is to continue teaching, to set people free from societal conditioning and their upbringings. Growing up means losing certain comforting illusions, but greater understanding fills their place.
I enjoy the dark humor in this one—savage and satirical, targeting pomposity. Voltaire uses a series of essays to show Candide going on travels and adventures, and meeting ignorance and bliss in turn. At the end, Candide reaches the conclusion that he should just “tend his own garden.”
It’s an ironic anti-clerical work that strips bare the follies and foibles of mankind. I appreciate how he didn’t hesitate to deconstruct the religious conditioning of the time.
Enriched Classics offer readers accessible editions of great works of literature enhanced by helpful notes and commentary. Each book includes educational tools alongside the text, enabling students and readers alike to gain a deeper and more developed understanding of the writer and their work.
A classic work of eighteenth century literature, Candide is Voltaire's fast-paced novella of struggle and adventure that used satire as a form of social critique. Candide enlists the help of his tutor, Dr. Pangloss, to help him reunite with his estranged lover, Lady Cunegonde. But the journey welcomes many unexpected challenges, and overcoming or outwitting the…
I am a psychotherapist and pastor. Since my first book Highly Sensitive People in an Insensitive World, which became an international bestseller, I have received letters from all over the world, from people, telling me about their lives. I discovered there is a need for books on how to live your life in an authentic way. I have studied Psychiatrist C.G. Jung and Philosopher Søren Kierkegaard at the university. The books, I recommend are easier to read than these two. In my books, I use many examples. It is important to me that the wisdom of great writers becomes accessible to all people regardless of their level of education.
Bent Falk writes so clearly and touches people. My students are always grateful to me for making them aware of his book. I still read in it now and then. It helps me accept things as they are and my feelings as they are. And it helps me be authentic and true to myself in my relations.
Focusing on how someone in need can best be helped, the author identifies the skills and honesty of the person who wants to help as key to how effective this can be. Looking in detail at the nature of boundaries, willingness to speak from a place of authenticity and to be honestly present to the experience of the individual person, and the sensitive and economical use of language, the author shows how people in a state of deep personal crisis can be richly helped. Taking the view that no set response is always right or always wrong, he argues strongly…
I am a psychotherapist and pastor. Since my first book Highly Sensitive People in an Insensitive World, which became an international bestseller, I have received letters from all over the world, from people, telling me about their lives. I discovered there is a need for books on how to live your life in an authentic way. I have studied Psychiatrist C.G. Jung and Philosopher Søren Kierkegaard at the university. The books, I recommend are easier to read than these two. In my books, I use many examples. It is important to me that the wisdom of great writers becomes accessible to all people regardless of their level of education.
I cried a lot, when I read this book at first. Later on I have returned to it now and then and find relief in its clear way to describe how important it is not to try to repress your grief. Face it and work through it, and you’ll afterward feel better and stronger than ever before.
Throughout life we have many opportunities to practice mourning. The better you become at going through grief, the greater becomes your courage to go into new loving relationships, and the better you become at loving.
Feelings of loss, resulting in grief, are triggered by many situations besides the death of a loved one. Healing Pain investigates why the process of grief can be such a dramatic turning-point, and why people who undergo it are never the same as they were before. A bestseller in Scandinavia, it describes the treatment methods developed by the authors to help people find the healing power inherent in health grief and gives detailed and practical advice on how to work with normal and pathological grief in individual or group settings.
