72 Books Like The World Doesn't End

Patti Smith’s book beautifully chronicles her intense and formative friendship with the groundbreaking artist Robert Mapplethorpe as they navigated the vibrant and often gritty art scene of late 1960s and 1970s New York City.

Theirs wasn’t a fairytale romance, but a complex, evolving bond between two flawed yet undeniably brilliant creatives. Reading about their struggles, their artistic pursuits within the legendary Chelsea Hotel, and the wider New York City scene evoked a strong sense of nostalgia for me, a time and place I've always found artistically inspiring.

The exploration of their creative partnership, the push and pull between them as individuals finding their artistic voices, is something I’ve often yearned for but haven’t quite experienced in such a profound way.

When I want to be astonished by the fierce and tender realities of the natural world—which is pretty much always—I read the late poet Mary Oliver. These are immersive essays by a writer who infused the very act of observation with a sacred energy—in her own words, “attention is the beginning of devotion.”

The essays are alive with animal life and soar with Oliver’s signature, forthright voice. In one essay, she rescues an injured gull. In another, she forages the eggs of a snapping turtle for dinner. Oliver humbly witnesses and partakes of the mystery and turns companionably to her reader with stirring questions: “Do you think there is anything not attached by its unbreakable cord to everything else?”

Once, on a weeks-long gig far from home, I stayed in a bare attic room with no TV, no internet, not even a radio. I didn’t mind. I had this translation of the Odyssey to settle down with every evening after work. I would think about it all day long: the vivid language, the fantastical events, the struggle and suffering of the protagonist. Reading it was like going to a technicolor movie every night, except that the movie was inside my head.

Talk about an essential human story—the Odyssey is four thousand years old, but its characters have the same emotions, fears, vices, and virtues we have today. Their struggles make my heart race and my eyes tear up. My imagination goes into overdrive, and I revel in the wonder.

Where do you go when all the political and social circuses have taken the last ounce of energy you can muster? Mountains and Rivers! This is where my book began. In fact, I can still see the cherry blossoms that fell into the central book margin while I read the twisting, turning, makes-meaning-in-any-direction-you-read “Star Guage” by Su Hui.

What mind conceived this brilliance? And West Cove on Orcas Island became miraculously superimposed by the natural world of Wu Wei! The Chinese poets opened a door, and now there’s no going back. The only way forward is The Cabin at the End of the World. Create it! Read it!

One of my favorite poets writing about one of my favorite artists. Cornell’s mysterious, alluring dreamscapes in his delicately crafted boxes meet their soulmate in the prose poems of Simic. In this work of only seventy-seven pages of short meditations on Cornell’s life, inspiration, and method, Simic creates the poetic equivalent of Cornell’s visual art. Simic recognizes, as did Cornell, that “The commonplace is miraculous if rightly seen, if recognized.”

It’s a short book with 5 essays on displacement, loss, and ways to find a sense of belonging. The stories are personal; perhaps because of that, they touch on something that I think many of us carry in our hearts–a need to reflect on what it means to lose and rebuild a home.

The essays evoke many different themes–the power of movement and starting anew, but also a sense of alienation that even the voluntary wanderers may never lose. We carry the cultures that shaped us within us; as Eva Hoffman, one of the authors, says, “We are nothing more than the encoded memory of our heritage.” And feeling, even if a blessing, sometimes deepens our sense of alienation.

For many of the authors, it’s the language and writing that make sense of the discomfort and find a ‘home.’ It’s a small but beautifully written book and one that inspires… show more.

Joyce Carol Oates is genuinely an extraordinary author, known for her prolific output. While some writers focus on series, Oats dedicates her time to crafting numerous standalone books, each a gem in its own right. 

The plot may appear simple at first glance—a missing sister, and a protagonist who must piece together the clues to find her. However, as the story unfolds, the reader becomes immersed in a web of subtle evidence that gradually weaves together, resulting in a rich and suspenseful novel. Put the book down.

Doubling as both a political thriller and political satire, and set on an unnamed, maybe South American island, Idra Novey’s novel about a corrupt senator stars powerful women who are determined to uncover a past sexual assault and possible murder, ultimately speaking truth to power.

This book aimed to enhance public speaking abilities using legendary speakers of the time (in 1996), these are mostly old-timers while the new “kid” is Tony Robbins.

More than 500 pages of 15 successful motivational speakers share their key content, their own motivation, their methods and practices. You get the incredible content. You get universal tips on communication. You get personal testimonies of struggle and overcoming. Sit down with these 15 masters of motivation and feel the side effect of being challenged.

This book will still be valuable 100 years from now because it is practical and inspiring. Hey, you might aspire to public speaking.

As a mom of six, I must say that I’m in a constant state of balancing motherly duties with other obligations—so Lucy Heron has my sympathy as a fellow native of Los Angeles, who juggles her kids, a bakery, and apparently her job as “Agent 485,” fighting supernatural crime.

Lucy works for a secret organization that wants to keep magic in the realm of myth and humanity none the wiser to its existence. Well, that will be tough as a tribe of ancient witches gets thrown into the mix, some unscrupulous magical beings, and the fact that this mom of three has to get this all done in time for dinner. This is definitely a fun read to check out!