Making Tibetan Buddhist teachings accessible, this “handbook for
living” lets us in on the purpose of life – you guessed it:
happiness – and how to conquer anxiety and anger. Like this? Try
Pema Chödrön’s The Places That Scare You, a rallying cry to live
and love deeply.

Way before Marie Kondo was making us toss away anything that
didn’t spark joy, Thoreau spent two years, two months and two days
on the shores of Walden Pond in Massachusetts, living minimally,
growing his own food, journaling, and so on. Consider the resulting
book – in which the seasons symbolise personal development – the OG
manual for a simple life.

Legend (read: the Goop Podcast) has it that this book, along
with The Seat of the Soul by Gary Zukav, inspired Oprah to be more
present. Our problems involve either stressing about the past or
worrying about the future. Live in the now.

Most travel literature tells us where to go; de Botton asks why.
Frank yet philosophical, he explores the motivations behind our
voyages around the world and questions why reality seldom matches
our fantasies. “Journeys are the midwives of thought”, he writes.
“Few places are more conducive to internal conversations than a
moving plane, ship or train.”

Making the history of natural sciences accessible – scrap that,
making it fascinating – Bryson’s book takes us from the Big Bang to
present-day, asking questions such as “what are black holes?” and
“how do cells work?”, while untangling string theory. Like this?
Read A Little History of the World by Ernst H. Gombrich or Yuval
Noah Harari’s Sapiens.

Evaristo’s Booker Prize-winning novel follows the lives and
struggles of 12 diverse characters – mostly black women in the UK –
over several decades. It paints a dynamic picture of modern Britain
and womanhood, concluding that “this is about being / together.”

You’ve probably watched The Call to Courage on Netflix (and if
you haven’t, you should). Brown dispels the cultural myth that
vulnerability is a weakness – in fact, it’s the most accurate
measure of courage. “When we shut ourselves off from
vulnerability,” she writes, “we distance ourselves from the
experiences that bring purpose and meaning to our lives.”

Challenging our idea of the traditional atlas, Schalansky blends
fact and fantasy, bringing to life alternative worlds as she lures
readers from Bear Island to Tristan da Cunha. Subtitled “Fifty
Islands I Have Not Visited and Never Will”, it’s a slim read that
will make you question whether the most adventurous journeys
actually take place in the mind.

As fictional Hollywood actress Maria Wyeth spirals out of
control, Didion dissects American life in the late 60s. Fifty years
after publication, this book’s weary nihilism forces readers to
reflect both on themselves and on a society in which nothing is
ever quite good enough.

Following an Andalusian shepherd boy’s journey across the North
African desert, this soul-searching modern classic reveals the
difference between gold and treasure, and how to channel courage as
we follow our dreams.

“The core of a man’s spirit comes from new experiences,” writes
Krakauer as he retraces the steps of Christopher McCandless who, in
a bid for self-discovery, renounced his material possessions and
hitchhiked from the Mojave Desert to Alaska, and whose decomposed
body was found four months later by a moose hunter. It’s a dark,
soul-searching read.

This book is best leafed through in the face of a crisis or
crossroads. Subtitled “The Journey Beyond Yourself”, it taps into
the practices of meditation and mindfulness to break down our
mental barriers and transform our consciousness – all in an easily
digestible, intuitive way.

Cosmology might not be your subject of choice, but hear us out.
Hawking’s highly readable book will change not just your view of
the world, but the universe (and our insignificant part in it) as
it probes subjects including alternative dimensions, antimatter and
time travel.

Though this book was published in 2006, it couldn’t feel more
timely. Posing the question “what should we have for dinner?”, it
gazes from farm to fork, considering the relationship between
modern society and what we eat. Food for thought, indeed.

This dystopian tale reminds us that you can’t have rainbows
without a little rain. Readers meet 12-year-old Jonas, who lives in
a seemingly perfect world. Yet when the young man becomes a
“receiver”, he discovers that a world without pain is also devoid
of joy.

Opening our eyes to the horrors of slavery in 1800s, Morrison’s
Pulitzer-winning tale (inspired by the real-life story of Margaret
Garner, known for killing her own daughter rather than allowing the
child to be enslaved) is one of heartache and hope. It follows
Sethe, a slave who has been emancipated but cannot escape the
ghosts of her brutal past.

Following protagonist Billy Pilgrim, this retelling of the
Allied firebombing of Dresden during the Second World War is
flecked with elements of sci-fi that make you question the nature
of experience and the limits of time and space. Much like Joseph
Heller’s Catch 22, Vonnegut’s book throws a harsh yet darkly
humorous light on the futility of war.

Travelling between the Deep South and Harlem, a young, nameless
African American man moves through life unseen. Published in the
50s, this novel still feels relevant today as it explores themes of
race and bigotry.

Loosely based on Eugenides’s (also author of Virgin Suicides)
own life and Greek heritage, this coming-of-age novel probes the
nature versus nurture conundrum. If you’re interested in gender,
social constructs or how family and biology shape your identity,
this is for you.

A fictional father-and-son motorcycle trip across northwest
America (completing a Chautauqua spiritual journey) becomes an
odyssey into life’s big questions, diving into philosophical
questions on love, fear, growth, discovery and acceptance.

Does this book need an introduction? Documenting Angelou’s
experiences of racism and childhood rape, I Know Why the Caged Bird
Sings is the first of seven autobiographical novels. It forces
readers to dwell on hope, strength and victimhood in the face of
oppression.

Cognitive psychologist Kahneman won the Nobel Prize for Economic
Sciences in 2002. Differentiating between slow, rational thinking
and the fast, intuitive kind, his best-selling book makes us
question our own judgement calls and helps us to make better
decisions.

If you’re after an easy read, skip this. In the wake of the 1994
Rwandan genocide (in which an estimated one million Tutsi, Twa and
moderate Hutu people were killed in just 100 days) Gourevitch
travels around the country interviewing survivors and reflecting on
genocide. If this gets you thinking, try Man’s Search for Meaning,
in which Viktor Frankl dwells on the power of purpose while
chronicling his time as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps.

Disarmingly candid, this up-and-down essay on ageing sparkles
thanks to Ephron’s smart, dry prose. Expect intel such as “never
marry a man you wouldn’t want to be divorced from” and “anything
you think is wrong with your body at the age of 35, you will be
nostalgic for by the age of 45”. For further ruminations on growing
old, pick up Immortality by Milan Kundera.