American journalist Margaret Fuller once stated, “Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.” The quote is enough to showcase the benefits associated with reading, especially books. While all the literary material is worth going through, there are some must read books of all time, like Pride and Prejudice, which never failed to capture the attention of reading enthusiasts.
Being a book lover, I have explored multiple libraries and digital literature to improve my knowledge. Based on what I read and explored so far, I have compiled a rundown of the top 25 books you should have in your reading list, as they are enough to transform your life.
Let’s Explore Them!
25 Must Read Books for Self-Development
Here are the must read books of all time for educators to enhance their self-development.
- Author: Harper Lee
- Genre: Domestic Fiction, Thriller
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.2/5
To Kill a Mockingbird, published in 1960, is set in a small town in Alabama. It covers themes of prejudice, justice, and racism.
Harper Lee
America
I wanted you to see what real courage is instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.
- Author: Elif Shafak
- Genre: Historic Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 5/5
There is a novel inside this novel that covers the spiritual story of Shams and Rumi. Both stories are parallel.
Elif Shafak
Turkey
Every true love and friendship is a story of unexpected transformation. If we are the same person before and after we loved, that means we haven’t loved enough.
- Author: Jane Austen
- Genre: Romance, Historical Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.3/5
Pride and Prejudice is set in the early 19th century, when young fall in love with each other. They have to face titular sins P&P if they express their love and marry.
Jane Austen
Hampshire
I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look or the words which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.
- Author: George Orwell
- Genre: Dystopian Fiction, Political Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.9/5
1984 is one of the must read books of all time because it covers all aspects of a dystopian future. In addition, the era when politicians will control each aspect of humans’ lives.
George Orwell
England
Being in a minority, even in a minority of one, did not make you mad. There was truth, and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad.
- Author: George Orwell
- Genre: Fable, Political Sitare
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.9/5
This book is based on an anthropomorphic animal farm that rebels against their human farmer for a better future. Ultimately, becomes the worst decision of them.
George Orwell
England
Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals.
- Author: William Wall
- Genre: Biography
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.8/5
Inspired by the Painting of Van Gogh, showcases the life scenes of Van Gogh. Moreover, this book also inspired a movie that is available on YouTube.
William Wall
Ireland
There would come a time when I would know very well the man who would stay in that house long after its charm had faded. Everything that I am writing here now leads to that.
- Author: Elif Shafak
- Genre: Religious Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.5/5
Elif Shafak wrote this book to explore the themes of Friendship, Faith, and identity. This book revolves around a wealthy housewife who falls in love with a Philosophy professor.
Elif Shafak
Turkey
She had always suspected that even the calmest and sweetest women under stress were prone to outbursts of violence. Since she thought of herself as neither calm nor sweet, she had reckoned that her potential to lose control was considerably greater than theirs.
- Author: Vladimir Nabokov
- Genre: Tragicomedy, Erotic Novel
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.5/5
Lolita is a tragicomedy book that covers the story of a girl and a professor who fell in love with her. This book was written by Vladimir Nabokov, who was a Russian-American writer, critic, and poet.
Vladimir Nabokov
Switzerland
She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms, she was always Lolita.
- Author: Alice Walker
- Genre: Domestic Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.5/5
The Color Purple is an epistolary novel, which is based on the story of a girl’s growing up and self-realization in the African American region. She survives by rape and abuse.
Alice Walker
California
I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it. People think pleasing God is all God cares about. But any fool living in the world can see it always trying to please us back.
- Author: Héctor García, Francesc Miralles
- Genre: Self Help Book
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4/5
IKIGAI is a book based on Japan’s secret way of living. Iki means “To Live,” and Gai means “Reason.” This enclosed the secrets of living lives in hard conditions.
Héctor García and Francesc Miralles
Japan
Life is not a problem to be solved. Just remember to have something that keeps you busy doing what you love while being surrounded by the people who love you.
- Author: Ernest Hemingway
- Genre: Nautical Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.5/5
A modern fiction based on a fisherman who went hunting, but came empty handed. This story shows his dedication to his work and wins at the end.
Ernest Hemingway
America
Every day is a new day. It is better to be lucky. But I would rather be exact. Then when luck comes you are ready.
- Author: Gabriel García Márquez
- Genre: Magical Realism, Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.9/5
Love in the Time of Cholera is a romantic novel about two lovers. From which one waits for another about 52 years.
Gabriel García Márquez
Colombia
But when a woman decides to sleep with a man, there is no wall she will not scale, no fortress she will not destroy, no moral consideration she will not ignore at its very root: there is no God worth worrying about.
- Author: Gabriel García Márquez
- Genre: Magical Realism, Family Saga, Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.7/5
The story revolves around the 7th generation of Buendía Family who used to live in Macondo. Further, it covers the story of the town’s fate.
Gabriel García Márquez
Colombia
Then he made one last effort to search in his heart for the place where his affection had rotted away, and he could not find it.
- Author: Charlotte Brontë
- Genre: Gothic Fiction, Social Criticism
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.3/5
In addition, Jane Eyre is a character in the novel who faces life struggles and society against her love. The story covers the path whether she met him or not!
Charlotte Brontë
England
I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being, with an independent will; which I now exert to leave you.
- Author: Rachael Lippincott
- Genre: Fiction, Romance Novel
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.9/5
The story of two lovers who fall in love with each other in the state of cystic fibrosis in the hospital. Both have been told to stay away from each other Five Feet. The story covers their emotions and disease cures if possible.
Rachael Lippincott
Pennsylvania
We need that touch from the one we love, almost as much as we need air to breathe. I never understood the importance of touch, his touch… until I couldn’t have it.
- Author: Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
- Genre: Gothic Fiction, Horror Fiction, Science Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 5/5
Frankenstein is a novel about a science geek person who made a person out of his curiosity. Then, it became a problem for him.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Pennsylvania
There is love in me the likes of which you’ve never seen. There is rage in me the likes of which should never escape. If I am not satisfied int he one, I will indulge the other.
- Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Genre: Literary Fiction, Tragedy
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.5/5
The Great Gatsby is set in 1920s New York City and covers the life of a self-made millionaire. Whole story is narrated by the character Nick Carraway.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Saint Paul
I felt a haunting loneliness sometimes, and felt it in others–young clerks in the dusk, wasting the most poignant moments of night and life.
- Author: J.D. Salinger
- Genre: Literary Realism
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.8/5
The Catcher in the Rye explores the life of a prep expelled student Holden Caulfield. It covers how he wandered on the NYC streets and how he was introduced to the adult world.
J.D. Salinger
Manhattan
And I have one of those very loud, stupid laughs. I mean if I ever sat behind myself in a movie or something, I’d probably lean over and tell myself to please shut up.
- Author: Fyodor Dostoevsky
- Genre: Crime Fiction, Psychological Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 5/5
Crime and Punishment explores the mind of an eccentric whose thoughts are differ from the world. It covers his story of becoming a murderer with no guilt.
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Moscow
And the more I drink the more I feel it. That’s why I drink too. I try to find sympathy and feeling in drink… I drink so that I may suffer twice as much!
- Author: Niccolò Machiavelli
- Genre: Non-Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.9/5
The Prince is a book by Machiavelli on the topic of how to acquire political power. Further, the novel itself is a short political treatise.
Niccolò Machiavelli
Florence, Italy
The lion cannot protect himself from traps, and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognize traps and a lion to frighten wolves.
- Author: John Gray
- Genre: Self Help Book
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 5/5
Men Are from Mars and Women Are From Venus is a self help guide for relationships. A person who is facing issues in relationships should read this to handle them effectively.
John Gray
Pennsylvania
Men need to remember that women talk about problems to get close and not necessarily to get solutions.
- Author: Sadegh Hedayat
- Genre: Fiction, Novel
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.6/5
The Blind Owl is a fictional novel that explores the themes of a killer husband who killed her wife. It also delves into the mystery of an unknown lover to find the way out for her.
Sadegh Hedayat
Tehran, Iran
The person that I had been existed no longer. If I had been able to conjure him up and speak to him he would not have listened to me and, if he had, would not have understood what I said. He was like someone whom I had known once, but he was no part of me.
- Author: Dante Alighieri
- Genre: Narrative Poetry
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.8/5
The Divine Comedy reveals the meetings of a person who assumed himself as Dante. He meets souls in Hell, Purgatory, and in the Paradise.
Dante Alighieri
Italy
The man who lies asleep will never waken fame, and his desire and all his life drift past him like a dream, and the traces of his memory fade from time like smoke in air, or ripples on a stream.
- Author: Franz Kafka
- Genre: Novel, Dystopian Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.7/5
The Trail focuses on the story of Joseph K. who was arrested for an unknown crime. Also, it delves into themes of bureaucracy, guilt, and individual struggles.
Franz Kafka
Prague
The books we need are of the kind that act upon us like a misfortune, that makes us suffer like the death of someone we love more than ourselves, that make us feel as though we were on the verge of suicide, lost in a forest remote from all human habitation.
- Author: Leo Tolstoy
- Genre: Novel, Fiction
- Personal Recommendation Scores: 4.9/5
Leo Tolstoy penned this fiction about Anna Karenina who cheats her husband, Alexey Karenin, with Count Vronsky. Further, the story explores the theme of cheating and how it affects society.
Leo Tolstoy
Moscow
All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
Finale
These are the details about the top 25 must read books of all time for learners. While some of them are my favourite ones, others are placed in this rundown because of the exceptional literature available in them.
As they are related to different genres, you have a golden opportunity to improve your knowledge base about different topics. Many readers find these books in the market, but if they are unavailable, you can visit online book markets like Pango Books and BookFinder.
So, what are you looking for? Just grab the book and embark on a high-end learning journey!
