I would love to get a reading list going...Im sure this belongs in another section but alas I cant post anywhere else. I would like the only restrictions to be, it must have been a book you completely read, and you must give a short description and any insights you gained.

Kind of like a mini book club

I'm not sure this is an introduction essay , but anyway... The first thing that comes to mind is probably the book that has changed my life more than any other and provided the most sharp turning point along my journey through life thus far:

The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge by Carlos Castaneda

I'm guessing the man needs little introduction for many around these parts. However, to satisfy the thread, the book is about an anthropologist, Castaneda himself, who travels to Mexico in order to study the cultural appropriation of peyote, as far as I remember. Instead he ends up under the tutelage of Don Juan, a Yaqui sorcerer. This is presented as a real-life series of events, and supposedly was actual Castaneda's submission as his master's thesis.

This is all very controversial, but the legitimacy of his claims aside, it still blew my mind. I was 16 when I read it, and it has been the catalyst for everything I have done in my life from that point on. Everything changed after that book. Everything. I don't know that it would have the same impact if I read it now, learning what I have learned since then, but the point is that everything I have learned since then is partially due to this book.

Great Topic. While I have read many books that have made an indelible impression on me, I would begin with the following: 1. Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy - THis book introduced me to the world of the spirit. 2. Be Here Now, Baba Ram Das continued and deepened my interest in the spiritual/mystical and 3. I am That, Nisargadata Maharaj, advaitic master. As you read this book it speaks to you in a way that transcends the actual words. All are highly recommended.

I'd recommend Henry Miller's Tropic of Capricorn, in the interest of 'mystical'. He was not on LSD as far as I'm aware, and everything he wrote was long before any of that really got started but the flavor of his writing as well as the deep, ruminative exposition and captioning of his own human experience was reminiscent to me of many philosophical writers and later fiction likely influenced by his work. His words themselves are psychedelic, and I don't think any other book has so far made me laugh so hard I couldn't see the page. This man was an angel.

Also, Blood Meridian ('or the Evening Redness in the West' by Cormac McCarthy. It is a fiction, and again not much 60's and 70's pop culture influence so far as I can tell, but highly entertaining and even spiritual though it was not intended to be. He is prose from top to bottom, and all fire. There is an endless wealth of passages from this book alone that I would spam without hesitation any forum's quotes section with pleasure. He also wrote No Country for Old Men, which is another great one but not as relevant here.

I would also stand behind Euphor's suggestion, 'The Yaqui Way' had a very powerful message were it a faithful account, pure fantasy or what. There is one particularly hilarious peyote trip report in there I remember that I felt also demonstrated the good nature of the company he kept in that time frame, also.

And of course, an obligatory, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.