How to Read Again: Both Fiction and Non-fiction

>>9053350
These guys are going to bog you down with a lot of dense literature and required readings for required readings for books you "Don't get" until the fifth time through. It's not what you're asking for. What are you into? Try the hitchiker's guide to the galaxy series or anything by Douglas Adams. You can breeze through them all in a week and get some momentum going and get a good, encouraging sense of what it feels like to watch pages disappear.

Nonfictions:
Carl Sagan for a good sense of size and scale of the universe, the place of life in it.
Richard Dawkins for the ideal of altruism in an indifferent universe.
Terence mckenna for drugs
Jung to understand Terence mckenna
Julian Jaynes to make you say what the fuck
Noam Chomsky to open your eyes
Tolkien to know what all fantasy wishes it was.
Doctor who to know what all scifi wishes it was.
David foster wallace if you want to know what everyone on /lit/ wishes they was.

Quick, get away from this place before it's too late.

>>9053350
1984

OP, just re-read the books that you enjoyed. if it's really been that long, you'll see how much you changed since you last read them - which is cool and valuable, unlike the "dorky white guy starter kit" up there

>>9053350
I'd recommend Brian Sanderson (Mistborn and Stormlight Archives) for transitioning from technical to fiction. His magic system is really logical and at parts seems kind of like an instruction manual but the stories are engaging.

>>9053350
i'm sort of in the same boat, but like a year back i started reading again, try books that same your interest in tv shows and film, so if you like viking tv show read vikings fiction etc. I'm half way through the broken sword by poul anderson right now and it's really really good, i'm only reading it because i couldn't find a pdf of his Tau Zero anywhere hahaha.

I really like sci fi and fantasy

/lit/ will hate me for this but looking up any list of high school reading books will provide you books that are mostly both 1. notable/quality/influential fiction and 2. something which is emotionally and technically accessible to someone who might not be an academic.

I was not in the same situation, but my freshman year of college I realized how little I was reading. I did very few of the reading assignments for my first-year seminar, and throughout high school I read maybe a couple books a year. I'm not sure where the inspiration came from, but reading One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest led me to taking a lot of literature and writing courses at my school. There are a lot of books that have literary merit that are also readable for any native English speaker.