There’s nothing new going on in my life right now so I decided to write about the books and stories that have changed my life.

1. To Kill A Mockingbird - This is a cliché novel to pick but it really did inspire me. I first read it in my sophomore year of high school and it was one of the first books that left me thinking about it afterwards. The story of Scout is compelling but it has elements that I never really thought about outside of school. It introduced serious issues such as racial injustice and the courage it took to live in the South back then. This novel made me realize just how naive I was growing up in a town that was predominantly white.
2. My Sister’s Keeper - This novel is just inspiring because of the tragedy it possesses. I initially bought the book to read on the plane back home. I listened to an interview that Jodi Picoult gave on one of the radio stations here and had wanted to read it anyways. The story itself is just inspiring to me because it shows that anyone at any age has the right to stand up for themselves whether they think about the consequences or not. The novel is sad but it left such an impact on me that I can see myself reading, and rereading it over and over again for years to come.
3. Summer Sisters - This is sometimes categorized as a “beach read” but it was one of the first novels that I’ve read where the plot stayed with me, and I found myself relating the situations of Vix and Caitlin to my friends. For the first time (I read it when I started high school) it gave me the realization that like these two girls, I was growing up, and my life was spread out through pages that I have yet to narrate.
4. Young Goodman Brown - This is the story that introduced me to ghosts and the devil and witches. Seeing as Salem, MA is only 30 minutes from me, I found it all the more intriguing because it was accessible to explore. Though this short story is fiction, when I first read it, I felt myself traveling back in time and pretending I was Brown sneaking through the woods to frolic with the devil. It also gave me insight into just how devastating the witch hunt got in the 1600s.

These are four stories that I will keep coming back to no matter how much time passes. If you have the time to read them I recommend that you do. Is there a novel, story, or play that has changed your life?