Basically what the title says: Is there any fiction book you’ve ever read that has emotionally or intellectually connected with you so much it changed the way you viewed the world, changed the way you viewed yourself or changed the way you viewed life (your own or in general)?
If so…
- What book was it?
- Why did it connect so well with you?
- How did it make you feel?
- And how did it change you?
Just to emphasize, I’m solely asking about works of fiction here. So nothing like reading just an academic book on philosophy or a self-help book or something.
Elfquest is a series of graphic novels, a fantasy story about a community of elves and other fictional species who struggle to survive and coexist on a primitive Earth-like planet with two moons.
My older brother was reading them, so I started them as well, and they really changed by worldview for the better. The artwork is really, really beautiful, and the idea of a group of elves who commune with wolves to survive in an alien environment is such a cool idea. The books made me feel transported to another, wilder place.
There are no villains in these books, at least not in the standard sense. Some characters do horrible things, but because they are flawed, misunderstood, traumatised or misguided. The humans who torture and kill elves have their reasons. The trolls, who enslave rock-shaper elves, have their reasons. Some elves want to subjugate their own kind and annihilate elves with ‘mixed blood’, and even they have their reasons. Understanding that made me better understand the world I live in. and made me more empathetic.
If anyone wants to read these books, the creators have put most of the series online for free.
It’s ElfQuest for me too! After years of admiring the front cover and asking about every character in the cast photo on the back cover of my aunt’s Donning editions of the Original Quest, at 7 I was finally allowed to save up my allowance to special order a volume of my own from WaldenBooks. (I bought the first 3 Father Tree Press hardcovers this way… then received 4-8 for Christmas!)
So many moments in the Original Quest had a profound effect on how I see the world. At the end of the day I feel like it’s a series about seeking to understand and accept others; that we all have good qualities and bad qualities, circumstances and reasons. That there will be times of struggle and hardship as well as times of happiness and plenty, and we should endeavor to be present and make the most of all of them.
I still have that copy I bought as a kid. (And the Donning and Dark Horse editions of the Original Quest… and I’d like to get the Archives and Gallery editions, too.) Maybe it’s time for a re-read.