it doesn’t have to be your favorite book or anything. It can be any book that you find yourself thinking of with a sense of pride for having read it.
Personally, I am really proud of myself for not DNFing A Little Life and pushing forward. I read a very good chunk of that book with tears running down my face–mind you, I was reading it on my phone during lectures for the entirety of my first semester last year–and I was always on the verge of putting it down just because of the horrible content. Also, it was pretty long; too long, actually. So when I was done, I was simultaneously Heartbroken, broken (just like in general), and relieved. It was truly a feat.
An honorable mention is A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, because I swear to God I did not understand a single thing about it even 10 chapters in. Charles Dickens is too much.
As a non-native English speaker: Moby Dick on English.
But the encyclopedic knowledge it contains is awesome. I too am a non-native English speaker but with an intense fascination for Geography and History. So I enjoyed every bit of it. For reference I used powermobydick.com. After reading it I got bitten by Thalassophillia. So I further read following books on Sailing.
David Grann: The Wager: A tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder
Alfred Lansing:Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage
Dava Sobel:Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time
Martin Dugard:Farther than any man
I am a native English speaker. I have not gotten past the fourth chapter!
As an English-speaker: same!
Yeah that book is rough, really good but it’s a slog.