Anyone's life could be turned into a suspenseful movie or an irresistible book. But only a few are able to put their lives on paper. And when it does, readers around the world can peek into the incredible stories based on true events and marvel. We present extraordinary books based on true events that are worth every minute of your time.
Incredible books based on true events:
1. The Glass Castle - Jeannette Walls
Jeannette Walls was by no means living an ordinary life. Her autobiography gives a very personal account of her family situation, poverty and dysfunctional parents. In parallel, the author describes the socio-economic problems in America. The Glass Castle is one of America's finest contemporary memoirs.
2. Into the Abyss - Carol Shaben
Amazing stories about plane crashes are hardly boring. But this is more than just a story about a plane crash. Carol Shaben, the daughter of one of the survivors of the 1948 plane crash, wrote an excellent book that describes how the lives, worldviews and relationships of the survivors changed after the crash.
3. Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down - Anne Fadiman
The tragic story of Lia Lee, the daughter of Hmong immigrants from California, who suffered from epilepsy and as a result stopped functioning. But Anne Faidman goes beyond describing the struggle with the disease and takes the reader to the heart of the problems of the collision of two cultures. On the one hand, Li's family rejects Western medicine, while on the other, Californian doctors struggle with respecting the parents' wishes and with the responsibility of helping the girl anyway.
4. Random Family: Love, Drugs, Troubles and Coming of Age in the Bronx - Adrian Nicole LeBlanc
The author's recollection of poverty and life in the Bronx ghetto vividly shows her growing up in all its chaos and horror. A book about uncovering the truth that lies beneath the glamor of gangsterism, the fear of the FBI and life on the streets.
5. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks - Rebbeca Skloot
Medical students are familiar with the story of Henrietta Lacks. It is little clear to others how important her cells were for the development of healthcare and medicine. Miss Lacks was a poor descendant of slaves. She was suffering from cervical cancer and before her death, doctors started researching her cells without her knowledge. This led to some revolutionary discoveries, including the discovery of the polio vaccine. The book portrays the life of Henrietta Lacks, the incredible level of racism she faced throughout her life, and the course of her illness, which contributed to important discoveries in medicine.
6. When Heaven and Earth Changed Places - Le Ly Hayslip
The Vietnam War was constantly described, analyzed, debated and exploited through the eyes of Americans. In short, this topic has been thoroughly covered. But what was life like on the other side of the bank during the war? Le Ly Hayslip wrote a novel about the events in her village during the US-Vietnam War. A moving book that provides a valuable counterweight to the one-sided truth.
7. Traveling with Charley - John Steinbeck
In the 1960s, the already established writer John Steinbeck packed his essentials, took his dog Charley and set off on a trip across the United States. As only a good observer and an exceptional writer can do, Steinbeck brought back from the trip a wonderful book about the search for American identity. Traveling with Charley is, on the one hand, a book about the writer's retrospective memories, and on the other, a study of America's too long unresolved conflicts, especially racism.
8. The Living: A Survivor's Story from the Andes - Piers Paul Read
Another story from the hands and hearts of plane crash survivors. In 1972, 16 members of a rugby team survived a plane crash in the Andes. But in addition to the accident, they had to spend another ten weeks trapped in the snowy mountains. The author without embellishment describes the struggle between the desire to survive and the power of unforgiving nature.
