Greatest book in history?

The Holy Bible, New Living Translation. It's translated into modern English and easy to understand.

I am a personal fan of the ESV, but to each his own. From my limited knowledge of Bible translations, I understand that NLT is much easier to read and ESV is more word-for-word accurate to the original text.

That's great, God won't save you from the real world. Crime and Punishment is the greatest novel ever written about reality, which is what most of us live in.

Born to Run. Barefoot running is the future

“ Picketts Charge”

by George Stewart

I have never understood the thought that went in to that charge despite at least two battlefield reconnaissance meetings between Lee and Longstreet

THEN, Longstreet writes a note to EP Alexander the artillery commander telling him in a sense, “ hey, I don’t believe in this charge so I’m leaving it up to you to tell Pickett when to advance “!!!

Its a darn good thing they didn’t have the media back then that they got today.

The Alchemist was pretty incredible

For whom the Bell Tolls , Hemingway

OP should just say, "Aside from the Holy Bible..."

I think The Brothers Karamazov is better than Crime and Punishment, so it gets my vote.

I also think Kafka's The Trial is up there. As is Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath.

Moby Dick? The Magic Mountain?

That book is a demented mashup of sordid pseudo-history, absurd myths and pretentious moralizations

doesn't matter if you believe in that stuff, as literature it is a pile of garbage

Don Ritchie's autobiography.

Having hiked the Picketts Charge route a handful of times, I can't imagine doing it under cannon and gunfire. That took some serious cajones.

On a similar note, as a Civil War buff, I love most books written by Noah Andre Trudeau.

The Wind in the Willows

There is no greatest book - too many good ones.

I'm reading the Wayfinder by Adam Johnson. Its a novel about life and politics in ancient Tonga. Its well researched and its very interesting reading about a pre-literate people.

If you want to read a fantasy, the best thing in recent years is The Tyrant Philosophers by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Its about an expansionist empire with the goal of spreading "perfection', its colonies, and the states that exist on its periphery. The perfect society is seen as atheistic - only thing is gods are very real in this world. Great characters, great world building.

Of course, The Name of the Wind is a personal favorite of mine too.

If you want to read nonfiction - 1929 by Andrew Sorkin is worth a read. Its of course about the causes of the stock market crash.

If you want to read a classic - The Odyssey is topical atm as a film adaptation is coming in July.

If you want to read the next big thing (maybe). James Cameron optioned Joe Abercrombie's 'The Devils'. Its about the quest to install an exiled princess on the throne of Troy, capital of a Byzantine Empire analog (except its the Carthaginian, not Roman rump state) in an alternate history version of Europe with magic and fantasy elements.

https://ia801509.us.archive.org/9/items/TheBrigade/TheBrigade.pdf

The Spirit as Adversary of the Soul