Why am I passionate about this?

 I’ve always loved a good mystery that doesn’t give you all the details upfront. My favourite stories growing up were those where I had little epiphanies along the way until I got to the end, where everything finally fell into place. But perhaps why I’m most drawn to these types of stories is because they parallel learning about your surroundings in the real world. After living in several different countries, I’ve come to learn many situations piece by piece, where some ended in danger, while others were more humorous events that I can now laugh about. 


I wrote

The Dream Factory

By Jon Vassa,

Book cover of The Dream Factory

What is my book about?

This is a story of loss in a dystopian world.

As time has progressed, the people living in this world…

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The books I picked & why

Book cover of The Road

Jon Vassa Why did I love this book?

At the time, when I read this book, I’d just become a father. Naturally, the story about a father trying to protect his son in a harsh dystopian world was captivating for me and still is to this day.

I loved the book's gritty realism and felt as if I were walking beside the characters during the entire journey. I also found McCarthy’s writing style unique and something new from the best-selling paperbacks I’d often read before picking up his book.

By Cormac McCarthy,

Why should I read it?

35 authors picked The Road as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE • A searing, post-apocalyptic novel about a father and son's fight to survive, this "tale of survival and the miracle of goodness only adds to McCarthy's stature as a living master. It's gripping, frightening and, ultimately, beautiful" (San Francisco Chronicle).

A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don't know what, if…


Book cover of Ubik

Jon Vassa Why did I love this book?

I loved this book for the new concepts it brought to me about psychic abilities, specifically telepaths that could block other’s psychic abilities.

After this, I was drawn to the book for the way it blurred the lines of reality, making me question alongside the main character if anything they were experiencing was real. I also thought the idea of the UBIK drug that kept people in a 'half-life' was fascinating and a different way to show addiction and its consequences.

Lastly, the ending was quite thrilling and kept me reading into the wee hours of the morning, even though I had work the next day! 

By Philip K. Dick,

Why should I read it?

8 authors picked Ubik as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A classic science fiction tale of artifical worlds by one of the great American writers of the 20th century

Glen Runciter is dead.

Or is he?

Someone died in the explosion orchestrated by his business rivals, but even as his funeral is scheduled, his mourning employees are receiving bewildering messages from their boss. And the world around them is warping and regressing in ways which suggest that their own time is running out.

If it hasn't already.

Readers minds have been blown by Ubik:

'Sheer craziness, a book defying any straightforward synopsis . . . a unique time travel adventure…


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Book cover of Black Crow Cabin

Black Crow Cabin by Peggy Webb,

A small town in the grips of evil... a single mom with nowhere to turn... and a madman who will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

He is the Collector, and he's taking prized possessions, pets, and children, keeping what he wants, and burying his rejects in shallow…

Book cover of The Stars My Destination

Jon Vassa Why did I love this book?

This book blew my mind! It changed my life and gave me food poisoning; well, maybe it was some lousy shrimp that did that, but it came around the same time anyhow.

I loved the initial point of revenge, how the main character was abandoned to die in a broken spaceship in the middle of nowhere. I, too, would be pissed if a ship flew by me without stopping to save my butt.

I was happy that the book also played with metaphysical notions and cranked up the ending to a glorious finish that broke from the standard good-guy wins trope.

By Alfred Bester,

Why should I read it?

5 authors picked The Stars My Destination as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Gully Foyle, Mechanic's Mate 3rd Class, is the only survivor on his drifting, wrecked spaceship. When another space vessel, the Vorga, ignores his distress flares and sails by, Gully Foyle becomes a man obsessed with revenge. He endures 170 days alone in deep space before finding refuge on the Sargasso Asteroid and then returning to Earth to track down the crew and owners of the Vorga. But, as he works out his murderous grudge, Gully Foyle also uncovers a secret of momentous proportions...


Book cover of The Stepford Wives

Jon Vassa Why did I love this book?

I love a book that can make you feel paranoid the whole time. I don’t know why but I also love stories that can paint a place as idyllic while all the while, as a reader, you pick up on all the red flags your character misses until it’s too late.

I’ve never seen either of the film adaptations, but I’ve got to say, this book gave me chills not just for its premise but its bleak ending as well. It made me dwell on this after reading: how far can you trust the people you believe love you the most?

As a bonus, I liked the ideas presented in the book about how society often tries to fit individuals into certain boxes or to conform to their "idea" of a beautiful life.

By Ira Levin,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Stepford Wives as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The internationally bestselling novel by the author of A Kiss Before Dying, The Boys from Brazil, and Rosemary's Baby

With an Introduction by Peter Straub

For Joanna, her husband, Walter, and their children, the move to beautiful Stepford seems almost too good to be true. It is. For behind the town's idyllic facade lies a terrible secret -- a secret so shattering that no one who encounters it will ever be the same.

At once a masterpiece of psychological suspense and a savage commentary on a media-driven society that values the pursuit of youth and beauty at all costs, The…


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Book cover of The Devil To Pay

The Devil To Pay by Gary Blackwood,

Some knowledge is dangerous... especially in the wrong hands...

As the conflict in Vietnam heats up, Simon Hannay is pursuing his Masters in Comparative Literature at a Midwest university, teaching karate on the side and doing his best to avoid the draft. He's not overly excited about his thesis... until…

Book cover of Kafka on the Shore

Jon Vassa Why did I love this book?

 I enjoyed the magical realism in this book. It was a nice read that took me away from reality for a while.

I think I’m drawn to stories about runaways also for my own personal reasons, feeling as if I never belonged at my home and having to make it out in the world on my own. I was also glad to see the incorporation of Yamanashi prefecture, as I’d stayed there for several months while working on a Japanese peach farm during my vagabond days.

However, what made this book stick in my head so many years later were some of the more brutal scenes and how things could take a sudden and disturbing turn. Not that I love violence for the sake of violence, but that the book kept me on my toes, never sure of what I might encounter on the next page. 

By Haruki Murakami,

Why should I read it?

10 authors picked Kafka on the Shore as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"A stunning work of art that bears no comparisons" the New York Observer wrote of Haruki Murakami's masterpiece, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle. In its playful stretching of the limits of the real world, his magnificent new novel, Kafka on the Shore is every bit as bewitching and ambitious. The narrative follows the fortunes of two remarkable characters. Kafka Tamura runs away from home at fifteen, under the shadow of his father's dark prophesy. The aging Nakata, tracker of lost cats, who never recovered from a bizarre childhood affliction, finds his highly simplified life suddenly overturned. Their parallel odysseys - as…


Explore my book 😀

The Dream Factory

By Jon Vassa,

Book cover of The Dream Factory

What is my book about?

This is a story of loss in a dystopian world.

As time has progressed, the people living in this world have lost their freedom to dream at night, lost their freedom to private life, and even lost their ability to create a life they dream of achieving. In this suffocating world, though, Junko slowly uncovers a greater conspiracy at work as she dives deeper and deeper into the forbidden world of dreams.   

Book cover of The Road
Book cover of Ubik
Book cover of The Stars My Destination

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