Love The Red Lion? Readers share 100 books like The Red Lion...

I read this book when it came out in the ‘70s, and I was in my mid-twenties, with only the most abstract, hypothetical awareness of my own mortality. It opened my eyes to the fact that our avoidance of thinking about our own deaths is not just an individual quirk of cowardice but a foundation of human culture and individual action.

To me, the latest popular manifestation of this avoidance is the current popular obsession with longevity, and this remains as current as the day it was published 50 years ago.

The next one on my list of the top 5 spiritual books is The Book of Secrets by Osho. He is my favorite spiritual teacher, and although he never wrote any books, the texts from his speeches were published in several compilations. Everything you read from him can be useful, but this book stands above the rest in its length, depth and practicality.

This book is based on a 5000 year old tantric scripture consisting of 112 meditations to achieve liberation. What Osho basically does is that he adds commentaries and his own experiences to each of the techniques, thereby making them understandable and practical for the modern seeker. If I had to recommend any book on meditation, it would definitely be this one.

The third book I would suggest is Living with the Himalayan Masters by Swami Rama. Written as an autobiography, this book follows the life of a famous spiritual teacher, and his many adventures on his path to becoming one. I personally love biographies, and this was one of the most interesting ones for me. I think you would get just as inspired by it as me, and you could even continue with The Autobiography of a Yogi by Yogananda.

I love this book!  I’ve returned to it many times over the years. It’s my rock. It contains a series of questions and responses of students in dialogue with the well-known Indian sage Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj. His teachings are direct, down-to-earth, and very timely, in that they address matters of continued importance to all of us: the nature of reality, suffering, mind, body, agency, fear, happiness, peace…and pretty much every truth you can think of!  It’s 550 pages of unadulterated wisdom.   

It was very exciting. The book is about coincidences/synchronicities and being guided by signs, visions, and feelings. I was already caught up in a spiritual path when this book appeared, and it was like a whirlwind time for me. I was led into many different studies, eventually returning to Christianity. This book was close to the beginning of a journey that began 30 years ago. 

This book, though, opened my eyes to the connection between a higher intelligence and yourself. Its magnificent guidance led me, which I still rely on today. I swear that that ability has saved me daily by following Christ. I learned that the world was very full, alive, exciting, and not mundane.

The companion reader was helpful and one very significant thing that I learned is how we choose our parents and to understand why and the qualities they have that I needed in this sojourn.… show more.

I read this wonderful coming-of-age tale when I was in my teens, but its magical mood remained with me ever since.

Reading the story of Emil Sinclair meeting the enigmatic Demian at school–who not only freed him from bullies but showed him that there was another world usually invisible to the common senses–set me on a life-long journey in search of the miraculous. 

This was one of my favourite reads ever: I truly lived through all of its pages. It is the true story of Hayashi, an 8th Dan Karate master teaching his protégé student not only martial arts but life.

I savoured every page, longing and aspiring for a similar relationship to explore such depths of the human psyche. It was one of those rare occasions when I felt the urge to contact the author, which led to a unique and wonderful friendship between Hayashi and myself.  

This book is so amazing because it describes the real-life spiritual adventures of the legendary transpersonal psychologist, Dr. Stan Grof, who has taken many journeys into non-ordinary states of consciousness.

The book describes what becomes possible when we shift our awareness away from a mere materialist outlook on the world and give consciousness a fundamental role. I like to refer back to it, again and again, to remind myself that the limitations of my perception are the limitations of my mind: If I open up my mind, even the so-called impossible will begin to happen.  

Kristóf (1935-2011) was a Hungarian writer who fled to Switzerland during the war and wrote in French.

The Notebook (the first in the trilogy) is currently number one on my list of all-time favourites. It has all the elements of storytelling that I love: deep, psychological insight into the human heart; adroit use of archetypes, which give the book a timeless, folkloric feel; concision (no waffling) and a poetic, pared-back language that creates a sense of startling immediacy.

Kristóf writes about World War II through the eyes of two young brothers in a Nazi-occupied country (unnamed), and she shocks us awake not through sensationalised violence but through matter-of-fact narration.

It reads like a cross-between dramatic monologue and biblical parable – she stretches the novel form and opens up new possibilities for writing. 

I can’t forget my very talented compatriot, Magda Szabó’s great writing. I am very proud of her and her success. It was hard work and lasted a lifetime for her to reach as Hungarian her books became popular worldwide. I hope one day I can follow her… This book is set in a religious school in the middle of World War II. The protagonist is young Gina, the daughter of a Hungarian General. The novel analyzes important social problems, teenager problems. At first, Gina is an outcast then we can see how she tries to fit in the class, and she makes friends. Friendship and togetherness are in the spotlight in this novel.