I read Martin McInnes's In Ascension recently. What I loved about it is that it felt both intimate and sweeping. Intimate in the sense of going deep into the protagonist's thoughts and feelings; sweeping in the nature of the things she thinks and does. Discovering and investigating things beyond all human knowledge, monologuing about the cyclic nature of life... The former keeps it grounded, the latter makes it exciting.

Another book that made me feel a similar way is Jeff Vandermeer's Annihilation, although it's a very different kind of awe. Being a horror book and all.

What are other books that can make me feel that way again?

Say as a sort of intro/starter to help them figure out if the genre's to their tastes or not.

I want to get up off my ass and actually attempt to contribute to lemmy eventually if I can

I love literature as much as the next person but sometimes I want to just shut my brain off and immerse myself in a simple engaging story. Any suggestions?

Title, I basically want to see a book that would be like a technical book on science or engineering or naval strategy if it weren't fiction.

Assuaging or reconciling, couldn't really decide.

Lately I've been feeling in something of a rut on how to go about participating in much of, well, anything given how things are. You buy this or that, despite knowing workers probably aren't being treated well, but you aren't sure what you could do to help.

This could be anything ranging from histories of organizing to help guide action, contemporary works that better help pointing to what may be done today, or general old meditations on this from throughout time.

One I've already set aside to dig through, despite some misgivings with it from parts I've read (or perhaps it was from another related work by the author, it's been awhile), is Moral Man and Immoral Society by Reinhold Niebuhr.

Another I've kept meaning to finish that somewhat touches on this subject as well was Pragmatism by William James, which I'd easily recommend as remarkably prescient for the time it was written, at least imo.

Thanks for any suggestions, and p.s. the first book I've mentioned may be available through your library if you're curious about it.

I have a giant mixture of how I discover new books, but my biggest thing is mainly browsing local library website and their weekly lists of new releases as well as different book review aggregator sites