light reading
Reference
The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, Envisioning
Information, and Visual Explanations, Edward Tufte. Three staples
of every designer's shelf.
Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud. This guy put comics
back on the map.
The Copy Book, D&AD Council. The world's best copywriters
strut their stuff.
A Smile in the Mind, McAlhone & Stuart. Packed with
examples of excellence in graphic design.
Designing Web Usability, Jakob Nielsen. The old stalwart
of useit.com.
The Design of Everyday Things, Don Norman. Jakob's pal
takes interface into a broader context.
About Face, Alan Cooper. Focussed on application UIs,
not web IIs, but still of huge value.
Telecosm, George Gilder. Factors driving technology markets
from a guy who does his homework.
The Elegant Universe, Brian Greene. Masterful human-scale
explanation of string theory.
The Five Ages of the Universe, Adams and Laughlin. A
biography of it all, extrapolated mind-bogglingly far into the future.
Molecular Biology of the Cell, Bruce Alberts et al. The
best textbook ever written; get an education just by reading the chapter and
paragraph headings.
Nanosystems, K Eric Drexler. The first text dealing with the
real engineering problems faced by nanotechnology.
Entertainment
The Sandman 1-10, Neil Gaiman. Comics' finest hour.
Watchmen, Moore and Gibbons. To comics what Tarantino
was to pulp fiction.
Literature
Complete Short Stories, Ernest Hemingway. Make sure you
get the Finca Vigia edition.
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
Edward Gibbon. Read it for its sheer scale.