Book and Board Game Recommendations for College Freshmen and Beyond

Recommended Reading for College Freshmen

• 💡 The Captive Mind by Czesław Miłosz is recommended for its insights into human nature and the moral resonance of choices, serving as an accessible psychology textbook for impressionable minds.
• 🎯 The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen is suggested for its portrayal of a family navigating a period of significant change and uncertainty at the end of the 20th century, reflecting the feeling of standing at a precipice.
• 📚 A New History of the World by J.M. Roberts is a comprehensive, albeit large, book that helps integrate diverse pieces of information and place them in proper historical context, offering a complete perspective.
• 🧠 Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts by Clive James provides biographical portraits of significant cultural and historical figures, offering a broad range of knowledge about movements that inform contemporary society.
• ✨ High Windows by Philip Larkin is a collection of 24 short, poignant poems that begin with everyday irritations and move into profound metaphysical insights about life.
• 💰 Plunket of Tammany Hall offers a humorous and insightful look into late 19th-century New York politics, explaining the difference between honest and dishonest graft and providing a grounded perspective on how the world really works.

Favorite Board Games and Games

• ♟️ Chess is highlighted for its lifelong skill development and intellectual engagement, with personal anecdotes about the joy of teaching children and the game's profound ability to capture certain intellects.
• 🔠 Scrabble is mentioned as a game played under duress, with suggestions for family-specific rule hacks to improve pacing and enjoyment.
• 🃏 Poker is recommended for teaching valuable life lessons in betting, bluffing, and strategy, especially for teenagers.
• 🎲 Boggle is noted for its word-finding challenges, with a parent's pride in being outmatched by their child's superior vocabulary and speed.
• 🏰 Axis and Allies is presented as the best board game of all time for those with Napoleonic tendencies, allowing players to run World War II from either the Axis or Allied perspective.
• 💰 Monopoly is discussed as a historically fascinating game, originally designed to teach socialism but now known for teaching players how to bankrupt others; its unique history includes being used by the Allies to smuggle escape tools to prisoners of war.
• ⚠️ Settlers of Catan is strongly disrecommended due to its perceived tediousness and resource management focus, with advice to avoid bringing it into the home.