Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens

The primary factor that places a book among my favorites is that it inspires me to be a better person. This is just such a book. Dickens gives us human greed, human envy and human cruelty in full measure, but also human sympathy, human generosity and human charity in full measure too. This is a coming of age story in which the protagonist opens our eyes to what it means to be a great man. The Great Expectations of the title ultimately deal with the yearning in our own heart to live up to the best that is in us.