I can say without a doubt that G.K. Chesterton has influenced my thinking
more than any other author. However, I find it extremely difficult to
pinpoint a specific book responsible for this. Chesterton is a unique author
in that his fiction and non-fiction are both charged with spiritual lessons
and theological insights, but where the non-fiction works communicate these
points through logical argument, his fiction supplies "real world" examples
of the types of people that should be produced by the philosophical and
religious outlook expounded in his non-fiction.

That said, I do think that, of his more intellectual works, Chesterton's
most influential books for me are Orthodoxy and The Everlasting Man. Both
of these writings have had a huge impact on my thinking, one I would say was
revelatory. Orthodoxy overflows with "gestalt" moments, when, after going
through a lengthy preliminary argument, Chesterton delivers a final blow,
and you simply know what he's saying is irrefutably true. It is a strange
quality to explain, in that it mixes intellectual arguments with extreme
pragmatism to articulate points that, once made, seem insanely obvious.

Chesterton's uncanny "horse-sense" is also well displayed in The Everlasting
Man. I have never read a book that better communicates the Christian view
of history. It showcases the devolution of man from the Fall till the
coming of Christ, the cataclysmic nature of his coming, and the irrefutable
change wrought in the world after his death and resurrection with more force
and brilliance than any other work within my intellectual experience.
Chapters such as "The Man In The Cave", "The Wars of Gods and Demons", "The
God in the Cave", and "The Five Deaths of the Faith" bowl one over with the
immense and weighty truth they communicate.

Both of these books are full of brilliant truths that are often, in the
author's own words, "too big to be seen."

-Alex