The Island is #21 in Jordan Peterson’s list of 100 great books. “Nice comfortable people just don’t have any idea what the world is like.” Will Farnaby is a cynical, depressed, neurotic but witty journalist who works for a rich man he despises (the average westerner, basically). His worldview changes drastically when he is shipwrecked on the forbidden island of Pala. According to the locals, Pala is exempt from the horrors that the rest of the world considers inevitable — war, poverty, depression, addictions, late night infomercials.