Spiritual Books part 2

I meant to finish this post a long time ago, but here we go.
So, I talked about what is wrong with most spiritual writing, but surely there are good books out there too, right? Well, yes, few and far between, but yes. I will talk about some of the ones that have meant something to me:

When it comes to traditional christian writing, I have read very few books that I have liked. I can think of several books that I found acceptable (Raggamuffin Gospel, Blue Like Jazz), but I wouldn't say that they impacted my life in any noticeable way, nor would I say that they were "good" per say, though I know many others who have thought of them as such. Books on apologetics (the defense of faith through reason) are sort of interesting hypotheticals, but nothing more to me. In truth, some of the most meaningful explicitly christian writings that I have read have come from both the early/medieval church or some contemporary catholic writers. While I don't always agree with all of their points of view, they tend to come across without pretension and with a bit more true artistic sensibility (in contrast with some wannabe post-modern christian writers who try way to hard to be poetic).

Which brings me to an important point. I am weird. I get that. But I tend to receive spiritual "enlightenment" (so to speak) through less direct and more subjective means. I've understood many biblical accounts through classical music much better than any sermon has ever been able to explain them to me. Looking at certain paintings has brought a greater spiritual understanding than any book. So when it comes to books, I have always grasped spiritual concepts through literature and myth rather than through direct explanation. If that makes any sense.

Now for the sake of writing, I will divide literature into two types: lit written by christians with direct christian undertones and literature that is "secular."

I hate to be cliché, but in the first category, CS Lewis really is one of my favorites. When I reread the Chronicles of Narnia a couple years ago I was amazed at the amount of wisdom and simplicity of explanation contained within them. I don't think I understood the transcendent meaning of sacrifice until I read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe a few years back. And the concept of Heaven has never seemed more appealing or real than the one hinted at in The Last Battle.
Another similar, but much more abstract, author is George Macdonald. Books like Phantastes or At the Back of the North Wind are also full of... stuff.
In the realm of christian biography, Thomas Merton's life story A Seven Storey Mountain was particularly good. He is a man who became a Trappist monk in the 50s. He tells his whole life story, from childhood, to hedonistic twenties, to devout christian, to monk. For one thing, the book is wonderfully written and praised by everyone from Evelyn Waugh to Graham Green, and on top of that it is wonderfully sincere and insightful.

In what I guess we can call secular literature there have been a lot of books that have "spoken" to me.
Ironically, during some of the darkest moments, Existentialist and Absurdist authors really guided me back in the right direction. Bleak stories by Camús, Weisel, Dostoevsky, Unamuno, Kafka, (and many films actually)... made me comfortable with the absurdity of reason, the uncertainty of existence, and for some reason the existence of a higher power (and the unavoidability of interaction with it).

Many other books and writers have left their mark as I have read their books, including the writings of Oscar Wilde on Jesus (not much mind you, but he has interesting insight into his character), but most notably Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. If you haven't read Siddhartha, do so. I would describe it as an Eastern Existentialist version of Pilgrim's Progress. A spiritual journey through India at the time of the life of the Buddha. Not only is it's poetic, beautifully simple language take you to seventh heaven, but it's conclusions and steps are surprising and wonderful in themselves. Also, While I don't agree with everything Whitman says, reading his poetry is often a spiritually enriching activity in itself. But then again, that happens a lot with poetry.

I'm sure there there are other books that I am forgetting, but those are some of the ones that leap to mind.
What spiritual books have you loved?

Edit: I forgot to mention Annie Dillard and Anne Lamott. Both are thoroughly respectable spiritual authors, though I admit that the former resonates with me more than the latter.