For simple dramatic effect it has to be Kafka's Metamorphosis:

"As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect."

My favourite is probably Report to Greco by Nikos Kazantzakis (more famous for Zorba the Greek). He wrote the book when suffering from a terminal illness and it is part autobiography and part fiction. It's also one of the inspirational books that people should read before they die. It begins:

"I collect my tools: sight, smell, touch, taste, hearing, intellect. Night has fallen, the day's work is done. I return like a mole to my home, the ground. Not because I am tired and cannot work. I am not tired. But the sun has set."

The simple, poignant epitaph on his grave sums up his philosophy: I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.