I spent my travel time en route from Dallas to Sacramento reading "Ignore Everybody and 39 Other Keys to Creativity" by Hugh MacLeod. Hugh MacLeod is the guy who gradually backed into a new career drawing and selling cartoons drawn on the back of business cards.
As I have come to expect from book titles, the book does not contain any single piece of advice "ignore everybody"...it is a lot more subtle than that.
The book is an easy-to-read primer by a grounded creative. I especially liked his constant refrain of "don't give up the day job just yet". As he explains, he gradually moved from working in advertizing to being a full-time creative person, but even now he does work that is not intrinsically exciting because "it pays the bills". The book validated my long-term plan to slowly move to a work life more focussed on creative endeavours. It also made me more energized to work at putting this plan into effect in 2010 and beyond.