The 19 Best Books I Read in 2023
I read 119 books in 2023. 19 of them were pretty amazing.
This year was a fun reading year.
I read a lot, as I always do, but the addition of more novels over the past few years has meant that I’m enjoying what I’m reading more. I still appreciate the pull of non-fiction learning — and I’ll always remain obsessed with narrative non-fiction, my absolute favorite thing to read — but I love rediscovering the pull of a really, really great completely made up story.
In all, I read 119 books this year.
As I’ve talked about over the years in my blogs, newsletters, and over on LinkedIn, for a long time I’ve read around 100 books a year. There are years where I’ve read 150, one year where I read 200, but it generally never dips below 100. That’s a natural number for me, and not one I work towards in any goal-setting way. (I’ll post a new article about how I do it next week for those who are interested.) In another big life boon, I no longer finish stuff I don’t like anymore, so that means I give up on about 20% of the books I start. It doesn’t matter how far along — I’ll drop something anytime, even at 80% of a murder mystery, as per yesterday. No bad book is safe!
But this post is all about the very best books I read this year, none of which were privy to unfettered dropping.
Let’s go!
Strangers to Ourselves: Unsettled Minds and the Stories that Make Us by Rachel Aviv
Rachel Aviv is a New Yorker staff writer, and a portion of this book started as a great article in the New Yorker. The concept is fantastic. Aviv herself was hospitalized as a child for anorexia, and that story opens this work of narrative non-fiction. She then dives into three very different mental health stories with three very different protagonists that aim to ask questions about the different ways we try to heal. Medications, hospitalizations, alternative treatments, spirituality, nothing is off the table. She ends the book tying it back to her own journey. Loved, and have recommended this one to so many.
At the Pond: Swimming at the Hampstead Ladies’ Pond by Jessica J. Lee et. al.
This was a niche one from the UK, but one I was dying to buy in paperback, as opposed to Kindle, and it definitely wins the award for my favorite cover of 2023. I was thrilled to find it on on the entry table of the first bookstore I walked into the second time I was in London this year. It’s a collection of essays by women who swim at the Ladies Swimming Pond at Hampstead Heath. The book is categorized into seasons, and obviously my favorite season was the winter one, since I’m a big cold swimming fan. I immediately got on a bus in London and headed up to the pond!
I Have Some Questions for You by
I loved this book! It’s a page-turning murder mystery set in a small Northeastern boarding school that brings together some of the hot themes of the moment: the 1990s all over again! true crime! cancel culture! Highly recommended. As are Rebecca’s tweet threads, often featuring horrid Zillow listings.
The Collected Schizophrenias by
This one truly blew me away, and it wasn’t my first time with it. Opening with the author’s diagnosis of schizoaffective disorder, this collection of essays looks at long-term mental health and chronic health issues, and does so with an incredibly deft hand. What I loved most was the surprisingly varied nature of the essays — from discussions of the author’s experience as a lab researcher at Stanford to the way she uses her love of fashion to present as high-functioning to her ethereal, hallucinatory moments. So, so good.
Novelist as a Vocation by Haruki Murakami
This is actually the only Murakami I’ve ever read, which I shouldn’t be admitting to. I loved this one so much, and can’t wait to finally read everything else, although preferably the non-fiction stuff, as I love the way he narrates his own life. Lucky for me, I’m a runner!
Yellowface by R. F. Kuang
One of my favorite books of the year, this novel takes the wild, viral New Yorker piece Who Is the Bad Art Friend? as loose inspiration for an even more messed up story. I did have a tiny gripe about the ending, but what do I know!
Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld
What a great, fun novel. I loved the main character! I loved that she was a funny TV writer at a place that breathed Saturday Night Live but was distinctly not Saturday Night Live! I loved her late-thirty-something dating stories! I loved her funny actress friends! I felt like I was there! All the feels! Heart heart heart!
The Daddy Diaries: The Year I Grew Up by Andy Cohen
I pay $12 a month to chat with people I don’t know on Discord about my favorite Bravo shows, so you better believe I got this the day it came out (PS: if you’re in GarbageWorld, my handle is Real Housewives of Argentina). I loved the diaries Andy Cohen wrote a decade ago, in the day-by-day Who’s Who vein of Andy Warhol, and this new one is just as fun. Hilarious stories about becoming a dad, mixed with all the behind-the-scenes gossip about all the dumpster fire television I can’t tear my eyes away from.
Trust by Hernan Diaz
I read this Pulitzer Prize winner for the second time in 2023 and it remains one of my favorite books of all time. Honestly, I don’t even know where to start. Just read it. Full stop. Also, the first Argentine writer to win a Pulitzer for fiction!
We Meant Well by Erum Shazia Hazan
A charity in West Africa is confronted with a horrific scandal, and the protagonist, who runs the place, is flown in to go fix it. Spoiler: it just gets worse! I thought this was a fantastic novel, and I was on the edge of my seat until the very end. It won awards, so I’m not sure why it wasn’t more popular. Covid release, anyone?
Girl A by Abigail Dean
I love psychological thrillers, but can’t get through many because the quality of the writing isn’t great. (Unpopular opinion: Your average British crime author from the 1940s writes better than your average psychological thriller author today.) That’s why I loved this one, done by a Googler in her spare time and sold to famed British literary agent Juliet Mushens for a reported seven-figure advance. It’s dark and twisty and keeps you glued. I read it mostly from a small iron bed on our winter trip to a foggy mansion ranch in the north of Argentina. Have I shown you those pictures? (My vintage Pendleton skirt has never felt so at home!)
The Guest by Emma Cline
I haven’t read The Girls, so I was happily new to Emma Cline’s work. I thoroughly enjoyed this quick page-turner about a truly awful female protagonist doing extremely dumb stuff in a storied world of summer wealth. Definitely not life-changing in its message, but the enjoyment factor was high. And, as someone who basically can’t read normal “beach books” because I can’t stand bad writing, this served a great purpose.
Fires in the Dark: Healing the Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison
Another great book on mental health, this one looks to history to ask questions about what we did wrong in healing the wounded men and women of the past. I loved the content on W.H. Rivers, who treated the World War I poet Siegfried Sassoon, friend of Wilfred Owen, for whom I have a particular fondness. His famous poem, Dulce et Decorum Est, is one of my favorites. Jamison, who is bipolar, also wrote the well-known book, which I also loved: An Unquiet Mind.
Sylvia Queen of the Headhunters: An Eccentric Englishwoman and her Lost Kingdom by Philip Eade
This was my second time through this fantastic biography of a truly crazy white woman doing a bunch of insane shit in a far-off land. This is one of the genres I read most, and yes, I think there is immense value in learning about the history of colonialism and its ills (and the present and its offshoots; go here to see my thoughts on the current HBO documentary, Savior Complex).
Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times by
I’m a huge fan of this author and her wonderful Substack, and this book was right up my alley. After many years of dubiously answering — “Autumn?” — when asked my favorite season, I’ve officially moved over to where I belong: winter. So much so that this summer I began to think I have reverse seasonal affective disorder! (I think it’s a thing?? The thing where you prefer winter to summer?!) This book fit squarely within my winter wheelhouse, accompanied by all the things I hold most dear: swimming in icy waters, Sylvia Plath, stories of hibernation, and sailing the Arctic. More, please!
Honorable Mentions
When the World Was Steady by Claire Messud
This early Claire Messud (published in 1994) has all my favorite themes. Strong women characters, weird/creepy shit, a jungly, far-off land. For some reason I lost this book (if one can say that, about a Kindle book) and then I got drawn into something else. I must go back!
Tom Lake by Ann Patchett
Another one I need to return to! If you’re a fiction reader and haven’t heard of it, you’ve definitely been under a 2023 rock, as this is the newest Ann Patchett. It’s the story of a family living on their Minnesota (?) farm during the pandemic, reflecting on the long, windy path of the novel’s protagonist from young actress to cherry farm matriarch. I was doing it via audiobook, because Meryl Streep narrates, and so I felt like I had to do the Meryl Streep thing, but the reality is I’m not an audiobook fan. I can read-read so much faster than I can listen-read, and already have enough podcasts, so I got bogged down by hour 7 or so. (To me, audiobooks are like: Hello! Welcome to a new book! I will now require 20 hours of your life!)
Reasons to Stay Alive by Matt Haig
Great! No notes! Well, a couple notes! A non-fiction book about this author’s mental health journey. Love seeing an author switch genres just because they want to! Haig is perhaps best known for his bestselling The Midnight Library.
Learning in Public: Notes from a Racially Divided America from My Daughter’s School by
I loved another one of this author’s books, and I have a distinct memory of finishing it while laying in a hotel bed in Istanbul in a long ago November before I gave a keynote speech about something or other. This narrative non-fiction is a look into her own experience in the very complicated Oakland Public School system, and I really enjoyed so much of it. She also touches on her life in a co-housing community, which is also fascinating. I grew up in in the area, and my parents and childhood friends still live there, so I know the players well. My brother even lives next door to her! It’s a topic most suited to parents in this stage of life, and I immediately passed this one on to others.
Refuse to Be Done by Matt Bell
Thanks to Pam Redmond, author of a bunch of amazing novels like Younger (yes, the book came before the TV show), for the recommendation on this one, which is only relevant if you are writing a novel. If you are, read it! And thanks to Pam, as always, for everything on my own journey.
This is an interesting list! Love how it's a mix of genres. Looking forward to reading lots of these ones. Recently started listening to Yellowface and it's crazy! Also, Wilfred Owen is one of my favourite poets! Anthem for Doomed Youth...sigh 💔
Love this list! Downloaded many Kindle samples to check some of them out. I could not get into Trust. What am I missing? Yellowface was my favorite book in last year. Now you have to read Weyward!!