- Bookshelf Bridge
- Posts
- Best of 2023
Best of 2023
Even though it's hard to pick favourites
I stopped rating books I’d read about midway through this year, as it didn’t feel right any more. You can’t mark things against the same rubric, so it feels odd to star-rate everything. Plus, my five stars are someone else’s one, so who cares?
Having said all that, I’ve combed through my Storygraph to pull together my top ten books of 2023. With the above caveat, these are just the ten books I enjoyed most in 2023, for various reasons. I've also included some stats of mine from 2023 below:
120 books read
33,350 pages read
79% fiction, 21% non-fiction
93% physical book, 6% ebook, 1% audiobook
I’ve also not ranked these, but listed them in the order I read them. I’ve been writing this newsletter for almost a year, and it’s been a joy. It makes me so happy when my loved ones tell me they’ve read something thanks to my recommendation. Here’s to 2024!
Notes on Heartbreak by Annie Lord
This was the first book I read in 2023, and really resonated, as someone who has spent most of her twenties and thirties dating both online and off. I’ve always been someone who has worn her heart on her sleeve, for better or for worse, and I related to Annie Lord’s discomfort in the modern dating scene, as well as how she tends to romanticise the people she’s been with in the past. It’s a sensitive and open exploration of millennial dating, that observes rather than offering solutions.
In the End, It Was All About Love by Musa Okwonga
This is a work of unparalleled beauty. Musa Okwonga writes vignettes about Blackness, queerness and love as a bisexual British man living and working in Berlin. I’ve never visited the city (it’s on my list for 2024), but it felt like a living and breathing character within the pages. It is heartbreaking, moving and another one for those of us who tend to feel a little too hard.
Cleopatra and Frankenstein by Coco Mellors
I missed a signing of this book as I was visiting Costco, which Coco Mellors kindly referenced when my friends asked me to sign my copy of the book. This is a novel, set in New York, about a younger British artist, and her relationship with an older American advertising executive. I’m always interested in novels about power, age gaps and the ways in which people in love interact with one another, and there’s also a sub-thread on addiction running through. A carefully and humanely constructed novel that I will likely re-read in 2024.
4 BROWN GIRLS WHO WRITE by Roshni Goyate, Sharan Hunan, Sheena Patel and Sunnah Khan
It’s hard to know how to describe this one, but it’s four pamphlets from Rough Trade, all on different subjects from the authors. Covering topics such as love, motherhood and identity, it’s a powerful collection of perspectives from talented writers. I had a soft spot for Sheena Patel’s entry, as I adored her novel I’m a Fan, but all of the pieces are captivating.
Kala by Colin Walsh
I’m not biased because I interviewed him and he’s incredible kind, warm and open. This book really is fabulous. Telling the story of a group of friends in their thirties who reunite in the west of Ireland after the body of Kala, who went missing when they were in their teens, is found, this is an original and gripping mystery, that also serves as a beautiful and painful study on the ways in which trauma can affect people. A must-read for anyone from small town Ireland, especially if you came of age in the mid-noughties.
This Ragged Grace by Octavia Bright
This may be my favourite of the year, although I don’t want to be forced to choose. I knew Octavia as an avid fan of Literary Friction (RIP!), but her memoir about recovery from alcoholism, twinned with caring for her father as he descends into Alzheimer’s disease is moving, human and completely relatable. My copy is covered in highlight and notes. Another one I hope to re-read in 2024.
Rememberings by Sinead O’Connor
Like most Irish women, I was devastated when Sinead O’Connor died last year. I had bought her memoir, but feel guilty that it took her death for me to pick it up. Like Britney Spears’ book, it is so singular and so characteristic of her. She talks about her childhood, how music guided her through her entire life, and the trajectory of her career, including her infamous appearance on SNL in the 90s. The way in which she talks about her children is stunning, as are her reflections on the different faiths she has held, threaded together by her deep devotion to God. A true one-off, a trailblazer. I don’t have words for how special she was and how deeply her absence is felt.
Simple Passion by Annie Ernaux
This one really packs a punch in about 50 pages. A meditation on the author’s affair with a married man and how it consumes her life. It left me hungry to read more of her work, so expect to see more of her here in 2024. I read it pretty much in one sitting and put it down afterward, completely dazed.
Good Material by Dolly Alderton
I read this in pretty much one sitting on a flight to New York. I’m a big Dolly Alderton fan, but this is my favourite of her books to date. Telling the story of Andy, a middling stand-up in his thirties who gets dumped by his partner Jen, it’s a moving account of heartbreak, coping mechanisms and the ways in which men interact with one another. I’d like to re-read it a little slower, as I felt like I swallowed it down in one gulp.
The End of the Affair by Graham Greene, narrated by Colin Firth
I’ve written an entire post devoted to this one, but my first (and only so far) audiobook experience was a joy. Colin Firth sensitively narrates one of the tragic love stories of the 20th century in a way that feels entirely consuming. It kept me company on flights, through jet lag and in the bath amongst other places. It made me want to explore audio more, but I worry that my standards are now too high.
I’ve also joined Letterboxd and Bluesky. Feel free to join me there if you’d like. Endless love.