My Books of the Year 2023

One of the stand-out novels I read in 2023 was Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld which is a fun and refreshingly original take on the genre. I also really enjoyed The Running Grave by Robert Galbraith which is the seventh outing for Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott’s detective agency as they infiltrate a sinister cult in Norfolk.

Soldier Sailor by Claire Kilroy was a memorable account of new motherhood. The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell is set in sixteenth century Florence and fictionalises the marriage of 15-year-old Lucrezia di Cosima de’Medici to Alfonso, Duke of Ferrera.

I reviewed at least one non-fiction book written by a woman every month in 2023. Islands of Abandonment by Cal Flyn stood out for its clear and perceptive prose about abandoned landscapes and the natural environment and was deservedly shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize in 2021. I think Attack Warning Red! by Julie McDowall should have got more attention this year for its alarming and often darkly funny look at how Britain prepared for nuclear war.

The Invention of Essex by Tim Burrows is a thoughtfully written tour of a much misunderstood part of the UK. Non-fiction books about politics and current affairs can go out of date very quickly, but Broken Heartlands by Sebastian Payne published in 2021 remains very topical reading ahead of a general election in 2024 as Labour seeks to recover the “red wall” seats it lost in 2019 to the Conservative Party.

Finally, I read two books in 2023 that made me feel really angry but are very much worth your time. Show Me The Bodies by Peter Apps is a harrowing account of the failures leading up to the fire at Grenfell Tower in west London in 2017. Wasteland by Oliver Franklin-Wallis is a behind-the-scenes look at the waste industry and explores the environmental and human cost of what we throw away.

Which books did you enjoy reading in 2023?