Look at us! Back together after only a week. And this time I have double the number of titles to share. So gather up that Christmas cash. As promised, here’s a list of my favorite books of 2023 in no particular order.
Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward
Annis, a young adult slave, is sold south by her sire, a rice plantation owner in the Carolinas, which sets in motion a journey of grief, rebirth, and ultimately, ascendance. Ward uses metaphor like a scalpel, dissecting the common narratives about American slavery and replacing them with a character’s plight you cannot look away from.
How to Stay Married: The Most Insane Love Story Ever Told by Harrison Scott Key
Don’t let the hyperbolic title turn you off. When I’m asked for book recommendations about marriage going forward, this will be the first one I suggest. It’s a story of infidelity that shifts to self-assessment, taking responsibility for personal failures, and resting in the grace that fuels love. Rarely do I come across a book causes me both to cry and gut laugh, but this is one of them.
Those We Thought We Knew by David Joy
When two brutal racially motivated crimes occur in a small North Carolina town, it forces the community to confront a wicked past it has yet to leave behind. Joy’s stories are clearly a labor of love as they never read as caricatures. You can’t write a story like this without being a part of it, knowing it firsthand, and caring about where it ends up.
On Getting Out of Bed by Alan Noble—I knew I’d appreciate this book, but I didn’t anticipate how much I’d need it. Noble’s unflinching look at the daily burdens of modern life is as sobering as it is encouraging. It also delivered my favorite quote of the year: “Suffering is a normal part of life. But you can remind yourself that it is not the ultimate truth. It ends. And it ends not with your failure or destruction but with a resurrection.”
The Fraud by Zadie Smith
With her first novel since 2016’s Swing Time, Smith ventures into historical fiction, setting her story during the Tichborne Trial that transfixed Victorian England during the nineteenth century. The novel transports readers from England to Jamaica across decades of history, considering the stories we tell ourselves and others and reminding readers that nothing is ever as simple as what meets the eye.
All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby
A year after electing its first Black sheriff, Charon County, Virginia, is upended when a local teacher is shot by a former student who is then killed in a standoff by the sheriff’s deputies. With tension abounding in the community, things only grow more tense when the case points to a serial killer on the loose. Cosby is one of the best writers of southern crime fiction today.
Nobody’s Mother by Sandra Glahn
Rarely in academic writing do you encounter both craft and persuasion, but this book is an exception. Glahn argues that contemporary Bible readers have misunderstood a crucial text about women due to lack of context about the cult of Artemis in Ephesus. Her meticulous research and accessible prose make for a (rightly!) disruptive work needed in the church today.
Wellness by Nathan Hill
I have a running joke with a friend about how I don’t think books over 1,000 pages should exist. I’m allergic to wordiness, which is why I was surprised by how much I liked this novel. Hill is wordy, but in a way that makes every word seem necessary in a story about a couple who begins to question the stories they’ve told themselves not only about their marriage, but about their lives as a whole.
Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
In a not-too-distant future, the Criminal Action Penal Entertainment (CAPE) program allows prisoners to literally fight for their freedom in death matches televised country wide and in front of sold-out arenas. Kill enough opponents and you’re free to go. Chain-Gang All-Stars is a searing and creative critique of America’s private prison industry told through a gladiatorial exhibition.
Ozark Dogs by Eli Cranor
When I read Cranor’s debut in 2022, I knew he would be a name to watch. Ozark Dogs is everything I love in a novel. It follows Vietnam War veteran and junkyard owner as he scrambles to rescue his kidnapped granddaughter. Making matters worse, his family legacy is intertwined with that of the Ledfords, a known white supremacist and drug peddling family with violent commitments. The book is southern through and through. Gritty, violent, and messy, plunging into the felt burdens of generational poverty and neglect.