The best books of 2023

This list is part of the best books of 2023.

We've asked 1,708 authors and super readers for their 3 favorite reads of the year.

My favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of American Breakdown: Our Ailing Nation, My Body's Revolt, and the Nineteenth-Century Woman Who Brought Me Back to Life

Barbara C. Ewell I this book because...

I don’t usually read non-fiction: I prefer characters, plots, and being drawn into another universe. But glowing reviews and the fact that a literary figure, Alice James, was involved: I decided to make an exception.

In short, dear reader, I was blown away. Lunden is not only a fine writer, she has a gripping story to tell, not only of her own struggles with a profit-driven medical system, but also how being a woman makes everything even harder.

Lunden puts the “breakdown” of a caring profession (like medicine) into sharp focus. But thankfully (since I really prefer happy endings), she also suggests ways out of our collective collapse. Read this and try to forgive your doctors, who like you, are just struggling to be human in a runaway capitalist culture.

By Jennifer Lunden,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked American Breakdown as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A Silent Spring for the human body, this wide-ranging, genre-crossing literary mystery interweaves the author’s quest to understand the source of her own condition with her telling of the story of the chronically ill 19th-century diarist Alice James—ultimately uncovering the many hidden health hazards of life in America.

When Jennifer Lunden became chronically ill after moving from Canada to Maine, her case was a medical mystery. Just 21, unable to hold a book or stand for a shower, she lost her job and consigned herself to her bed. The doctor she went to for help told her she was “just…


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My 2nd favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of When We Were Sisters

Barbara C. Ewell I this book because...

Good reviews and prizes always help to shape my choice of novels, and this book had both. It also had an intriguing title. As one of six sisters (no brothers), I was puzzled by the past tense: in my experience, sisters are forever. I was also attracted by the Muslim culture. Recently, I’ve been reading a lot of fiction about immigrants and cultural experiences very different from my own.

This is a painful story in many ways, about three orphaned girls who are forced by an indifferent (at best) uncle to grow up in an underground American reality. But they are sisters indeed and the writing is excellent: this short novel will break and warm your heart all at once.

By Fatimah Asghar,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked When We Were Sisters as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

LONGLISTED FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION 2022
WINNER OF THE CAROL SHIELDS PRIZE FOR FICTION 2023

'A grief-soaked and gorgeous debut novel . . . A poet first, Asghar picks up on the themes of her debut collection If They Come for Us - partition and fragmentation, borders and bodies - and plays with space and silence on the page . . . this fragmentary form has the effect of ephemerality - much like life' Sana Goyal, Guardian

In this heartrending, lyrical debut work of fiction, Fatimah Asghar traces the intense bond of three orphaned siblings who, after…


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My 3rd favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of Calling for a Blanket Dance

Barbara C. Ewell I this book because...

Despite the awkward and puzzling title, this novel had excellent reviews and prizes (my typical criteria for contemporary writing), and I was not disappointed.

The structure seems familiar (alternating points of view—think Faulkner and Woolf), but Hokeah does a masterful job of both keeping the reader wondering what’s going on and captivating her with fascinating turns of plot and charmingly bizarre characters and choices.

It’s not a pretty story—life in Oklahoma as Mexican and Native American was and is hard. But the warmth and love that continually shows up in the most unexpected circumstances makes this a powerful affirmation of how good even “bad” people can be.

By Oscar Hokeah,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Calling for a Blanket Dance as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"STUNNING." -Susan Power, author of The Grass DancerA moving and deeply engaging debut novel about a young Native American man finding strength in his familial identity, from a stellar new voice in fiction. Oscar Hokeah's electric debut takes us into the life of Ever Geimausaddle, whose family-part Mexican, part Native American-is determined to hold onto their community despite obstacles everywhere they turn. Ever's father is injured at the hands of corrupt police on the border when he goes to visit family in Mexico, while his mother struggles both to keep her job and care for her husband. And young Ever…


Don‘t forget about my book 😀

Sweet Spots: In-Between Spaces in New Orleans

By Teresa A. Toulouse (editor), Barbara C. Ewell (editor),

Book cover of Sweet Spots: In-Between Spaces in New Orleans

What is my book about?

For jazz musicians, the “sweet spot” is the space between dancers/listeners and musicians where the sound achieves an ideal balance. Sweet Spots: In-between Spaces in New Orleans traces this idea through the elusive intersections among particular spaces, stories, and cultural performances in the Crescent City.

This collection of original essays from a range of disciplines—including architecture and art, music and literature, philosophy, geography, sociology, and cultural studies–explores how New Orleans’ platting, housing types, gardens, neighborhoods, and streetscapes reveal the complex relationships of race, gender, community, history, and the environment in this remarkable city.