The best books of 2023

This list is part of the best books of 2023.

Join 1,707 readers and share your 3 favorite reads of the year.

My favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

Cory Hartman Why did I love this book?

I’ve been reading this book for 40 years. I can’t get over it; I never will and never want to. It’s the story at the heart of the story of Everything.

Every time I read it, I choke up a little more. I’ve read almost all of Lewis’s nonfiction by now, and I can see how here he drops Easter eggs of deep, complex intellectual stuff he was working out at the time. It just makes it even better.

A caution. In one part, the four main characters hear another’s name for the first time. It triggers a powerful sensation unique to each of them that reveals what they are and might become. The book itself does the same to the reader: what it draws out of you reveals what you are.

By C. S. Lewis, Pauline Baynes (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

34 authors picked The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 9, 10, 11, and 12.

What is this book about?

Lucy steps into the Professor's wardrobe - but steps out again into a snowy forest. She's stumbled upon the magical world of Narnia, land of unicorns, centaurs, fauns... and the wicked White Witch, who terrorises all. Lucy soon realises that Narnia, and in particular Aslan, the great Lion, needs her help if the country's creatures are ever going to be free again...


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My 2nd favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of Trigger Warning: Short Fictions and Disturbances

Cory Hartman Why did I love this book?

Virtuoso, that’s the only way I can describe this authorial performance!

Gaiman’s inventive range defies description. It’s not just that the imaginative conceits of each story are so shockingly diverse, nor that the plots are so totally different, nor even that almost every mood known to humankind is reflected here. It’s that the literary style of each work is unique; you would almost think each story was written by a different author (and I sincerely hope they weren’t.) You might also think Gaiman was showing off, except that he just seems to be having loads of fun.

By Neil Gaiman,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Trigger Warning as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In Trigger Warning, global phenomenon and Sunday Times bestselling author Neil Gaiman returns to dazzle, captivate, haunt, and entertain with this third collection of short fiction, which includes a Doctor Who adventure, the David Bowie-inspired The Return of the Thin White Duke and a never-before published American Gods story, Black Dog.

The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains was serialised on BBC Radio 4's Book at Bedtime in November 2015.

'We are all wearing masks. That is what makes us interesting. These are stories about those masks, and the people we are underneath them.' Neil Gaiman, writing from…


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My 3rd favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of Contagious Disciple Making: Leading Others on a Journey of Discovery

Cory Hartman Why did I love this book?

Try to imagine a genuine disciple-making movement (DMM): a chain reaction of Jesus' disciples making disciples in gatherings spawning gatherings as his message spreads through the natural networks of ordinary people. Want to see it in real life? I do!

This is the primer for cooperating with God to get one started, something that happens through you but doesn’t depend on you to extend far beyond you. It's drawn from verified DMMs, among some of the most challenging peoples in the world, now consisting of over 2 million new Jesus-followers.

Warning: if what the Watsons propose doesn’t disturb you, you probably haven’t understood it yet. When it does disturb you, the best thing to do is painstakingly to disentangle what the Bible says from what you’ve been told it means.

By David Watson, Paul Watson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Contagious Disciple Making as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

It is hard to deny that today's world can seem apathetic toward Christians. Some may look down at their iPhones when we mention God, motion for the check when we bring up church, or casually change the subject when we talk about prayer. In a world full of people whose indifference is greater than their desire to know Christ, how can we dream of growing the church?

In Contagious Disciple Making, David Watson and Paul Watson map out a simple method that has sparked an explosion of homegrown churches in the United States and around the world. A companion to…


Don‘t forget about my book 😀

Future Church: Seven Laws of Real Church Growth

By Cory Hartman, Will Mancini,

Book cover of Future Church: Seven Laws of Real Church Growth

What is my book about?

Church growth models have often been long on promises and short on disciple-making. We continue to watch consistent church attendance shrink, and our desire to reach the lost is infected with a need for self-validation by growing our numbers at any cost. If we believe that God wants his church to grow, where do we go from here? What is the future of the church?

With plenty of salient stories and based solidly on the disciple-making methods found in Scripture, my book exposes the church's greatest challenge today and offers 7 transforming laws of real church growth so that we can faithfully and joyfully fulfill Jesus's Great Commission.