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 Foster

Melissa Walker Why did I love this book?

This is a quiet book. A child’s father takes her to stay with relatives she has never met in the Irish countryside. Here, she finds affection, love, and warmth that have been absent from her life of poverty and stress in the city.

It is a lovely book I did not want to put down.

By Claire Keegan,

Why should I read it?

8 authors picked Foster as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

** Adapted into the Oscar-nominated film adaptation, An Cailin Ciuin / The Quiet Girl **

From the author of the Booker-shortlisted Small Things Like These, a heartbreaking, haunting story of childhood, loss and love by one of Ireland's most acclaimed writers.

'A real jewel.' Irish Independent

'A small miracle.' Sunday Times

'A thing of finely honed beauty.' Guardian

'Thrilling.' Richard Ford

'As good as Chekhov.' David Mitchell

It is a hot summer in rural Ireland. A girl is sent to live with foster parents on a farm, not knowing when she will return home. In the strangers' house, she finds…


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My 2nd favorite read in 2023

Book cover of Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words

Melissa Walker Why did I love this book?

This was an enormously important read for me this year.

Whyte explores the deepest meanings of common words like anger, courage, despair, disappointment, forgiveness, joy, loneliness, regret, silence, and withdrawal. I read this one slowly, a word or two at a time, to digest and savor.

While I disagreed with the meanings he read into every single word, I found so much helpful wisdom and insight here that I have returned to it again and again, and I have shared bits with others.

By David Whyte,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

After many years of revising the essays, author David Whyte has published this revised edition of his well loved book. In addition to sharper versions of many of the essays, it contains an additional piece, CLOSE:

To consciously become close is a form of unilateral disarmament, a chancing of our arm and our love, a willingness to hazard our affections and an unconscious declaration that we might be equal to the inevitable loss that the vulnerability of being close will bring.

With the imagery of a poet and the reflection of a philosopher, David Whyte turns his attention to 52…


My 3rd favorite read in 2023

Book cover of A Gentleman in Moscow

Melissa Walker Why did I love this book?

I can’t believe I waited so long to read this book. When it was released, I read the description and could not imagine how the story of a Russian aristocrat who was placed under house arrest in a hotel by the Soviets could be a page-turner. I was wrong.

This is a timeless and compelling story about the resilience of the human spirit and the power of love.

By Amor Towles,

Why should I read it?

41 authors picked A Gentleman in Moscow as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The mega-bestseller with more than 2 million readers, soon to be a major television series

From the #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Lincoln Highway and Rules of Civility, a beautifully transporting novel about a man who is ordered to spend the rest of his life inside a luxury hotel

In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and…


Don‘t forget about my book 😀

The Battles of Kings Mountain and Cowpens: The American Revolution in the Southern Backcountry

By Melissa Walker,

Book cover of The Battles of Kings Mountain and Cowpens: The American Revolution in the Southern Backcountry

What is my book about?

The American South is so identified with the Civil War that people often forget that the key battles from the final years of the American Revolution were fought in Southern states.

The Southern backcountry was the center of the fight for independence, but backcountry devotion to the Patriot cause was slow in coming. Decades of animosity between coastal elites and backcountry settlers who did not enjoy accurate representation in the assemblies they meant a complex political and social milieu throughout this turbulent time.

The Battles of Kings Mountain and Cowpens bring to light the chaotic Southern backcountry in the years that led up to the turning point battles of the American Revolution.

Book cover of Foster
Book cover of Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words
Book cover of A Gentleman in Moscow

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