The best books of 2023

This list is part of the best books of 2023.

Join 1,708 readers and authors and share your 3 favorite reads of the year.

My favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of Solito

Rick Umali I this book because...

I loved Solito. This is my favorite book from the past year.

This book is written from the point-of-view of the author, Javier Zamora, as a young boy (Javiercito). The story focuses on this young boy’s journey from Ecuador to America. It is an immigration story, but one that is imbued with the wonder and emotion of a child.

There are treacherous moments, but also moments of such ardent love that I needed to weep. We read to learn and be transported. In this book, I learned a lot of Spanish and Central American music. I was also transported with these tired masses making this dangerous trip.

It reminds all of us that every immigration story is ultimately a deeply personal one. I wish everyone could read this.

By Javier Zamora,

Why should I read it?

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

What is this book about?

A TELEGRAPH BOOK OF THE YEAR

'Solito is my travel book of the year.' Telegraph

'Heartbreaking... A rare, eye-opening rendition of the brutal reality of border-crossing.' Lea Ypi

'If there's any justice, Solito will someday be considered a classic.' Rumaan Alam

Young Javier dreams of eating orange sherbet ice cream with his parents in the United States. For this to happen, he must embark on a three-thousand-mile journey alone. It should last only two weeks. But it takes seven.

In limbo, Javier learns what people will do to survive - and what they will forfeit to save someone else. This…


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My 2nd favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

Rick Umali I this book because...

Dave Egger’s memoir is about his early years as the adult caretaker of his younger brother after the death of both their parents. This is an energetic and writerly work.

His writing screams “Look at me” with its sharp and distinctive style. He writes that he wants to be heard, that he wants to be understood, and his writing demands this of you. 

There are stories of him starting a magazine and him trying to get into MTV’s The Real World. My memory of the book is a scene of him and his brother playing frisbee. It is told in a dramatic and elevated manner, their throws monumentally heroic, the disc cutting the air between them, their catches amazingly acrobatic.

You sense this is how a young hero should see himself in his own story. Surely this is worth seeing, he asks, and I thought: absolutely!

By Dave Eggers,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The author chronicles his life in the years after the deaths of his parents, when he assumed responsibility for the care and upbringing of his eight-year-old brother.


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My 3rd favorite read in 2023…

Book cover of One Hour in Paris: A True Story of Rape and Recovery

Rick Umali I this book because...

Karyn Freedman has written a superb but difficult book. It is a close look at her own rape by a stranger while she was in Paris, traveling as a college student. 

The book is a memoir using the lens of this one event. The book is also a scholarly look at rape and its societal causes. It succeeds at both points of view. She documents her ongoing recovery and the power of psychotherapy.

It was illuminating for me to see how this process worked. She writes that rape is often seen as a personal problem but declares that rape is a social issue with deeply set causes.

She makes persuasive arguments backed up by a study she did on rape in Africa. Despite its difficult and intimate subject matter, she was able to remain unflinching in her focus, and her book is powerful because of it.

By Karyn L. Freedman,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked One Hour in Paris as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In this powerful memoir, philosopher Karyn L. Freedman travels back to a Paris night in 1990 when she was twenty-two and, in one violent hour, her life was changed forever by a brutal rape. One Hour in Paris takes the reader on a harrowing yet inspirational journey through suffering and recovery both personal and global. We follow Freedman from an apartment in Paris to a French courtroom, then from a trauma center in Toronto to a rape clinic in Africa. At a time when as many as one in three women in the world have been victims of sexual assault…


Don‘t forget about my book 😀

I Couldn’t Keep It To A Tweet

By Rick Umali,

Book cover of I Couldn’t Keep It To A Tweet

What is my book about?

I Couldn’t Keep it to a Tweet is a collection of short essays by long-time blogger and small-time writer Rick Umali.

His pieces are about living an ordinary life, working in high-tech, parenthood, and sports. The book is gentle and full of fond feelings. These posts have existed on the Internet since 2001, and they have touched at least a handful of people.

When Rick was growing up, he cherished reading small articles/essays in newspapers, and this book is inspired by those old observational pieces.