The books that moved me in 2023
10 books that made me laugh/cry/rethink/sign a petition this year
I read hundreds of books every year. Far too many to properly take in. Sometimes, during an event-heavy month, my brain sometimes feels like Dumbledore’s pensieve, with so many books passing through it and leaving again the second I’m done with them. (Not a cheery thought if you spent all year – or more – writing one of them, I know.) A book that lingers a little longer, burrows its way into my thoughts, is something really special. So, for this year’s end of year round up, I asked myself, not just what did I enjoy, but what made me really feel something. I restricted myself to 10 (I’m pretty sure you won’t agree with them all) and then cheated by including a little list at the end, because there were just too many other books that made their mark. (And, yes, I know it’s a little early for an end of year round up, but I didn’t want to be influenced by all the other lists that are bound to be incoming imminently.)
Anyway, here they are, in no particular order:
History of women in 101 objects, Annabelle Hirsch (translated by Eleanor Updegraff)
If you’ve been increasingly feeling it’s long past time we looked at history from a different perspective, the perspective of some of those who didn’t get to write it, you will love this book. Instead of battles, coups and land-grabs, Annabelle Hirsch has chosen to take a more intimate route to telling the story of women through the centuries. From 16th century glass dildos to 17th century dress pockets to very 21st century pussy hats, this is an intimate, inspiring and unexpected look at the overlooked lives of women. Far from being weighed down with academic heft this is the literary equivalent of spending a happy afternoon rooting through your grandma’s handbag. A treasure trove of ideas, artefacts and stories.
• Buy it from amazon or bookshop.org
The Woman In Me, Britney Spears
If you’d asked me several months ago to predict my top ten books of the year, I can tell you for certain that Britney Spears’ memoir would not have been on it. That’s how much of a book snob I am. But Britney proved me (and over a million book buyers in its first week on sale alone, of which I was one) wrong. This book is quite something. Candid. Angry. Sometimes painfully innocent. It’s the story of one young woman’s misuse at the hands both of “the system” and, more enragingly, of the people who were supposed to love her. Like Matthew Perry’s memoir, last year’s surprise-to-me-until-I-read-it hit, Friends, Lovers & The Big Terrible Thing, it will make you rethink everything. (Oh and if you’re an audiobook person, Michelle William’s narration is exceptional.)
• Buy it from amazon or bookshop.org
The Secret Hours, Mick Herron
Humour and rage are Mick Herron’s stock in trade, so I guess it’s no surprise that this has been Herron’s year. His Slough House series has been turned into a hit apple TV+ show starring Gary Oldman as farting, swearing, bathing-averse Jackson Lamb and Kristin Scott-Thomas as Diana Taverner, Lamb’s Chanel-wearing nemesis. Set in Berlin as the wall comes down, The Secret Hours is a Slough House-adjacent standalone that introduces us to a host of characters in flux as the world around them is shaken to its foundations. It’s laden with all the razor sharp wit, political observation, snarky dialogue and out-and-out exasperation that we’ve come to expect from Herron.
• Buy it from amazon or bookshop.org