My year in reading, 2023
The best books I've read over the past twelve months
This December, I’ve been clicking open The Millions’ “Year in Reading” essays as they’re published to the site each day, eager like I’m opening the little doors of an Advent calendar. I’ve loved Granta’s “Books of the Year,” The Paris Review’s “Favorite Books of 2023,” and Words Without Borders’ “Best Books We Read,” etc. So, like last December, I’ve been looking forward to reflecting on the books that have shaped my year.
I’ve kept track of every book I’ve finished since Ms. Eisenreich gave us reading charts in sixth grade, and although I’ve come close in the past, 2023 marks the first year I’ve read one hundred; rather than being a goal I set, the number’s a sweet reminder that I’ll find time for and prioritize something I have always loved to do. :) (Maybe next year, though, I’ll read far fewer and commit to tackling the Long Ones?) I don’t get to everything below but would love to be friends on Goodreads if you’re wanting more thoughts on more books.
Next to the fireplace in my childhood home last year, in the snowy period after Christmas and into January, I read two books that became immediate favorites: Katie Kitamura’s Intimacies and Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles. Both are novels about women and their circumstances, about the tensions between independence, power, and belonging. The former—minimalist, contemporary, and precise—captures a moment; the latter, rich and romantic, spans seasons in a life. Soon after, I read and reviewed Vigdis Hjorth’s Is Mother Dead, tr. Charlotte Barslund, for the Cleveland Review of Books, which features another equally bold and ultimately shocking main character.
Back in New York, I reviewed Esther Yi’s fanfiction opus Y/N for Necessary Fiction. A stop at Passageway Books in Chelsea brought Cynthia Ozick’s heart-wrenching novella The Shawl into my hands, after which I read (and cried on the subway to) Jenny Erpenbeck’s Visitation, tr. Susan Bernofsky. Rachel Cusk’s Second Place and Penelope Fitzgerald’s The Blue Flower were both inspired by historic figures, a bohemian American artist of the 1930s and a romantic poet of 18th-Century Germany, respectively.
The classics that pulled me into spring were Wharton’s The Age of Innocence (that ending!), Kafka’s Amerika (a sillier take on his trademark absurdity), and James Henry’s Washington Square. Two wildly different yet equally enjoyable story collections also kept me company: Kate Folk’s Out There and David Means’ Two Nurses, Smoking. I didn’t fall all the way in love with Tess Gunty’s The Rabbit Hutch or Justin Torres’ We the Animals, but I’m looking forward to reading more from them both.
At the beginning of summer, I reviewed Erpenbeck’s newest, Kairos, tr. Michael Hofmann. I was heartbroken by Julie Otsuka’s The Swimmers. I was haunted by Saramago’s Blindness, tr. Giovanni Pontiero. I was charmed by Calvino’s The Baron in the Trees, tr. Ann Goldstein. I was moved by a novel I’d picked up on a whim, Burhan Sönmez’s Labyrinth, tr. from the Turkish by Ümit Hussein, about the aftermath of a musician’s attempted suicide that resulted in memory loss. I read and am already wanting to reread Alejandro Zambra’s Chilean Poet, tr. Megan McDowell. And I listened to the audiobook of Sally Rooney’s Beautiful World, Where Are You? so intensely over the span of a few days that the voice in my head took on an Irish accent. (I felt I had no choice but to finally pick up Normal People later in the year.)
This was also a rewarding year of nonfiction for me. I read essay collections (including C.J. Hauser’s The Crane Wife, Robert Walser’s Berlin Stories, and Athena Dixon’s The Loneliness Files), craft books (Murakami’s Novelist as a Vocation and Amina Cain’s A Horse at Night), memoirs (Chanel Miller’s Know My Name, Jennette McCurdy’s I’m Glad My Mom Died, and elite runner Lauren Fleshman’s Good for a Girl), and a handful of psychology, science, and history books (Rachel Aviv’s Strangers to Ourselves, mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot’s The Fractalist, Candice Millard’s River of the Gods, and two from the Penguin Classics Green Ideas series: Jared Diamond’s The Last Tree on Easter Island and Terry Tempest Williams’ The Clan of One-Breasted Women).
As summer stretched on and drew to a close, I hit a lucky run of novels I couldn’t put down and have since been recommending to everyone I know: Marguerite Duras’ The Easy Life, tr. Emma Ramadan and Olivia Baes; Olga Ravn’s The Employees, tr. Martin Aitken; Ursula Parrott’s Ex-Wife (thanks, Rachel!); Victor Heringer’s The Love of Singular Men, tr. James Young; and Jessi Jezewska Stevens’ The Exhibition of Persephone Q. From my apartment’s rooftop in the August sun, I flew through Jonathan Escoffery’s sweltering If I Survive You and the fourth installment in Knausgaard’s seasons quartet, Summer. I’ll admit that, during the U.S. Open, I couldn’t help but read and love Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Carrie Soto is Back. And although it isn’t quite a book, I spent lots of time with Swiss writer Gianna Rovere’s “Incidents of Everyday Elephants.” My translation of the diaristic story was published at Asymptote in February, and Gianna and I were invited to read with PEN America’s virtual Women in Translation series in August.
At the end of August, I left my entry-level job in publishing (despite loving it!), moved out of my apartment in New York, and landed in Hamburg for the year. I read Ann Patchett’s new classic of Midwestern Americana, Tom Lake, overnight in a European airport. Clarice Lispector’s Near to the Wild Heart, tr. Alison Entrekin, made my heart race as I waited for my train. I read Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure in various S-Bahn and U-Bahn window seats, and I nearly choked on my gasp at the novel’s climactic tragedy—it was the last thing I saw coming.
Autumn had a coming-of-age theme. Author-narrated audiobooks of Elif Batuman’s The Idiot and Either/Or accompanied me on weekend runs through nearby fields and around the lake. Outside a favorite coffee shop, J.M. Coetzee’s Youth was the only English-language pick at a little free library, kismet. I read Elena Ferrante’s My Brilliant Friend and The Story of a New Name, tr. Ann Goldstein, while visiting my brother who was studying abroad in Florence.
I was glad to have made my way through books that challenged me, too. The first part of Nobel Prize-winner Jon Fosse’s dreamlike Septology, The Other Name, tr. Damion Searls, challenged me formally; award-winning Palestinian author Adania Shibli’s Minor Detail, tr. Elisabeth Jaquette, on the other hand, was a difficult but necessary and timely read in terms of content.
I haven’t been able to stop thinking about two contemporary German novels I read this fall: Fatma Aydemir’s family epic Dschinns (Djinns), about the German-Turkish experience, and Marlen Pelny’s Warum wir noch hier sind (Reasons We Remain), an anti-true crime novel about daily life in the aftermath of violence. The former is slated for English-language publication with UW Press, and I have my fingers crossed the latter will find a publisher as well.
Through the snow—then rain—of the past few weeks, I’ve wrapped up my year with Calla Henkel’s Berlin-based rollercoaster of a debut, Other People’s Clothes; French writer Nolwenn Le Blevennec’s first novel in English, As the Eagle Flies, tr. Madeleine Rogers; Claire Keegan’s Small Things Like These, which I was pleasantly surprised to find set at Christmas; Ann Patchett’s Bel Canto; and, a wonderful recommendation from my mom, Anita Brookner’s Hotel du Lac, which left me feeling both charmed and bereft. I read GDR-era author Brigitte Reimann’s brilliant novel Siblings, newly translated into English by Lucy Jones, who I then interviewed for New Books in German. Today, I finished listening to the audiobook of Kafka’s anxiety-inducing novel The Trial as I finished reading his Letters to Milena—which I found just as anxiety-inducing, though perhaps slightly more romantic.
Now, I’m a few pages into Ishiguro’s The Unconsoled and looking forward to all that next year will bring. Would love to hear if you’ve read any new favorites over the past twelve months.
All best, and happy holidays,
Regan