My Top 5 Books of 2023
As we slip quietly into 2024 it’s time to reflect on my absolute favourite books of 2023. I used to pick three but I’ve had to up that to five as I just couldn’t narrow it down.
It’s always hard. There were instant standouts again – about 10 of them but I had to cut it down to five. I have tried to include a mix of genres but failed yet again. I read a lot of crime fiction, which occasionally make my quarterly selections, but my Top books of the year tend to be something a bit different, so here we go.
The Dictionary Of Lost Words by Pip Williams
Absolutely fantastic! Who knew that a book about compiling a dictionary could be so emotional and beautiful.
It’s a combination of fictitious characters like Esme and her father ‘Da’, and others like Dr Murray, his daughters Elsie and Rosfrith and Ditte who really existed. The author gives some of the real people more importance and personality in the story than we know as real – Ditte for instance is very central to the book, but in reality we know little about her in real life.
For my full review click here
The Fascination by Essie Fox
This is one of my favourite books of the year so far. I simply adored it. I don’t read that much historical fiction, but when I do it has to be unique and something special and this is. It’s the third book I’ve read this year which involves music halls, entertainers and ‘freak shows’, and The Fascination did not disappoint.
It’s mainly the characters – Theo Seabrook, disowned grandson of Lord Seabrook, the twins Keziah and Tilly, sold by their quack medicine-man father to the mysterious ‘Captain’, Aleski Turgenev based on real-life Fedor Jeftichew, better known as the Dog-Faced Boy, a sideshow performer in Barnum’s circus, Martha who hid her face because of a disfiguring harelip and Dr Eugene Summerwell, owner of the Museum of Anatomy in London, who becomes Theo’s employer.
For my full review click here
Salt and Skin by Eliza Henry-Jones
I’ve only ever read two books that I can compare this with, and they are She Never Told Me About The Ocean by Elizabeth Sharp McKetta and The Unravelling by Polly Crosby. They all have that same whimsical, magical unworldliness, and the first two became my top books of the year in 2021 and 2022. I have a feeling Salt & Skin will be in my top books of 2023.
It’s hard to describe what Salt & Skin is about, because it’s so much more than a story. It’s beautiful, lyrical and filled with superstition and magic. It’s about a family and their journey across the world to find a new beginning, but it’s also about motherhood, grief, love and community. It’s about the witches who were executed in the 17th century and the religion that fears them and would still persecute them if they could.
For my full review click here
The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods
I love this book so much. It’s gone straight to the top of my favourite books of the year – maybe even the decade. I kept thinking it reminded me of the books of another author, but it was only towards the end that I remembered who that was – Menna Van Praag.
Magical realism is one of my favourite genres, though occasionally it disappoints, because there are books which fall too much into the fantasy genre. The Lost Bookshop, however, is perfect.
For my full review click here
The Stargazers by Harriet Evans
The book is written in three timelines though Iris’s childhood only features fairly briefly. Mostly it’s about Sarah as a child in the 1950s, living with her sister Victoria, and their mother Lady Iris Fane. Their father Henry Fox (the girls have his name Fox, but Iris has reverted to her maiden name of Fane), appears to be totally absent.
Then we have Sarah as an adult in the 1970s, married to Daniel (who is lovely but would annoy me if he was my husband) and their life in a crumbling house in Hampstead. It’s a house they can’t afford and Daniel’s attempts at DIY always end in disaster. After a childhood in a crumbling mansion, I am surprised that Sarah wants to live here, but then I suppose for her it’s normal. Daniel invites his bohemian friends and half the neighbours to drop round all the time and Sarah can’t cope. I’m not sure I would be able to.
For my full review click here
