Life gets busy sometimes and it is easy to fall out of the reading habit. To get yourself back between the covers try setting yourself a challenge of reading a book a month. The other challenge is finding a book worthy of your time which will keep you turning the pages. Here we have 12 books for you to read throughout 2023. Each one brilliant in its own right and well worth adding to your reading list.
American Gods
by Neil Gaiman
This is one of the most talked-about books of the new millennium. A kaleidoscopic journey which heads deep into myth and across an American landscape which feels totally alien yet familiar all at once.
Released from prison, Shadow finds his world turned upside down. His wife has been killed; the mysterious Mr. Wednesday offers him a job. A battle for the very soul of America is coming and they are in its direct path. It is, quite simply, a contemporary masterpiece.
Autumn
by Ali Smith
The novel centres on the unconventional friendship between Elisabeth and Daniel Gluck who meet in 1993. Daniel is a century old. Elisabeth, born in 1984, has her eye on the future. The United Kingdom is in pieces, divided by a historic once-in-a-generation summer.
Love is won, love is lost. Hope is hand in hand with hopelessness. A playful, multi-layered and, at times, delectably subversive novel on the nature of time, aging, identity, art, love and friendship.
A Man Called Ove
by Fredrik Backman
This is the book on which the new Tom Hanks movie, A Man Called Otto, is based. Ove is a grumpy yet loveable man finds his solitary world turned on its head when a boisterous young family moves in next door. Behind his brusk exterior there is a story and a sadness. Whilst still trying to come to terms with the death of his wife Ove’s life unexpectedly and comedically intertwines with the new family to the neighbourhood. This has heart-warming story has a quintessential don’t judge a book by its cover feel.
Although Ove doesn’t gush with emotion, nor does he walk around with a constant smile on his face, he turns up when it counts. A wonderful tale of love, loss and friendship.
Fingersmith
by Sarah Waters
Moving from the underworld dens of Victorian London to the boudoirs of country house gothic, and hingeing on the seduction of an heiress, Waters’s third novel is a drippingly atmospheric thriller, a smart study of innocence and experience, and a sensuous lesbian love story, with a plot twist to make the reader gasp. This daring novel pickpokets its way through a Dickensian landscape where no one-and nothing-is as it seems.
My Brilliant Friend
by Elena Ferrante
Believe all the hype. This is a modern masterpiece from one of Italy’s most acclaimed authors. An intense and generous hearted story about two friends, Elena and Lila. Ferrante’s inimitable style lends itself perfectly to
a meticulous portrait of these two women that is also the story of a nation and a touching meditation on the nature of friendship.
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
by Michael Chabon
Joe Kavalier, a young Jewish artist who has also been trained in the art of Houdini-esque escape, has just smuggled himself out of Nazi-invaded Prague and landed in New York City. His Brooklyn cousin Sammy Clay is looking for a partner to create heroes, stories, and art for the latest novelty to hit America – the comic book. Drawing on their own fears and dreams, Kavalier and Clay create the Escapist, the Monitor, and Luna Moth, inspired by the beautiful Rosa Saks, who will become linked by powerful ties to both men. With exhilarating style and grace, Michael Chabon tells an unforgettable story about romance and possibility. A well rounded character set novel which is, in my opinion, a must-read for anyone who enjoys books that defy the boundaries of genres.
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night‑Time
by Mark Haddon
Fifteen-year-old Christopher John Francis Boone becomes absorbed in the mystery of a dog’s demise, meticulously investigating through diagrams, timetables, maps and maths problems. Haddon’s fascinating portrayal of an unconventional mind was a crossover hit with both adults and children and was adapted into a very successful stage play.
If you haven’t read this book then you should. I maybe did it the wrong way round; I watched the stage adaptation then read the book. Both are amazing and an insight into the autistic brain. Though provoking and heart warming and, at times, a glimpse into Christopher’s overwhelming world.
A Visit from the Goon Squad
by Jennifer Egan
Inspired by both Proust and The Sopranos, Egan’s Pulitzer-winning comedy follows several characters in and around the US music industry, but is really a book about memory and kinship, time and narrative, continuity and disconnection. In a breathtaking array of styles and tones, ranging from tragedy to satire to PowerPoint, Egan captures the undertow of self-destruction that we all must either master or succumb to; the basic human hunger for redemption and the universal tendency to reach for both and escape the merciless progress of time.
The Colour of Magic
by Terry Pratchett
If you haven’t experinced Pratchett’s razor-sharp wit then everyone in the world who has, won’t be judging you, they will be a little jealous. Imagine watching Star Wars or reading Harry Potter for the first. The sheer thrill of it is priceless. This is the first in the Discworld series and not only a good place to start but a fabulous book to boot. It might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but you should at least read one of his novels and this is, in my opinion the best place to start.
White Teeth
by Zadie Smith
Hapless veterans of World War II, Archie and Samad and their families, become agents of England’s irrevocable transformation. Set against London’s racial and cultural tapestry, venturing across the former empire and into the past as it barrels toward the future, White Teeth revels in the ecstatic hodgepodge of modern life, flirting with disaster, confounding expectations, and embracing the comedy of daily existence. This is an extremely funny novel which chronicls the lives of immigrants in the UK. Focusing on issues such as the children of imigrants forming a new collective identity, and the big question of who is really English. An entertaining read.
The Road
by Cormac McCarthy
A father and his young son, “each the other’s world entire”, trawl across the ruins of post-apocalyptic America in this terrifying but tender story told with biblical conviction. The slide into savagery as civilisation collapses is harrowing material, but McCarthy’s metaphysical efforts to imagine a cold dark universe where the light of humanity is winking out, are what make the novel such a powerful ecological warning. Awesome in the totality of its vision, it is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.
The Tiger’s Wife
by Téa Obreht
The central question in the novel is “How do people respond to death?” In answer to this, Obreht creates a book which is mesmerising and filled with cycles of life and death, love and loss.
In a Balkan country mending from years of conflict, Natalia, a young doctor, arrives on a mission of mercy at an orphanage by the sea. Soon she feels age-old superstitions and secrets gathering everywhere around her. Secrets her outwardly cheerful hosts have chosen not to tell her. Secrets involving the strange family digging for something in the surrounding vineyards. Secrets hidden in the landscape itself.