Holiday Post 2023: Books and Reading

Welcome to the third post in my holiday posts series here at The Itinerant Librarian. This is where I look at a few book lists. I try to find what may be interesting, to me at least, and see what I can add to my ever growing TBR list. As I have written before, way I see it these are lists of books that "experts" say I should be reading. The odds are good I have not read them, nor am I in any rush to read them. As my four readers know, I read what I want when I want to read it. This year I've had a bit more of a challenge due to my current boycott of the book publishers and their imprints suing Internet Archive; you can read my boycott statement here. If anything, it has made me a bit more aware of what I read, and I may write a short reflection on the experience later on. 

I also do this post as a bit of reader's advisory. Hey, if I help one or two of my readers to find something good to read I consider that a good thing. As always, I will do my best to avoid any book lists behind a paywall and/or presented in a slides format. 

Let me take a moment to remind my four readers that I will be posting my end of year reading list and report sometime around January 2024. In addition, I will be posting my lists of best books I read and reviewed in nonfiction, fiction, graphic novels and comics, and Tarot and esoterica in early 2024, so stay tuned for those. 

 

 

Big Lists

I do not always pay attention to the usual Big Lists everyone else does, but I know I need to at least acknowledge they exist. So here is a small sampling.

• The Big A has their lists of best for 2023. They have various lists, but I am highlighting their best nonfiction list given I tend to read more nonfiction. Feel free to check out their other categories if you must. On a side note, I was expecting not to have read a single book from their nonfiction, but it turns out I did read one: The People's Hospital (link to my review).
  
• Their competitor, Barnes and Noble, also has their lists. They don't seem to have a nonfiction list, so I am going with their best history for the highlight. I have not read a single book from that list. To be honest, I have not done any shopping at a Barnes and Noble in years now. Part of it is because they seem more a gift store than a bookstore, and part of it is I am just not buying as many books in print, and when I do, I just go over to Half Price Books and get something secondhand, but that is another story.
   

 Lists from Newspapers, Magazines, and other Periodicals

These are in no particular order. 

• Esquire lists their best 20 for 2023. In terms of fiction, it seems dystopian fiction was popular for them.
  
• The Globe and Mail has their best 100, divided into categories.The list also includes some books for young adults and children. Being a Canadian news source, it includes some Canada specific books. 
• The Guardian offers various genre lists for their best of the year.
• Harper's Bazaar has a list of 45 books they claim you won't be able to put down.  Their list is predominantly fiction, mostly commercial fiction, and memoir. If that strikes your fancy, go see what you can find. 
• The New Statesman has a list of 20 best in fiction and nonfiction. From this list, I missed that there is yet another translation of The Iliad; it's listed under their fiction list. From the their nonfiction, I am curious about What is a Doctor? a GP's Prescription for the Future (link to WorldCat), which is about a doctor in the UK and his experiences about the National Health System (NHS) that their RWNJs are doing their best to dismantle. I am sure there are lessons from the UK we could learn and apply here in the United States if people had the will. 
• NPR has their books they love portal, where you can find their selections in various categories, plus the portal let's you look at previous years. I have not read anything from their 2023 bests, 381 in total, but I am thinking about adding the following to my TBR list (links to WorldCat). 
• Anansi's Gold: the Man Who Looted the West, Outfoxed Washington, and Swindled the World. This is a bit of history and a bit of true crime. 
• The Male Gazed: on Hunks, Heartthrobs, and What Pop Culture Taught Me About (Desiring) Men. My library recently acquired this one, and I checked it out, so I am hoping to read it sometime in 2024. 
• I've had Ringmaster: Vince McMahon and the Unmaking of America on my TBR list for a bit now. Maybe 2024 is the year I get to it. 
• Invitation to a Banquet: the Story of Chinese Food.
  

• The San Diego Union Tribune has a small list of books to give as gifts for 2023. From this list, Raw Dog: The Naked Truth About Hot Dogs sounds interesting for the TBR list.  
• Library Journal has a portal of best books for 2023 in various categories.  
• The Progressive picks out their favorites for 2023. The magazine's staff pick out their favorites and then comment on them to help you decide if you want to read them. 
• Mother Jones offers the "29 Books We Couldn't Stop Thinking About in 2023."  The list does have one or two books found on other lists, but it also features some selections I had not seen elsewhere.
  
• Literary Hub has a nice roundup of the award-winning novels of 2023. They've rounded up the winners in the "biggest" book prizes.
  

 

Lists by genre

Let's have a look at some more specific lists.  Again, in no particular order.

• Graphic novels and comics. This is a genre I enjoy, but I do not always get to read as much in it as I wish. 
• Comics Beat has their list of 34 Best Comics of 2023.
• Polygon has a list of the best comics for 2023. 
• Walden Pond Books offers a list of best comics and graphic novels for adults. If you like your comics and graphic novels a bit more "grown up," this may be the list for you.
   
• Science Fiction and Fantasy.
• Gizmodo offers a list of 20 fantasies they consider underrated. 
• Five Books looks at the Hugo Award nominees for best novel in 2023.
  
• Horror.
• Esquire claims that these "31 Best Horror Books of 2023 Will Scare You Sh*tless." 
• Den of Geek came up with their list of horror so far back in October. 
• Paste Magazine has their list of best horror of the year.
  
• Powell's Bookstore also has their list of best horror for the year.
• Want something stronger? You can check out the 2023 Splatterpunk Awards list, via Locus Magazine.
   

 

 Some miscellaneous lists for fun

Finally for this post, here are some lists in curious categories. These are lists that we may not see very often and/or on topics we may not consider much. 

• OK, African American history and literature is not just a curious category, but since this is not a major list, I am linking to it here. From the AAIHS (African American Intellectual History Society) blog Black Perspectives here is a list of the best Black history books for 2023. There may be one or two on this list we need to order for our library. 
• Brittle Paper has their list of 100 African notable books.  Anansi's Gold, which I mentioned above, is on this list. The list seems a bit heavy on fiction, but there is a variety in fiction types. A book from the list I find interesting and possible for my TBR list is in nonfiction:
• Black Ghosts: Encounters with the Africans Changing China. From the book description: "The travel memoir of a Nigerian woman in China exploring the intersections and divides between the two cultures and the lives of African economic migrants in the bustling People's Republic." This could be one to order for our library as well.
  
• Autostraddle offers a list of 65 Best Queer Books. Their list is divided into categories including graphic novels and comics, fantasy, and nonfiction among others. Odds are you can find something you like here. 
• Want Sapphic books? The Lesbrary has a list.  
• Mombian, a resource for lesbian moms, has a list of best books for LGBTQ parents, prospective parents, and parents of LGBTQ kids.
  
• Creative Loafing has a list of best Florida books. 
• Cookbooks? There are a few lists of cookbooks such as: 
• Epicurious offers their best of the year.
• Forks over Knives has a small list of vegan books. Some of them are cookbooks; others are about veganism in general. 
• The Gamer has the best video game cookbooks. These are books based on a video game, and they could be a good gift for the gamer in your life. 
• The team at The Art Newspaper chose their top art books of the year. 
• One of these years I need to see if I can talk our library staff here to pick out a favorite book for a year and then post a year's best or a year's favorites or such on our blog. Until that happens, here are some other library lists: 
• Chicago Public Library list. They got their top 10, then other lists of best by categories. 
• The New York Public Library list, presented by age groups. The list is curated by their librarians. 
• The top ten list from the staff at Boston Public Library. 
• The Beverly (MA) Public Library has a list of their staff's favorites.
  
• Seattle Public library has their staff's favorite children's books for the year.
  
• Photo-Eye has a list of their favorite photography books.  
• Need some humor? Vulture presents their best and funniest books of 2023.
• Enjoy reading books in translation? I can read fluently in Spanish just fine, but for the rest of the world, I may need a little help. I know I do enjoy reading a translated work once in a while. World Literature Today has a list of 75 Notable Translations for 2023.
• For folks who read on audiobooks, here is AudioFile Magazine's best of 2023 list.
  
• Literary Hub has a list for the Lefties in your life, a little Marxism and Mistletoe.
• Want business books? Five Books talks to Andrew Hill of the Financial Times on the five books that made FT's Business Book of the Year short list.  
• Bookshop.org has their list of top selling indie books for 2023. Now finding these kind of books in one place is not always easy, so I hope some folks find this list helpful. 
• Broke By Books has their list of 15 New Christmas Romance Books for 2023. 
• OK, this link is just for amusement. Literary Hub has put together a list of the most scathing book reviews of 2023. If you want to read some reviewers ripping a new one to books like Eli Cologne's new biography, keep reading. 
• Want more bad books? Open Letters Review looks at the worst fiction books of 2023.