BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2023 ...by our top authors, thepeoplewho really know
Jilly Cooper
Why Mummy Drinks At Christmas should be re-titled Christmasochism, as one of our funniest writers, Gill Sims, describes the traumas of the festive season. These include ghastly relations descending in hordes – particularly tactless mothers-in-law – while adored daughters opt instead to stay with their new boyfriends’ families and husbands constantly upstage one another over who’s the most exhausted. Please read, it’s hilarious.
To have your heart warmed, please also read Tinseltown, in which the Daily Mail’s great sports writer, Ian Herbert, tells the thrilling story of two Hollywood stars joining forces with Wrexham football club and its heroic supporters. Together they turn around the fortunes of a failing team, setting it on the path to glory. I defy even people who dislike football not to be engrossed. Tackle! by Jilly Cooper (Bantam £22) is out now
Dan Jones
I have pressed copies of Alice Winn’s astonishing debut In Memoriam on many friends. It’s a dazzling, funny, heartbreaking story of life between public school and the Western Front during the First World War, and it deserves all the acclaim it has garnered.
I enjoyed The Enchanters, James Ellroy’s sleazy, scabrous riff on the death of Marilyn Monroe. Finally, while I was driving around the country on a book tour, I powered through the audio book of Walter Isaacson’s biography of Elon Musk. Isaacson has made deep character studies of difficult, transformative genius men his forte, and Musk is a terrific subject, if not always an attractive one. Wolves Of Winter by Dan Jones (Head of Zeus £16.99) is out now Curtis Sittenfeld
I fell madly in love with two novels in 2023: Everything’s Fine by Cecilia Rabess and Big Swiss by Jen Beagin. Both are outrageously smart and both feature protagonists who find themselves simultaneously smitten with another person and so surprised by their own smitten-ness that it upends their understanding of their place in the world.
I’m currently listening to the audio version of the non-fiction book The Country Of The Blind: A Memoir At The End Of Sight by Andrew Leland, and it’s a remarkable combination of informative and charming. Leland started having vision problems in childhood, and he’s now in his 40s and legally blind. He reports on the history and current politics of blindness, while also chronicling his own experiences. Leland himself reads the audio book so delightfully that listening to it is like chatting with a wise and witty friend. Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld (Doubleday £16.99) is out now
Paul Lynch
In Samantha Harvey’s Orbital, six astronauts cast a cosmic eye upon the fragility and wonder of life on Earth. With each novel, Harvey pushes past the known towards something unique – and Orbital is entirely original, a serenely beautiful and intelligent creation.
A.J. Liebling’s Between Meals: An Appetite For Paris was republished as a Penguin Classic this year and deservedly so. Decadent Paris between the wars is brought to life with one amuse-bouche after another. Liebling’s appetite is bottomless, his gaze relentless, his savvy style full of wit and bite.
Mike McCormack’s This Plague Of Souls is European fiction in a Mayo jersey. McCormack’s metier is the material existence of the pint-of-plain Irish man, shaped by inscrutable forces. It’s strange and luminous, lapidary and rewarding. Prophet Song by Paul Lynch (Oneworld £16.99) is out now
Daniel Mason
Some of the more enjoyable hours of my summer were spent reading Abraham Verghese’s novel The Covenant Of Water.
In addition to its many pleasures – the richness of its sense of place, its kaleidoscope of characters, its humour – I was particularly drawn into it as a kind of love letter to the practice of medicine. Not only does it treat the challenges of medical discovery as narrative elements on par with other great twists of plot, but its depictions of illness felt so real, so tender, that they seemed at times a kind of blueprint for patient and care-giver alike.
The cumulative effect is more than just a literary one. At a time when we find healthcare increasingly corporatised, The Covenant Of Water felt like a call to arms, a plea to reimagine what medicine can be. North Woods by Daniel Mason (John Murray £16.99) is out now
Holly Bourne
As a first-time mother, Matrescence is probably the most reassuring book I’ve ever read. Detailing the chronically understudied metamorphosis of motherhood, Lucy Jones explores the physical, hormonal, psychological and socio-economic impact on women, some of which are permanent. It’s searingly honest and warm.
Reading it, it became so clear that our society is built to fail mothers and therefore for mothers to feel like they’re the ones failing. Buy it for every new parent you know – and then maybe buy a copy to send to your local MP as well. You Could Be So Pretty by Holly Bourne (Usborne £8.99) is out now
JacquelineWilson
A History Of Women In 101 Objects isn’t just my best book of 2023. I’ll keep it on my desk for years and whenever I need a coffee break or a pause for inspiration, I’ll dip into it.
The 101 objects are chronological, from 30,000BC right up to last year. The Singer sewing machine, the Remington typewriter and the hunger strike medal are perhaps predictable choices – but the 16th Century glass dildo, George Sand’s right arm and Kim Kardashian’s ring are delightfully unexpected. Annabelle Hirsch’s book is written with great flair and style, her sly wit giving us a new perspective on our lives.
She’s never strident or overly academic, and every essay has an original twist. Treat all your female friends to it for Christmas. The Other Edie Trimmer by Jacqueline Wilson (Puffin £14.99) is out now
John Boyne
Sarah Gilmartin’s Service is a powerful story of a sexually abusive chef that exposes the continuing differential between powerful men and inexperienced young women in the workplace. A literary page-turner with carefully constructed characters and an important narrative.
In non-fiction, I greatly admired Joe Gibson’s Seventeen. Groomed and sexually abused by his female teacher when he was a teenager, Gibson writes without self-pity but with the scar tissue of someone betrayed by a school that knew what was going on and did nothing to stop it – an experience that, unfortunately, many of his readers will relate to. Water by John Boyne (Doubleday £12.99) is out now
Ken Follett
The House Of Doors by Tan Twan Eng is my fiction choice for 2023. Tan’s titles are a bit fey – another one is The Garden of Evening Mists – but the stories are tough, sometimes brutal.
They take place in Malaysia, and are about war, murder and adultery. Often they flash forward or back to the Second World War, when the British colonists fled and the Japanese took over. His theme is betrayal and its cruel consequences. The House Of Doors begins with a visit by Somerset Maugham, whose whole life is a deception – he was gay at a time when men had to lie about it. It’s about time Tan won the Booker Prize. The Armour Of Light by Ken Follett (Macmillan £25) is out now
Natalie Haynes
In Metamorphosis, Robert Douglas-Fairhurst describes the moment when his doctor told him he had multiple sclerosis as feeling like a trapdoor had opened beneath his feet. He responds to the devastating news with quiet wit and clear-minded intellect, searching his bookshelves for a literary map to the uncharted territory of sickness.
Emily Wilson has added a magisterial translation of the Iliad to her mighty Odyssey from 2017. The story of the battle between Hector and Achilles in the Trojan War, of a city under siege, of innocents caught up in conflict, has never been more resonant or necessary.
What You Need To Be Warm is a beautiful poem of welcome composed by Neil Gaiman, with gorgeous illustrations by multiple artists. A warm light in the dark of winter. Divine Might by Natalie Haynes (Picador £20) is out now
Philippa Gregory
My book of the year is The Walnut Tree: Women, Violence And The Law – A Hidden History by Kate Morgan. This outstanding work shines a light on the women in history who have exposed the violence to women condoned and rooted in the law of the land.
It’s not published until February but is a brilliant read, written by a legal historian who helps readers understand the inequalities within British law and discover the women who fought to change it. With plenty of individual stories, court records and campaigners, this book brings to life the danger, tragedy and violence faced by centuries of women.
Normal Women: 900 Years Of Making History by Philippa Gregory (William Collins £25) is out now
Sophie Hannah
I adored Louise Swanson’s End Of Story, a chilling and moving dystopian mystery with a gasp-inducing twist. Clémence Michallon’s The Quiet Tenant is an unputdownable serial killer thriller, and Robert Galbraith’s (aka J.K. Rowling’s) The Running Grave is pure joy.
I loved Time To Write: Inspiring Lessons And Practical Skills For Writing The Novel You’ve Always Wanted by Emily Winslow, who edits all of my books and is an editorial and writing-teaching genius. And finally, not out until next year but you can pre-order it now: Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra is possibly the best crime novel I’ve ever read.
Hercule Poirot’s Silent Night by Sophie Hannah (HarperCollins £22) is out now, and her murder mystery movie The Mystery Of Mr E is available on Amazon Prime
Susie Dent
My book of the year has to be Babel by R.F. Kuang. It’s an epic, sweeping story set in a fantastical, 19th Century version of my home city of Oxford. The focus is the Royal Institute of Translation, also known as Babel, to which bright children are brought from all corners of the globe to find ‘match pairs’ – words in different languages that mean similar things but that are also a world apart. The words are engraved on bars of silver, whose magic is only activated when a speaker thinks and dreams in both languages.
The story skilfully blends history and fantasy, and its scope is monumental – taking in war, colonialism, academia and emotions, as well as the power and dangers of language. It’s not a cosy read, but I haven’t felt so shaken and moved by a book in a long time. If I could display even a fraction of Kuang’s skill in my own fiction, I would be a very happy woman. Guilty By Definition by Susie Dent (Zaffre £16.99) is out on August 15 next year
Terry Hayes
I do not know if it is my favourite book of 2023 but it is certainly shaping up that way. The book is Stuart Broad’s autobiography Broadly
Speaking and I am only a short way into it. I bought it because having spent so long with my two sons booing him at various Ashes matches in Australia, I thought the least I could do is buy his book.
It is a great read from a truly great cricketer. I doubt that the game will ever see anything again like the Broad/Jimmy Anderson partnership so, in a way, Stuart’s account of his career has true historical significance. Of course it would have been even better if he had been wearing the baggy green cap!
That aside, he appears to be a highly intelligent man and a great credit to the game.
Thank you, Mr Broad, for so many fine wickets – and such a good book. The Year Of The Locust by Terry Hayes (Bantam £22) is out now
Victoria Hislop
Fifteen Wild Decembers by Karen Powell is a re-imagining of the lives of Emily Brontë and her siblings, and is masterfully written.
Powell transported me to the Brontë universe that I love so much with enormous skill, and her vivid and descriptive writing recreates the wild Yorkshire environment where this extraordinary family lived.
Equally masterfully, she takes the reader to Emily’s inner world. We get a strong sense of the rivalries within the family, but also a flavour of the love and affection between the sisters and their brother – and the grief caused by the early deaths that rocked their lives.
The sadness for fans of Wuthering Heights (I am one of them) is that Emily’s first novel was also her last. Karen Powell has done something to fill the void. I adored this book – its only fault was that it had to end! The Figurine by Victoria Hislop (Headline £25) is out now