Annual Top Ten Favorites
Top Ten Favorite Books of 2023
Since January 1, 2023, these books have been my favorites. They span a wide range of reading genres, from non-fiction to fiction, from lengthy to short works, and from the Classics to modern literary fiction. The inclusion of Samuel Beckett's Trilogy is one example of an exception, and the pairing of Cormac McCarthy's two last novels because they enhanced one another is another. If I were to enlarge my list, I could have included more novels from this year, which was a really rich reading year. Even though the other works were excellent, these ten will be with me for a long time; in fact, I reread the Faulkner and Ellison volumes.
The list is in no particular order, but if I had to pick my favorite of the year it would be Three Novels by Samuel Beckett. I read these together as one book in the final months of the year and they stand out as the most powerful novels I have read in a long time. They have joined the other classics on my top ten books of all time.
Things We Lost to the Water by Eric Nguyen
Independent People by Halldor Laxness
Landscape: Memory by Matthew Stadler
The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
All Down Darkness Wide by Sean Hewitt
The Wrong End of the Telescope by Rabih Alameddine
The City of God by Augustine of Hippo
2 comments:
I am hoping to read City of God in the future, myself, once my current list of classics is completed.
Stephen,
You are in for a treat. While Augustine's thinking is powerful, his prose is accessible and the combination of religion, philosophy and history is fascinating.
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