Superlatives for my 2023 Book Reads

Chaotic ones, obviously

If you follow any content creator online - newsletter, YouTube, music, etc - you’re probably inundated with ‘End of Year’ and ‘Best of Year’ lists. I know I am. While I find some value in those, no one *really* needs my thoughts on the best and worst books I read this year. 

Instead of recounting every single book I read( especially since I’m still trying to hit my 100 book goal), I thought I’d give out some superlatives for some of the books I did read. 

My reasoning for this is two fold: 1) my criteria for what is ‘good’ in a book is wildly different than most people, and so therefore me ranking books would not be that useful to you as a reader in any way, shape or form, and 2) everyone’s taste is subjective, anyways. I would much rather give personalized recommendations or assorted thoughts. 

So because this is my show and I can do what I want, I give you, my Superlatives for 2023. 

If you get this reference, you know what’s up.

---

1. Best book I cannot remember reading 

The Penelopiad, Margaret Atwood

All photos are from Bookshop.org unless otherwise mentioned.

When I tell you as I was looking through the list of books I read that I could not for the life of me recall a single solitary thing about this book…I’m so sorry Margaret Atwood. I had to look up the summary and then it came back to me. This is a retelling of The Odyssey from Penelope’s point of view. It was probably fine, but I’m not the best person to ask on that.

2. Best book I read to stay on schedule for my reading target 

   

   They are small but mighty.

The Little Book of Paris. Or The Little Book of the Language of Flowers. Or The Little Book of Astrology.¹ All teeny tiny books on my bedside table that I used to get caught up after I went through a huge reading slump in June. (I was paralyzed by the amount of upcoming travel I had, so I did nothing except watch re-runs of Grey’s Anatomy. I regret nothing.) 

That’s a lie - I do have one regret. That I bought these books IN ENGLISH when I later learned that there were FRENCH EDITIONS. Quelle dommage. For shame, Marissa.  

3. Best Audiobook with Performative Accents

Spare, Prince Harry. I do love some good royal drama,² but I wasn’t chomping at the bit to read this. I then heard that not only does Prince Harry himself narrate the book, but also that he does so quite well. Plus that he does some accents in here. While I’m not the biggest audiobook fan, I am much more inclined to listen to one if the author themselves is reading it. This was an impactful listen, and I don’t think I would have enjoyed it nearly as much if Prince Harry hadn’t narrated it. Plus - a Brit trying to do American, Australian and Canadian accents.

4. Best Ancestral Books

What do I mean by this? I mean I’m a European mutt by descent and I read books that came from the countries of my forbearers: Italy, Ireland, and Poland. Here are my top picks from each of my natal homelands. 

Ireland

Foster, Clare Keegan 

Or honestly, *anything* by Clare Keegan. Have you ever heard the phrase addition by subtraction? I think this sums up Keegan’s writing well. It’s sparse in a way that works - she gives you enough details to understand the story, but the missing information is greater subtext to understand what’s really going on. Reading between the lines is a big theme here, and I think this style works because her pieces are generally short. I’m not sure I’d like this if it was a full length novel. Anyways, Foster is about a young girl who is sent to a relative’s farm for the summer, and depicts her growing relationship with her foster family. 

Poland

This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen, Tadeusz Borowski

Borowski was imprisoned in Auschwitz from 1943 to 1945. Knowing this, re-read the title. Yeah. 

This book is different from most Holocaust books I’ve read for a few reasons. First, the narration is so detached and disassociated that it makes the death camp’s operations seem mechanical. Second, Borowski implicates himself in his own survival. By his logic, he helped perpetuate the horrors of the camp while he worked there as a prisoner. I don’t know if I agree with him, but it is a powerful statement of how truly awful humanity can be to each other. Further, Borowski was not Jewish. He and his fiancee were ethnic Poles who were arrested, and they survived Auschwitz and Birkenau together. I haven’t read many non-Jewish narratives on surviving the concentration camps (which is honestly as it should be; Jewish voices should be centered here), so overall this was a new perspective. This was a harrowing listen, but necessary and important. Technically, this isn’t a memoir, but a collection of short stories, but even upon its original publication in 1952, it was assumed that this was based on Borowski’s wartime experiences.

Italy 

Six Characters in Search of an Author, Luigi Pirandello 

This play was recommended to me by a student, and it’s quick, absurd and delightful. There is so much sarcasm and so much actor angst that I giggled more at the side characters than the plot itself. Overall, delightfully sarcastic, just like Italians themselves! 

5. Best Book that covers a Niche Marissa Interest™️

Graveyard Ghost

Pure, Andrew Miller. I did a post on it. It’s about a cemetery. In Paris. Or the destruction of one, really. 

6. The most ‘French’ French book I read 

Odette Toulemonde et autres histoires, Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt. A book of short stories which contained such affirming morals such as, “You should be happy your husband stayed with you after he had a whole other secret family because that means he really loves you!” and “if you expected your husband to be monogamous, you should have gotten a dog.” Classic France. 

7. Best Book on a Conflict that Deserves More Attention³ 

As Long as Lemon Trees Grow, Zoulfa Katouh. This is a YA book about the Syrian Civil war, something I peripherally knew about, but hadn’t read further. The story centers on Salama, a pharmacy student working in a hospital during the Syrian Civil War. Even though Salama hasn’t finished her studies, because of the lack of medical personnel, she is basically working as a doctor. The novel is an incredibly realistic portrayal of living in a combat zone, maybe out of any other book I’ve ever read. It’s also speculative, and has fantastical elements in how Salama’s PTSD appears. There’s also a love story that’s very, very sweet.   

8. Best Book I still haven’t finished reading yet 

The Sparrow, Mary Doria Russell.  

(Covers face in shame) I’m gonna finish it, I promise! I’ll do it in my own time. Don’t rush me. The real problem here is that Russell used SO MUCH FORESHADOWING that I flipped forward to the end to figure out what happened because it seemed like nothing could live up to that level of hype. I was kind of right, but point being - I know the end and now have no motivation to read the rest of the book. Don’t be like me, folks. Read the book about Jesuits in space properly. 

And that’s it! My book superlatives for 2023. Maybe you found something new to read, but if not, I hope it at least made you smile. Come back on Tuesday for a post on graphs!!! Aka, I mine all of my data from The Storygraph on what I read this year. Way better than a roundup post. What about you? Any notable books from 2023 that are outside of the ‘best’ and ‘worst’ categories?

1. Sorryyyyyyy these are all Amazon links - could not find them on Bookshop.

2. One of my earliest memories is of my mother getting me up at 6am to watch Princess Diana’s funeral. I had no idea who Princess Diana was and thought she was talking about Diana who lived on the next street over. I was almost 6 years old and very confused.

3. Both the Syrian Revolution and the book deserve more attention, just to be clear.