It’s time for my annual geeky book roundup!
The last three years have been a huge shift for me as a reader.
I now read with specific objectives to further my own writing, which sounds like it would suck the joy out of reading, but it’s added so much more passion and urgency instead. I keep adding new books to a huge TBR pile and often feel like I can’t read fast enough.
I used to go for months without reading; now, I pick up a new book as soon I’ve put down the last. I still find so much pleasure in reading “for work”—maybe even more, because now joy comes hand in hand with inspiration.
In 2021 my goal was to read as much sex writing as I could to help me figure out how to write my own sex scenes. In 2022 I attempted to diversify my reading beyond books by written by white, American female authors.
In 2023, I set out to find “comps” or comparative titles, publishing speak for books I could use to describe my own book to agents and editors, e.g. “The English Patient meets Jurassic Park”, or “Normal People, but set in Amsterdam with Asians” (which sound awful and do NOT describe my book, okay?).
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It was frustrating to discover that so many popular, traditionally published books with similar themes and topics to my own (female-led memoirs about open relationships or marriage in general) throwing me firmly back into the land I’d been trying to escape. Yep: back into white, American female author territory.
Landing a book deal with a UK publisher in September made me realize that my reading choices are sooooo heavily American-influenced. I don’t really know any UK-based authors apart from Neil Gaiman, Kazuo Ishiguro or Philip Pullman, and more recently, Sally Rooney and Katherine May. For shame, there were exactly zero UK authors on my 2022 list!
Who are your favorite UK authors? Let me know who I should be reading!
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Determined to remedy that in the second half of 2023, I dug into my massive book haul from my publishers’ meetings in London, where books upon books were piled into my arms as I left the conference room still aglow from lavish editorial lovebombing. “Would you like to take some books with you?” felt like the ultimate char feeling like I’d died and gone to heaven.
I’ve loved all the books I’ve been given. And I now have a much deeper appreciation of the arduous journey a book must make from author’s mind to reader’s heart, and of all the people involved in that process.
So, here’s my list.
Memoir
In the Warm Shadow of Islam (Isabelle Eberhardt) - a Patti Smith recommendation, written in the 1930s by a woman masquerading as a man to travel through North Africa in 1904
Body Work (Melissa Febos) - both a memoir and writing guide to writing memoir, which I found really useful for my own work
How We Love: Notes on a Life (Clementine Ford) - warm, insightful, lighthearted essay collection from the Australian author of the feminist manifesto Fight Like a Girl
Many Love (Sophie Lucido Johnson) - an illustrated memoir of polyamory, with warm, humorous drawings by a brilliant New Yorker illustrator
Open (Rachel Krantz) - a reported memoir about an open relationship, written by one of the founding editors of Bustle
Acts of Infidelity (Lena Andersson) - I seem to be reading one very depressing book about infidelity with a love-to-hate-her protagonist per year. Last year’s adulteress was the sex-addicted Parisian Adele by Leila Slimani; this year it’s a lovesick playwright living in Stockholm, who is beyond delulu but imaginably Scandi chic
Worlds of Wonder: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments (Aimee Nezhukumatathil) - a beautifully illustrated essay collection that combines nature and science writing with memoir. And the author is Filipina-Indian like me!
You Could Make This Place Beautiful (Maggie Smith) - I (tiny voice) really didn’t like this. Sorry.
The Cost of Living (Deborah Levy) - if you want to read a divorce memoir, this is it. Sorry, not sorry.
These authors are also on Substack:
Sophie Lucido Johnson on Substack
Clementine Ford on Substack
My favorite memoir of 2023: Monsoon Mansion by Cinelle Barnes vividly renders the absurdity, joy and heartbreak of growing up in Manila, wrapped up in an incredible riches-to-rags, coming-of-age story.
Sometimes when I tell people what it’s like to have grown up in Manila, I am met with sheer disbelief. Like, are you making this shit up? Can that really happen? Onli in da Pilipins, as we say. Cinelle, who is also a wonderful human being as she is a writer, captures that perfectly.
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Nonfiction
Black Hole Survival Guide (Janna Levin) - Astrophysics, but make it literary, in a tiny-but-mighty-volume. Patti Smith had this in her coat pocket during a live performance and I can’t resist anything that woman does.
Conversations on Love (Natasha Lunn) - very enjoyable collection of interviews with writers and thinkers on different aspects of love
Sex and Lies (Leila Slimani) - like The Sex Lives of African Women, but featuring the stories of Moroccan women
Love Isn’t Color Blind (Kevin A. Patterson) - on race and representation in polyamorous spaces (and alternative lifestyle communities in general). This really informed how I think about how public I would like to be leading up to the publication of my book.
Before & After the Book Deal (Courtney Maum) - I highly, highly recommend this to anyone trying to get traditionally published.
Enchantment (Katherine May) - a follow-up to Wintering, which I loved, about rediscovering the magic and wonder of everyday life
Mother (Land): What I’ve Learnt About Race, Motherhood and Identity (Priya Joi) - the author’s background as a science journalist informs this memoir-in-essays, making it unique and insightful
Dear Dolly: On Love, Life & Friendship (Dolly Alderton) - a compilation of advice from the bestselling author’s weekly column as an Agony Aunt. I found Dolly incredibly likeable, no wonder she was a huge hit in the UK with her memoir Everything I Know About Love.
Subscribe to these authors on Substack:
Courtney Maum on Substack
Katherine May on Substack
Priya Joi on Substack
My favorite nonfiction of 2023: a tie between Unbound: A Woman’s Guide to Power (Kasia Urbaniak, who funded her studies to become a Taoist nun by working as a professional dominatrix), and The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker.
Aargh but This is Your Mind on Plants (Michael Pollan), on opium, caffeine and mescaline was soooo good! Especially after going on a plant medicine retreat.
Fiction
I don’t read much fiction. But wow, what I read this year really blew me away! Rich, immersive and transporting, these novels filled me with awe for writers who can plot conjure up such rich characters and worlds from nothing.
Neruda on the Park (Cleyvis Natera) - I met the author very briefly in Marrakech early this year and was immediately intrigued by her work. I loved the speculative
The Song of Achilles (Madeline Miller) - epically gorgeous love story that had me swooning and sobbing. As you probably know, a massive BookTok hit.
My Name is Leon (Kit de Waal) - I LOVED this novel written from the perspective of 9 year-old Leon, a Black boy growing up in London who is taken into foster care. That’s two books this year that made me cry!
Queenie (Candice Carty-Williams) - oh, what a heroine. Twenty-six year old Queenie from Brixton is EVERYTHING. All her misadventures and sexcapades had me both LOLing and in tears. I’m going to be starstruck when I finally meet Candice in person (we have the same agent!)
My favorite novel of 2023: a toss-up between The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida (Shehan Karunatilaka), set in Sri Lanka, where the narrator is a gay ghost, and The Island of Missing Trees (Elif Shafak), set in Cyprus where one narrator is a fig tree!
Poetry
Divisible By Itself And One (Kae Tempest)
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This January I’ve already finished the lyrical, luminous Small Worlds by my (ehem) fellow Viking Books UK author, Caleb Azumah Nelson. This rhapsodic novel of Black joy, music, discovery and heartbreak comes with an equally gorgeous playlist that I’ve had on repeat for days.
Signing with a Dutch publisher made me set a new goal for 2024: to read five books in Dutch! Alongside all the books I’m going to read in English, of course. Recommendations are welcome—but keep them short and easy please, my reading level in Dutch is at about Jip and Janneke.
Now, you. What was your favorite book of 2023? What is your first book of 2024?
Here in Amsterdam, the days are sharp and bitterly cold, but clear and brilliantly sunny. I prefer the deep freeze to the gloom and incessant rain of December. I hope the bright blue skies are a sign of a good year yet to unfold, and that it’s started out well for you.
Best of all, I’ve defrosted from a creative freeze and am writing again. So see you soon.
