The 45 Best Books of 2023 You Won’t Put Down

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The best new books of 2023 include a little something for everyone, whether it’s the will-they-or-won’t-they intensity of a romance novel or the seismic revelations of a tell-all celebrity memoir. But all-encompassing variety is just the start of what this year’s latest and greatest releases have to offer.

From fizzy summer beach reads to highbrow literary fiction, 2023’s most noteworthy releases so far are highly personal and deeply memorable. At the start of the year, readers were treated to heartfelt debut novels by Jessica George and Delia Cai. Throughout the spring and summer, modern literary forces like Brandon Taylor, Ann Patchett, and Zadie Smith returned with highly-anticipated novels that were worth the wait. The momentum isn’t ending with the calendar year, either. Books arriving in fall and winter include Elizabeth Hand’s bone-chilling A Haunting on the Hill and Class, Stephanie Land’s follow-up to her best-selling memoir Maid. From a study of Brooklyn’s gilded upper class in Pineapple Street to a scammer’s anxiety-inducing lurch through the Hamptons in Emma Cline’s The Guest, this year’s best new books hook you from the first scene. Their characters are so memorable, you’ll want to revisit them again in the not-too-distant future. (Even the anti-heroes.)

Read on for the best books of 2023 to add to your reading list now and read a second time later, organized by release date. You won’t want to put them down from the moment you pick them up. And if there’s a book lover in your life, any one of these titles would fit their definition of a luxury gift for the holiday season.

The Survivalists: A Novel

The Survivalists is one of the year's most noteworthy new books on premise alone. Aretha, a partner-track lawyer who thrives on corporate success, descends into the world of armageddon bunkers and doomsday arms-dealing after she begins dating a coffee entrepreneur whose roommates are preparing for all sorts of unknown catastrophes while managing the roastery in their shared brownstone. On execution, The Survivalists delivers with a portrait of an underground corner of Brooklyn that's so vividly captured, you may question what's going on behind your favorite coffee shop.

Maame: A Novel

Maddie, the narrator of Jessica George's stirring debut novel, has spent most of her twenties caring for her father, who has Parkinson's disease. Her mother is in Ghana; her brother is on the road with a musician; neither offer much in terms of money or help. But a moment for Maddie to finally figure out what she wants from life, independent of her family, is on the horizon—just not in the way Maddie initially anticipates. This is a coming-of-age novel that finds beauty in the messiness and complexity of growing up, with a narrator whose singular voice instantly captivated readers and reviewers.

There's more where Maame came from: The novel has already been picked up for a TV adaptation.

Central Places: A Novel

Heroines who travel from a bustling city to their flyover state hometown for the holidays often find trouble and maybe a new love interest in their old zip code. But Audrey Zhou, the narrator of Central Places, isn't on the Hallmark trajectory when she books a Christmas trip back to Hickory Grove, Illinois, for her first visit since high school. Audrey intends to spend the week introducing her Chinese immigrant parents to her white fiancé and helping them feel like one family—a tough order, considering Audrey and her mother aren't on the best terms. Instead, after run-ins with a past crush and old acquaintances, Audrey embarks on a self-reckoning that's hilarious at some times, heartfelt at others, and impossible to put down the whole way through.

Wolfish: Wolf, Self, and the Stories We Tell About Fear

Wolfish's explorations of predators and prey in the natural world and in the man-made world defies easy categorization. The way Berry weaves an ecological adventure story about OR-7, a wolf that makes a record-breaking journey away from its Oregon pack, with tales from her own coming-of-age, asks readers to reconsider their relationships with fear and the creatures who cause it.

I Have Some Questions for You: A Novel

Is I Have Some Questions for You a campus novel, a noir murder mystery, or a literary dissection of #MeToo social dynamics? With literary sensation Rebecca Makkai steering journalist Bodie Kane back to her high school alma mater to teach a workshop and, eventually, sift back through the files of a former classmate's death to potentially exonerate a wrongly accused killer, the answer is all of the above.

Saving Time: Discovering a Life Beyond the Clock

In 2019, Jenny Odell drew our collective attention to the attention economy's downsides with her book How to Do Nothing. Saving Time, due in March, offers another chance to shift our perspective on the systems we accept as the standard—specifically time, and how we structure and spend it. You might just put this book down with a whole new outlook on how you measure your days.

Pineapple Street: A Novel

Comedies skewering the one percent have borderline overstayed their welcome in film, but this novel's take on the sub-genre in fiction is laugh-out-loud good. It follows three women connected to the wealthier-than-wealthy Stockton family and their Brooklyn Heights brownstone: two Stockton siblings, Darley and Georgiana, and their sister-in-law with a middle-class background, Sasha. Love and money have always mixed like oil and water (not well), but Jackson finds new humor and warmth in her particularly witty debut.

Brother & Sister Enter the Forest: A Novel

Richard Mirabella braids two timelines into one propulsive narrative about survival. In the first: Justin, a queer teen, sets off on a catastrophic road trip with his first boyfriend after his love interest gets into violent trouble. In the second: It's several years later, and Justin has arrived on his sister Willa's doorstep, desperate for refuge but at risk of damaging them both with the aftereffects of his trauma.

Hello Beautiful: A Novel

Little Women fans will be endeared by Hello Beautiful's homage to the March siblings, in the form of the four Padavano sisters. Any lover of a sweeping family saga will be moved by the Padavano's unraveling after the eldest daughter, Julia, meets Will, a man whose tragic past comes back to disrupt the entire family.

Romantic Comedy: A Novel

The title doesn't lie: Curtis Sittenfeld sets up her latest novel with a plot that demands a fizzy on-screen adaptation, ASAP. Sally Milz, a writer on a fictional SNL twin, The Night Owls, has more or less given up on romance when popstar Noah Brewster signs on to host the show. Over a week of writing jokes and rehearsing the week's lineup, Sally feels something that's a lot like love—but you'll have to read to see if their connection is real or just another sketch.

A Living Remedy: A Memoir

On one level, Nicole Chung's second memoir is an elegy for her adoptive parents. On another, it's an indictment of the broken healthcare systems that prevent a disappearing middle class from receiving the affordable care they desperately need. Chung writes about and through her grief with clarity and wisdom. Her reflection on her early life and her parents' last days is a salve for any reader who has experienced the specific devastation that is losing a parent.

Happy Place

Happy Place is a different kind of Emily Henry romance. Harriet and Wyn, its leading duo, aren't a couple in the making. They're partners since college who quietly broke up months ago—and didn't tell any of their friends before an annual group trip to Maine. Back at their usual summer escape, Harriet and Wyn have to fake that they're still together for the friends the haven't clued in to the truth and maybe come to a new understanding with one another in the process. Don't be surprised if you're weeping through the last few chapters (in a cathartic way, we promise).

Homebodies: A Novel

Tembe Denton-Hurst's debut novel astutely captures what it's like to fight for yourself in a world that's stacked against you. Unfairly ousted from her job, Mickey Hayward puts her experiences as a Black woman in media to paper in the hopes it'll wake up the industry to the racism and sexism she endured. Instead, it hardly makes a ripple—until Mickey has left New York for her Maryland hometown and her letter reappears amid a larger scandal involving her old workplace.

Wildflower: A Memoir

How did Aurora James found her CFDA Award-winning label Brother Vellies and galvanize retailers to take a stand for Black-owned brands through The Fifteen Percent Pledge? James' forthcoming memoir recounts the peaks and valleys from childhood to adulthood that led her to the fashion industry—where she changed it for the better.

The Guest: A Novel

Emma Cline's best-selling novel became the book of the summer for a reason. The Guest invites you to follow a down-on-her-luck scammer through one chaotic week in the Hamptons—where each day takes her to more desperate means of survival and manipulation than the one before.

Yellowface: A Novel

The unexpected death of acclaimed author Athena Liu presents (what looks like) an opportunity for struggling writer June Hayward to finally break through—by stealing Liu's last manuscript and inventing an Asian American identity to pass off Liu's masterwork as her own. Posing as "Juniper Song," June gets a taste of the literary success she stole and definitely doesn't deserve. And as she soon learns, she can't keep up the lie forever—can she?

R.F. Kuang's satirical thriller covers everything from white privilege to internet culture with increasingly eviscerating precision the further June/Juniper spirals away from the truth.

The Late Americans: A Novel

Brandon Taylor's third book is the most dazzling example of his sharp pen and keen observations of human nature yet. The Late Americans assembles a troupe of Iowa City student-artists and their lovers, friends, and neighbors in a novel that tracks their shifting relationships over the course of a single year. Taylor develops his characters so precisely, they feel like close friends: recognizable, sometimes infuriating, and always worth following to the book's last page.

(Double-recommendation: Check out Taylor's literary newsletter while you wait for The Late Americans to arrive.)

Girls and Their Horses

Tensions have always run high in the elite (and usually, rich) equestrian world. Girls and Their Horses dials up the intrigue by several degrees, embedding a new-money family into an insular and highly competitive horseback riding community—where deceit, romance, and even murder aren't out of the question in pursuit of a blue ribbon.

The Mythmakers

Keziah Weir's debut novel takes an age-old literary question—is this fiction actually based off reality?—and twists it into a compelling story about art, perspective, and the line between inspiration and transgression. The Mythmakers isn't from the perspective of a novelist, though: It begins with a down-on-her-luck journalist who recognizes herself in a short story by an acclaimed, and recently deceased, author.

Adult Drama: And Other Essays

Three years after an essay about her (unhealthy) friendship with influencer Caroline Calloway went viral, Natalie Beach is delving into other can't-look-away dramas—in her relationships, in her work, and in the world at large—with the same captivating voice that landed her on so many readers' radars. This isn't a debut essay collection to miss.

The Light Room

Early reviews have called this book a miracle between two covers. In The Light Room, Zambreno writes about the intersections of catastrophes that unfold on a global scale—like the pandemic and climate change—with the small wonders and worries of raising her children. Despite the unfathomable distractions we're all facing, Zambreno writes with a sense of hope that will especially resonate with anyone who's soldiered through pandemic-era parenting.

Crook Manifesto: A Novel

Fans of 2022's Harlem Shuffle didn't have to wait long for its equally riveting sequel. Now, it's the 1970s, New York is in chaos, and furniture salesman-slash-former-conman Ray Carney's commitment to turning his back on crime is starting to waver. What comes next is a journey through a tumultuous decade in Manhattan with equal doses of dark humor and poignancy.

Family Lore: A Novel

In her first novel for adults, National Book Award winner Elizabeth Acevedo tackles some of life's biggest questions with the vivacity and empathy readers know from her young adult novels. Family Lore is a multi-generational family epic that's grounded in a supernatural twist. This novel's Dominican-American matriarch, Flor Marte, can predict exactly when someone will die—and the novel's events build over three days toward a "living wake" for an as-yet-unannounced member of the Marte clan. Is the next death one of Flor's three sisters, one of Flor's nieces—or Flor herself?

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store: A Novel

National Book Award-winning author James McBride will shatter your heart and then gently put it back together in The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. Two communities on the outside of a small Pittsburgh neighborhood—one comprised of African American, the other of Jewish immigrants—become intertwined as the discovery of a dead body brings up long-held secrets.

Learned by Heart

Emma Donoghue's upcoming novel turns a real-life love story into one of the year's most compelling dramas. Eliza Raine, an orphaned heiress, and Anne Lister, a tomboy with a rebellious streak, meet at the Manor School for Young Ladies in 1805. The fourteen-year-olds' connection is the foundation of a story that's passionate and heartbreaking in equal measure—inspired in part by the secret journal Lister kept as a student.

The Vaster Wilds: A Novel

Like The Matrix before it, The Vaster Wilds crackles with the spirit of a young woman and her connection to a higher power. But this latest Lauren Groff heroine isn't in the confines of a convent, but rather the open, unfamiliar expanse of colonial America. After escaping servitude and heading into the deep wilderness, this young woman faces an unforgiving world that tests her resilience and will to survive at every turn in the year's most propulsive new read.

Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World

No book is better suited for our times than Naomi Klein's latest. It starts as an investigation into Klein's digital double: a person she is often confused for but who holds political views that oppose Klein's. It evolves into a dazzling examination of modern culture and the darkest corners of The Discourse online. Doppelganger is intellectual but not unapproachable, and provides a necessary, singular point-of-view for navigating 2023's online identity crises.

The Wren, the Wren: A Novel

For the women of the McDaragh family, patriarch Phil McDaragh's poetry is a beacon to some and a sign of all his shortcomings to others. All three generations—grandmother, mother, and daughter—grapple with the long shadow of their family's best-known voice in this moving and lyrical novel.

Bright Young Women: A Novel

On one level, Bright Young Women is a breakneck thriller based on Ted Bundy's heinous crimes. It ties together the stories of two women with connections to the murders and their search for justice. On another, it functions as a sharp examination of our culture's obsession with serial killers and true crime.

Wellness: A Novel

Every married couple knows they don't just exchange vows with their spouse on their wedding day—they're committing to all the versions their partner will become in the future. Often hilariously and above all honestly, Nathan Hill explores the intricacies and evolutions of a modern marriage in his follow-up to The Nix. The subjects are Jack and Elizabeth: a couple trying to save their relationship and reckon with who they've become two decades after meeting in college.

Land of Milk and Honey: A Novel

In a secluded enclave at the top of a mountain, a chef who'd become disillusioned with her profession and the world's slow decline suddenly finds a new appetite in every sense of the word. She has mysterious, wealthy benefactors and a garden of rich ingredients unavailable in the dystopia below the mountain to thank—but all is not what it seems. C. Pam Zhang's speculative tale of the pursuit of pleasure is thrilling to the last drop.

The Museum of Failures

Every family has its secrets. In The Museum of Failures, a young man learns just how much his mother has been hiding on the eve of becoming a father himself, with emotional repercussions.

A Haunting on the Hill: A Novel

Hill House, the estate at the heart of Shirley Jackson's chilling gothic novel, has new residents alive and dead in Elizabeth Hand's latest. But this isn't a cut-and-paste remake of a horror classic with modern adjustments. Populating Hill House with a struggling playwright, a troupe of creatives, and spirits that defy definition invites all sorts of unexpected scares, written in Hand's evocative, eerie prose. Read this one with the lights on.

How to Say Babylon: A Memoir

Safiya Sinclair grew up in a home that sought to silence her. Sinclair's father, a musician and strict follower of a Rastafarian sect, set abusively puritanical standards where "obedient" was the most a woman could and should be. But Sinclair had bigger dreams for her life, and her riveting, poetic memoir shows how, in the end, no one could forbid her from using her voice to its fullest potential.

Roman Stories

Jhumpa Lahiri's short story collection is as riveting for its content—nine interconnected tales about Italy's Eternal City—as its means of creation. Lahiri wrote each vignette in her adopted language, Italian, then translated it to English with assistance from editor Todd Portnowitz. The collection shows an author at the height of her powers; she works hard at storytelling, but her words float off the page.

Black Friend: Essays

At her Harper's Bazaar Icons photoshoot in 2022, comedian and writer Ziwe said she couldn't think of a time when she felt like she'd "made it." The publication of her first essay collection could be that moment. With her inimitable voice and sense of humor, Ziwe invites readers into the real stories that informed her breakout sketches and talk show. The result is, dare we say it, iconic.

Let Us Descend: A Novel

This title may invoke Dante's Inferno, but the voice is wholly and uniquely Jesmyn Ward's. The novel follows Annis, an enslaved girl, on a descent into the underworld of the antebellum South. Haunting and epic in scale and tone, Let Us Descend sets a new standard for literary fiction of the American South.

The Berry Pickers: A Novel

Amanda Peters pays tribute to her Mi’kmaq lineage in this stunning debut. In 1962, a young Mi’kmaq girl goes missing while picking berries in Maine with her family; years later, an only child of a wealthy family unravels a family secret tying her to the abduction.

Class: A Memoir of Motherhood, Hunger, and Higher Education

With Class, Stephanie Land picks up where Maid left off. She details with unflinching honesty her path to finishing her college degree in her mid-thirties and pursuing a writing career—all while parenting her young daughter, and without the financial resources and safe place to land that wealthier, younger, and more privileged students had. Land's setbacks and risks can be excruciating to read, and almost all the odds are not in her favor. But in the end, she triumphs.

The Vulnerables: A Novel

The Covid-19 pandemic sets The Vulnerables in motion, but The Vulnerables is not your typical pandemic novel. Grounded in an unexpected friendship between an abandoned bird and a lonely, older novelist, The Vulnerables finds new ways to expound on themes of community, companionship, and finding hope in seemingly hopeless situations.

My Name Is Barbra

Fans, critics, and casual moviegoers all think they know the legend who is Barbra Streisand. This fall, the superstar tells everyone exactly who she is and reflect on her illustrious career in one of 2023's most anticipated celebrity memoirs.

Day: A Novel

In Michael Cunningham's hands, everyday life is the source of extraordinary yet quietly devastating revelations. He works another small miracle in Days, a novel telling the story of a young family's rupture on the same day, three years in a row. Readers last read Cunningham's fluid, achingly resonate prose in the Pulitzer Prize-winning Virginia Woolf adaptation The Hours ten years ago; a decade later, it's even more refreshing to read his voice in the form of a totally original story.

Endgame: Inside the Royal Family and the Monarchy's Fight for Survival

Royal correspondent and Harper's Bazaar contributor Omid Scobie gathers more than a decade of behind-the-scenes Palace reporting to deliver an unprecedented portrait of the Royal Family today. Scobie's level of access gives readers the clearest insight yet into the fate of the British monarchy in a world that no longer bows down to the royals.

Songs on Endless Repeat: Essays and Outtakes

Anthony Veasna So was one of the literary scene's most promising new authors, as proven by his posthumous short story collection Afterparties. In Songs on Endless Repeat, So's best essays and previously unpublished stories are gathered in a single, luminary volume.

The Woman in Me

Calling The Woman In Me one of the most anticipated books of 2023 is an understatement. The moving read allows the Princess of Pop to finally reflect not just on her life and incomparable career but of course the 13-year long conservatorship that ultimately stole her autonomy as not just a star, but as a human.

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