2023: My Year in Reading—A Retrospect

As 2023 comes to a close, it’s time to review what I read in the last year. How did my habits change compared to 2022 and what themes emerged from the books that made it from my TBR and onto my nightstand? As usual, I tracked my progress via Goodreads and set myself a challenge on the platform, so to keep up with what I’m reading in 2024, make sure you connect with me there.

In 2023, I read 50 books (compared to 60 in both 2021 and 2022). At this slower pace, I had to average ~50 pages a day, which was still at times a tough ask, but achievable during what has been a hectic year.

I leaned towards selecting books by female writers—38 of the books I read this year were by women and 12 were by men.

Novels made up the bulk of my reading material—they accounted for 36 out of 50 reads. But I also read 10 works of non-fiction, three plays/collections of plays, and one collection of short stories.

As you might expect from a writer of historical fiction, the genre remains my favorite—19 of the books I read in 2023 fit into this category. But I also read 5 novels with strong fantasy/speculative elements and 4 that dealt with mystery and/or crime. 

Nine of the authors I read this year are known to me personally. Congratulations again to Hope C. Tarr, Nancy Bilyeau, and Nicole Evelina for the publication of their 2023 novels and to Richard Huddleson for his dramatic translation.

I reviewed five of the novels I read on this blog, so check out the full posts for my take on each of them. They were Karen Joy Fowler’s Booth (2022), Gina Marie Guadagnino’s The Parting Glass (2019), Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s The Daughter of Doctor Moreau (2022), Julie Gerstenblatt’s Daughters of Nantucket (2023), and Rachel Cantor’s Half-Life of a Stolen Sister (2023).

The top theme that emerged from my reading this year was romantic and/or intense relationships between women characters. Yiyun Li's The Book of Goose (2022), Julia Fine's Maddalena and the Dark (2023), Gina Marie Guadagnino's The Parting Glass (2019), and Emily M. Danforth's The Miseducation of Cameron Post (2012) all fit into this category.

I also read two Bronte-related books (Lucasta Miller’s The Bronte Myth (2001) and Rachel Cantor’s Half-Life of a Stolen Sister (2023)), and two ballet-related books (Adrienne Sharp’s White Swan, Black Swan: Stories (2002) and Alice Robb’s Don’t Think, Dear: One Loving and Leaving Ballet (2023)).

One thing I enjoyed this year was mixing up my reading by turning to books I wouldn’t necessarily have chosen by myself but ended up loving. A book club led to me reading Michelle Zauner’s Crying in H Mart (2021), while Ursula Parrott’s Ex-Wife (1929) was a gift that became one of my favorite reads of the year.

Going into 2024, I hope to continue to bring this same spirit of experimentation to my reading. I’m looking forward to seeing which 50 books I turn to next… 

What were your top reads of 2023? Let me know—here, on Instagram, on Facebook, or by tweeting @SVictorianist. Want to keep up with my reading and writing? Sign up for my email newsletter here.

Neo-Victorian Voices: Daughters of Nantucket, Julie Gerstenblatt (2023)

Welcome back to my Neo-Victorian Voices series, where I review books set in the nineteenth century, but written in the twenty-first. For the second time in this series, following my review of Amy Brill’s The Movement of Stars (2013) in 2019, we’re back in nineteenth-century Nantucket. This time I’m reviewing Julie Gerstenblatt’s 2023 Daughters of Nantucket, which follows several women’s lives on the island in the lead up to and aftermath of the Great Fire of 1846.

Eliza is a whaling captain’s wife, who’s struggling financially and emotionally following her husband’s long absence at sea. Maria is an astronomer and curator, who’s hiding her sexuality. And Meg is a pregnant Black businesswoman, who’s still fighting for equality, although she was born free.

Gerstenblatt uses the three women’s different perspectives and experiences to bring the island as it was during this period to life. Only one of them (Maria) shares a name with a true historical figure, although all three were born out of research. The stakes of the interwoven narratives were high and the women’s personalities were distinct enough to maintain reader interest throughout.

What I most enjoyed about the book were the details that were clearly part of Gerstenblatt’s research. I’ve visited the Whaling Museum on the island and so it was great to see the true story of Nantucket’s commercial and social history told there reinvented in fiction. I also enjoyed the structure of the novel, with the countdown to the fire ramping up tension and keeping us guessing about what would happen to our characters. 

What I found less successful was the engagement with social justice themes, especially related to race and sexuality. There is so much rich history in Nantucket about the island’s Black population, but the characters in Daughters of Nantucket at times seemed to speak with twenty-first-century voices, rather than embodying the attitudes of progressive islanders in the 1840s. 

All in, though, Gerstenblatt’s love for Nantucket and its history shines through in this entertaining read. If you want to lie to yourself that it’s still summer, consider picking up a copy and taking an imaginative trip to the beaches of New England. 

What novel would you like me to read next as part of my Neo-Victorian Voices series? Let me know—here, on Facebook, on Instagram, or by tweeting @SVictorianist. Want to stay up to date with all my reviews? Make sure you sign up to my monthly email newsletter here.