Best Books I Read in 2023 – Fiction

I read 100 books in 2023, and these were my favourites among them (in no particular order).

Garden of the Evening Mists

Author: Tan Twan Eng

I picked this book up for my Around the World Book Tour as my book for Malaysia. The book follows a newly retired judge in Malaysia and hops between the present (just after her retirement and return to her home in northern Malaya), the past (during the Malayan Emergency), and the slightly more distant past (the Japanese occupation of Malaysia during the Second World War).

Much of the story focusses on the main character’s journey coming to terms with the events of the occupation and her time in a prison camp as well as her experience living through the Malayan Emergency—during which communist guerrilla groups attempted to overthrow the pro-British government—and reconciling her feelings towards a country who enslaved her own but whose people she cannot see simply as one-dimensional villains.

This was beautifully written and moving, and, though it is fiction, the author captures many of the themes of internal (and external) conflict, loss, and questions of justice that often plague countries that have recently gone through wars with or occupations by their neighbours.

Hurricane Wars

Author: Thea Guanzon

I adored this book, which was the October Fairlyoot adult pick. The story follows Talasyn and Alaric, who stand on opposite sides of the Hurricane Wars, which have been raging between their peoples for years. Alaric is the son of the Night Emperor who is on his way to conquering the entire continent while Talasyn’s side, Sardovia, struggles to hold onto limited territory. Eventually, the two warriors find themselves having to work together to prevent an event that threatens the entire continent.

This was a Southeast Asian-inspired high fantasy that I felt gave the perfect balance between the romance and fantasy plots. Though I don’t necessarily mind straight romance books, even ones set in fantasy settings, I like having other plot and stakes, and this book delivered. This was a delightful debut for author Thea Guanzon. It’s the first in a trilogy, and I’m eagerly awaiting the next instalment.

Jade City

Author: Fonda Lee

Keeping with the theme of Asian-based or Asian-inspired fiction, Jade City was one of the most compelling fantasy books I read this year. Set on the island of Kekon, it follows a family who runs one of the two major crime syndicates that control the island. In this world, jade can be used by certain people to channel a sort of magic (which is mostly useful in combat). As such, jade itself is a highly coveted substance, and those who have the strength to wield a large amount of it can exert power over others, which the Kaul family relies on to maintain their control over their territory. Conflict arises when it’s revealed that a new drug is allowing people who wouldn’t usually be able to wield jade to use its power, which threatens the status quo.

Because it follows a few different characters, mostly within the Kaul family, the book covers a wide variety of themes including honour, duty, and loyalty, as well as coming-of-age, stretching unexpectedly into new roles, and political machinations. I devoured the first book and I’m excited to read the other two in this already completed trilogy.

Love Theoretically

Author: Ali Hazelwood

Ali Hazelwood writes books usually featuring women in STEM who are smarter than most of the people around them, though overlooked and undervalued because of their gender, finding love with tall, smart men who fall for the heroine in a way that’s obvious to everyone but her. There’s definitely a formula to her novels that some have found repetitive and predictable.

And I don’t care. I will read every book that Ali Hazelwood writes, and she is one of the few contemporary romance writers for whom I’ve had the urge to re-read her books. Even if you’re not into STEM, her books are always hilarious and refreshing. I can’t think of a time when I’m not in the mood to read about a hot, smart guy being in love with an unapologetically intelligent woman, not being threatened by her cleverness and valuing that just as much as the rest of her.

Love Theoretically follows a recently-graduated theoretical physicist who’s burning herself out teaching at three Boston-based universities when all she wants to do is sit in front of a whiteboard and figure out how the universe works. She lands an interview for a tenure-track position that would be working closely with an experimental physicist of whom she has an academic hatred. This is a contemporary romance, so you can guess what happens next. This was, as all of her other books in this collection have been, funny, witty and lovely to read, and I’m impatiently awaiting the next instalment in this series of related stand-alones that is set to release this year.

Six of Crows

Author: Leigh Bardugo

Like Jade City, this is another book that’s been around for a while and, in my opinion, very deservedly hyped on social media. This follows another group of people in the fictional city of Ketterdam, where rival gangs compete for control of certain businesses and revenue streams. It takes place in Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse, the same world as the Shadow and Bone series, though you don’t need to have read Shadow and Bone to understand what’s happening in Six of Crows.

The main characters in this book are tasked with pulling off a heist that will make them rich beyond their wildest dreams, and they set off with the goal of stealing something from an impenetrable fortress that is sure to be the death of them. What I really loved about this book was the banter between the six main characters and the way Bardugo was able to develop all of them with fully-fleshed backstories, voices and personalities that allowed me to identify and sympathise with every one of them, even when they were at odds with each other (all within the space of one book, mind you). As with most of the other books I’ve mentioned so far, it’s given me another sequel to look forward to reading this year.

Half a Soul

Author: Olivia Atwater

This was one of a few historical fae romances I read this year. While the main story and the romance were wonderful, the parts I found most compelling were the ones not advertised in the blurb. The female main character is Dora, a young lady who, because of a faerie curse, only has half a soul which gives her no shame but also what appears to the rest of the world as very little emotion. Her love interest is Elias, the Lord Sorcier, a magic-wielder in the king’s employ, who finds himself frustrated with the lack of empathy he finds in the upper crust of London society for the great majority of people in Britain who suffer in the highly unequal and changing world.

I admired the less common features of this regency-era romance, including the author’s choice to actually look at elements of class as well as the compelling characters that had interests and cares outside of their immediate family and friends. I sometimes feel like fantasy books often coalesce on either side of the spectrum from cosy, low-stakes books that concentrate on the everyday struggles of the characters to high-stakes, end of the world sort of stories that must be told over at least three books and usually involve war and revolution. I found this book walked a very nice middle-ground between the two where there were very real structural, external difficulties (based in actual historical problems) that the characters dealt with, but we reached a satisfying conclusion to the story without it needing to end in an overthrow of the entire system (and thus maintaining some of the cosy vibes we love in regency romances).

By addressing some of these bigger problems in the story and having an absorbing plot outside of the romance, it gave the characters something much more substantial to bond over and led to some really interesting character arcs.

Lore Olympus

Author/Illustrator: Rachel Smythe

This may be a bit of a cheat, but I would put the entire Lore Olympus series on this list. They’re graphic novels and take a couple of hours max to read, so reading all five that had been released by the end of 2023 is basically the same as reading a normal book, right?

These are the Lore Olympus web toon in book form. The story concentrates on Hades and Persephone and is set in a mix of ancient Greece and a modern Olympus complete with cars, technology and skyscrapers. It’s a delightful mashup of a lot of tropes and themes popular in the romance genre including age gap, billionaires, forbidden romance, grumpy-sunshine, and obviously Hades x Persephone. In addition to the two main characters, we get side-stories from other gods and goddesses that fill out the world and add to the story.

I devoured the first book and subsequently ordered all other published books in this series and went through the rest of them in about a day. And then a few weeks later I did it again. I loved all of them, both the art and the story, and I’m counting down the days until the release of the sixth.

Throne of Glass

Author: Sarah J. Maas

This is another cheat because this is a series that I’ve about half-finished now, and I read the first four books of during 2023. I’ve read both of Maas’ other series, but I have to say that even though I haven’t finished this series yet, I know it will likely be my favourite among her books.

Throne of Glass follows Celaena Sardothien, an assassin who has spent the past year in a salt mine after being sent there by the King of Adarlan. She’s given a chance to get out by participating in a deadly contest to become the king’s champion.

This is an epic fantasy series, and what I loved most about it was the characters. I found them rich and compelling, and as the series progresses, we’re introduced to many different perspectives and storylines that eventually intertwine. The whole series is just generally a good time, and I’m parcelling out the remaining three because I don’t want it to be over.