The 10 Books I Read in 2023 That Impacted Me the Most
Music and fiction and race (among many topics), oh my!
2023 has been my biggest year ever for reading by far. I’ve always been passionate about ideas and learning, but with my ADHD, I’ve been a painstakingly slow reader for decades.
In college, I didn’t finish many, many books–as an English major–because of that. Since I began a graduate program for English in 2014, however, I have made ample use of audiobooks, and the proof that they have helped is twofold.
The first proof is that I graduated from my master’s program with a 3.78 GPA (between an A- and A average). I couldn’t have done that without a lot of effort on papers, but the bigger hurdle was keeping up with reading, including some thick novels. I’m proud of that result.
The second proof is that this year I have read 57 books so far, totaling over 15,000 pages. Not all were read in audio, but most were, and that technology has proven exceptionally helpful for reading titles I wanted to read decades ago.
I read dozens of great books in 2023, so whittling down this list proved more difficult than it did in 2021 and 2022. There were many outstanding books that did not make my final ten, including ones I reviewed at PopMatters like the anthology Prine on Prine and several contemporary books blending music and personal narrative.
But this list reflects a wide range of uncharted territory for me. Within the many books about music, I read several books on genres that I have studied less and/or ones that are undervalued in the dominant culture: country, metal, and hip hop.
But in addition, I read my first graphic novels and my first book of theology ever; my first books of Young Adult fiction and humorous essays in many years; and four books of poetry, which I have tended to avoid with my trouble with figurative language.
I love reading books that challenge me. Many books I read dealt with DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) issues, especially involving race and gender, but also class, sexuality, and disability. In this time of book banning and censorship–and no, “cancel culture” isn’t the same thing–it’s especially important for me to read widely and hear different perspectives from people of marginalized groups while taking sides.
So, for this list, I allowed one book per author or editor, listed in the order in which I read them.
Feel free to comment with books you read that you loved this year!
Risks of Faith: The Emergence of a Black Theology of Liberation, 1968-1998, James H. Cone (1999)
I don’t affiliate with any religion, but I’m not against religion, and this collection shows a big reason why. Despite any number of atrocities that have been committed in its name(s), religion can be used as a source of community healing, unity, and empowerment to make political change happen on the ground. And as liberation theologians have long suggested, any idea of God must side with the oppressed rather than the elite and privileged.
As the founder of Black Theology, a form of liberation theology, scholar James H. Cone wrote urgently about political issues of his time and beyond, as seen in this 1999 collection. Cone was acutely aware of the Christian Church’s roles in both international white supremacy and resistance to it, and his writings showed a strong awareness of how to make theological discourse both accessible and relevant to multiple generations.
I never read a book of theology before 2023, but in college I had read an exceptionally thought provoking piece from this collection, “Black Theology on Revolution, Violence, and Reconciliation,” originally a 1975 journal article. It proved to be one of the most transformative readings for my intellectual development, and I reread it for my PopMatters article on Tracy Chapman published in April.
Risks of Faith is brilliant and illuminating, but that particular essay’s highlighting of racist double standards of violence struck me as especially relevant in this time of imperialism, mass shootings, mass incarceration, and genocide. Other essays and articles focus on Black theological responses to environmental injustice, education, music, and the legacies of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X. Whatever one thinks of religion, I love this book and learned a lot from it.
Her Country: How the Women of Country Music Became the Success They Were Never Supposed to Be, Marissa R. Moss (2022)
One of my favorite music books I’ve read in recent years, journalist Marissa R. Moss’s Her Country is both well researched and accessible to a wide range of readers. Focusing especially on the careers of Kacey Musgraves, Maren Morris, and Mickey Guyton, Moss highlights blatant sexism, as well as racism, heterosexism, and cissexism, in the broader country music industry while giving hope for a more inclusive future for the genre.
Beginning at the turn of this century, Moss chronicles the last twenty-plus years of struggles and triumphs for women in country music. The well-paced journalistic narrative highlights painful incidents of music industry harassment and deliberate marginalization of women in country music, including the infamous “Tomatogate” controversy involving radio airplay of female artists. Moss recognizes that intersectional marginalized groups’ struggles are connected, and she also discusses issues of people of color and LGBTQ+ people, female and otherwise.
I really enjoyed this book as a survey of some very important issues in contemporary music and beyond. It also gives many country fans who despair of the state of mainstream country evidence that things change. Granted, more recently Maren Morris announced that she is leaving country music, but with the commercial success of artists like Lainey Wilson, Carly Pearce, and others, Moss’s book will give many readers reasons to hold on to hope.
This Woman’s Work: Essays on Music, ed. Sinéad Gleeson and Kim Gordon (2022)
The aptly titled This Woman’s Work is one of the most delightfully surprising music books and one of the most important interventions I’ve seen in the dominant orthodoxy of music writing in recent years. Each essay features a female writer and/or musician writing about a topic involving women in music, including hip hop, rock, country, folk, jazz, classical music, and more, including special emphasis on the labor and physicality of music making.
The famous musicians highlighted include Lucinda Williams, Ella Fitzgerald, Wendy Carlos, and Wanda Jackson, but the emphasis on musical process and labor, as opposed to perfect performances and results, subverts the typical, white male-dominated lens in much music writing. The essays also focus on dictatorship and postcolonial exile, labor activism, sweat, and friendship, among other topics.
The book isn’t supposed to be a single cohesive statement on women and music, but it nonetheless comprises a revelatory statement about how music history narratives are told. The writing is brilliant, intimate, and passionate, rather than dry, clinical, or conventional. The emphasis on physicality makes for a fresh approach, at least compared to most mainstream music writing. This book makes a strong case for contexts of gender and labor as crucial to studying music. I loved it and plan to reread it and cite writer Margo Jefferson’s essay on Ella Fitzgerald in an upcoming personal essay.
Heartstopper, Volume 4, Alice Oseman (2022)
I mentioned that this year I invested myself in, for me, new forms and genres. In fact, I read my first graphic novel–and then the other three in Alice Oseman’s Heartstopper series. Heartstopper is a welcome chronicle of gay life in high school, with two teenage boys, Nick and Charlie, navigating their feelings for each other as well as coming out and dealing with bullying.
The fourth and most recently released volume made the greatest emotional impact on me. The characters confront mental health crises, eating disorders, self-harm, and hospitalization, as well as love. The romance is palpable on the pages, but more than that, I felt for the characters and their development.
The Heartstopper series on Netflix adds storylines to the graphic novels, including about a character’s asexuality. The show and the graphic novels add depth to typical media depictions of young LGBTQ+ folks. And as much as film and TV aren’t supposed to reflect reality, they can help heal, and I won’t lie, I could have used something like Heartstopper in high school to feel less alone. Reading these graphic novels and watching the resulting Netflix series has been very healing, and I look forward to reading the rest of the series.
Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison (1952)
One of the most fascinating, complex, and brilliant novels I’ve ever read, Ralph Ellison’s masterpiece Invisible Man is a towering achievement that I had never finished until this year–hallelujah for the audiobook helping me get through 600 pages! The novel’s use of music, conflict, ironic humor, and a range of characters and political commentary is dazzling. This book made my head spin in the best possible way.
Densely packed with action, Invisible Man follows the nameless narrator through different harrowing adventures, from a battle royal upon his high school graduation to a stint working for the Communist Party. Although I was surprised that it took 500 pages for the narrator to become invisible, as he puts it, I didn’t find the book boring or lacking.
The theme of deception, from others and the narrator, illuminates the message I got from the text about Black Americans living a life of distrust and experiencing duplicity in impossible situations. Whether or not invisibility is meant as a representative comment on Black experiences in this country, that idea works with my interpretation. I found the overall story and character development masterful. This was the only novel Ellison ever completed, and though he was an excellent essayist and critic as well, I doubt anything of his could top the majestic feat of Invisible Man.
I’ve Had to Think Up a Way to Survive: On Trauma, Persistence, and Dolly Parton, Lynn Melnick (2022)
Memoirs come a dime a dozen, so to speak, but I haven’t seen many this nuanced, lyrically written, or musically informed, with or without subject matter this wrenching. Poet Lynn Melnick is a survivor of rape, and she writes of her experiences, traumatic and otherwise, with painful clarity. Adding to the narrative, the book centers around the overlap between Melnick’s experiences and the music of an American musical giant.
Melnick is not what many would stereotype as a fan of Dolly Parton, but every chapter, framed around a Dolly Parton recording, is filled with passion for Parton’s music and for finding the layers of the resonances in her own life. In fact, I really appreciated reading about Dolly’s relationship to a rape culture that objectifies women, very much including herself, as well as to Melnick’s feminism. That complexity alone makes the book worth reading.
As a Parton fan, though not always acquainted with the recordings and events Melnick cites, I found this book not only moving, but also engaging. The book writes about other difficult subjects, including drug and alcohol abuse and abortion, but ultimately what I got out of this book was hope. In my article on the 10 best contemporary books that blend music and personal narrative, I called this the best pure memoir on the list. I stand by that judgment.
They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us, Hanif Abdurraqib (expanded edition, 2022)
Probably the most important cultural critic of our time, Hanif Abdurraqib has written multiple works of nonfiction and poetry, in recent years receiving a MacArthur Genius grant and being a finalist for the National Book Award. I have read all three works of his nonfiction, and though I enjoyed each, They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us from 2017, which I reread this year in its five-year anniversary expanded edition, is easily my favorite.
Perfect or not, this essay collection is one of my favorite music books of the past decade, and reading it in an audiobook narrated by the author proved exceptionally helpful for appreciating the nuances of Abdurraqib’s prose. Yes, most of this collection focuses on music, but I highly recommend They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us to anyone who loves exceptional writing. The way he weaves personal narrative into his stories about bands whom I find forgettable, including Fall Out Boy, is frankly astonishing. (I will say that I didn’t include this book in my article on books that blend music and personal narrative because it’s not strictly about music, but I did include Abdurraqib’s Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest on my list.)
I didn’t have to know or appreciate the music and issues that Abdurraqib writes about, including police brutality, Islam, and urban authenticity, to appreciate this book. In fact, the connections he makes between, for example, attending a Bruce Springsteen concert and visiting Michael Brown’s grave in Ferguson, Missouri, are illuminating and make the book more accessible for a range of readers. Whether writing on Prince, Carly Rae Jepsen, Chance the Rapper, Migos, or anyone or anything else, Abdurraqib’s prose is some of the best this century has produced. I might reread it . . . again, very soon.
The Autobiography of Malcolm X, Malcolm X and Alex Haley (1965)
Another mammoth text–in both length and reputation–that I had hoped to finish decades ago, The Autobiography of Malcolm X has to be on the short list of the most important books of the twentieth century. Though heavily manipulated by coauthor Alex Haley (Roots), this book captures crucial ideas from one of the most consistently relevant leaders and thinkers of his time and beyond.
Malcolm X’s journey from prison to the heights of fame and renown in the Nation of Islam is well known, but the autobiography also spends considerable time on the last year of Malcolm’s life, which I appreciated because it adds depth and nuance to the story. The book was completed and released after Malcolm’s 1965 murder, and though I had plenty of questions after reading the Autobiography, especially about how much of it was written by Haley, I found Malcolm’s ideas especially useful in distinguishing between integration, segregation, and separation, as well as highlighting the importance of connecting domestic and international struggles for human rights against colonialism and white supremacy.
After reading the Autobiography, I read Les Payne and Tamara Payne’s highly acclaimed biography, The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X, and though I appreciated the level of reporting about Malcolm’s life and death, I expected more information about Haley’s role in writing the Autobiography. Nonetheless, I very much appreciated both books.
The Body Is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love, Sonya Renee Taylor (2nd edition, 2021)
This book has become very popular since the first edition came out in 2018, but there are strong reasons for that. Sonya Renee Taylor’s idea of radical self-love, including being against what she calls body terrorism, is one of the most transformative concepts to emerge in so-called self-help literature . . . well, likely ever.
Taylor stresses the difference between, for example, self-esteem and other traditional concepts of self-help with radical self-love, which views as key to building larger social movements against oppression, including racism and ableism. Though I found the title of this book initially perplexing, I reflected on how many times I’ve apologized for being clumsy or thinking differently or misperceiving social situations, and I realized those are all very much issues of my body.
I found The Body Is Not an Apology highly useful and applicable to personal struggles and social movements. I read it fast in audio–it is a short book, after all–but I plan to revisit it because the ideas are unusually sharp and helpful–and not just for a book classified as “self-help.”
Fargo Rock City: A Heavy Metal Odyssey in Rural North Dakota, Chuck Klosterman (2001)
Reading an excerpt of this book in the 2017 anthology Shake It Up: Great American Writing on Rock and Pop from Elvis to Jay Z caught my attention, and not just because of pop culture critic Chuck Klosterman’s chatty writing style. Klosterman makes a convincing case for the respect due 1980s glam metal–yes, you read that right–both as music and as a reflection of the culture of its time.
In some ways, Fargo Rock City is a blend of memoir of life growing up in the American midwest during the ‘80s and a history of the music in its time. Writing about different issues associated with bands like Guns N’ Roses, Bon Jovi, and Poison, I was pleasantly surprised by its depth, including around satanic imagery and the emerging music video scene. I don’t know how it compares to other texts on metal, including by scholars like Robert Walser and Deena Weinstein, but scholars I respect, including Craig Werner, praised it as easily the best book on metal, and that made me take notice.
There are aspects of this book I wanted to disagree with, including about misogyny in metal, but this was a rare music book that was not only fascinating for me as a scholar but also a pleasure to read. I read multiple books this year about music that has often been disrespected in the academy and other elite institutions, including country and hip hop. Of these books, Fargo Rock City surprised me the most and was the most delightful.