Books of the Year 2023
One of the books I feel most happy about to have bought, is The Voynich Manuscript, of which we do not know whether it's fiction or non-fiction - but to all expectations the latter, a book you cannot read but just browse through and try to identify any possible sense of recognition, patterns or meaning. I never thought I could spend so much time on something that is impossible to understand. The other great winner in my opinion is Simon Sebag Montefiore's "The World - A Family History", a majestic overview of the horror of mankind throughout our common history. In the Fiction department, I had several contenders, of which "The Maniac" also borders on the non-fiction, whereas "Solenoid" and "Orbital" are close to be each other's opposites: the former massive, mad, personal, fantastic, the latter precise, controlled, precious and poetic. Not all of these books were actually published in 2023, and I have still a pile lying here that will be read next year, I hope.
Non-Fiction
- Simon Sebag Montefiore - The World - A Family History *****
- Siddharta Mukherjee - The Song Of The Cell ****½
- Kit Yates - How To Expect The Unexpected ****
- Thomas Hertog - On The Origin Of Time ****
- Andy Clark - The Experience Machine ****
- Robert K. Massie - Catherine The Great ****
- Mark Solms - The Hidden Spring ****
- Patrick Loobuyck - Wetenschap & Religie ***½
- Joren Vermeersch - Vlaanderens Waanzinnigste Eeuw ***½
- Andrew Doig - This Mortal Coil - A History Of Death ***
Fiction
- Benjamín Labatut - The Maniac ****½
- Samantha Harvey - Orbital ****½
- Mircea Cărtărescu - Solenoid ****½
- Hernan Diaz - Trust ****
- Georgi Gospodinov - Time Shelter ****
- Alejandro Zambra - Bonsai ****
- Edmund De Waal - Letters To Camondo ****
- Tim Winton - The Shepherd's Hut ****
- Virginie Despantes - Vernon Subutex 3 ****
- Bret Easton Ellis - The Shards ***½
