The Top 20 Books I Read In 2023

Out Of About 70 Books Read This Year

Collage of books covers made by Jymi Cliche

These are my personal top 20 favorite books out of about 70 I read this year. I broke huge personal records with my reading goals. My original goal was to read 23 books in 2023, but I got three times that. I have never read that many books in one year. Last year, I believe I read 27 books, and that was record breaking for me, so this year was insane, not to mention that I also wrote several books, and by the end of the year, I will have completed my 7-book, LGBTQIA, coming-of-age series, The Offbeat Life Of Ren Anonymous.

List of my favorites read in 2023, below…

1. Modern Tarot by Michelle Tea — This is the book that I got the most out of, this year. It was sort of unexpected. Although I’m a big fan of Michelle Tea, I’ve mostly just read her memoirs, and while this does have elements of being a memoir, I have mostly been using it as a non-fiction reference book, to help me learn tarot. Not only that, but it includes spells to enhance the cards pulled, if they were positive, or to help clear away the negative energy, if they are negative, and it has enhanced my life and my spiritual practice, which was a goal, going into 2023. I wanted to get back in touch with my spiritual side, and I didn’t know what that would look like after all these years of not practicing any religions, but I have included a lot about witchcraft in my own series, The Offbeat Life Of Ren Anonymous, and Ren is a teen witch. It is not the focus of the books, but throughout the series, there are scenes with Ren practicing magic in some way, and the series is based on my life. Writing about it all made me remember how much I loved it, so right before Halloween, I bought a beautiful text book about the history of magic throughout the world, and I got a lot out of that book too, but this one, by Michelle Tea is so easy to read and get into and the spells are easy and there’s nothing dark or dangerous about them, which is good too. I made a promise to myself, around Halloween, when I practiced my first Samhain, that I was only going to use magic for healing, recovery, good health, good luck, protection, cleansing, and things like that. I highly recommend this book if you do magic or tarot or are looking to get into it.
2. On The Come Up by Angie Thomas — One of my friends recommended this book, knowing I would like it, as a fan of hip hop, and it is really an amazing book. I absolutely love the writing style, which is easy to follow and the characters are relatable and deep and there is a powerful message to the book, which is not fantasy or horror or romance or any genre like that. It’s just realistic to life. People always tell me they don’t like to read that kind of stuff when I tell them about my books. They say they want to escape, but the message in this book is important, and the fact that it is realistic is an important piece of it, and my books are like that too. Knowing that Angie has had so much success with this book and the other one by her on my list, gives me hope that there are plenty of people out there who would love my books, and so I’m gonna keep trying to get them out there, although I’m planning to write some more specific genres soon, like fantasy, dystopian, and mind-fuck… whatever the correct term is for that genre… supernatural maybe? But I’ve always loved books about real life and this was relatable but also eye-opening
3. The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas — This is probably her most popular book and it’s an important and powerful story about a black teenager who is shot by the cops. It’s told from the point of view of the young girl who was with him. Everyone should read this.
4. Running With Scissors by Augusten Burroughs — I loved this strange but relatable memoir. I say it is relatable, but even my life wasn’t as strange as his, and I’ve had a pretty strange life, but this young, queer boy with a bipolar mother, is sent to live with his mother’s psychiatrist in a house full of psych patients out in Western Massachusetts in the 70s and 80’s, I think. I forget exactly when it took place, but definitely an interesting story.
5. The Perks Of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. This was intense in the end and kind of triggering, but overall I loved and related to the story. Out of all the books I read this year, it is the most like my series, “The Offbeat Life Of Ren Anonymous.”
6. The Creative Act: A Way Of Being by Rick Rubin — I was kind of expecting a rock and roll magazine-type feel to this book, full of lots of photos and crazy stories of sex, drugs, rock and roll, and how creativity feeds into it all, based on the fact that Rick Rubin is a music producer of a lot of hard rock, punk, and hip hop, among other things, but this book felt like a meditation guide to creativity, written by a monk or something! It was eye-opening in many ways, but what I liked best about it was that I felt like he was saying I was doing everything right, to be a true artist… that fame and money and power is a big part of the art world, but to be a true artist is just about living and breathing art every day, the way I do. I should really read it again, this year, after the hugely successful year of creativity I’ve had. I found it so inspiring.
7. Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King — Besides “On Writing,” this was my first Stephen King book, and I’ve seen the movie about a million times, so it was very easy to follow the short story, which was a lot like the movie, but I have to say, I really enjoyed the ways in which it was different, too. It gave me different perspective, especially since the movie version definitely showed prison life in a very Hollywood way and the book seemed a lot more real, although more traumatic. I have begun reading The Stand, but I haven’t picked it up lately. I bought it used and I thought I had bed bugs, briefly, and that they they came from the book, but I don’t, so I might go back to reading it. The other thing was just that I’m not sure I want to read a book about a plague right now… and it’s fuckin’ long, so I dunno if I will or not but Shawshank was great!
8. Tales Of A Boy Dragon by RJ Kai- This is by a good friend of mine who I helped inspire to write and publish this book (by publishing my own, which he is a fan of.) Tales Of A Boy Dragon is not a fantasy story about dragons, but actually a true story about RJ Kai’s history as an Alaskan trans man who was sent to a women’s prison in South Dakota for weed trafficking. It’s an important story and easy to get into. I enjoyed it a lot and am looking forward to his next book.
9. The Impending Blindness Of Billie Scott by Zoe Thorogood — This is a graphic novel and it may be my favorite graphic novel ever. I don’t know, but I can’t think of any I liked better. The art is awesome and unique and the story is as well, about a queer artist who finds out they are going blind. It wasn’t exactly what I expected, and offered lots of fun surprises, but it was also just what I needed and hoped it would be, as a disabled artist myself.
10. The High Desert: Black. Punk. Nowhere. by James Spooner — This is probably my new second favorite graphic novel. It’s full of beautiful, detailed, punk-style art and is written by a black punk who has clearly been into punk and punk politics since the late 80's/early 90’s when this memoir of his life takes place. As someone who got into punk a little bit in 1992 (and more through the years) I absolutely love this story and recommend it whether you know anything about punk or not.
11. The House In The Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune — This was one of the 12 books recommended to me by 12 friends this past year and I was looking forward to it after hearing a lot about it. I loved the writing style, even though it was a bit slow, it was very poetic and it was a creative, fun, inspiring and touching story that involved a lovable Lucifer child, among other things.
12. The Outsiders by SE Hinton — I’ve seen this movie about a dozen times by now and love it, so it was nice to finally read the novel that inspired this story.
13. Dark Matter by Blake Crouch — This was a fast paced suspense book that was sort of Sci-fi, but not exactly. It involved time travel and different realities and it was an interesting concept. I thought it was a fun read and kind of deep at the end.
14. Gang Leader For A Day by Sudhir Venkatesh — A former student from my old high school recommended this to me after we had an interesting conversation and I immediately wanted to read it. The author may be incredibly problematic in how he went about his research and even the way he wrote about the gangs and the conclusions that he drew. So much about it is wrong. However, in doing what he did, he was able to get a really interesting and informative look at how gangs operate and there is a lot of truth to the book as well, plus a fascinating story.
15. Another Crazy Trans Woman by Heather Flescher — This is a hand made book of amazingly deep and well written poetry and short prose that a friend sent me, which you can get for $7. That includes shipping, in the US, and it can be shipped worldwide, as well, but with a shipping charge, through the author, by emailing her at heatherflescher@aol.com
16. Mrs. Frisby And The Rats Of NIMH by Robert C. O’Brian — I grew up on this movie. It was one of the few we had in our collection, and I just recently watched it again a few years ago. It’s a brilliant film with beautiful animation, but I loved the book, as well. I got a better look inside Mrs. Frisby’s mind, for one thing, and the other thing, and this was the main reason I’ve wanted to read this book for a long time, was that there was more about NIMH. NIMH is the National Institute for Mental Heath, and is a real agency that has a lot of affect on people with mental illness and they do studies on rats there, so I wanted to learn more about that, and it definitely had more to it than the movie.
17. The Giver by Lois Lowry — This is yet another one that I have seen the movie of, but I always wanted to read it, and I am a fan of dystopian stuff. This is definitely an amazing and creative story. I’m planning to write a dystopian book at some point and this was great inspiration.
18. I’m Not Holding Your Coat by Nancy Barille. Nancy is a Facebook friend of mine who I don’t know very well, but I know she’s a well loved teacher in the Boston area and that she was a big part of the local punk scene in the 80’s. Apparently, she has ties to other punk scenes and moved to Boston years later. She wrote this great book about her experience, especially as a woman in a male-dominated and sometimes violent scene. It’s full of fascinating stories and lots of name dropping, as well as cool photos and if you like punk, it’s definitely worth a read. It’s a pretty popular book, too. I heard all about if for a while so I had to check it out and was glad I did.
19. Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka — I saw a therapist this year, briefly, between April and October, who told me to read this. I’m not even sure what his intentions were or how he thought it would help me, but he thought I would relate and I definitely did, although I found it kind of triggering and it made me feel a little ill about the whole situation, but it was an interesting and good read. I dunno why, but I always assumed this book was super long and a boring, philosophical metaphor but it was plenty interesting and had a plot and characters, and the fact that it was not originally written in English didn’t take away from it in any way. I was glad I read it and it actually impacted some of what I wrote in my own books, while reading it. I dumped the therapist, however, for a variety of reasons. I have a much better one now.
20. Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens — This was one of the 12 books recommended to me by 12 friends and I wasn’t really sure if I wanted to read it, due to the very mixed reviews, and some of the things said in those reviews made me think I wasn’t going to like it, but I did. I wasn’t in love with everything about it, but it was a strong visual story that took me to a world I have never been but could see in my mind. I was pretty invested in it and it has stayed in my mind since i read it, months ago. I have not seen the movie though, as I have barely turned on the TV in 2 years, other than to stream music.

To give an idea of what these books were up against, a lot of the books that didn’t make my top 20 were pretty popular books as well, including…

• The Sandman, books 1 and 2
• Batman: The Killing Joke
• A History Of Magic, Witchcraft, and The Occult
• The Rap Yearbook
• On The Road
• The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer
• The Body Keeps The Score
• What Would Buffy Do?
• Keith Haring: The Story Of His Life
• Matilda
• The Watchmen
• V For Vendetta
• Slaughterhouse Five
• Gender Queer
• Why Buffy Matters
• Scott Pilgrim’s Precious Little Life
• Walden
• The Ways Of White Folks
• There, There
• Cat On A Hot Tin Roof
• Animal Farm

I read several others as well, but the majority of these are very well known books that I always meant to read and I enjoyed most of them.

If I had to pick a least favorite I’d probably go with The Body Keeps The Score, which took me two years to read and as soon as I finished it, I threw it in the donation pile. It is a long book with very small print and the information is either extremely triggering or extremely boring, and most of the studies done there that were discussed in the book are not accessible to the average trauma survivor and there is very little in there that is helpful for actual trauma survivors. Not only that, but once I realized the studies were done at the Trauma Center in Boston, which dropped me as a client when I needed them most, right after 9/11, because they didn’t approve of my gender transition, it made me mad that all of the people in the book got help but they sent me away. So yeah, I didn’t like that one, but I finished it.

So that’s that… You can get my books through the links to The Offbeat Life Of Ren Anonymous, on Amazon (by looking up the name Jymi Cliche) or through my website, here…

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