Book Ponder

The 5 Best Books I Read in 2023

In 2023 I read 33 books, most of them were biographies and history books with a couple of new release fictions from my favorite fictional worlds (Cosmere & Malazan). These are the five best books I read in 2023.

The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday

My daily devotional for 2023 was The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday.  I’ve recently become a big fan of daily devotionals especially when they are from authors whose work you have read, and the daily devotional is a reminder of your favorite parts.  Last year my daily devotional was The Daily Laws by Robert Green, I have read all of Robert Greene’s and Ryan Holiday’s books, and the devotional felt like daily reminders of my favorite parts of their books without having to go back and reread them.  Many authors are coming out with their versions of a daily devotional, next year I am reading The Daily Dad by Ryan Holiday and The Daily Pressfield by Steven Pressfield. 

The Daily Stoic was excellent, and Ryan did a great job splitting up every month into a different theme, each day only took a minute or two to read but many times helped me start my day on the right track or helped me get back on track if I had fallen off course.  Many times, during busy periods I would fall behind and I would read a few days at a time which was also very enjoyable.  Everyone should partner some sort of daily devotional with their reading life and The Daily Stoic is a great one if you are into Stoicism.

The War of Art by Steven Pressfield

The War of Art was my “quake book” of 2023.   If you haven’t heard of quake books, they are books that shake your life.  They impact you at a higher level than a regular book can, they either come to you at the exact moment you need them or resonate with you in a way so deeply that it encourages you to make a major change in your life.  The War of Art is a book about writing but can be applied to anyone trying to create something of their own.  The book came to me at a time when ChatGPT and AI-powered assistants were rolling out and the world was in fear that content creators were going to be obsolete because a computer could do it much better and faster.   This almost made me give up writing, because I thought only established or highly skilled writers would survive, and I was neither of those things.  After learning about what Pressfield calls “The Resistance” I knew that this powerful force was constantly fighting against me to give up.  It gave me the most perfectly curated reasons as to why it was not worth it, and I should just play it safe.  We must realize that our brains are still hardwired to keep us safe and to reciprocate.  So doing anything that we fear, our brains give us good reasons to take the easy way out, we must fight the resistance.

On Writing Well by William Zinsser

Paired with The War of Art, On Writing Well by William Zinsser were game changers in improving my writing.  While The War of Art was more motivational to do the work, On Writing Well focused on tips and tricks to become a better writer.  My biggest takeaway was the increased difficulty that writers now face, competing against the lowered attention span of people today and the apps that are designed to take advantage of that.  Back in the day writers were competing against TV, VCRs, DVDs, and video games, now they are competing against apps like TikTok that are strategically engineered for lowered attention spans.  Writing must be better than ever to pull people away from screens.

Grant by Ron Chernow

My favorite biography I read in 2023 was Grant by Ron Chernow.  I always heard about the great achievements of Ulysses S. Grant, but I decided I needed to find out for myself.  Grant’s redemption story must be one of the best I have ever read, there were points in the book where I couldn’t fathom how this man who was handed blow after blow from life would end up becoming one of our greatest war generals and the future president of the United States.  If I was reading this book not knowing who Grant would become, I wouldn’t have believed it possible.  Grant’s story is a true lesson on perseverance and a better look at how the years after the Civil War were more turbulent than the Civil War itself.  Perhaps Grant deserves as much credit for not allowing us to fall into a second civil war, as he did for leading us to victory in the Civil War.  Grant was also one of the few individuals President Lincoln could trust and allowed him the freedom to become a great president because he could delegate his Civil War duties to Grant.

Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela

Long Walk to Freedom is the story of former South African President Nelson Mandela and how he spent most of his life imprisoned while still fighting for the rights of the suppressed South Africans.   What impressed me the most about this book was Mandela’s willingness to put it all on the line for a cause he believed to be bigger than him.  He was willing to die if it meant advancing his cause, and that was put to the test on the days before he was to be sentenced to prison.  He told his lawyers and advisors that if he and his comrades were sentenced to the death penalty, they would not appeal it, because that would weaken their claim and give the opponent a moral victory.  During his almost three decades in prison, Mandela was able to continue working on his cause by educating himself and never forgetting what his mission in life was.  Like Viktor Frankl, he believed that if he never allowed the enemy to win the battle with his mind, he would persevere.  They came very close with cruel ways to sabotage his visiting rights and communications with his family, but in the end, it paid off and he was able to become the first black president of South Africa. 

2024 Reading

2023 was a different kind of reading year for me.  I tried to emphasize quality over quantity and spent most of my reading on physical books compared to most years where 75% of my books came from audio.  I took my time with books I considered important and emphasized taking high-quality notes and attaining as much value as possible from them.  I believe I can still reach the 52-book yearly goal I place on myself while still reading deeply if I continue to work on cutting out distracting activities and replacing them with reading.  2024 should be my best reading year yet.