My annual best books episode with the dynamic Carla Jean Whitley never disappoints! Below are her picks, in order. Happy reading!

The Best Books She’s Read This Year:

I Have Some Questions for You by Rebecca Makkai (Fiction) 

Arrangements in Blue: Notes on Loving and Living Alone by Amy Key (Nonfiction) 

Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano (Fiction)

The Quickening: Creation and Community at the Ends of the Earth by Elizabeth Rush (Nonfiction, and her No. 1 pick of 2023!)

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett (Fiction)

Happily: A Personal History—With Fairy Tales by Sabrina Orah Mark (Nonfiction) 

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin (Fiction) 

You Could Make This Place Beautiful by Maggie Smith (Nonfiction) 

The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year by Margaret Renkl (Nonfiction) 

The Best Books She’s Reread This Year:

Frindle by Andrew Clements (Fiction)

The Giver by Lois Lowry (Fiction)

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott (Nonfiction)

This is the Story of a Happy Marriage by Ann Patchett (Nonfiction) 

This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub (Fiction)

Signal Fires by Dani Shapiro (Fiction)

The Books She Is Anticipating for 2024:

Sandwich by Catherine Newman (Fiction)

After Annie by Anna Quindlen (Fiction)

Grief Is for People by Sloane Crosley (Nonfiction)

The Last Fire Season by Manjula Martin (Nonfiction)

Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story by Leslie Jamison (Nonfiction)

If You Can't Take the Heat: Tales of Food, Feminism, and Fury by Geraldine DeRuiter (Nonfiction)

Twelve Trees: The Deep Roots of Our Future by Daniel Lewis (Nonfiction)

Anita De Monte Laughs Last by Xochitl Gonzalez (Fiction)

The Books I Am Anticipating for 2024:

The Summer Pact by Emily Giffin (Fiction)

Closer Together: Knowing Ourselves, Loving Each Other by Sophie Grégoire Trudeau (Nonfiction)