One of the things I promised myself I’d do last year was to share the books I liked best in 2023, none of which I reviewed here. Today’s Top Ten Tuesday from That Artsy Reader Girl invites me to get my act together and do a down-and-dirty update of this draft and finally hit publish:

1. Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo
   Two generations of Dominican-American women with magical gifts (ranging from the ability to tell if someone is lying to possessing an “alpha vagina”) find their lives upended when Flor, whose gift is knowing when someone will die, announces she’s throwing herself a living wake. Organized as personal narratives/interviews told to Flor’s daughter, an anthropologist, the chapters mostly alternate through all four senior sisters and the two daughters/cousins. Each one looks back at how her life — both in New York and in Santa Domingo, Dominican Republic — has been shaped by her gift and her family and how these matrilineal powers cause them to walk through the (male-dominated) world. If you like family sagas or immigrant stories and magical realism, I highly recommend Acevedo’s first novel for adults.
    
   
2. Thistlefoot by GennaRose Nethercott
   A modern fairytale about two estranged adult siblings who inherit a family home — that just so happens to have chicken legs, the man who chases its family across time and space, and the way we choose to let our personal and familial past influence our future. Highly recommended for those who love well-crafted folklore adaptations.
    
   
3. The Emma Project by Sonali Dev
   In the conclusion to The Rajes series, Dev’s contemporary Indian-American saga inspired by four of Jane Austen’s novels, we get a romance for the youngest Raj, Vansh, who’s spent years living abroad doing hands-on work on global development projects. In the wake of his brother’s gubernatorial election campaign, Vansh must decide where to devote his attention — yes to finding a software answer to homelessness (it’s more complicated than that…). And definitely not to Naina, who is no longer fake-engaged to his brother and who calls him on his shortcomings in a very irritating way. (Bonus: while eldest cousin Esha does not get her own book, she does get a resolution woven through this one.) If you like contemporary romance, Austen retellings, or family sagas, start with the first novel, Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors.
    
   
4. The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
   A House in the Cerulean Sea meets Ballet Shoes. A 20-something vlogging witch is called to an estate house and asked to take over the tutoring of three adopted sisters, who also happend to be orphaned witches. The problem? First, the girls’ legal guardian is absent and the man they treat as their father doesn’t like Mika at all. But he admits their magical talents are beyond him and that they need her help. More important, Mika is flouting the first rule of British witchcraft — other than quarterly meetings, witches may not gather together to avoid endangering the community. But Mika is lonely — and can’t face being the cause of separating the girls. But is she is a match for three little girls — and the unbending will of her coven’s head witch? This book taught me the term “romantasy” and I am all in. Read this if you are too, with a particular recommendation for those pulled in by found family stories.
    
   
5. Any Way the Wind Blows by Rainbow Rowell
   Like The Emma Project, this is the final book in a series, in this case the Simon Snow trilogy, about a group of young adults who attended a magical school in the United Kingdom (and one American boy who has no Magic, but who has a nearly otherworldly talent for getting those imbued with it to talk to him). Read this series if your loved ones appreciate what makes you unique even if you cannot see it yourself.
    
   
6. Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree
   An orc decides it’s time to hang up her fearsome blade and take the gold she’s earned over the years to pursue her true life dream — opening a coffee house. Along, she befriends a variety of outcasts, from a ratkin to a succubus; introduces a city to roasted bean water; and creates the home she didn’t know she’d been fighting for all those years. It’s low on action but full of heart. If you ever wanted more narrative about “happily ever after,” this book is for you.
    
   
7. A Restless Truth by Freya Marske
   In the middle novel of the Last Binding series, Maude, the younger sister of one of the protagonists from the first book, is sent to New York to encourage an elderly woman with knowledge of the magical artifacts to share what she knows. When the woman is murdered on the first night aboard the ship back to London without revealing any secrets, Maude has to team up with the unpleasant Lord Hawthorn, another side character from A Marvellous Light, Violet, a bi stage performer returning home to claim an inheritance, non-magical ship reporter-cum-thief Ross, and a spirit in a necklace to identify what she’s looking for before the bad guys find it or they dock in England. No pressure. Oh and along the way, she may also find herself a lover. If you like spicy fantastical queer historical fiction, start with the first book in the series to take advantage of the full world-building.
    
   
8. Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer
   At last, a series kickoff! After optimistic Evie Sage, a young woman responsible for supporting her ill father and young sister, finds herself helping her land’s Evil Villain flee from the king’s soldiers, he offers her a job as his assistant. And she proves to be very good at it, not minding the severed heads in the entryway or the screams from the dungeon or the brooding manners of her boss. As time goes on, it becomes clear that someone inside his castle is conspiring with his enemies. Can Evie figure out who to trust and save her boss and her job? If you want your new adult romantasy light and filled with humor, this might be a fun place for you to start.
    
   
9. The Vibrant Years by Sonali Dev
   This standalone contemporary novel focuses on three generations of Indian-American women. Bindhu has just inherited a lot of money, threatening to raise questions from her family about her past, so she moves into a retirement community to try to create some distance. Her ex-DIL, with whom she’s lived for decades, is confused and hurt, but she’s also trying to navigate changes to her career as a tv journalist. And Cullie, her tech prodigy granddaughter, might have more thoughts, but she’s busy trying to manage a manipulative ex, her crushing anxiety, and a dating app that her bosses are expecting, that she has yet to design. Just one problem, she doesn’t date. But if she’s going to get it delivered (and protect the app she created that she credits with saving her life), it’s going to require her to start — and to convince her mother and grandmother that they need to provide an assist, as well.
    
   
10. The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music by Dave Grohl
    A memoir from contemporary rock’s favorite everyman. I listened to the book, which Grohl reads, and it includes snippets of music throughout. If you want to read a book about a guy who really loves what he does and who seriously seems to be a fanboy even though pretty much everyone else would consider him to be the star, it’s a good one to pick. He doesn’t muckrake and I wouldn’t say it’s especially self-revelatory. But it is a good listen and you’ll get a front row seat to 30 years of Gen-X American rock history.

Honorable mentions: All Systems Red by Martha Wells (science fiction), Wayward Son by Rainbow Rowell (fantasy), The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman (mystery), Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn (mystery), Invisible by Christina Diaz Gonzalez and Gabriela Epstein (middle-grade graphic novel)

The rest of 2023’s four-star reads:
A Sinister Revenge by Deanna Raybourn (mystery), Check, Please! Sticks and Scones by Ngozi Ukazu (graphic novel), The Best Strangers in the World: Stories from a Life Spent Listening by Ari Shapiro (memoir), Hoops: A Graphic Novel by Matt Tavares (graphic novel), Fake Dates and Mooncakes by Sher Lee (YA romance), No. 91/92: A Diary of a Year on the Bus by Lauren Elkin (poetry), My Brother’s Husband by Gengorah Tagame (manga)