Book of the Year

The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng

Our book of the year is by Malaysian author Tan Twan Eng, who counts Cape Town as one of his homes. His new novel has attracted dozens of glowing reviews. Set in 1920s colonial Malaya, with a cameo for the Karoo, the book features a fictionalised W Somerset Maugham and a scandalous murder trial.

Non-fiction: Heavy-hitting, shocking and considered, these are the year’s instant non-fiction ­classics

Some People Need Killing by Patricia Evangelista is a powerful record of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal war on drugs. It covers the extrajudicial killings stealthily carried out by pro-Duterte hit squads and vigilantes.

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Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives by Siddharth Kara is billed as an exposé of the human rights abuses within Congo’s cobalt mines – although Kara has been criticised for his “colonial mindset”. A primer on the horrors and exploitation of the industry.

Fair Play by Katie Barnes offers a nuanced and compassionate consideration of how to maintain fairness in sport in the context of trans and intersex athletes. Barnes, who identifies as nonbinary, delves into the science, the personal and the ­politics.

Normal Women by Philippa Gregory, the Queen of Historical Fiction, who turns her hand to historical fact, chronicling the disregarded, neglected and miswritten women of British history, from 1066 to the present.

South African non-fiction: The engine of South African publishing never disappoints

Place by Justin Fox. Possibly the top gift book of the season, in which Fox sets off to explore the landscapes of his favourite authors, from the Cape interior (Deneys Reitz) to the bushveld (Eugène Marais) and the Wild Coast (Zakes Mda) to the Cederberg (Stephen Watson) – and more.

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Catch Me a Killer by Micki Pistorius. Soon to be a major TV series, the book dives into the sphere of criminal profiling with trailblazing psychologist Micki Pistorius. Not for the faint of heart.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly by Ray Hartley, Greg Mills, Mills Soko. The bad news: South Africa is facing an extraordinary “polycrisis”. The good news: leaders in business and politics have workshopped the scenarios that could save us. All we need is the will to make difficult choices.

I Write the Yawning Void by Sindiwe Magona, edited by Renée Schatteman. Magona, an author of  pre-eminence across genres, turned 80 this year. These essays span the transition from apartheid to the post-apartheid period, and address themes such as HIV/Aids, culture, home and belonging.

Finding Endurance by Darrel Bristow-Bovey. The author has a deeply personal relationship with the story of Endurance and in this lyrical journey into past and present, above and below the Antarctic ice, he revisits the famous ship’s story.

2023 prize winners: The books that took the Big Ones

Don’t skip Prophet Song by Paul Lynch, the winner of the Booker Prize, aka “the best novel written in English” this year.

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Scoop up the Sunday Times Literary Awards winners: My Land Obsession: A Memoir by Bulelwa Mabasa (non-fiction) and How to Be a Revolutionary by CA Davids (fiction).

Take on Aliss at the Fire, by the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, Jon Fosse.

Don’t miss the winner of the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize – oh, you haven’t heard of it? Well, it was just our excuse to include this debut detective novel from the world’s best absurdist comedian: The Satsuma Complex by Bob Mortimer.

Finally, The Book Lounge’s Book of the Year, though not a formal prize, makes for a read all literary tastemakers should heed. They chose a “powerful South African coming-of-age story”, A Soft Landing by Wisani Mushwana.

Best audiobooks of 2023: Dial into these reads

Misbelief by Dan Ariely, read by acclaimed actor Simon Jones. An ear-opening exploration of the human side of the misinformation crisis.

Chain Gang All Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, read by Shayna Small, Aaron Goodson, Michael Crouch and Lee Osorio. Audiobooks with an ensemble cast are an acquired taste, but these readers pull it off emphatically.

Tom Lake by Ann Patchett, read by Meryl Streep. A hopeful and moving novel, made even more so by Streep’s virtuoso delivery.

Making It So by Patrick Stewart, read by the author. A fascinating read elevated further by Stewart’s performance.

Fiction: Because TV’s becoming boring and Instagram Reels are bad for your eyes

The Fraud by Zadie Smith brings 1860s London alive. It tells the tale of the bizarre trial of a cockney-born Australian butcher who claims to be the heir to a fortune.

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Bridge by Lauren Beukes is a surreal new speculative novel, in which a grieving daughter’s quest to find her mother becomes a journey across parallel universes. Tight as a drum, and set at a page-turning pace.

The Bee Sting by Paul Murray is an addictive 650-page Irish family saga set after the 2008 financial crash: You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll make excuses to stay in and read.

The Bitterness of Olives by Andrew Brown, who takes his signature literary detective storytelling to Tel Aviv, where a retired Israeli detective and a Palestinian doctor are reeling from a crisis that has jeopardised their delicate friendship.

The Future by Naomi Alderman, which unfolds at a breakneck speed. A handful of friends plot a daring heist to save the world from tech giants’ greed.

Cookery: Life’s too short for a summer body. Bake and braise your way into the new year

Now & Then: A Collection of Recipes for Always by Tessa Kiros is part memoir, part recipe book from London-born Kiros, who grew up in South Africa. With influences from her Tuscan home, her SA childhood, and her time in Mexico, New Orleans, Thailand and Greece.

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Sweet Salone by Maria Bradford offers a culinary journey to Sierra Leone. Inspired by her grandmother’s cooking, Bradford introduces the world to her country’s diverse and rich food culture.

Clever Cooking by Vickie de Beer. South Africans are having to take the meal prep fad one step further, thanks to the ­perils of load shedding. This book shows you how to organise nutritious meals ahead of time.

2024 reads: Some mouth-­watering titles

January: The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years by Shubnum Khan is “a haunting, a love story, and a mystery”.

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February: Countdown: The Blinding Future of Nuclear Weapons by Sarah Scoles. Why are we no longer scared witless of the Bomb? Scoles chastens us in her book.

March: Until August by Gabriel Garcia Márquez, the “lost novel” from the Nobel laureate, which he worked on while struggling with dementia. Love and Fury: A Memoir by Margie Orford, South Africa’s Queen of Crime, in which she divulges some of the harrowing experiences that have shaped her life and influenced her writing.

April: We Have Everything We Need to Start Again by Koleka Putuma, whose new collection is aimed at young readers and offers a positive take on coming-of-­age ­experiences.

September: The Creation of Half-Broken People by Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu, an African take on the Gothic novel.

Get your litfest on: Plan your 2024 literary pilgrimages

In Durban, the 27th Time of the Writer festival will run from 14 to 21 March.

The Franschhoek Literary Festival is on from 17 to 19 May. Accommodation sells out fast, so book now!

Also watch out for Cape Town’s Open Book Festival (September), Johannesburg’s Kingsmead Book Fair (May), and the Gauteng International Book Fair (December). DM

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, available countrywide for R29.