Are you surprised that I’m a total bookworm? Probably not. I adore reading. My top Clifton strength is Input, which means I take in a ton of information, process it, and churn it out in a way that makes sense to the other person. So yeah, I’m a big bookworm. In 2023, I’d like to be more intentional with my reading list, so I spent a few minutes reviewing my “want to read” list on GoodReads. I also flipped through my journal from the year to gather all the books people recommended to me over the past 12 months.

Now, this is not to say that I won’t add to this list throughout the year. However, I want to make sure these are on the list. And, of course, I’ll be writing about each of them!

In no particular order, here are the books in my TBR pile for 2023:

• Forward: A Memoir, by Abby Wambach

• Call Us What We Carry, by Amanda Gorman

• Agent Josephine: American Beauty, French Hero, British Spy, by Damien Lewis

• When Women Were Dragons, by Kelly Barnhill

• You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty, by Akwaeke Emezi

• The Myth of Normal, by Gabor Mate

• Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman

• I’m Glad My Mom Died, by Jennette McCurdy

• Our Missing Hearts, by Celeste Ng

• A Black Woman’s History of the United States, by Daina Rame Berry and Kali Nicole Gross

• When God Was A Woman, by Merlin Stone

• I Never Thought of it That Way, by Monica Guzmán

• Atomic Habits, by James Clear

• Kitchen Confidential, by Anthony Bourdain

• You Are a Badass Every Day, by Jen Sincero

• The Light We Carry, by Michelle Obama

And these books coming out in 2023 have already piqued my interest:

• Really Good, Actually, by Monica Heisey

• How to Sell a Haunted House, by Grady Hendrix

• The London Seance Society, by Sara Penner

• Spare, by Prince Harry

• Who Gets Believed?: When the Truth Isn’t Enough, by Dina Nayeri

You’ll notice that these books span multiple genres. It’s important to nurture each side of ourselves - the side that craves business growth and the side that craves imagination and creative storytelling. If you create your own TBR pile for the new year, I encourage you to do the same thing: include non-fiction, fiction, memoir, and business books on it. Alignment is key!