Best Book Club Books From 2023

Book Summary

This novel transports you to 1940s rural Colorado and the home of teenager Victoria Nash. Despite her young age, she runs the household as the sole female in a family of troubled men. One day, she meets Wilson Moon, a mysterious young drifter who has been displaced from his tribal land. Their sudden and passionate connection is full of danger and secrets.

Victoria ends up fleeing to the harsh mountain wilderness in a small hut, where she struggles against impossible conditions. As the Gunnison River rises and threatens her homeland, she begins a quest to fight for all she has lost.

Book Summary

In the middle of the 1811 winter social season, Virginia’s planters and their families gathered at the capital for the General Assembly. Just after Christmas, six hundred people packed into the theater for a show.

Newly widowed Sally is in a third-floor box. Cecily is in the colored gallery, happy to briefly escape bad circumstances at home. Stagehand Jack is backstage hoping to earn a permanent job. Blacksmith Gilbert is on the other side of town, trying to make enough money, first to buy his freedom and then to be able to take his wife to the theater.

In the middle of the performance, the theater catches fire. The decisions by Sally, Cecily, Jack, and Gilbert will impact their futures as well as the lives of countless others.

Based on the true story of a fire in Richmond, Virginia’s theater in 1811, this compelling novel moves from tragedy to redemption as the lives of four people instantly become forever intertwined.

Book Summary

Set during the summer of 2020, Lara’s three adult daughters have returned home to quarantine at the family’s northern Michigan cherry orchard. As they pick cherries and go about running the family business in isolation, the sisters beg their mother to tell them the story of her long-ago romance with celebrity Peter Duke. When Lara was in her early 20s, she and Peter shared the stage during a Michigan summer stock theater run of the play Our Town.

Lara begins the story with her very first experience on stage in high school and works her way forward through her brief but eventful theater career. As the girls learn more about their mother’s life, they are forced to reconsider everything they thought they knew about her and their father.

Book Summary

On Memorial Day in 1958, the residents of Jewel, Minnesota, are shocked to discover the dead body of the town’s most powerful citizen, wealthy landowner Jimmy Quinn. Sheriff Brody Dern must investigate, but he’s still carrying the physical and emotional scars of his military service, which complicate his career.

The townspeople have a prime suspect before Dern even has the autopsy report. Noah Bluestone, a Native American WWII veteran, has recently come back to town with a Japanese wife. But does the couple’s return have anything to do with this case?

The River We Remember explores midcentury life in America and highlights how countless small towns were affected by the WWII scars that remained well after the last shots were fired.

Book Summary

Babur “Bobby” Singh lives in an affluent New York suburb and dreams of success in America. He’s a single parent and has a fledging small business as a driver. His daughter Angie uses swimming as an escape from the discomfort she feels as an immigrant’s daughter. 

Over the summer, Angie is walking home from the pool when she finds Henry, a popular and wealthy classmate from a prominent family on the football field. He’s been stabbed and the knife is still in his abdomen. Angie immediately calls 911, and her life changes forever. And it’s not only her life that is impacted. The police immediately suspect Chiara, a Black classmate who had run away from her family to live with her aunt. 

The perspectives in this book change and you see how father and daughter try to find their place in the community and with each other.

Book Summary

Charlie greets the women in his family, including his wife and four daughters, by saying “Hello, Beautiful” and truly sees something special in each of them. Unfortunately, Charlie is resented by his wife, Rose, because he’s an alcoholic, which also impacts his ability to provide for the family.

Their oldest daughter, Julie, is smart and ambitious. When she meets William, whose family couldn’t be more different than her own, he’s at college on a basketball scholarship. For William, the sport has been his saving grace and a substitute for the love of family. At least until he meets Julie and her family embraces him in their family unit when they become a couple. Once that happens, the family refuses to give up on him.

While you’ll get some fall vibes when Julie heads to college, Hello Beautiful also follows the characters for nearly four decades. The book begins in the main character’s childhood, in the 1960s, and spans into their middle age years.

Book Summary

This historical fiction novel tells the story of the friendship between two powerful and influential women in American history.

Mary McLeod Bethune, the daughter of formerly enslaved parents, was one of the first black female activists. Through her work as both an activist and an educator, she helped lay a foundation for the civil rights movement. Eleanor Roosevelt shared Mary’s passion for education and women’s rights and was eager to make her acquaintance. The two became fast friends and confidantes.

After Eleanor’s husband, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was elected president in 1932, the two women began to collaborate even more closely. She became quite a controversial First Lady for pursuing her own agenda, separate from FDR, and particularly for her outspoken stance on civil rights.

When Elanor begins to receive threats as a result of her close relationship with Mary, both women use it as motivation to fight even harder for equality.

Book Summary

This suspenseful saga is set both during the war and in present-day Việt Nam. Trang and Quỳnh are sisters from a rural village, and like many in the region, their parents are struggling to survive. In 1969, the daughters took the desperate step of becoming “bar girls” in Sài Gòn, drinking, flirting (and more) with American GIs in return for money.

Trang becomes involved with a charming helicopter pilot named Dan. Decades later, we’ll see Dan return to Việt Nam with his wife in an attempt to heal from his PTSD and reckon with secrets from his past.

Also, in the present day, we’ll meet Phong as he tries to find his parents, a Black American soldier, and a Vietnamese woman. He was abandoned at an orphanage as a baby and grew up being called names because he was a “child of the enemy.” He dreams of finding a way to America in hopes of a better life for his family.

Book Summary

House of Eve alternates perspectives of our main characters in 1950s Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. Ruby’s story is told in first person perspective as she tries to become the first person in her lower-income family to attend higher education. However, her plans are threatened when she begins to fall for a Jewish boy.

Eleanor’s story is told from the third person perspective as she arrives in D.C. with equal parts ambition and secrets. Like Ruby, Eleanor’s plans are changed when she falls for a man, William, at Howard University. William is from one of Washington’s elite wealthy Black families, and his parents are picky about who is good enough to join them.

While this setup feels like a romance novel, this is a fast-moving historical fiction novel that will take you into a piece of history you may know little about. Don’t miss the author’s note at the end!

Book Summary

Sallie Kincaid’s father, Duke, was the biggest man in their small Virginia town at the turn of the 20th century – both literally and figuratively. Sallie was Daddy’s little girl. She has few memories of her mother, who died when she was young. By the time she is 8 years old, her father has remarried and has a new son, Eddie. But this shy, timid son is nothing like Duke. Sallie takes it upon herself to teach Eddie to be more like their outgoing, daredevil father. But an accident occurs, and Sallie is cast out.

Nine years later, Sallie returns to her hometown to reclaim her place in the family. But the world is a very different place now that Prohibition is the law. After confronting the secrets and scandals she left behind, she finds her calling as a bootlegger.

Book Summary

In 1929, Robert moved to Birmingham, Alabama for a new job opportunity as a master carpenter. The city was booming, and his young family enjoyed the busy markets and nightlife. However, his success and snazzy car combined with his light-skinned wife make him concerned about attention from the Klan, which is also booming in the region.

Ninety years later, Meghan is the youngest reporter for the Detroit Free Press. She decides to use her position to investigate the murder of her great-grandfather. His body was never found, and no one knows what happened to him. Spurred by the Black Lives Matter movement, Meghan travels to Birmingham to uncover the past. However, revealing secrets that span cities and decades may put her own life at risk. 

Book Summary

Nineteen-year-old Marion’s dreams come true when she’s cast as a member of the Rockettes, Radio City Music Hall’s precision dance troupe. It’s an honor for any dancer to be selected for the role and given the opportunity to perform at the Art Deco masterpiece of a theater that is Radio City. But Marion soon learns that, behind the scenes, the days are long and the rehearsals grueling.

One night, in 1956, a bomb explodes in the theater. It’s suspected to be the work of the infamous “Big Apple Bomber” who has been planting bombs in crowded places around the city for the past sixteen years. The police still have no leads, leaving citizens living in fear. At Marion’s urging, the police agree to try psychological profiling, a radical new technique at the time.

While the Rockettes are trained to stay in line, Marion realizes that to help catch the bomber, she’ll have to stand out.

Book Summary

When bombings began in London in 1939, 14-year-old Hazel and her 5-year-old sister, Flora, were evacuated to a rural village in the English countryside. Living with a woman and her teenage son in a charming stone cottage, Hazel comforts Flora by telling her stories of a magical fairy tale land. It provides the sisters with a fictional place where they can escape the fears and hardships of war. One day while playing near the banks of the River Thames, Flora disappears. Hazel blames herself and carries the guilt into adulthood. Twenty years later, Hazel’s life looks ideal from the outside – charming boyfriend, a nice flat in London, and a good job at a rare bookstore. But on the eve of her new career at Sotheby’s, she unwraps a package that changes everything.

It’s an illustrated first-edition book called “Whisperwood and the River of Stars.” It’s the imaginary world that she created for Flora – one that she never wrote down and never told anyone else about. What does it mean? Is Flora still alive? And does this fairy tale hold the truth about her disappearance? Hazel embarks on a feverish quest for answers. Along the way, she’ll reconnect with people from her past and put her future in jeopardy.

Book Summary

Maddie lives in London and is trying to find her own way in life. But she’s also responsible for the care of her father, who has advanced-stage Parkinson’s disease. On top of that, her boss is a nightmare, and she’s tired of being the only Black person in meetings. 

Her overbearing mother, who calls her Maame (which means woman) instead of Maddie, is returning from Ghana, where she spends most of her time. Maddie’s thrilled with the chance to relinquish care of her dad and leave the family home to make her own life. As a self-described “late-bloomer,” she’s ready to finally experience her own “firsts.”

Book Summary

Nora spends her days working in a vintage clothing boutique in Manhattan. She loves her job, but she and her husband are struggling with debt and can barely make ends meet financially. They’re also struggling with infertility and the deep desire to start a family of their own.

When socialite Evelyn Elliot walks into the boutique, she and Nora have an instant connection. Evelyn takes Nora under her wing, as both her stylist and confidante. Nora is suddenly whisked into the unfamiliar world of New York’s moneyed elite. Then Evelyn decides that her next cause will be to help Nora have a baby by acting as her surrogate.

It’s a very generous offer from Evelyn, and on the surface, it’s everything that Nora could hope for. But this “favor” further imbalances the power dynamic between the two women in ways that will test this unlikely friendship.

Book Summary

To the other women in her hometown of Ahmedabad, India, Nita had the ideal life – a financially comfortable, happy marriage, with a sweet daughter. But Nita felt otherwise. It wasn’t the life she wanted. Instead, she decided to follow her creative ambitions all the way to Paris. But this decision is not without consequences. 

Years later, when Nita’s daughter, Sophie, learns the truth, she sets out for Paris to find the mother who left her behind. The trip threatens to derail Sophie’s upcoming arranged marriage, but she won’t stop chasing leads across the City of Lights until she finds the truth about Nita. Along the way, however, she may find even more than she bargained for.

Book Summary

Set against the backdrop of Seattle’s wealthy tech elite, this fast-paced novel follows three women who take on (and try to take down) a manipulative CEO. 

Together, Anna and her husband Jake built a company. But after a sudden divorce, Anna finds herself pushed out of the company and struggling to raise their two teenage sons on her own.

On the other side of the city, Samanta still has lingering, unanswered questions from her college relationship with Jake. When she learns that his tech company is positioned for a billion-dollar IPO, she decides maybe it’s time for her to seek answers… and justice.

Then there’s Jake’s new, much younger wife, Jess. She feels her husband pulling away from her just as she’s adjusting to life as a new mom. 

As this novel develops, the lives of these three women become intertwined. Long-buried secrets will be revealed.

Book Summary

They say you learn a lot about a person when you walk in their shoes… but can you also swap fates with them?

At 45, Nisha leads a charmed and glamorous globetrotting life. But suddenly, things aren’t going her way. First, someone accidentally walks off with her gym bag (custom-made, red crocodile Christian Louboutin’s and all), and then she returns to her London hotel room to discover that her husband has locked her out of their penthouse and cut her off.

Sam Kemp is struggling to keep her family afloat, and while she didn’t mean to swap bags with Nisha, she also doesn’t have time to worry about exchanging them. By the time she realizes the mistake, she’s already late for a meeting, so she puts on Nisha’s red heels rather than the old black pumps she left in her own bag. She’s shocked at how much more confident and empowered she feels. The new confidence inspires changes that go deeper than fashion.

Book Summary

Solia was raised in Nairobi, Kenya, by her wealthy and conservative mother. Despite her mother’s stern parenting style, Solia is headstrong and outspoken. Eager to escape her mother’s strict rules, she wants to attend college in New York City. 

When she arrives, New York in the 1990s is very different than she imagined. She’s equally shocked by the entitlement of her wealthy classmates and the poverty she sees elsewhere in the city. Her sheltered upbringing in Kenya shielded her from many of the harsh realities of racism, so it comes as a shock when she experiences it for the first time in America – the place she envisioned to be the golden land of opportunity.

Book Summary

Ah Boon is growing up in the last days of British rule in Singapore. He lives in a small fishing village but would rather play with the girl next door, Siok Mei, than go fishing. Despite his disinterest in fishing, he discovers that he has an uncanny ability to locate uncharted islands, which are rich with fish. 

By the time Ah Boon and Siok Mei are teenagers, the Japanese army has arrived and occupied Singapore as part of WW2. This coming-of-age story is set against the backdrop of Singapore’s legacy of British colonialism, the World War II Japanese occupation, and the pursuit of modernity. Readers say the beautiful writing transports you to a different time and place and includes a hint of magical realism to emphasize the human-land connection.

Book Summary

Alice is a gifted writer who struggles to include her full self in her work. However, when her heart is ripped open after a devastating event, the words finally flow freely onto the page. She turns the tragedy into a stunning debut novel called Theo. 

This novel demonstrates the power of books as we watch Alice’s novel find its way into the hands and hearts of nine very different readers. From a teenager hiding that she is experiencing homelessness to a bookseller looking for love and a widower experiencing grief, Theo connects each reader with a new pathway in their life. 

After the introduction to Alice and her backstory, the chapters walk through the nine readers affected in different ways by Theo.

Book Summary

The Celebrants focuses on a group of five college friends who are now approaching their 50s. Right before graduation, they lost the 6th member of their friend group, and the tragedy has had a lasting impact on each of them. During the memorial, the group made a pact that each person could summon the group together once with no prior planning. As part of the gathering, whoever has gathered the group gets a living “funeral” to remind them that life is worth living.

Twenty-eight years later, Jordan has a big secret that may destroy their nearly three-decade-old pact.

We also have a full book club guide for The Celebrants, including discussion questions, character lists, and more!

Book Summary

Geeta had a terrible husband, so it wasn’t the worst thing when he disappeared five years ago. She didn’t kill him, but everyone thinks she did. At first, she’s worried this will hurt her reputation, but it turns out that being feared is good for business. 

No one bothers her, and people want to stay on her good side, so they keep buying her jewelry. Things are working out well until women start coming to her for help getting rid of their terrible husbands. Not all the women are asking nicely, and these are very bad guys, but how far will she go to protect her reputation?

Book Summary

This unique novel shares an immigrant story in a whole new way, exploring what it means to be American in New York City from three perspectives over thirty years.

Tony is a Chinese-born engineer who immigrated to the US and took a job as a doorman in hopes of providing more opportunities for his family. Daughter Tammy is nine at the start of the book, and this is, in part, a coming-of-age story of her upbringing in Queens, New York. As she grows up and enters adulthood, you’ll see the weight of expectations so many first-generations carry, along with how those expectations interact with her personal desires.

The final point of view is from Oliver, who lives in the building where Tony works. He’s a wealthy white lawyer with a dark secret. An unexpected act of violence brings Oliver together with Tony’s family. As the book progresses, you’ll see the ripple effects of decisions along with ways that love can overcome differences.