Here is a list of our favorite books read this year.

If you have visited the youth services department recently, you have probably noticed that there are a lot of empty shelves and there are new spine labels on the books. Well, the youth services staff is reorganizing and re-cataloging the nonfiction collection by subject instead of by the Dewey Decimal System. The collection is now under construction!

One of my favorite books of 2023 is Tom Lake by Ann Patchett. It is set in 2020 during the COVID pandemic. Lara Nelson and her husband Joe own a cherry orchard in northern Michigan. Their three daughters, Emily, Maisie, and Nell have returned home to the family farm as the world shuts down.

I have always loved cemeteries. As a child, I studied the gravestones in the cemetery surrounding our church to learn as much as I could about the lives of the people who came before me. In college, I sought out a cemetery near my school as it was a quiet place to study on warm days. For a break, I often wandered around admiring the sculptures that adorned the graves. To this day, whenever I travel to a new place, I always try to include a cemetery or two on my itinerary.