20 Books You Must Read in 2023 by 540WMain

Dear Community,

We tried really hard to get this list completed and published before the end of 2022 but alas we didn’t make it. The end of this past year came in like a wrecking ball and we needed to rest and recharge before ringing in the new year with a bang. This annual list contains some important holdovers from prior years and some classic texts that we deem must-reads for anyone wanting to better understand the nuances of intersectionality, gender, and racism. In a culture where fact is maligned as fiction and truth and facts are less and less relevant; it’s books and knowledge that will truly free us from the shackles of white supremacy and capitalism.

Check our essential reading list below, and revisit our lists from 2022, 2021, 2020, and 2019. And make sure that you read through to the end for our complimentary list of Black-owned books to ensure that you read and BUY BLACK.

Books You Must Read in 2023

1. Rest Is Resistance | Tricia Hersey 
2. Hell of A Book | Jason Mott 
3. Deaf Republic | IIya Kaminsky 
4. The Deep | Rivers Solomon 
5. Kindred | Octavia E. Butler
6. Me: Moth | Amber McBride
7. Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation | Harriet A. Washington 
8. Medical Bondage: Race. Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology | Deirdre Cooper Owens
9. Digital Black Feminism | Catherine Knight Steele
10. Your Children Are Very Greatly in Danger | Justin Murphy
11. The Body Is Not An Apology: The Power of Radical Self Love | Sonya Renee Taylor 
12. Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants | Robin Wall Kimmerer 
13. How the Word Was Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America | Clint Smith
14. Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness | Da’Shaun L. Harrison
15. Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia | Sabrina Strings 
16. The End of Policing | Alex S. Vitale
17. Black Futures | Kimberly Drew & Jenna Wortham
18. The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story | Nikole Hannah-Jones 
19. Prisons Make Us Safer: And 20 Other Myths About Mass Incarceration | Victoria Law
20. An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States | Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz

Buy Black, buy local

1. The Secondhand Librarian (instagram.com/thesecondhandlibrarian) | Rochester, NY
2. Hipocampo Children’s Books (hipocampochildrensbooks.com) | Rochester, NY
3. Writers & Books (wab.org) Rochester, NY

(he/his/him) Calvin Eaton is a disabled community educator, content creator, and social entrepreneur, whose area of expertise includes antiracism, equity, justice, instructional design, and program development. In 2016 Mr. Eaton founded 540WMain, Inc. a virtual non-profit organization and antiracist education brand that promotes justice for all. The organization encourages individuals to broaden their horizons and learn more about multidisciplinary issues and topics that impact the world.