Best books from 2023—one could save your life

Author

Brad Luttrell
December 30, 2023

None of my hobbies had a more direct impact on me this year than reading. 

I’ll be transparent—I’m an audiobook guy. Between running a startup and shuffling kids around to all of the activities, I don’t have a lot of time to sit down and turn pages. 

But I do manage to find time to listen to a book every week or two. 

I’ve been addicted to listening to books for years now. Once I realized how much I could consume just by listening while running, taking short drives and mowing the lawn, it became an addiction. I now listen while making dinner, breaking down the recycling, eating lunch, and even ironing a shirt. If I have a few minutes alone, I’m probably listening to a book.

Most of my 2023 reads

As I mentioned last year in my book recap, reading empowered me to pivot my career. And this year, it helped my company launch a new product, and one book taught me more about health than a lifetime of trying to be fit.

I don’t just read to make myself better at work. Reading just makes me a better human, lifting my spirits, enriching my historical understanding, and bolstering my soul’s understanding of my place in the world.

That’s the power of story. 

Enjoy this list of favorites. I hope it helps you find something fresh for 2024. 

Top business book: “Play Bigger: How Rebels and Innovators Create New Categories and Dominate Markets”

Authors: Al Ramadan, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, Kevin Maney
Who should read: Founders of any stage, leaders developing new products.
Why I love it in one sentence: This book walks you through why creating a category is better than designing a better product, and teaches you how to do it. 

I mentioned this book heavily a few months ago in my blog about disruption. It was key to us planning the launch of our new product, Holler, and it’s been my most recommended book to startup founders this year. 

What do Uber, Salesforce.com, Airbnb, Tesla and Netflix have in common? No, it’s not just that they’re all now worth a fortune (well, it could be argued that this is part of it). It’s that they all designed their own category, which created a monster market that they went on to own. 

This is called category design. 

“Play Bigger” highlights why category design is the dominate play vs. just building better. No matter the stage your company is in, you can benefit from applying this concept to help define, develop and rule a category over time.

Top health book: “Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity”

Author: Dr. Peter Attia
Who should read: Anyone interested in having a longer, higher quality life.
Why I love it in one sentence: Outlive could be the most important book you ever read, as it showcases how to improve your nutrition, fitness, sleep and emotional health.

This book could save your life.

Dr. Peter Attia’s book has quickly become the “operating manual for longevity,” providing insights into nutritional interventions, techniques for optimizing exercise and sleep, and tools for addressing emotional and mental health. 

A small sample of the things this book taught me:

  • Regular exercise reduces cognitive decline, but 77% of Americans don’t exercise. 

  • Going from 0 to 90 minutes of exercise per week can reduce your risk of dying from all causes by 14%.

  • Regular Exercisers live a decade longer than sedentary people

  • Someone who smokes has a 40% greater risk of dying at any moment. Poor cardiorespiratory fitness carries a greater risk than smoking.

Everyone I’ve spoken to who has read this book loves it, and they all made themselves healthier as a result.

Top history book: “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany”

Author: William L. Shirer
Who should read it: Anyone who wants to know the truth behind World War II.
Why I love it in one sentence: Love is not the right word on this one, but I am recommending this book because it details in painful detail the actions that led to World War II and can help us understand how to avoid another world war. 

This book is one of the heaviest (literally and metaphorically) I have ever read. The only thing that compares is the story of the atom bombs as told in “Fallout.” Hitler bragged that The Third Reich would reign for a thousand years. Under his control, it only last 12, but that’s all Hitler needed to launch catastrophic campaigns and to take the lives of tens of millions.  

Your history classes in high school didn’t even skim the surface of how horrible World War II really was, or how maniacal Hitler’s journey to the top was. Foreign correspondent and historian William L. Shirer reported on the Nazis from 1925 through the end of the war, and was in close proximity to Hitler. He spent nearly six years sorting through documentation after the war was over, and compiled it in what is considered the definitive record of one of the most frightening chapters in the history of mankind.

This isn’t a “good” read, but it’s one I think everyone should read so we better understand our past, and how not to repeat it. As I was reading this, I saw what was happening with Russia and China in a different light. 

Top fiction book: “Project Hail Mary”

Author: Andy Weir
Who should read it: Anyone who enjoys space and strong character development.
Why I love it in one sentence: The characters in this book are so fun, and the way Andy Weir unravels the story of the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission to save humanity makes it hard to stop reading. 

It’s hard to say much about this book without spoiling a few surprises. What I will say is Andy Weir also wrote “The Martian,” which I also read this year, and even though that book was even better than the great movie, “Project Hail Mary” is his best work. 

Just picture this—one astronaut wakes up, realizing he’s been asleep for a long time. He realizes he’s millions of miles from home, his crew is dead, and he has to figure out how to conquer an extinction-level event without any ability to communicate with home. 

That’s as far as I’m going, other than to say you don’t have to be into science fiction to enjoy this one. It’s just great storytelling, and even better character development. 

Top biography: Leonardo da Vinci

Author: Walter Isaacson
Who should read it: Anyone who enjoys the sciences or arts.
Why I love it in one sentence: I’ve never read about a single person who accomplished more in various fields (engineering, military advances, science, art), much of which was not discovered until hundreds of years later. 

More so than anyone I’ve ever read about, Leonardo was a genius. 

Walter Isaacson is the best biographer in the game (I’ve read five of his books so far), and what I love about him is how gracefully he moves through complex periods of the subject’s life. Isaacson often leaves the chronological in order to focus on themes, which is so helpful in understanding someone like Leonardo’s accomplishments.

If this book was purely chronological, I’m not sure the average person could really keep up, because at any given time, Leonardo was working through anatomy, fossils, birds, the heart, flying machines, botany, geology, weaponry and more. 

I’ve seen many of the works mentioned in the book in person, and have learned about others for my whole life. It was inspiring to hear how works like the Mona Lisa or Last Supper came to be, but even more impressive was how Leonardo discovered how the heart pumped blood 200 years before anyone else. 

This book is very accessible, so don’t be intimidated. It’s a fulfilling read that also has some ways you can apply Leonardo’s thinking to your daily life.

Honorable mentions:

Give me your suggestions

I’m always building out a list for what’s next. I’m currently wrapping up my fifth Isaacson book, then will do my normal bouncing around before finding what’s next. I’m also in the middle of “Demon Copperhead” by Barbara Kingsolver, which is absolutely fantastic. Unfortunately I started it on Spotify’s new audiobook program, and maxed out my 14 hours. I’ll finish that book in late January and would not be surprised to see it take top fiction spot for 2024. 

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Who I’m listening to: Del Barber
What I’m reading: “The Innovators” by Walter Isaacson

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