Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. This week’s topic is authors new to me in 2024.

I must admit, I wasn’t sure that I would have read enough new authors last year. I was surprised to discover that I had.

1. The Origins of Totalitarianism – Hannah Arendt (1951) It was interesting reading this in the current climate and I was able to apply it to some aspects of current politics. Depressing how little seems to have changed. 5/5
2. The Sellout – Paul Beatty (2015) A satirical look at race relations in the USA. 5/5
3. The Ten Thousand Doors of January – Alix E. Harrow (2019) An interesting premise but ultimately a disappointing tale of travel between different worlds. 3/5
4. Tigana – Guy Gavriel Kay (1990) I started to read this about 25 years a go but didn’t finish it so I think that it still counts as new to me. A very enjoyable albeit straightforward adventure story. 4/5
5. Wolf Hall – Hilary Mantel (2009) This was a slog at times but I enjoyed the beginning and the end. 4/5
6. A Killer’s Wife – Victor Methos (2020) This had been sitting on my kindle for a long time and I normally enjoy a bit of crime but I found the twists in this a bit unbelievable. 3/5
7. Big Little Lies – Liane Moriarty (2014) This was lifted from chick lit by the subject matter of domestic abuse. I haven’t seen the TV programme but I would watch it after reading this. 3/5
8. Labyrinth – Kate Mosse (2005) I really enjoyed this tale of a mysterious ring and book and the lengths that people will go to get it. 5/5
9. Between Shades of Grey – Ruta Sepetys (2011) This is set in Lithuania during the second world war and details the horrendous treatment of Lithuanians by the Russians, something I knew nothing about. Another very enjoyable read. 5/5
10. How Not To Be A Boy – Robert Webb (2017) An interesting autobiography which shows some of the pressures on men and boys to fulfil a certain sort of masculinity. 4/5

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

This week, the topic is Books I love were written more than ten years ago. As I read more older books than recent ones, this was not a difficult list to write. These are my most recent 5 star reads on Goodreads that are older than 10 years.

1. The Hand That First Held Mine – Maggie O’Farrell (2009)
2. The Collector – John Fowles (1963)
3. Anansi Boys – Neil Gaiman (2005)
4. Mysterious Skin – Scott Heim (1996)
5. The Reamins of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro (1989)
6. The Lost Language of Cranes – David Leavitt (1986)
7. The Shipping News – Annie Proulx (1993)
8. All Quiet on the Western Front – Erich Maria Remarque (1929)
9. The Plot Against America – Phillip Roth (2004)
10. The Midwich Cuckoos – John Wyndham (1957)

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

This week is a freebie so I was able to choose my own topic. I decided on one of my favourite genres – the dystopia. It’s hard to say which one would be my favourite which is why they are in alphabetical order.

1. The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood
2. Oryx and Crake series – Margaret Atwood
3. Fahrenheit 451 – Ray Bradbury
4. A Clockwork Orange – Anthony Burgess
5. A Scanner Darkly – Phillip K. Dick
6. Brave New World – Aldous Huxley
7. The Stepford Wives – Ira Levin
8. The Road – Cormac McCarthy
9. 1984 – George Orwell
10. Day of the Triffids – John Wyndam

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

This weeks Top Ten is the books on your spring TBR. I do like to try and plan what I am going to read but I am also terrible at keeping to it. Anyway, here is what I intend to read.

1. Blood and Guts in High School – Kathy Acker (1984)
2. Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte (1847)
3. The Master and Margarita – Mikhail Bulgakov (1967)
4. House of Glass – Hadley Freeman (2020)
5. Anansi Boys – Neil Gaiman (2005)
6. Live By Night – Dennis Lehane (2012)
7. Pies and Prejudice – Stuart Maconie (2007)
8. Shuggie Bain – Douglas Stuart (2020)
9. The Kitchen God’s Wife – Amy Tan (1991)
10. The Underground Railway – Colson Whitehead (2016)

Neil Gaiman, Dennis Lehane and Amy Tan are all being read for the TBR challenge run by Adam at Roof Beam Reader so if nothing else, those three will be read.

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

Today’s top ten is quite hard as I have mentioned an awful lot of books on my bog over the years. Here are some which I may have missed. I’m not sure why I haven’t written about them. They are all brilliant books.

1. Cat’s Eye – Margaret Atwood
2. Exquisite Corpse – Poppy Z. Brite
3. In Cold Blood – Truman Capote
4. The Chocolate War – Robert Cormier
5. The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
6. How Late it was How Late – James Kelman
7. It – Stephen King
8. Spider – Patrick McGrath
9. The Things They Carried – Tim O’Brien
10. The Picture of Dorian Gray – Oscar Wilde

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

I did quite well last year for reading new authors so I’ve picked the best ones to share.

1. Jews Don’t Count – David Baddiel – An exploration of anti-Semitism and why it doesn’t seem to be taken seriously enough. 4/5
2. All the Light We Cannot See – Anthony Doerr – An interesting spin on a war novel involving a blind girl and a model of Paris 4/5
3. Little Fires Everywhere – Celeste Ng – Shaker Heights seems perfectly peaceful but the arrival of Mia, artist and single mother, turns things completely on their head. 3/5
4. Mysterious Skin – Scott Heim – A dark and disturbing look at the effect of sexual abuse on the lives of two young boys. 5/5
5. The Buddha of Suburbia – Hanif Kureishi – A bildungsroman that chronicles the sexual awakening and social difficulties of Karim Amir. 4/5
6. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy – John Le Carre – Classic spy story with plenty of twists and turns. 4/5
7. How Not To Be Wrong – James O’Brien – O’Brien charts his personal journey of learning how to change your mind. 5/5
8. All Quiet on the Western Front – Erich Maria Remarque – The heartbreaking classic of German schoolboys who sign up and fight in the first world war. 5/5
9. The Plot Against America – Philip Roth – What would have happened if the US hadn’t joined the second world war? A disturbing look at the possible outcome. 5/5
10. The Nickel Boys – Colson Whitehead – A hellish look at the reform schools of the 1960s. 5/5

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

This weeks Top Ten Tuesday is 2021 Releases I Was Excited to Read But Didn’t Get To. However, as I don’t read many current books, I’m going to change it slightly to books I didn’t get to last year. I had aimed to read 45 books last year but I only got through 37 so there were a few I missed.

1. Emma – Jane Austen. I faced down Middlemarch and Far From the Madding Crowd last year and I just couldn’t face another classic.
2. The Thief of Time – John Boyne. Not sure why I didn’t read this one. I’ve enjoyed the other novels by Boyle I’ve read.
3. The Long Call – Anne Cleeves. I watched this on the TV and it was okay but not great so I put off reading it.
4. David Copperfield – Charles Dickens. Another classic I couldn’t face.
5. Girl, Woman Other – Bernadine Evaristo. I read The Testaments last year and had intentions of reading this as it was joint booker winner with the Atwood.
6. Just Like You – Nick Hornby. This was a new release but I’m not sure why I bought it as I seem to like Hornby less with each book.
7. The Institute – Stephen King. I must admit the length of this is putting me off. I’m sure that once I pick it up, I’ll get through it quite quickly but it’s just making myself pick it up.
8. Live by Night – Dennis Lehane. This has been on my TBR for far too long. I’m not sure why I haven’t got round to it yet because I enjoyed the other books I have read by him.
9. Pies and Prejudice – Stuart Maconie. I didn’t read much non fiction last year and this is one that I intended to read but didn’t get to.
10. Wolf Hall – Hilary Mantel. I put this on last year’s reading list because a lot of people have recommended it but I’m not sure I actually fancy it.

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

This weeks top ten – Most recent additions to my book collection.

I’m trying not to buy books as I have so many books that I haven’t read. However, people often give me Amazon vouchers or book tokens for my birthday / Christmas so I have bought some lately. Also, I do tend to buy books on my kindle as they don’t take up physical space.

1. Blood and Guts in High School – Kathy Acker (1984) I’ve been meaning to read this since university – which is thirty years ago now. Not quite sure why it had taken so long to purchase a copy.
2. The Origins of Totalitarianism – Hannah Arendt (1951) Another one that I’ve been meaning to read for a while. It has never felt more relevant to be reading about this subject.
3. Ridley Road – Jo Bloom (2014) I bought this after the TV series which was very good but also after reading Jews Don’t Count and The Plot Against America and deciding I needed to read more Jewish fiction / non fiction.
4. The City and the Stars – Arthur C. Clarke (1956) I’m trying to read through some classic science fiction and Clarke seems about as classic as you can get.
5. House of Glass: The Stories and Secrets of a Twentieth Century Jewish Family – Hadley Freeman (2020) I read Freeman’s column in the Guardian and am curious to know more about her life and about life in a Jewish family.
6. The Moon is a Harsh Mistress – Robert A. Heinlein (1966) More classic science fiction.
7. The Lost Language of Cranes – David Leavitt (1986) I’ve read Leavitt’s biography of Alan Turing and enjoyed it so I thought I’d give his fiction a go.
8. A Perfect Spy – John Le Carre (1986) I’m not a massive fan of spy fiction but I enjoyed Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy last year so I’m giving Le Carre another go.
9. Shuggie Bain – Douglas Stuart (2020) I’ve been trying to read Booker Prize winners and this sounded particularly good.
10. The Midwich Cuckoos – John Wyndham (1957) I love Wyndham.