This week’s topic for Top Ten Tuesday (hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl) is: “Books I Was Reading On This Day Over the Last Ten Years”.
I’m not sure if my list is entirely accurate – I track my reading through Goodreads and found it easy enough to find the books I’d marked as finished on or just after 11th August each year, but that doesn’t mean I was necessarily actually reading them on that date. Anyway, I’m sure it’s close enough!
Here are my ten books, beginning with 2025 and going back through time to 2016.
2025 – One, Two, Buckle My Shoe by Agatha Christie – I’ve been taking part in the Read Christie challenge every year for the last few years, so it’s not surprising that there are two Agatha Christie novels on this list! The one I read last August is a Poirot mystery in which he investigates the murder of a dentist.
2024 – Eighteen: A History of Britain in 18 Young Lives by Alice Loxton – An entertaining nonfiction book containing biographies of eighteen historical figures, with a focus on how their first eighteen years shaped the rest of their lives.
2023 – Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith – Only a small part of this psychological thriller is actually set on a train, but it’s the scene of a very significant meeting between a pair of strangers who find themselves discussing a plan to commit two perfect murders!
2022 – The Wolf Den by Elodie Harper – Ancient Rome is not usually a favourite setting of mine, but I found this novel about a group of prostitutes working in a Pompeii brothel completely absorbing.
2021 – The Sussex Downs Murder by John Bude – A British Library Crime Classic first published in 1936 and one of many John Bude novels to feature Superintendent William Meredith. I enjoyed it, but found the solution to the mystery too easy to guess – something I don’t say very often!
2020 – Sleeping Murder by Agatha Christie – The second Christie novel on my list and my favourite of the two. This time it’s a Miss Marple mystery – the final Miss Marple novel to be published, in fact – and I found it a particularly atmospheric one.
2019 – The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware – our narrator Rowan Caine arrives at Heatherbrae House in Scotland to find that she is just the latest in a long string of nannies in a very short time period. Could the ghostly occurrences taking place in the house be the reason?
2018 – Post of Honour by RF Delderfield – The second book in Delderfield’s A Horseman Riding By trilogy is set during the First World War and explores the impact on the lives of the inhabitants of Devon’s Sorrel Valley.
2017 – Shadow of the Moon by M.M. Kaye – I read this as part of a readalong and loved it, which was no surprise as Kaye’s The Far Pavilions is one of my all-time favourite books. Both books are set in India but are completely separate novels and this one takes place before and during the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857.
2016 – Exposure by Helen Dunmore – I loved this book which on the surface is a Cold War spy novel but has so many extra layers it becomes something quite different, exploring the consequences of one decision on the lives of a man and his family.
~
Have you read any of these?
She Reads Novels 
Cool idea! I’ve read the Harper, Ware, and Dunmore – enjoyed them all, though none were hands-down new favourites. Dunmore was such an adaptable novelist.
I’ve read four or five of Dunmore’s novels and found them all quite different. I should really find time to read more of her books.
I’m the opposite of you with The Wolf Den. Usually I like stories set in Pompeii but I wasn’t taken by that one!
I didn’t really expect to like it and was surprised that I did!
I had the same trouble as you pinning it down to the actual – do people really keep journals of what they’re reading each day? – and followed your approach. I’ve read other books by some of the authors but not the ones you mention.
I often don’t get round to marking a book as read on Goodreads until a few days later so I probably finished reading some of these before 11th August – it was impossible for me to pin it down exactly!
I have read both the M.M.Kaye books you mention which I thought excellent. I never read Strangers on a Train but I did see the play with Laurence Fox. What a very strange story. Clever but I don’t think I enjoyed it much.
I haven’t seen the Strangers on a Train play, but if it’s similar to the book I think clever but very strange is a good description! I’m glad you enjoyed the two M.M. Kaye books. I liked her series of contemporary mysteries as well.
Weirdly, the Highsmith title is the only one of the several I’ve read I just couldn’t get into, with it becoming one of my relatively rare DNF. Perhaps I ought to give it another chance …
That was the first Highsmith I read and although I didn’t DNF it, I didn’t love it either. It did leave me wanting to read another of her books, though, and I enjoyed the next one I read a lot more.
I’ve read half of them. Look how often you were reading a mystery or thriller!
Yes, I was surprised to see all those mysteries and thrillers!
This looks like a great list. I loved The Wolf Den and want to read more by Helen Dunmore. I decided not to try to find the books I was reading on August 11, I just looked at favorite books I read in August for each year.
I’ve read a few of Helen Dunmore’s books but still have a lot of them left to read. It was difficult to tell exactly what I’d been reading on a certain date, so I like your idea!
It’s always fun to look back although I usually end up adding authors I meant to read more of but didn’t! Good to see Agatha on there, and I loved Exposure too.
Yes, looking back can be dangerous – all those authors you enjoyed at one point, then forgot about! It didn’t really surprise me that Agatha ended up on my list twice. I’ve been reading so many of her books over the last few years, some of them were bound to have been in August!
I remember Shadow of the Moon very well and the Chisties, more or less. I’ve listened to several Ruth Wares (the audiobooks are good for car trips) but not that one yet. The Wolf Den sounds worth hunting down!
I’ve only read two Ruth Ware books – I should really look for more of them. The Wolf Den is excellent and the first in a trilogy. I’ve read the second book, which I also enjoyed, and am looking forward to reading the final one.