Category: Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created by The Broke and the Bookish and now hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. For the rules see her blog.

The topic this week is Green Book Covers (in honour of St. Patrick’s Day today!). I’ve chosen books I’ve read and enjoyed that are mostly green.

Hamlet Revenge! by Michael Innes – When Lord Auldearn, Lord Chancellor of England is murdered on stage during an amateur production of Hamlet at Scamnum Court the Prime Minister asks Inspector Appleby to investigate.

The Hog’s Back Mystery by Freeman Wills Croft – the 10th Inspector French book. When Dr Earle disappears from his cottage, Inspector French of Scotland Yard is called in to investigate. At first he suspects a simple domestic intrigue – and then begins to uncover a web of romantic entanglements beneath the couple’s peaceful rural life.

The Queen’s Spy by Clare Marchant – historical fiction with a dual timeline set in 1584 and 2021. I read this quickly drawn along by the plot and keen to know the links between the two main characters, Mathilde in the present day and Tom in the 16th century.

Circus of Wonders by Elizabeth Macneal – a novel that transported me back to the Victorian period, full of the atmosphere of both the circus and of the Crimean War. It’s narrated from the perspectives of the three main characters, Nell, who became a star as ‘Nellie Moon’ flying high above the circus ring suspended beneath a balloon, Jasper, the ambitious circus owner and Toby his younger, gentler brother, haunted by memories of the war.

A Room Made of Leaves by Kate Grenville – historical fiction telling the story of the Macarthurs, Elizabeth and John Macarthur, who settled in Australia at the end of the 18th century. It’s based on the real lives of the Macarthurs using letters, journals and official documents of the early years of the New South Wales colony.

Exit by Belinda Bauer – the opening chapter sets the scene for the work of the Exiteers, a group of people who provide support for people with a terminal illness to end their lives. But what at first looks like a novel considering the ethics of assisted suicide turns into crime fiction as Felix and Amanda realise they have become murder suspects. I was amused by the wry humour and surreal scenes. And the ending is bitter sweet. 

The Animals at Lockwood Manor by Jane Healey – historical fiction, part a love story and part a mystery, beginning in 1939 at the outbreak of World War Two. A taxidermy collection of mainly mammals is being evacuated from a natural history museum in London to Lockwood Manor in the countryside to save them from the threat of bombs.

He Who Whispers by John Dickson Carr –  a ‘locked room’  mystery/impossible crime, featuring Dr Gideon Fell, an amateur sleuth, set in 1945 just after the end of the Second World War. It’s a tale of an impossible murder on the top of a ruined tower, that had once been part of a French chateau burnt down by the Hugeunots in the 16th century, and a mysterious woman, Miss Fay Seton.

The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding by Agatha Christie – a collection of six short stories, the first one of which is the title story. Poirot is invited to spend Christmas in a 14th century English manor house to investigate the theft of a priceless ruby stolen from a Far Eastern prince.

The Cabinetmaker by Alan Jones – a gritty crime novel based in Glasgow that tells the story of a local cabinetmaker, Francis Hare, father of a murdered son, and John McDaid, a young detective on the investigation. It has an intricate plot following John McDaid’s life from his first day as a detective up to his retirement in 2008, focusing on one crime – the killing of Patrick Hare a student, by a gang of thugs in Glasgow’s west end. It’s not your normal run-of-the mill crime fiction and I was totally gripped.