Tag: TBR

20 Books Of Summer 2026 Reading Challenge Sign-Up #20BOS26

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Last year Cathy at 746 Books handed over the baton of the 20 Books of Summer Reading Challenge to two new hosts: Annabel at AnnaBookBel and Emma at Words and Peace. This year Annabel has taken on sole hosting duties producing brand new graphics and a new hashtag #20BOS26.

The 20 Books of Summer 2026 challenge runs from 1st June to 31st August. You can find all the information you need about the challenge here where you can also sign up to participate. 

Every year I approach the challenge high on ambition and usually low on likelihood of success. I’m aiming for the full 20 books again but this year with a healthy dose of realism. Therefore the majority of books on my list are from my NetGalley shelf, prioritising those with publication dates between June and September that I should theoretically be reading during that period anyway. I’ve added a couple from my current Classics Club list, my book club’s June pick and a couple of nonfiction books. Finally the remaining books longlisted for this year’s Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction that I haven’t yet read.

Being a stubborn old so-and-so, I like to stick to my original list and not take advantage of the option to swap books in and out. However, I do give myself more freedom to abandon books during the challenge if they’re not working for me. Links from the titles will take you to the book description on Goodreads. I’ll update them with links to my reviews when I’ve read them.

  1. Country People by Daniel Mason
  2. Carrion Crow by Heather Parry
  3. Prey by Graham Hurley
  4. Invitation from a Dictator by Rory Clements
  5. The Eagle and the Wolf (Age of Attila #1) by Gordon Doherty
  6. The Knife Maker of Venice by David Gilman
  7. A Fatal Love by Louisa Treger
  8. Where are the Kings by Donal Ryan
  9. The Millionaire Waltz by Anthony Quinn
  10. Daughters of Naples by Diana Giovinazzo
  11. Throw Away the Key by Jason M. Hough
  12. Call Me Ishmaelle by Xiaolu Guo
  13. Murder at the End of the World by Akane Araki, translated by Jesse Kirkwood
  14. Victoria Four-Thirty by Cecil Roberts
  15. Creatures of Circumstance by W. Somerset Maugham
  16. Miss Veal and Miss Ham by Vikki Heywood
  17. Edenglassie by Melissa Lucashenko
  18. The Draw of the Sea by Wyl Menmuir
  19. Under a Metal Sky: A Journey Through Minerals, Greed and Wonder by Philip Marsden
  20. Boundary Waters by Tristan Hughes

Wish me luck! If you’re taking part too, enjoy your summer of reading.

#TopTenTuesday Ten Random Books From My To-Read List #TuesdayBookBlog

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

The rules are simple:

  • Each Tuesday, Jana assigns a new topic. Create your own Top Ten list that fits that topic – putting your unique spin on it if you want.
  • Everyone is welcome to join but please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own Top Ten Tuesday post.
  • Add your name to the Linky widget on that day’s post so that everyone can check out other bloggers’ lists.
  • Or if you don’t have a blog, just post your answers as a comment.

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic is Books I Enjoyed that Were Outside My Comfort Zone. Although I’m not afraid to step outside my comfort zone from time to time, I generally stick to my favourite genres. I’d have had to go back years to find ten books to fit the topic so I’ve decided to repeat a version of last week’s topic – Ten Random Books From My Bookshelves – using books on my Kindle. I rarely keep ebooks once I’ve read them so these are all unread, selected at random. (Ironically, a couple of these probably are out of my comfort zone.) Links will take you to the full book description on Goodreads.

  1. Sealskin by Su Bristow – Donald is a young fisherman, eking out a lonely living on the west coast of Scotland. One night he witnesses something miraculous, and makes a terrible mistake.
  2. The Bee Sting by Paul Murray – The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under – but rather than face the music, he’s spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman.
  3. The Mangle Street Murders (The Gower Street Detective #1) by M.R.C. Kasasian – 1882. Queen Victoria may sit on the throne and Robert Peel’s bobbies walk the street, but London is still haunted by the spectre of Spring-heeled Jack.
  4. The Alice Network by Kate Quinn – 1947. In the chaotic aftermath of World War II, American college girl Charlie St. Clair is pregnant, unmarried, and on the verge of being thrown out of her very proper family.
  5. The Curse of the House of Foskett (The Gower Street Detective #2) by M.R.C. Kasasian – 1882. Sidney Grice once had a reputation as London’s most perspicacious personal detective . But since his last case led an innocent men to the gallows, business has been light.
  6. Lost For Words by Stephanie Butland – Loveday Cardew prefers books to people. 
  7. Before We Were Yours by Lisa Wingate – Twelve-year-old Rill Foss and her four younger siblings live a magical life aboard their family’s Mississippi River shantyboat.
  8. The Death of Mrs Westaway by Ruth Ware – When Harriet Westaway receives an unexpected letter telling her she’s inherited a substantial bequest from her Cornish grandmother, it seems like the answer to her prayers.
  9. The Fact of a Body: A Murder and a Memoir by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich – When law student Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich is asked to work on a death-row hearing for convicted murderer and child molester Ricky Langley, she finds herself thrust into the tangled story of his childhood.
  10. A Kind of Light by H.R.F. Keating – Two stories, two journeys into the darkness…

Have you read any of these?