Books 2008

Books I've enjoyed this year...

1. The Dressmaker - Elizabeth Birkelund Oberbeck
2. The Traveling Horn player - Barbara Trapido
3. Mosquito - Roma Tearne (loved it!)
4. Septembers of Shiraz - Dalia Sofer (wonderfully told)
5. Tall Grass - Sandra Dallas (I have enjoyed her other books too)
6. A Golden Age - Tahamima Anam (great read, first of trilogy; won Commonwealth First Novel award 2008)
7. People of the Book - Geraldine Brooks (interesting story)
8. The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen - Syrie James (ok for JA fans)
9. Gods behaving badly - Marie Phillips (very funny & very interesting concept!)
10. The house at Riverton - Kate Morton (really enjoyed this)
11. Mister Pip - Lloyd Jones
12. The Outlander - Gil Adamson (loved it; slow to start but what a surprise heroine! Also won prize for first novel)
13. In the Dark - Deborah Maggach
14. My Best Friend's Girl - Dorothy Koomson
15. Blood from Stone - Francis Fyfield (great British crime novelist)
16. The Host - Stephanie Meyer (never read her other books; surprised myself at liking this one a lot - interesting concept)
17. Garden Spells - Sarah Addison Allen (very sweet; sometimes we all want something simple & sweet to brighten the day)
18. April In Paris - Michael Wallner
19. The Reapers - John Connolly (First JC novel I've read; I was hooked; have now read a lot of his previous but 'this is probably my fav still - humour is dark & bittersweet)
20. Austenland - Shannon Hale (again for JA fan, it's just silly fun)
21. Death comes for the fat man - Reginald Hill (a Dalziel & Pascoe latest)
22. Absolution - Caro Ramsay (new Scottish crime novelist - will look forward to next in series)
23. The cellist of Sarajevo - Steven Galloway (written by a local 'boy' - actually university professor; very good)
24. East of the Sun - Julia Gregson (armchair travel to India in 1920's - lush, epic)
25. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows (FAVourite book of the year - loved it; wrote it in my blog Oct 13)
26. When will there be good news? - Kate Atkinson
27. The Good Thief - Hannah Tinti
28. The Opposite of Love - Julie Babaum
29. A Guide to the Birds of East Africa, a Novel - Nicholas Drayson
30. Alice's Tulips - Sandra Dallas
31. The White Tiger - Aravind Adiga