Top Ten Tuesday: Books I’d like to find under the Christmas tree

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by the Broke and the Bookish. This week’s theme is all about the books we’d like to receive for Christmas this year.

I’m not really one for Christmas lists or TBR lists but here are some of the books I wouldn’t mind seeing under the tree this year:

1 The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes. I’ve liked Julian Barnes’ books ever since I read A History of the World in 10 ½ Chapters for A’Level English. This one got the Booker prize and I’m yet to see it pop up in any of my usual secondhand shop haunts… both are promising signs, right?

2 Perfume by Patrick Suskind. Cheap copies of this book seem fairly elusive and the copy at my local library always seems to be on reserve. I know enough about the plot to wonder if it might not be a little gruesome for me but, goddammit, I’m determined to get my grubby mitts on a copy one day whether I like it or not.

3 Hard Times by Charles Dickens. I think I’ve just about forgiven Dickens for the agony of The Old Curiosity Shop now. For the past year or so I’ve stuck to just rereading my old favourites but it’s probably about time to move on and try something new. Hard Times was the first one I thought of but it could go any way really.

4 The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver. The Poisonwood Bible is one of the few modern(ish) books I’ve read more than once so I’ve been desperate to read this ever since it came out. Plus, it’s got Frida Kahlo in it. ‘nuff said.

5 Katherine by Anya Seton. Anyone who knows me will tell you that I’m kind of obsessed with medieval women so I’m really looking forward to reading this one day. It was on the BBC Big Read Top 100 but I have never once seen a secondhand copy anywhere in all my TWELVE YEARS of searching. It better be bloody good.

6 The Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini. I loved both The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns and I’ve heard excellent things about this book. I conveniently bought it for my best friend last Christmas so I shall probably end up borrowing it back so I can read it myself!

7 Whose Body? by Dorothy L. Sayers. The Nine Tailors, which I read in May, was my first DLS book and I enjoyed it hugely. I’m going to investigate some of the other books in the Lord Peter Wimsey series, this being the first. I thought it’d be best to start from the beginning and then I can work through them in order, if I enjoy them enough.

8 Jacob the Liar by Jurek Becker. This was on one of my ‘suggested’ reading lists at university and I’ve always been a bit disappointed that I never got round to it. It’s another one that never seems to pop up in bookshops so I might have to bite the bullet with this one and buy it online. Eurgh.

9 Precious Bane by Mary Webb. I don’t know much at all about Mary Webb but this book was the subject of an enthusiastic review by one of my colleagues last week. Last time I looked it was in stock at the library so it should be a relatively easy one to cross off my TBR list!

10 Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell. I’ve never read anything by Gaskell but recently everybody seems to be recommending her to me. I don’t really mind which one of her books I read but Wives and Daughters is the one I know least about.

It occurs to me now that maybe I need an Amazon wishlist. I will bear that in mind for next year!