Top Ten Tuesday: My Top Reads of 2024

/ Lisa R. Howeler

|| Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. ||

Today’s prompt is “Best Books I Read in 2024”

I have a list of 16 books I enjoyed from my 2024 list, but I whittled them down to ten for today. I’m going to leave my favorite read from the year at number 10.

  1. The Cat Who Talked to Ghosts by Lilian Jackson Braun

I have read most of the books in The Cat Who series and this one was definitely my favorite. Honestly, it almost felt like it was written by a different author in some ways. I enjoyed most of the books in the series even though this one felt different.

2. Miracles on Maple Hill by Virginia Sorenson

I really enjoyed this middle grade book that takes place in my home state of Pennsylvania. There were some tough topics here — such as PTSD after war —— but they were handled gingerly.

3. Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto

This one was different than many of my other reads and not “clean” by some standards because of language, but I fell in love with the main character and the side characters. I can’t wait for the sequel!

4. Murder in an Irish Village by Carlene O’Connor

This one also featured some language but otherwise was clean and a lot of fun. I loved this cozy mystery that took place in a small Irish village and I can’t wait to read more in the series. I hope they are as good as the first book.

5. Move Your Blooming Corpse by D.E. Ireland

This was the second book in a series based on the characters of My Fair Lady – Eliza Doolittle and Professor Henry Higgins. The book was a ton of fun from start to finish.

6. The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

I had seen the movie based on this book but had never read the book. I read it and then read it again to my daughter shortly after so I guess I read it twice in 2024. The ending was a bit too abrupt to me, but I still enjoyed it.

7. Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne

Yep, this was another classic I had never read and I ended up really enjoying it.

8. The Clue of The Whistling Bagpipes by Carolyn Keene

This was a Nancy Drew Mystery and while they can be a bit cheesy at times, I really enjoyed this one because it was full of Scottish history and culture.

9. Return to Gone Away Lake by Elizabeth Enright

This was another middle-grade book that I read with Little Miss and really enjoyed. We had read Gone Away Lake, the first book in the series in 2023.

10. The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

This was by far my favorite read of the year and my favorite read from the past several years. This book was so much different than the Anne of Green Gables books and I sometimes wonder how they are so different in their language and style. I don’t usually write in or mark up my paperback books but I underlined and marked so many passages in this book. If you haven’t read it, I would definitely encourage you to move it up your TBR list.

Honorable mentions:

Other books I enjoyed this year include:

The Sentence is Death by Anthony Horowitz (A Hawthorne/Horowtiz Mystery)

Clueless at the Coffee Station by Bee Littlefield

The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie

Murder Always Barks Twice by Jennifer Hawkins

A Quilt for Christmas by Melody Carlson

The Middle Moffat by Eleanor Estes

Have you read any of these books? What did you think of them? And what books were among your favorite reads in 2024?

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20 thoughts on “Top Ten Tuesday: My Top Reads of 2024”

  3. Pingback: Sunday Chat: Octagenarian birthdays, starting my 2025 reads, and podcasts I recommend – Boondock Ramblings

  4. It’s been decades since I read The Blue Castle but I remember it being different too. Was it a lot darker? I can’t remember much except that it was an outlier in Montgomery’s body of work to me.

    I’ve read a couple of Verne’s books but not Around the World the Eighty Days. I stumbled on Around the World by Matt Phelan, a graphic novel about three true voyages around the world. Before reading that book, I didn’t realize that Nellie Bly set out around the world on a journey to beat Verne’s fictional 80 days. Now I want to read Nellie Bly’s Book, her own record of her journey.

    Happy New Year!

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  9. I loved the Vera Wong book. I read it last year and it made my best of 2023 list. I’m looking forward to the new one coming out. I’ve only read a few of The Cat Who books. I should read more since I love cat mysteries.

    Happy New Year!

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