I think I must have been extra good this year as Santa, or rather his league of assorted elves have done themselves proud this Christmas. My TBR (and arguably my to-be-played/watched) pile is freshly stocked up for 2025 and the tricky part will be deciding what to read/watch/play first!
My husband, looking at my pile of presents yesterday evening, did ask if I had too many. My response…
Fun cat gifs aside, I thought I would share below my crime/mystery related gifts I go this Christmas. If you see any personal favourites then do let me know!
First up we have some Green Penguins that I received in my book advent calendar from my husband. A woman can never have too many Green Penguins!
Next up we have a trio of Rae Foley mysteries. The blurb for the one on the left sounded particularly interesting…
This next quartet was gifted to me by a very generous blog reader, who wanted to pass these books to a fellow classic crime fiction fan. Aside from Patricia Wentworth I have not tried the other authors…
This next pair are by or are about Agatha Christie. I have been aware of the work by Osborne for a while, but have yet to try it. No excuse not to now! I also don’t think I have read this Poirot story. So hopefully I will remedy that omission in the new year.
I was also part of a book Secret Santa this year and these were the titles that I received…
The blurb for the Edward Candy book sounds very intriguing. Next up are the DVDs I received. I have seen one Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes film and I am interested in trying some more. Do you have a favourite one you would recommend? I have watched a few mystery TV series written by Francis Durbridge and I find he is good at creating exciting cliffhangers, so I am looking forward to watching this one.
Quite a few years ago I read and enjoyed a book by Douglas Stapleton and Helen A. Carey, but typical me I failed to follow this up with any more reads, so I am keen to try Late for the Funeral. The other book in the photo is David Whitelaw’s Murder’s Calling, which is an attention grabbing title.
Just to mix things up I also received some mystery themed games and stationery. I am hoping to try out the extra hard questions of quiz with my book group on Sunday. This group contains Christie super fan Brad Friedman (who blogs at Ah Sweet Mystery) so I may have to give these questions in Greek to make them challenging enough for him lol
Agatha, my cat, was also quite interested in these items…
A selection of modern mysteries also made it into my present pile. I really enjoyed The Botantist (2020) by Anne Wedgwood, so I am looking forward to reading The Soloist. I am also intrigued to see what Susie Dent’s first mystery is like.
After this photo was taken, I busied myself putting all my books away, confident I had remembered everything. But had I remembered everything…
No I had somehow managed to forget this delightful cat and mystery puzzle book…
Over to You
I hope you all had a great Christmas. Did you get any mysteries for Christmas? Or perhaps you are armed with gift vouchers, ready to storm your nearest bookshop?