purplerabbits

2020 was a good year for reading. Well kind of. I did read a good number of books, but most of them were super lightweight, and a lot were short - novellas or kids books. I refuse to feel bad about this under the circumstances. These are not in the order I read them, because I didn't record that - maybe I will next year, but don't hold your breath. These are all, complete with publication dates, from the giant spreadsheet of books I have read ever, which doesn't contain ALL the books I have read ever, but does contain 2924 books. What can I say - I like lists.

1. One by One They Disappeared: A Golden Age Mystery, Moray Dalton, 1929
2. Death at Breakfast, John Rhode, 1936
3. The Mouse and his Child, Russell Hoban, 1967 - I hadn't read this before. It is certainly ODD.
4. G is for Gumshoe, Sue Grafton, 1990 - I working my way through this series but I can never get them in the right order. 
5. The Burglar in the Library, Laurence Block, 1997 - I'm pretty sure I'd read it before, but it must have been in the days before the Great List.
6. N is for Noose, Sue Grafton, 1998 
7. Q is for Quarry, Sue Grafton, 2002 
8. R is for Ricochet, Sue Grafton, 2004
9. S is for Silence, Sue Grafton, 2005
10. Crooked Little Vein, Warren Ellis, 2007 - I had had this on my wishlist since it came out, so I kind of had to buy when it was 50p. Not my style of book any more really, but still funny
11. T is for Trespass, Sue Grafton, 2007
12. U is for Undertow, Sue Grafton, 2009
13. Time Riders, Alex Scarrow, 2010 - I like kids books, I like time travel, but it didn't grab me enough to care what happened
14. V is for Vengeance, Sue Grafton, 2012
15. Death of Yesterday, M. C. Beaton, 2013
16. The Games House, Claire North, 2015 - I read some of this online when it was on her website in separate stories. The ending is quite satisfactory but maybe a bit too gothic for me.
17. The Case of the ‘Hail Mary’ Celeste, Malcolm Pryce, 2015
18. Shot in Southwold, Suzette A Hill, 2017 - I read the first one of these because I know Southwold, but in retrospect that's not enough reason to have read another.
19. The Essex Serpent, Sarah Perry, 2017 - I'm sure this was a book club kind of book, which may be why I don't get it. More atmosphere than sense.
20. The Lonely Hour, Christopher Fowler, 2019 - I was reading this at the start of 2020 so it goes into that year. Bryant and May are always good.
21. Murder in the Merchant City, Angus McAllister, 2019 - fairly meh modern detective fiction
22. Because Internet, Gretchen McCulloch, 2019 - I love her Lingthusiasm podcast so much, but this was a little bit disappointing maybe because I was familiar with a lot of the ideas already. Definitely worth reading, but don't bother buying the physical book - the typesetting and production quality is poor and there are no diagrams or anything to make it worth while having on paper.
23. Becoming Jo, Sophie McKenzie, 2019 - this is not good, it loses far too much of what makes Jo March excellent.
24. False Value, Ben Aaronovitch, 2020 - I love all things Rivers of London, so yay
25. Tales from the Folly, Ben Aaronovitch, 2020 
26. The Constant Rabbit, Jasper Fforde, 2020 - I usually love everything by Fforde, but wish I hadn't bought this. Do not read this if you don't like bad things happening to rabbits.
27. Bryant & May: Oranges and Lemons, Christopher Fowler, 2020 - a new Bryant and May book is worthy of celebration in such a year
28. The Blind Side, Patricia Wentworth, 1939 - having read all the Miss Silver books I am now working through her other stuff. This one at least is less formulaic.
29. Who Pays the Piper, Patricia Wentworth, 1940
30. Norse Mythology, Neil Gaiman, 2017
31. Doctor Who: The Shakespeare Notebooks, Anthology, 2014 - I skipped a lot of this, some of it was cringeworthy and none of it was great
32. Just One Damned Thing After Another, Jodi Taylor, 2013 - I ended up reading every book in this series in 2020, well the library was closed and they were cheap on Kindle, and I do love time travel  
33. The Very First Damned Thing, Jodi Taylor, 2015
34. A Symphony of Echoes, Jodi Taylor, 2013
35. When a Child is Born, Jodi Taylor, 2013
36. A Second Chance, Jodi Taylor, 2014
37. Roman Holiday, Jodi Taylor, 2014
38. A Trail through Time, Jodi Taylor, 2014
39. Christmas Present, Jodi Taylor, 2014
40. No Time Like the Past, Jodi Taylor, 2015
41. What Could Possibly Go Wrong, Jodi Taylor, 2015
42. Ships and Stings and Wedding Rings, Jodi Taylor, 2015
43. Lies, Damn Lies, and History, Jodi Taylor, 2016
44. The Great St Mary’s Day Out, Jodi Taylor, 2016
45. My Name is Markham, Jodi Taylor, 2016
46. And the Rest is History, Jodi Taylor, 2017
47. A Perfect Storm, Jodi Taylor, 2017
48. Christmas Past, Jodi Taylor, 2017
49. An Argumentation of Historians, Jodi Taylor, 2018
50. The Steam Pump Jump, Jodi Taylor, 2018
51. The Battersea Barricades, Jodi Taylor, 2018
52. And Now for Something Completely Different, Jodi Taylor, 2018
53. Hope for the Best, Jodi Taylor, 2019
54. When Did You Last See Your Father, Jodi Taylor, 2019
55. Why is Nothing Ever Simple?, Jodi Taylor, 2019
56. Plan for the Worst, Jodi Taylor, 2020
57. The Ordeal of the Haunted Room, Jodi Taylor, 2020
58. The Quantum Curators and the Faberge Egg, Eva St John 2020 - recommended to me after I'd read all the Chronicles of Saint Mary books, and very similar really, although rather less white.
59. The Glass Room, Ann Cleeves, 2016 - I would enjoy Vera books more if they didn't mention how fat she is every other paragraph...
60. Murder at Melrose Court, Karen Baugh Menuhin, 2018 - I often get impatient with "period" detective fiction by modern writers, but this one gets a pass for being funny. I nearly gave up though when he flew his Sopwith Camel home from France in 1918 to his father's deathbed!
61. The Borrowers, Mary Norton, 1951 - a reread when I found the boxed set of the first four books (I've since found out there's a fifth which I still haven't read)
62. The Borrowers Afield, Mary Norton, 1955,  - I may have read this as a child, but not sure. I got the box set of the series in the shop I volunteer at, which was a win.
63. The Borrowers Afloat, Mary Norton, 1959
64. The Borrowers Aloft, Mary Norton, 1961
65. Portrait of a Murderer, Anne Meredith, 1933 - very much a psychological thriller rather than a whodunnit.
66. Finding the Fox, Ali Sparkes, 2006 - The 1st Shapeshifter book, I got this in a charity shop, and was so good I ordered the whole series from Amazon.  
67. Running the Risk, Ali Sparkes, 2007 - Shapeshifter 2, still good
68. Going to Ground, Ali Sparkes, 2007 
69. Death by Detention, Ali Sparkes,  2018 - I read this while I was waiting for the rest of the Shapeshifter books to arrive. It's not as good because it's a bit too silly.
70. The London Eye Mystery, Siobhan Dowd, 2007 - A bit too much like The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime in it's treatment of autism, but still enjoyable.
71. Checkmate to Murder, E.C.R. Lorac, 1944 - I liked this because it did seem to have a more realistic picture of London in the war than most popular fiction, as confirmed by my mum, who was there...