Top Ten Tuesday: New to me authors I read in 2025

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week the theme is Bookish Discoveries I Made in 2025 (New-to-you authors you discovered, new genres you learned you like, new bookish resources you found, friends you made, local bookshops you found, a book club you joined, etc.). I am going to use this as an opportunity to showcase some of the new to me authors I read last year.

All up I read 67 new to me authors which is hard to narrow down to just ten choices, so the first 9 of these authors are those that I read multiple books from. In other words, I enjoyed their first books enough to go and read more!

Finding that elusive 10th author to include on the list was a bit trickier. I thought I would pick one where I only read one book by them but I gave that book 5/5 rating. However, there are still four of those! 

Claire Keegan - I know that I am late to the party with this one but I read two of Irish author Claire Keegan's books last year and I have already read another this year. I am going to run out of her books soon I think. Often her books are quite short but boy they pack a punch!

Claire van Ryn - Another Claire! This one is from Tasmania, and I really loved both books of hers that I read last year which I reviewed here and here. Birds play an important part in the stories and both covers are gorgeous! I will be excited about her next book for sure!

Emma Davies - Emma Davies is a British author. I enjoyed the two books I read from her and have now bought some of her earlier books. I reviewed her books here and here.

Emma Grey - I have mentioned Emma Grey several times now in my best of posts for last year. She is the only author that I have given 5/5 stars to both of the books I read from her last year. I reviewed them here and here. Can't wait for the next book which is out soon.

Hannah Bonam-Young - This is definitely a case of being last to the party. I read Out on a Limb and Next of Kin last year and I am looking forward to reading more this year!

Laura Imai Messina - Laura Imai Messina is Italian by birth, but she has lived in Japan for more than 20 years. I loved both of her books but so far I have only reviewed one of them. I have a friend who is a Japanophile and I was talking to her about this authors books, and she started to cry because she said that the stories just sound so Japanese. I don't think any more of this authors books have been translated into English, but if they are I will be reading them!

Mai Mochikuzi - At first I wasn't sure about the mix of human size, walking, talking cats, astrology and food but it is fun. I reviewed the first book here and the second book here.

Shari Low - I read three of Shari Low's books last year. They are mainly set in Scotland and feature a bunch of fun characters, and are often interconnected. 

Yuta Takahashi - This is the author of one of several Japanese foodie series I am reading. This one features a restaurant where you can come to eat remembrance meals and get the chance to have one last conversation with the person you are remembering. I reviewed the two books here and here.

Jodi McAlister - In the end I chose this book because it is the only book by a new to me author that I rated 5/5 stars that I never got around to reviewing, for no other reason than I ran out of time. I also saw her at a couple of events last year as well! If you love smart, funny enemies to lover romances check it out! Highly recommend! One of the members of my book club read it and she absolutely loved it, and she is 80 years old!! I will definitely read more from Jodi McAlister

Top Ten Tuesday: What I Read on Holidays

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week's theme is My Unpopular Bookish Opinions (You can share opinions surrounding being a reader, a book reviewer, etc. OR you could share your opinions on specific books that go against what everyone  else is saying. Are there any books you loved that most people didn’t, or vice versa?)


I am going rogue (again) and instead I am doing What I Read on Holidays, which fits nicely into the post because I finished exactly ten books while I was away!

The Full Moon Coffee Shop by Mai Mochizuki - What an interesting and delightful book! I am planning to review this soon.

The Pumpkin Spice Cafe by Laurie Gilmore - Given all the hype around this series, I was expecting more but it was a good book to read on a plane.

Safe Harbour in Pelican Harbour by Maggie Christensen - I always enjoy Maggie Christensen's books and this one was no exception. I reviewed this book here.

White Mulberry by Rosa Kwan Easton - I wanted to read this one because it is set in both Korea and Japan. I had no idea that Japan had occupied Korea between 1910 and the end of the war. 

The King's Messenger by Susanna Kearsley - I told myself I was reading this one for our read on a theme book club. The theme for this month is spy and I guess I could make this fit the theme if I really tried.

The Librarian Spy by Madeline Martin - This one definitely fits the theme!

Under a Riviera Moon by Helen McGinn - This is an upcoming review book!

Next of Kin by Hannah Bonhan Young - I just wanted to read something fun and this one fit the bill! 

Where the Birds Call Her Name by Claire van Ryn - What a book! I really enjoyed this one! I am hoping to review it soon, but I don't have a specific date. Maybe I should just give it a date just to give myself a deadline.

One Day and Forever by Shari Low - I have said yes to a book that features some of the same characters from this book. However, it turns out that this book has lots of links to other books as well!

This week...

 

I'm reading

We have a public holiday here today for Labour Day so, in theory, that means more reading time! Well, not really, as I do have quite a bit of reading time already. 

Last week I finished listening to The Truth by Terry Pratchett. I originally started listening to this back in January, but then I put it aside to listen to Jane Austen. I do intend to write something about this, but I will say here that my favourite character was Otto the vampire iconographer who had a terrible tendency to disintegrate every time he took a photo with a flash! 

I have now gone back to listening to Atlas: The Story of Pa Salt by Lucinda Riley. This is a long book so I will probably be listening to this for a couple of months at least. 

I finished reading If You Could See Me Now by Samantha Tonge. I really like Samantha Tonge's books but they are a bit tricky to review because there are things that you definitely need to not know when you are starting the book. My review is here. 

I also read and reviewed The Jam Maker by Mary-Lou Stephens, which I really loved! I had been to see the author talk a few weeks ago. I really think going to author events really enhances the reading experience! This was a 5/5 read for me!

For a bit of a change of pace, I also devoured Out on a Limb by Hannah Bonam-Young. I had read a couple of chapters a couple of weeks ago, but this week I picked it up and started again and devoured it! This was my first book by her, but it will not be the last! I thought it was fab. 

I have two reviews due later this week so I read Love and Laughter (and Other Disasters) by Elora Canne, and started reading The Shadow on the Bridge by Clare Marchant. 

In other big news, I finished volume 1 of War and Peace this week. It is funny what you find when you look back in the archives of your blog. I was searching for something last week and came across this post from 2010 which is the last time I attempted to read this book. I have made it further this time than I did then, but I have to figure out what my strategy is going to be for when we go away for a couple of weeks. I don't really want to drag the book around with me, and I don't want to change versions or translations. Maybe I will read a few chapters ahead and then catch up when I get home!

We had our read on a theme book club meeting on Saturday. The theme was Classics and this is just some of what people read. I listened to Pride and Prejudice and will have a post up soon with some thoughts, not necessarily on the book, but on the enduring impact and legacy of Jane Austen or something like that anyway. Our next theme is Spy and I have a couple of ideas of what I am going to read.

I'm watching

You may recall that last weekend I went to the movies and saw the latest Bridget Jones movie. While I knew that I had watched the first one, I had no recollection of the second and third films at all, so this week I sat and watched the first 3 movies. If I had to rate the four movies I would say that the first and last movies are the best, followed by the third one and then the second one was the least entertaining!

The French Film Festival has just started and I am a little bit gutted that I am going to be away for most of it as there are quite a few movies that I wanted to see showing. I did go to the movies by myself on Friday night to see Jane Austen Wrecked My Life which was a lot of fun. It is about a woman who wants to be an author, but can't seem to finish any of her stories. Her friend sends a few chapters off and she gets accepted into a Jane Austen residency writers retreat in England. It is a fun movie!

Here's the trailer

Life



After book club I went to see the Yayoi Susama exhibition for the second time. The second half of the exhibition is so much fun, full of immersion rooms, polka dots, pumpkins with polka dots. It's a lot of fun. You can see a couple of photos from the first time I went here, and then below are some from my most recent visit.

Posts from the last week


Top Ten Tuesday: Author sisters
Blog Tour: If You Could See Me Now by Samantha Tonge
Weekend Cooking: The Jam Maker by Mary-Lou Stephens
Historical Fiction Reading Challenge - February stats




I've linked this post to It's Monday, what are you reading? as hosted by Book Date and Sunday Salon hosted at Readerbuzz

This week...

I'm reading

We are going away at the end of this month, so I wanted to get a bit of a head start to my reading so that I can write all my posts before I go away. I therefore read I Knew You Were Trouble by Aussie author Sandy Barker, which is the fifth and final book in the Ever After Agency series.

I then started reading Out on a Limb by Hannah Bonam-Young. I am not really sure why as I already had multiple books on the go, but sometimes you just have to do what you have to do! I have heard lots of good things about it!

I also started reading If You Could See My Now by Samantha Tonge. My review for this book will be up later this week!

Last week I had mentioned that I had started listening to Mis-directed by Lucy Parker but I was falling asleep on the couch. In the end, I started it again, and found myself sitting at the desk just listening to it! I got through it in two days as I couldn't stop listening. I did have to remind myself that Lucy Parker had written the book - it wasn't Nicola Coughlin sharing some of things that go on backstage on a period TV series.

I have now gone back to listening to The Truth by Terry Pratchett. I started this in January but put it aside to listen to Pride and Prejudice for book club. I expect I will finish The Truth this week.

Speaking of Jane Austen, I went to a library event on Friday night. It was a one woman show where she acts as the author whilst dressed in accurate period clothing, sharing letters that she sent and received, as well as excerpts from Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility and Emma. Given that I have only recently read P&P, the section she read was very familiar to me!

I'm watching


I've seen a few movies this week. I watched The Dolce Villa which is about a young woman who buys a 1 Euro house in a small village in Italy. Her dad comes to try to persuade her that this is a mistake. He clashes with the female mayor straight away but he does start to come around. They did get all the renovations done very quickly, and there were some nice foodie scenes!

I then watched a movie which has been given an English title of Honeymoon Crasher, but in French it is called Lune de Miel Avec Ma Mere or Honeymoon with My Mother! And that pretty much describes the movie. A man is dumped at the wedding ceremony  and so he is convinced to go on the honeymoon with his mother. Queue all the jokes about him being married to a much older woman. It was fun as he began to see her as someone in her own right, not just as his mother. The movie was set in Mauritius which looked gorgeous!

On Sunday I went to see Bridget Jones 4: Mad About the Boy at the cinema. I am not sure that I remember seeing movies 2 or 3, but I did quite enjoy this one. I cried several times, and I laughed! I might go and see if I can rewatch the first three movies.

We also started watching season 2 of Rogue Heroes. We really enjoyed the first series which is about the development of the SAS - Special Auxiliary Service. It is very much a smash em, bash em, blow em up kind of series, but it is a lot of fun!


Life

Not much to report here!

Max

Max is definitely better than he was last week, but we are struggling to get his sugar reading down. Hopefully we can work it out this week. He's very happy in himself though which is a relief.


Posts from the last week


Top Ten Tuesday: Books Set in Another Time

Blog Tour: A Santorini Secret by Rose Alexander

Blog Tour: From Provence with Love by Alison Roberts

Historical Fiction Reading Challenge - March links

Weekend Kitchen: What I Baked in my Kitchen in February 

Six Degrees: Prophet Song to My Father's House







I've linked this post to It's Monday, what are you reading? as hosted by Book Date and Sunday Salon hosted at Readerbuzz