Top Five Tuesday was originally created by Shanah @ Bionic Book Worm, but is now hosted by Meeghan @ Meeghan Reads. To participate, link your post back to Meeghan’s blog or leave a comment on her weekly post.

This week, Meeghan asked us to pick five books on our wish list that we really want but haven’t bought yet!

This is only the third time I’m participating in a Top Five Tuesday, but it is Meeghan’s birthday week, and because mine is coming up soon, you never know, someone might want to buy me a birthday present! This one isn’t as easy to do as it seems… I actually, have TONS of books on my wish lists (and one that was there recently got reduced on Amazon, so that’s off the list). Even so, I think I can pare it down to my top five books that I’m just aching to get. (Note: the links here are all affiliate links for The Book Depository, which has world-wide free shipping.) So, without any further ado….

#5 – Our Woman in Moscow by Beatriz Williams

I didn’t know Williams’ work until I started reading the “Team-W” books that she wrote with Lauren Willig and Karen White. My love of those books made me seek out each of the authors’ solo works, and the first one I found was Williams. Well, I quickly became a fan of her style of writing that I’ve described as sparkling. Unfortunately, her publishers didn’t seem to appreciate my adoration, and they didn’t approve me for an ARC of this book. Oh well, that just means I’ll have to buy a copy!

#4 – The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams

I can’t tell you how many reviews of this book I’ve seen that all seem to adore it. Okay, there were a couple that didn’t give it a full five stars, but still, the things they said that forced them to rate it lower aren’t the types of things that would bother me too much. I guess my love of words (having started out writing poetry) is what draws me to this novel.

#3 – The Brief and True Report of Temperance Flowerdew by Denise Heinze

The paperback for this will be coming out in late September. This is one of those books that I read a review for, which just struck me as being very special and very different. I don’t read many books set in the 17th century, so that’s one attraction. Plus, I really think I should read more historical fiction books set in America, since I seem to read so many set in Europe (and especially around the two World Wars). I mean, I was born there, even if I haven’t lived there for 40 years!

#2 – A Narrow Door by Joanne Harris

I recently finished reading and reviewing Harris’ third book in her Malbry/St. Oswald’s series (blueeyedboy), and what do I see, but she’s got another one coming out. Obviously, with a series this good, that I’ve followed as faithfully as possible, of course I want to read the next one. Plus, we finally get women into St. Oswalds, so it sounds like a wonderful twist! Furthermore, to my mind, these are her finest books (and remember, I’m not really into psychological thrillers). The book will be released in August, so if no one wants to buy me a gift, I don’t have that much time to wait.

UPDATE: I just pre-ordered this one for myself. So… that takes it off the list! Instead I’m putting in this one:

Immortal by Jessica Duchen.

When I read a review of this, being a huge classical music lover, I thought it might be something I’d really get into. The blurb reads: “Who was Beethoven’s ‘Immortal Beloved’?After Ludwig van Beethoven’s death, a love letter in his writing was discovered, addressed only to his ‘Immortal Beloved’. Decades later, Countess Therese Brunsvik claims to have been the composer’s lost love. Yet is she concealing a tragic secret? Who is the one person who deserves to know the truth? Becoming Beethoven’s pupils in 1799, Therese and her sister Josephine followed his struggles against the onset of deafness, Viennese society’s flamboyance, privilege and hypocrisy and the upheavals of the Napoleonic wars. While Therese sought liberation, Josephine found the odds stacked against even the most unquenchable of passions…“

#1 – The Mystery of Mrs. Christie by Marie Benedict

Try as I might, I couldn’t get the ARC to this one, and believe me, I tried – really hard! In fact, I don’t think there’s even an eBook of this out yet, and we are still months away from the paperback coming out. This biographical, historical, women’s fiction book is about the 11 days when author Agathe Christie disappeared! Doesn’t that sound fascinating?

How about you?

What are your top five books on your wish list?

And…