Top Ten Tuesday: Books I was Reading on This Day Over the Last Ten Years

The Artsy Reader Girl's assignment topic for August 11th is the books we were reading on this day over the last ten years. This was a really fun exercise! I started keeping a reading log in 2001 (although I did not get as much reading done when I was in law school - my book group gave me a beautiful bookmark from Tiffany's, expecting not to see me again, but I turned up quite often, although never on time, due to evening classes) and joined Goodreads several years later so it is relatively easy to figure out what I was reading and when. What is more interesting (at least to me) is how well I remember most of these books.

Catching Up with Miss Hargreaves, Poppy, and Summer in Cape Cod

Miss Hargreaves (1939) by Frank Baker

This book is a warning to anyone who ever embroidered a story or made something up that seemed hilarious to him (or her) but perhaps not so much to other people.  Norman Huntley and his friend Henry Beddow are on vacation chatting to a sexton when they make up an eccentric older lady called Miss Hargreaves.  Carrying on with their silliness, Norman sends a letter inviting her to visit his family in the Cathedral town of Cornford.  When he gets home, he is horrified to find someone named Hargreaves has sent a telegram stating she will arrive on Monday!  No one believes Norman when he says he doesn't know her and did not invite her, and once she arrives Norman is torn between pride in his creation, embarrassment at her behavior, and a strange affection for her that comes and goes. Miss Hargreaves' visit to Cornford threatens to destroy his life - unless or even if it is Norman who is behaving irrationally.  This is an amusing story, recommended by Simon at Stuck in a Book.