#TopTenTuesday | 30th December 2025: Most Recent Additions to My Bookshelf #Top10Tuesday #bookblogger #bookish #amreading #TTT #BookTwitter #booktwt #BookSky #damppebbles

Hello and a very warm welcome to damppebbles. It’s Tuesday which means it’s time for this week’s Top Ten Tuesday post. I’ve decided to take part in That Artsy Reader Girl’s Top Ten Tuesday meme to mix things up a little here at damppebbles. Add a little bit of variety to our bookish weeks.

The meme was originally created by The Broke and the Bookish but has lived with Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl since January 2018. It was created to encompass a love of books, of lists and to bring readers together. If you would also like to take part then you’re very welcome: the more, the merrier. Just make sure you link back to Jana’s post every week. If you don’t have a blog, then no problem, just add your list to the comments below.

This week’s theme is Most Recent Additions to My Bookshelf. I love this type of list because it’s written itself! Without me even knowing, really. Because I’m going to share my ten most recent Kindle purchases. The books that have caught my eye and I’ve downloaded ad hoc.


1. The Howling by Michael J. Malone (The Annie Jackson Mysteries #3)
Two men, centuries apart, dream of being a wolf.

One is burned at the stake.

Another is locked in a psychiatric hospital for most of his life.

And Annie Jackson is about to find out why…

Vowing once again to remove herself from society, Annie is back living alone in her little cottage by the shores of a loch. But when an old enemy – now locked up in a high security hospital – comes calling, begging her to find the son that she was forced to give up at the age of seventeen, Annie is tempted out of seclusion. The missing boy holds the key to ending Annie’s curse, and he may be the only chance that both she and Lewis have of real happiness.

Annie and Lewis begin an investigation that takes them back to the past, a time etched in Scottish folklore, a period of history that may just be repeating itself. And what they uncover could destroy not just some of the most powerful people in the country, who will stop at nothing to protect their wealth and their secrets, but also Annie’s life, and everything she holds dear…

Dark, immersive, and utterly compelling, The Howling is a story of deception, betrayal, and misplaced power, and a reminder that the most public of faces can hide the darkest of hearts…


2. Coffin Moon by Keith Rosson
It’s the winter of 1975, and Duane Minor, back home in Portland, Oregon after a tour in Vietnam, is struggling to quell his anger and keep his drinking in check, keep his young marriage intact, and keep the nightmares away. Things get even more complicated when his thirteen-year-old niece, Julia, is sent across the country to live with her Aunt Heidi and Uncle Duane after a tragedy. But slowly, carefully, guided by Heidi’s love and patience, the three of them are building a family.

Then Minor crosses the wrong man: John Varley, a criminal with a bloody history and a trail of bodies behind him. Varley, who sleeps during the day beneath loose drifts of earth and grows teeth in the light of the moon. In an act of brutal retaliation, Varley kills Heidi, leaving Minor broken with guilt and Julia shot through with rage. The two of them are left united by only one thing: the desire for vengeance.

As their quest brings them into the dark orbit of immortal, undead children, silver bullet casters, and the bevy of broken men drawn to Varley’s ferocity, Minor and Julia follow his path of destruction from the gritty al-leyways of 1970s Portland to the desolate highways of the Northwest and the snow-lashed plains of North Dakota – only to have him turn his vicious power back on them. Who will prevail, who will survive, and what remains of our humanity when our thirst for revenge trumps everything else?


3. The Night Watcher by Tariq Ashkanani
As private investigators go, Callie Munro is tougher than most. She’s had to be. Abandoned as a baby and raised by a succession of strangers, she knows a thing or two about surviving…

…but she never expected to find herself hunting a serial killer.

After uncovering a string of missing women—women no one seems to care about—Callie refuses to look away. With police ignoring the evidence, her only ally is an organised crime boss with his own agenda.

The deeper Callie digs, the more dangerous the hunt becomes. Every clue exposes another lie. Every step brings the killer closer.

She’s fighting for the forgotten. But if she’s not careful, she’ll be next.


4. Whistle by Linwood Barclay
Evil has a one track mind…

Celebrated children’s author and illustrator Annie Blunt has had a dreadful year. Her husband was killed in a tragic accident, then one of her children’s books ignited a major scandal. Desperate for a fresh start, she moves with her young son Charlie to a charming small town in upstate New York where they can begin to heal.

But Annie’s year is about to get worse.

Bored and lonely in their isolated new surroundings, Charlie is thrilled when he finds a forgotten train set in a locked shed in the grounds of their new house. While Annie is pleased to see Charlie happy, there’s something unsettling about his new toy. Strange sounds wake Annie in the night – she’s sure she can hear a train in the middle of the night, although there isn’t an active line for miles. And then bizarre things start happening in the neighbourhood. But even stranger, Annie can’t seem to stop drawing a disturbing new character that has no place in a children’s book…

Grief plays tricks on the mind, but Annie is beginning to think she’s walked out of one nightmare straight into another, only this one is far more terrifying…


5. Carrie by Stephen King
Carrie White is no ordinary girl.

Carrie White has the gift of telekinesis.

To be invited to Prom Night by Tommy Ross is a dream come true for Carrie – the first
step towards social acceptance by her high school colleagues.

But events will take a decidedly macabre turn on that horrifying and endless night as she
is forced to exercise her terrible gift on the town that mocks and loathes her . . .


6. Room 21 by Jessica Huntley
My name’s Kimberley. I’m twenty-five. I have epilepsy, a seizure alert dog named Muffin, and a job I love as a senior housekeeper in one of London’s top hotels. I’m used to being invisible. Overlooked. Safe.

But that was before Jennifer Clifton checked in. She’s rich, powerful, terrifyingly calm — and she asks for me by name.

She offers me my dream job, working in her exclusive hotel in the Scottish Highlands. It’s more money than I ever imagined.

There’s just one catch: Don’t open the door to Room 21.

How hard can that be?

But something is wrong in this hotel. The guests give me the creeps. The staff whisper behind closed doors. And that room — the one I promised not to enter — calls to me.

I took this job for a better life. Now I’m trapped in a nightmare.


7. How to Survive Camping: The Man with No Shadow by Bonnie Quinn
Goat Valley Campground has been in Kate’s family for generations. It draws campers year after year . . . as well as creatures from folklore that have made the land their home, their hunting ground, and their portal between worlds.
 
As campground manager, Kate must do whatever she can to keep her campers alive and the monsters contained, including making some basic rules on how to survive your camping experience. Still, not everyone gets out alive. 
 
And now the threat of decapitated campers are the least of Kate’s worries, as one of the most dangerous, insidious inhabitants of the campground is determined to claim the land for himself . . .


8. Done and Dusted by Lyla Sage
For the first time in her life, Clementine ‘Emmy’ Ryder has no idea what she’s doing. She’s accomplished everything on her to-do list. She left her small hometown of Meadowlark, Wyoming, went to college, and made a career for herself by doing her favorite thing: riding horses. But after an accident makes it impossible for her to get back into the saddle, she has no choice but to return to the hometown she always wanted to escape.

Luke Brooks is Meadowlark’s most notorious bad boy, bar owner, and bachelor. He’s also the unofficial fifth member of the Ryder family. As Emmy’s older brother’s best friend, Luke spent most of his childhood antagonizing her. It’s been years since he’s seen her, but when she walks into his bar and back into his life, he can’t take his eyes off her. Against his better judgment, he wants to do a whole lot more than just look at her.

As things between Emmy and Brooks heat up, it gets more difficult for him to keep his hands off of her. Can he help her get her spark back? Or will they both go up in flames?


9. The Kidnapping of Alice Ingold by Cate Holahan
Alice Ingold has been kidnapped. Call the police. Alert the media. You can’t play this game without all the pieces.

Beautiful, blond, and immensely privileged, Alice Ingold is the perfect victim for a true-crime obsessed culture—and for a masked duo with a singular purpose. Instead of a demand for ransom, her captors have a riddle, and they’re inviting the entire country to solve it.

No one is more invested in the search than Alice’s parents: Catherine, a socialite with obscene generational wealth, and Brian, a visionary AI tech guru. But while Brian turns to machines to solve the problem, Catherine tries to crowdsource the solution, stopping at nothing to bring her daughter home. And America isn’t just watching the story unfold…it’s playing along. The nationwide scavenger hunt for Alice is on.

As an increasingly desperate Catherine strives to understand each new clue, a complex picture of the crime develops. Soon, everyone will see the kidnapping of Alice Ingold for what it is—and Alice won’t be the only one who will need saving.


10. The Death Watcher by Chris Carter
When a routine autopsy on what looked like a straightforward hit-and-run leads the LA Chief Medical Examiner, Dr Carolyn Hove, to discover some puzzling inconsistencies, she calls in Detective Robert Hunter of the LAPD Ultra Violent Crimes Unit. Not only did Dr Hove discover that the death wasn’t caused by a hit-and-run, but she also found indications that the victim had been severely tortured prior to death.

What no one realises is that what Dr Hove has stumbled upon is just the tip of the iceberg and it will lead Hunter and his partner, Carlos Garcia, on the trail of a twisted and clever killer who hides in plain sight. A serial killer no one even knew existed – a killer who has always operated under the radar, expertly disguising every gruesome murder as an accidental death.

But with no leads as to why the victim was targeted, the investigation comes to a standstill, until another body is discovered with an alternative cause of death.

What becomes clear is that this serial killer isn’t going to stop – unless Hunter and Garcia can get to him.

But how do you investigate a murder when you have no victims? How do you catch a killer who leaves behind no crime scene? How do you stop a ghost who no one can prove even exists?


The last ten books to arrive on my poor overloaded Kindle.  What new arrivals have been added to your bookshelf recently? Are you taking part in Top Ten Tuesday this week? Let me know in the comments.

So there we have it! If you fancy joining in next week then head on over to That Artsy Reader Girl’s blog to find out what the next topic is!

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