''It was 1948....it was a very good year.....''

Since discovering this group, though swamped by challenges and over 80 books to read for them this year,I couldnt resist exploring on one of my favourite fiction resources,Fantastic Fiction. I decided to check out the most popular novels of my birth year,1948,and what a rush of nostalgia that caused. So many old favourites.even more books and authors I discovered in the last few years who are icons in their genres back in those days. Plus a lot of nostalgia at authors who were still very prevalent 15-20 years later(libraries were poor then,when they got a book,they kept that book,often for decades. When the paper dust cover tore,they often covered the book with some weird modern art patterned vynil sort of shiny cover,so books would slip away from each other - lots of experience there,I worked in a library for the second half of the 60s!). So here are a few books that caught my eye.
Favourite reads/famous reads even today
Dodie Smith I Capture the Castle
J B Priestley An Inspector Calls
Edith Blyton The Secret Seven
Margery Allingham More Work for the Undertaker
Josephine Tey The Franchise Affair,
Elizabeth Goudge Pilgrim's Inn
Norman Mailer The Naked and the Dead
Giovanni Guareschi The Little World of Don Camillo
Alan Paton Cry the Beloved Country
William Faulkner Intruder in the Dust
Phyllis Whitney - Ever After
There are a host of SF and crime authors,but also a lot of the authors that brighten the eye of the members of this group :0)
Hammond Innes,Anya Seton,Angela Thirkell,Mary Renault,Howard Spring,Edith Pargeter.Taylor Caldwell.Elfrida Vipont,Frank G Slaughter,Elizabeth Cadell,Frank Yerby.Monica Dickens.Margery Sharp,Denise Robins,Flora Thompson,Ann Bridge,D E Stevenson,and more.
So there is one category of next '12x12 challenge sorted,a category will be ''Books from 1948'' lol.
Do check out this website - www.fantasticfiction.com/most-popular/?page=1&cover=hardback&year=1948&genre=all Check out your own birthday year,I'm sure you will remember a host of books!
I certainly loved my stroll down Memory Lane today!

Some of your touchstones need correcting.

The Herb of Grace has also been published as Pilgrim's Inn.

Ever After

>1 dustydigger: That looks to be quite a useful resource. Thanks for sharing!

I do wish they said how they determined popularity, though. I didn't see any explanation, but I may have missed it.

I was late to discover I Capture the Castle, but it's one of my favorite rereads now!

>4 gmathis: it's on my shelf, tbr. Maybe soon...

I hardly think Rolt's Inland waterways of England can have been a global bestseller in 1948, but it's a book that is probably in high demand on the secondhand market in the UK now. They also list the top Kindle titles for 1948, so it obviously isn't the popularity at the time they are measuring. I guess they must be taking data from Amazon rankings.