Sarah Waters’ wonderful 2006 tale of forbidden love in the shadows before and after Blitz Britain, The Night Watch, earned the top spot in the list of favourite titles read this year by the Loveliest Book Group, according to a December 2012 survey of current members.
The Talented Mr Ripley, Patricia Highsmith’s deliciously black novel, earned the No. 2 spot, followed closely by Evelyn Waugh’s classic, Brideshead Revisited.
Overall, the group said the 2012 library, which included a Man Booker Winner (The Sense of an Ending) reversed the a four-year trend of declining quality.
Rating Table 2012
| Title | Rating | Owner | |
| 1 | The Night Watch by Sarah Waters | 2.63 | EmmaJ |
| 2 | The Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith | 2.25 | Catherine |
| 3 | Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh | 1.69 | John |
| 4 | Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck | 1.60 | Baljit |
| 5 | The Man Who Fell to Earth by Walter Tevis | 1.41 | Miranda |
| 6 | The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes | 1.03 | Sue |
| Mrs Palfrey At The Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor | 1.03 | DKB | |
| 8 | Hard Times by Charles Dickens | 0.47 | Catherine |
| 9 | Oedipus the King by Sophocles | 0.28 | John |
| The Beautiful and Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald | 0.28 | DKB | |
| 11 | In Patagonia by Bruce Chatwin | 0.00 | Anthony |
| 12 | The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop by Lewis Buzbee | 0.00 | EmmaT |