This year, I plan to give my visits to the library and my reading a little bit of purpose: I’m taking up the British Crime Classics Challenge.

The rules for this challenge are simple. In fact, there’s just the one rule. To read British crime novels originally published before 1965.

Now, of course, I could just fall back on old favourites – Christie, Sayers, Heyer – but I’m taking up this challenge to try and expand my reading habits, to try authors I’ve heard of but not read. Like Margery Allingham or Josephine Tey (I have an Allingham in my TBR pile as I write: hopefully not for much longer!). Or indeed, any of the authors whom the British Library reprint under the Classic Crime imprint. (Which makes life so much easier for finding these novels, since they have a handy little label across the cover saying British Library Crime Classic.)

I shall, naturally, continue to read all the other books in my TBR pile (probably), but I shall aim to read at least one classic crime novel a month. Which shouldn’t be too difficult: I like Golden Age detective fiction. Probably because I like puzzles, and quite a few of the authors wrote them as intellectual challenges.

If you wish to know more about this challenge, head over to The Book Decoder for more information or ideas where to start.