Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly task that currently resides at The Artsy Reader Girl and features bloggers creating and sharing lists on various book topics. For this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, participants need to list their favourite books that feature ordinal numbers in the title. As defined by The Artsy Reader Girl topic page, ordinal numbers are numbers that define an item’s place in a series, for example whether it’s the first, second, third, etc, book in the series.
This was a very interesting topic, which I was curious to try out. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a lot of books I’ve read that specifically used a number in the title to correspond where it sat in the series. As such, I’ve been a little creative with this subject and included some more unusual examples, as well as books where the number in the title corresponds to where the novel sits in the series. I’ve also wasn’t too attached to putting the actual numbers in and have relied on a few number-based words (for example first instead of one, twice instead of two and so on). This produced an interesting list from a bunch of different authors, and I ended up liking the final result. So, let’s see what made the cut.
Honourable Mentions:
The fun second book in Jeff Lindsay’s Riley Wolfe series. A special shoutout also needs to go the third and fourth entries in the series, Three-Edged Sword and The Fourth Rule.
The Two-Faced Queen by Nick Martell
The ultra-impressive second entry in Nick Martell’s The Legacy of the Mercenary Kings. I’ve left this as an honourable mention as the name really is a coincidence tied to a character’s title.
Top Ten List:
First Watch by Dale Lucas
My first choice for this list (pun intended), was the cool fantasy crime novel, First Watch by Dale Lucas. An interesting read with an excellent mystery premise behind it, First Watch was the great first book in a series and a fun inclusion here.
Another ‘first’ book in a series that identified itself as such in the title was the cool Warhammer 40,000 novel, First and Only by Dan Abnett. Book one in the iconic Gaunt’s Ghosts series, First and Only was a great opening entry that perfectly introduced the series’ scenario and solider characters. An outstanding first book in one of my favourite Warhammer 40,000 series.
Fool Me Once Harlan Coben
Another cool novel that proclaims’ where it sits in a series is the outstanding read, Fool Me Once from the always impressive Harlan Coben. Previously a standalone novel, Fool Me Once just became the first book in a series after Coben released a sequel in 2025 with Nobody’s Fool, allowing for its inclusion on this list.
Patient Zero by Jonathan Maberry
I’m being slightly cheeky by including Patient Zero in this list, as it was technically book one in Jonathan Maberry’s Joe Ledger series. However, I think it’s appropriate because the premise of this novel is a team of elite operators attempting to hunt down and killing the first patient in a man-made zombie plague (i.e. the titular patient zero). In some ways, Patient Zero followed a similar trend as it was the first book in a series that quickly and relentlessly spread out into a massive, long-running franchise. As such, I’m going to include Patient Zero on this list, and it comes very highly recommended for those who like an extreme, science fiction thriller.
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman
Moving onto the twos/twice, we have The Man Who Died Twice. The second book in Richard Osman’s exceptional Thursday Murder Club series, The Man Who Died Twice was an excellent novel and a wonderful sequel. A fun and hilarious inclusion for this list.
The Third Day, The Frost by James Marsden
I just had to include The Third Day, The Frost here, as it is one of my favourite Australian novels. While James Marsden took the name from a Shakespeare line, the title does also correspond with The Third Day, The Frost being the third book in the author’s iconic Tomorrow series. I have a lot of love for this novel, especially as this third entry is easily the best entry in this outstanding young adult war series. A highly recommended read and a very worthy novel to highlight in this post.
Four Ruined Realms by Mai Corland
The next entry on this list is a little different, as the Four Ruined Realms is the second book in its series. However, as the four decreases from the five in the first book, Five Broken Blades, I think that it counts as an ordinal number as it does indicate to readers where Four Ruined Realms lies in the Broken Blades series. It helps that the third book in the series, Three Shattered Souls (which I still need to read), also negatively changed number to reflect its position in the series, relative to the five in the first book. As such, I think this is an acceptable inclusion for this list, and an interesting loophole I’m happy to exploit.
The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett
Due to the name of this blog, I generally try to include one of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels on my lists, and for this Top Ten Tuesday I’m going to use The Fifth Elephant. A fun and highly entertaining fantasy crime fiction novel set out in an entertaining Transylvania parody setting, The Fifth Elephant is a good inclusion for this list as it is the fifth book in the City Watch sub-series. An excellent book that really expands the setting in some interesting directions for the rest of the Discworld series, The Fifth Elephant fits into this post perfectly, and I’m glad I could highlight Terry Pratchett’s legendary words again.
The Malevolent Eight by Sebastien de Castell
This next entry is another slightly different inclusion, as The Malevolent Eight is really the second book in a series, rather than the eighth. However, I’m including it here because The Malevolent Eight is the sequel to Sebastien de Castell’s fun, parody-titled dark fantasy novel, The Malevolent Seven, which as you can imagine brought together seven malevolent adventurers for a job. The subsequent title of The Malevolent Eight helps to showcase this book as a sequel to The Malevolent Seven, and as such I think it counts as an ordinal number and a perfect inclusion for this list. A highly recommended read as well, The Malevolent Eight is a ton of fun and I deeply enjoyed getting through it last year.
The final book that I want to include on this list is the highly entertaining legal thriller, Witness 8. A great read on its own, the eight in this title serves to refer to a malevolent witness who is manipulating the events of a trial for her own ends. However, Witness 8 also serves as the eighth book in Steve Cavanagh’s outstanding Eddie Flynn series, so it also works as an ordinal number inclusion. A very cool read whose title works on several levels, Witness 8 is an excellent novel for fans of crazy legal thrillers and the perfect book to end this post on.
As you can see, I’ve had the pleasure of reading a few cool books with ordinal numbers in their titles over the years. While I didn’t always follow the expected rules for this list, I quite like how it turned out, and I think it nicely shows off some of the unique novels that I have fun reading. I had a great time pulling this latest list together, especially as I needed to think hard about the books I wanted to feature here, and I think the results speak for themselves. Let me know what cool books you’ve enjoyed that had ordinal numbers in the title and make sure to check out some of the above awesome books when you get a chance.
The Unseen Library 