Techniques for data reads from secondary stores are described. In one embodiment, an apparatus may comprise a client front-end component of a messaging system operative to receive a messaging client update request from a client device; retrieve an up-to-date message set from a message cache component of the messaging system; and provide the up-to-date message set to the client device; and; the message cache component operative to retrieve a message set from a message store in response to the messaging client update request; determine that the message set is an out-of-date message set; retrieve a recent message update set from a message queue, the recent message update set comprising a plurality of message updates; and apply the plurality of message updates to the out-of-date message set to generate an up-to-date message set. Other embodiments are described and claimed.