Part of the fun of reading challenges for me is to discover new authors, and finally get to try books by authors that I’ve been meaning to read for a long time. I usually add a self-imposed rule to my challenges to try to avoid reading multiple books by the same author to try to encourage myself to read more variety. That went out the window a little this year when I decided I just had to finish The Lunar Chronicles, and it is definitely not a rule for 2018 where I am prioritizing series I have in-progress. I’ve found in the past that without reading challenges, I tend to stick to the same few authors who I know I’m going to like and I don’t branch out past that very much. After three years of participating in challenges, I’ve definitely learned to experiment a bit more and I’ve discovered so many great new authors.
Top 10 Tuesdays is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and The Bookish
1) Celeste Ng
I feel like I really overlooked Celeste Ng in my recent End of Year survey, considering her book was one of my favourites. I read Everything I Never Told You in mid-February after hearing so many rave reviews about it over the past couple of years, and I connected immediately with her writing style. This book was about a Chinese American family living in Ohio in the 1970s, whose teenager daughter is found dead. The book gives such a great look into the lives of the family members and their relationships, and especially their experiences with racism and sexism. I was very interested by how Celeste Ng showed the long-lasting impact of societal attitudes that the parents experienced on their children. It was a beautifully written book, and I’m looking forward to reading her next one.
2) Yaa Gyasi
I’ll admit I’m not a huge fan of literary fiction, and I was especially worried about reading Homegoing because I had it linked in my mind with The Underground Railroad, which I didn’t like. I went into this book expecting that I would find it pretty boring, and was surprised to find that it quickly became one of my favourites of the year. This book follows two branches of an African family over multiple generations. One side of the family remains in Africa, and the other moves to America. The story is told in a series of chapters that each focus on one family member and their experiences before moving on to the next person. It takes a lot of talent to be able to create so many distinctive characters who each have their own unique voice. The style took a bit of getting used to, since I sometimes did not want to leave that character’s story, but it was a very powerful book.
It still completely baffles me how much hatred the Red Queen series has amassed online. I was both looking forward to reading it because I saw so many blogs and vlogs discussing it, and nervous to try it because of all the negativity surrounding it. I do see where the book is similar to other dystopian series, although I would also argue that the tropes it uses that people complain are too common are exactly what make it fit into the genre. In any case, I absolutely loved this book and I was drawn into the story right from the start. The plot might not be the most original, but it was very well-executed and I thought the characters were very well-written. I never knew who to trust, and I did not see the ending coming at all. I am very interested in finding out what happens next.
The only thing I knew about The Forgetting Time before I picked it up is that I had seen the cover on Goodreads, and the artwork alone was enough to interest me. The main reason I decided to pick it up this year was because I discovered it was recommended by Jodi Picoult, my favourite author, which fulfilled a particularly tricky prompt for one of my reading challenges. As soon as I started reading this, I could see why she recommended it. This book reminded me so strongly of Jodi Picoult’s work, both in terms of the writing style and the subject matter. The book focuses on children who claim to remember past lives, which is a very interesting topic that I had never read about before. I could not put this book down!
Technically, I should have discovered this author two years ago. I had one of her books requested from the library for my first ever reading challenge, but they never had it. After over a year of waiting, they finally told me they couldn’t get it because it was out of print! I have no idea why it took them that long to figure it out. I chose another one of her books this year (one that I had personally seen on the library shelves, so I knew they had it!), and I really enjoyed it. The book I picked, Pretending to Dance, is about a woman who wants to adopt a baby with her husband, but they worry that her past will interfere with the adoption process. The book alternates between her present-day life, and her life as a teenager in 1990, living with a father who has MS. I thought the past storyline was very strong, but the modern-day sections were not as compelling. Even with that said, I really enjoyed the book because of the well-developed characters, and I look forward to reading more of her books.
6) Adam Silvera
This is another author that I’d been hearing a lot about, but kept putting off trying for no real reason. I finally decided to give one of his books a chance when I started planning my list for 2017, and History is All You Left Me kept jumping out at me every time I looked through my TBR list. The book is about a teenage boy named Griffin who is grieving the loss of his ex-boyfriend, Theo, and the only person who seems to understand how he feels is Theo’s current boyfriend, Jackson. This book was such a powerful portrayal of grief and guilt, and the characters really leapt off the page. The story alternates between the history of their relationship and the present, where Griffin is left to cope with the loss as well as his feelings for Theo. It was a very emotional story, and had a lot more impact than I expected.
7) Laini Taylor
As I mentioned in my End of Year Survey post the other day, I feel like I haven’t given anywhere near enough attention to Daughter of Smoke and Bone. For whatever reason, it always seems to get overlooked in favour of the other series I started this year, even though I enjoyed it just as much. This book is so beautifully written and descriptive, and I loved the world that was built. I loved how Laini Taylor took common tropes and presented them in a way that was very fresh. Karou is a fascinating main character, and I loved how we got some of Akiva’s backstory that helped show how the characters connected. I also loved the amazing cast of side characters! I’m definitely looking forward to finding out what happens next, and since I don’t say it nearly enough, I would highly recommend this book!
I feel like I have to include Dawn Kurtagich because she made me enjoy a book in a genre that is completely outside of my comfort zone. I read And the Trees Crept In, which is a very creepy YA horror story about two sisters who are living in their aunt’s house which seems to be haunted. I’m a huge coward when it comes to horror stories of any kind, and this one really creeped me out but also kept me reading! I devoured the whole thing in just two days, and the only time I could put it down was to purposely give myself time to get it off my mind before bed. I know it may seem silly to find a book aimed toward teenagers so scary, but it was so well-written. Dawn Kurtagich created such an unnerving atmosphere, and even though the ending was a little weird, I thought it worked well.
To be honest, I think I stereotyped Maggie Stiefvater’s books before I ever gave them a fair chance. I knew of her from the Shiver series, which I had never read but lumped in with Twilight and other similar paranormal romances because it dealt with werewolves. After hearing non-stop rave reviews for The Raven Boys for over a year, I finally broke down and decided to give it a fair chance…and I’m so glad that I did! This book hooked me from the first page, and quickly became one of my favourites of the year. I absolutely adored the characters in this book, and I loved the writing style even though I found the plot a little confusing at times. The style actually reminded me a bit of Harry Potter although the story is very different, and I am very interested in reading the rest of the books in 2018!
10) Victoria Schwab
This was another author that I’d been hearing a lot about but never really cared to try. Eventually, I decided that This Savage Song was a book I just had to read this year, and it ended up being another of my favourites. I thought her characters were very unique and compelling, and I loved the interactions between them. I especially appreciate how Victoria Schwab did not go the typical YA fantasy route and have the two main characters automatically fall in love by the end of the first book. I haven’t read the second one yet, so I don’t know if that changes (no spoilers, please!). I loved the world-building, especially toward the middle of the book where we got a more detailed description of how the monsters came to be. It was a little confusing at first to be thrown in to the world with no backstory, but once it was all explained, it was amazing! The sequel is definitely going to be among the first books I read this year!
Abyssal Librarian 