Top Ten Tuesday: Required Reading for High School

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish. Every week a new topic is chosen, and I love answering questions so I'm going to try and post regularly. :)

Top Ten Tuesday: Book Recommendations for the Verse Novel-Averse

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish. Every week a new topic is chosen, and I love answering questions so I'm going to try and post regularly. :)

Top Ten Tuesday: Best Books I've Read This Year

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish. Every week a new topic is chosen, and I love answering questions so I'm going to try and post regularly. :)

Top Ten Tuesday: Series I Haven't Started Yet

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish. I haven't done one of these posts in years, literally! This week's topic is pretty interesting, and definitely one that I could extend way beyond ten, but let's go with the recommended amount, shall we? Feel free to kick my butt into gear.

Top Ten Tuesday (9): Ten Books I Almost Put Down But Didn't

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish. I, however, will just pick and choose which ones I want to answer because I play by my own rules. #rebel

Top Ten Book Covers I Almost Put Down But Didn't

1. Game On (#1) by Monica Seles
2. Falling Kingdoms (#1) by Morgan Rhodes
3. Cinnamon Rain by Emma Cameron
4. Born Wicked (#1) by Jessica Spotswood
5. Emerald by Karen Wallace
6. Dreams of Significant Girls by Cristina Garcia
7. Wood Angel by Erin Bow *
8. Small Blue Thing by S.C. Ransom
9. Matched (#1) by Ally Condie
10. The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

* I am extremely, extremely glad that I didn't put this book down because I would have missed out on one of my absolute favourite books ever! <3 It's a bit slow in the beginning, but it picks up and it's just beautiful.

Top Ten Tuesday (8): Covers I'd Frame as Pieces of Art

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish. I, however, will just pick and choose which ones I want to answer because I play by my own rules. #rebel

Top Ten Book Covers I'd Frame as Pieces of Art

I have over 2000 books on my Goodreads list, I gave up at 700, so really this is my "Top Ten Book Covers I'd Frame as Pieces of Art" among the 700 most currently released (or to-be released) books on my Goodreads.

Extra:

Top Ten Tuesday (7): Popular Authors I've Never Read

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish. I didn't care much for this week's TTT topic, so I looked back at previous topics and thought this one was pretty interesting. :P So here they are...

Top Ten Popular Authors I've Never Read

• Jodi Picoult
• Cassandra Clare
• Holly Black 
• Melina Marchetta
• Shannon Hale
• Victoria Schwab
• Rainbow Rowell
• Sarah Beth Durst
• Jennifer Echols
• Neil Gaiman

I think I'm most ashamed to not have read Melina Marchetta, because she's an Australian YA author! A really popular Australian YA author. And I. Have. Not. Read. A. Single. Book. Of. Hers. I do have plans to tackle a few of these authors' works this year, such as Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell, Vessel by Sarah Beth Durst, On the Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta and The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman--all titles which I already own.

Top Ten Tuesday (6): Favourite Books in 2013

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish.

Top Ten Books Read of 2013

• Beth Revis - Shades of Earth
• Best series ender of 2013
• Betty Smith - A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
• Favourite classic
• Leigh Bardugo - Shadow and Bone
• Favourite fantasy
• Ruta Sepetys - Out of the Easy
• Favourite historical fiction
• Suzanne Collins - Catching Fire
• Best instalment in a series
• Rick Yancey - The 5th Wave
• Favourite dystopian/Most surprising
• Truman Capote - Breakfast at Tiffany's
• Favourite New Yorker
• Sarah J. Maas - Crown of Midnight
• Best couple
• Markus Zusak - The Book Thief
• Most intense read
• Huntley Fitzpatrick - My Life Next Door
• Favourite contemporary fiction/gave me the warmest fuzzies

Honourable mentions: Kristen-Paige Madonia - Fingerprints of You, Emily Gale - Steal My Sunshine, Gayle Forman - Just One Day, Allyse Near - Fairytales for Wilde Girls and Sophie Flack - Bunheads

Source: ♥

 

Top Ten Tu...Saturday (5): Books that scare me

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish.

It's not even Tuesday...and this is actually last week's topic, but I really really wanted to take part in this, add in my little list and send it off to the world. Ten is barely anything, but here's the top most freakishly long or ambitious or old or over-hyped or all the above titles that equate to my feeling the intimidated feelings. Mostly classics--big surprise there, am I right?

Top Ten Most Intimidating Books

• Margaret Mitchell - Gone with the Wind
• It's such a highly-revered American classic, plus it's massive!
• George R.R. Martin - A Game of Thrones
• Length, hype, epic.
• Thomas Hardy - Tess of the D'Urbervilles
• I had to read this for high school and only made it half-way. It was such a chore but now that I don't have to write an essay or overanalyse it I want to try it again (because people seem to like Hardy) but... memories.
• Victor Hugo - Les Misérables
•  It's lengthy, it's "intellectual", or at least highly descriptive and political and about the French Revolution of which I have a very limited knowledge base.
• Leo Tolstoy - Anna Karenina
• Again, length. And I just want so badly to love it, but there are so many characters and I worry that it's going to lose me within the first 50 pages!
• Any Stephen King novel
• Surprisingly there are some titles of his that have gained my interest. 11/22/63, The Stand, Under the Dome... Ultimately I worry that I won't connect with his writing the way that lots of people seem to do.
• Vladimir Nabokov - Lolita
• The subject content intimidates me quite a bit. But it also scares me just so fascinated I have become towards this title. Like, I really want to read this.
• Emily Brontë - Wuthering Heights
• It's like a forbidden star-crossed love gone wrong, right? I'm scared to read any Bronte to be honest, but this one...this one.
• Any Charles Dickens other than A Christmas Carol
• Loved A Christmas Carol. But Dickens is so horridly verbose... I want to read all of his novels eventually but I can't deny how intimidating the task is!
• J.R.R. Tolkien - The Lord of the Rings series + The Hobbit
•  Well, I fell asleep in the first ten minutes of the first movie (I know, it's sacrilege), so there's that. I won a box set a while back, I just have to muster the gusto to pick them up.

And because I'm incredibly lazy (and it's quite late as I type this) I won't leave Goodreads links. Because you all know these titles. You have to be illiterate to not know them, right? (Or at least not a reader, and then I would have to pose the question What are you doing here? Get yo' gluteus outta here!)


Hoo boy. I'm going to have nightmares tonight... the books are going to attack me!

Top Ten Tuesday (4): Authors on my Auto-Buy List

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish.

This week has another really interesting topic that I couldn't pass up on. I have a bit more than 10 authors on my auto-buy list... I feel like I'm just repeating the same authors over again and again and again. But I love their books so much.

Top Ten Authors on my Auto-Buy List

Gayle Forman [contemp] ~ If I Stay was one of my first YA reads. I've re-read IIS and WSW twice and once, respectively. I devoured Just One Day, stopping every now and then to grab a tissue.
 
Stephanie Perkins [contemp] ~ Obviously. So I didn't buy any of her books (perks of being a reviewer, I suppose), but that doesn't mean I wouldn't rush to preorder something of hers. Her debut, Anna and the French Kiss, is lovely-sweet and has even won the hearts of many non-contemp fans.

Holly Cupala [contemp] ~ In 2010 I was really involved in her debut's (Tell Me A Secret) e-launch event. I was lucky enough to win her book and I fell in love. TMAS was the first rave review I've written. Don't Breathe A Word . . . It. Was. So. Good.

Tara Kelly [contemp - music] ~ Harmonic Feedback was slick with musical terminology, with characters flawed but relatable. A sterling debut contemp novel. Amplified was so enjoyable. The romance is adorable! Cannot wait for the companion to Amplified.

A.S. King [contemp] ~ Her writing style is unconventional, her characters well-defined and realistic. I adore King. She's one of my best examples of an auto-buy author. I barely read the synopses of her books before I hand over the money.

Ruta Sepetys [historical] ~ Between Shades of Gray broke me. Already have Out of the Easy pre-ordered. I'll be tearing into it as soon as it arrives. Heard a lot of great things already!

Veronica Roth [dystopia] ~ Divergent astonished me. It was like nothing I'd ever read and I read it in practically one sitting. I quite enjoyed Insurgent--not as much as the first, granted, but the ending has really gotten me stoked for the third book!

Beth Revis [dyst./sci] ~ Frexity frex. This series. I'm still recovering. Still need to write my review for Shades of Earth, which I've consciously been avoiding because it'll be like saying goodbye to the trilogy.

Sarah J. Maas [fantasy] ~ I really loved her novellas and Throne of Glass was just amazing. This lovely gal is a sucker for fairytales, meaning we'll be seeing fairytale-retellings from her. Which is exciting. Yay!

Kristin Cashore [fantasy] ~ I don't need to say anything. I'm still waiting on the US pb release for Bitterblue (they must match!).


Also have to mention . . .

• Lauren Oliver (all her books have come for review so far...)
• Zoe Marriott (loved Shadows on the Moon! But still haven't gotten her other books.)
• Kirsten Hubbard (Wanderlove was one of my favourites of 2011. I'm antsy for her next release! Like Mandarin was also really good.)
• Laura Buzo (Aussie author! Her stories are poignant and intricately woven together. Her debut is now out in the US: Love and Other Perishable Items.)
• Erin Bow (Plain Kate/Wood Angel, simply unforgettable. Her second novel, Sorrow's Knot, comes out later this year!)
• John Green (still haven't gotten all his books since TFiOS but I certainly want to, and I'll probably preorder any of his future books)

Top Ten Tuesday (3): Authors in Contemporary YA

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish.

I only ever participate in these when I find the topic really interesting. This week's topic is "Top 10 favorite authors in X genre". I've chosen Contemporary YA, since it's the genre I feel I know the most. I included the books that I have read by each author (in the contemp YA genre), with links to my reviews. All these authors listed in the top ten are on my auto-buy list.

Top Ten Favourite Authors in Contemp YA
(in no particular order)

1. Holly Cupala [Tell Me a Secret & Don't Breathe a Word]
2. A.S. King [Please Ignore Vera Dietz, among others]
3. Kirsten Hubbard [Like Mandarin & Wanderlove]
4. Jay Asher [Thirteen Reasons Why]
5. Stephanie Perkins [Anna and the French Kiss & Lola and the Boy Next Door]
6. Hannah Harrington [Saving June & Speechless]
7. Laura Buzo [Good Oil & Holier Than Thou]
8. Tara Kelly [Harmonic Feedback & Amplified]
9. Jandy Nelson [The Sky is Everywhere]
10. Gayle Forman [If I Stay & Where She Went]

There is also John Green (The Fault in Our Stars), Lauren Oliver (Before I Fall) and Natalie Standiford (How to Say Goodbye in Robot) that I just have to mention.

  Now how about you? 

Top Ten Tuesday (2): My list of shame

Whoa, what's going on? This is my second post in a week? Yeah, yeah, I'm a terribly lazy blogger. Whenever I think about all the books I still have to review I get all depressed. I swear that one of these days I'll catch up... but in the meantime, I thought this week's Top Ten Tuesday topic was interesting, so here we go!

Top Ten Series I Haven't Finished

1. The Seven Kingdoms trilogy by Kristin Cashore
   I'm just waiting for the US paperback release for Bitterblue. This is one of my favourite series ever! This shouldn't even really be on my list, since the reason for my having not finished the series is out of my control...
   
2. The Morganville Vampire series by Rachel CaineI enjoyed the first book, Glass House. It's just that there are so many books in the series that it's really discouraging me to keep reading...
   
3. Pretty Little Liars series by Sara ShephardLoved the first four books. By the time I made it to Book #6 (Killer), there were announcements that there was going to be more in the series, and I just called it quits. I thought it ended pretty well with #4 (Unbelievable) and in my heart that's how it ended.
   
4. Uglies series by Scott WesterfeldI just haven't gotten around to grabbing Pretties to continue the series. I think I'm still "saving up" for the box set.
   
   
5. Bad Girls Don't Die trilogy by Katie AlenderThe first book was pretty good. I just haven't gotten around to grabbing book #2 to read.
   
6. The Poison Diaries by Maryrose WoodI loved the first book and I have the second (Nightshade). I don't even know why I haven't read it yet, but there you go.
   
7. Stork series by Wendy DelsolThe uniqueness of this book blew me away, and I liked the main character enough. I just read a lot of discouraging reviews for #2 (Frost) so while I do own a copy I haven't picked it up.
   
   
8. Matched trilogy by Ally CondieMatched grew on me after I stepped back and thought about it. I got a review copy for #2 (Crossed) but I just haven't picked it up.
   
9. Prophecy of the Sisters trilogy by Michelle ZinkBook #1 was phenomenal. I have book #2 (Guardian of the Gate) on my shelves, just haven't picked it up. My justification is that I'm waiting for the paperback release of #3 (Circle of Fire).
   
10. Harry Potter series by J.K. RowlingBut I'm on the case! My Project Harry Potter is still alive! I'm up to #4 (...Goblet of Fire) at the moment, but before I gave up the first time around I made it to #5 (...Order of the Phoenix).

Now how about you, my dear readers? I find the reasons behind my not having finished certain series really interesting. I also didn't mention any that I have absolutely no desire to continue--an example is the Embrace series by Jessica Shirvington. Just not for me.

Top 10 Tuesday (1) & Where She Went Cover Reveal!!

 This is the first time I'm doing this, but since the topic this week is interesting, I'll take a crack at it. :) There may be some *gasping* on your part as I uncover the BIG titles that I haven't even taken a peek at. So anyway this meme for this week is Books I Can't Believe I've Never Read! Let's begin, shall we?

1. The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins
2. Any of the Penguin Five (The Replacement, Sapphique, The Eternal Ones, Nightshade and Matched)
3. The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare
4. The Darkest Powers series by Kelley Armstrong
5. Anything by Sarah Dessen - So give me a helping hand and send me some YA chick-lit! :P
6. Anything by Shannon Hale - Though, I have most of her books over with my book fairy in the US. This preposterous disposition will be absolved by the end of the year, I promise!
7. Lisa Schroeder's verse novels - 'nuff said.
8. The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han
9. Millennium series by Stieg Larsson
10. Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer - Okay, this is only half true. I read like half of Twilight but gave up on it. Won't go there, please don't unfollow me. Respect my opinions... I'm just not a vampire person. Which is why I've been reviewing pretty much only contemporary novels.

ALSO, news on Where She Went, the sequel to Gayle Forman's If I Stay... The cover is revealed! [link] Also, here's what Gayle had to say about the unexpected unveiling... (Twitter)

What do you think about the cover for the sequel? I have the hardcover edition, so I'm hoping there will be another cover for the hardcover up soon! This one seems to be a good companion for the paperback, and IMO it's super pretty!