Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers share their own bookish top ten lists based on the topic of the week.  You can check out Ten Tuesdays here.

Top Ten Books To Read If You Like…

I really had to think about this one!  I thought it would be fun (and maybe a little easier) to come up with 10 different books/authors, because I had a few pairings that immediately came to mind when I saw the topic!  And it’s also fun to give under-the-radar recommendations for popular/well-known books and authors!

1. If You Like Eleanor And Park by Rainbow Rowell, read like How To Say Goodbye In Robot by Natalie Standiford.  How To Say Goodbye In Robot is everything I wanted Eleanor And Park to be, but I think there’s a similar feel to both books.
2. If you like Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, you will like Some Boys Are by Patty Blount.  Both deal with the same topic (rape), but Some Boys is much more about rape culture than Speak is.  Some Boys is a really good read-alike, though.
3. If you like Toni Morrison, read Nnedi Okorafor.  I’ve only read a couple of Okorafor’s books, while I’ve read a few of Morrison’s books.  But I also think they have very distinct voices and stories they want to tell, which is why I think Okorafor is a good read-alike for Morrison.
4. If you like Tiny Pretty Things by Sona Charaipotra and Dhonielle Clayton, read Taking Flight by Michaela DePrince.  Even though Tiny Pretty Things is fiction, and Taking Flight is a memoir, both highlight the world of ballet, particularly if you aren’t white.
5. If you like The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot, read Does My Head Look Big In This? by Randa Abdel-Fattah.  Amal’s voice really reminded me of Mia’s, which makes it a great book for fans of the princess diaries.
6. If you like Shrek, read The School For Good And Evil by Soman Chainani.  I know Shrek is a movie, but The School For Good And Evil is such a good read-alike for it that I couldn’t help but include it.
7. If you like Downtown Abbey, read Manor Of Secrets by Katherine Longshore.  There may be better read-alikes out there, but I was really reminded of Downtown Abbey when reading it.
8. If you like anything by Ellen Hopkins (particularly Identical), read Drowning Instinct by Ilsa Bick.  I can’t place why Drowning Instinct is such a good read-alike for Hopkins, but I think it’s the way they handle really dark stuff.  There’s also the fact that Drowning Instinct and anything Hopkins writes translate well to audio book (for me).
9. If you like Half-Blood by Jennifer Armentrout or Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead, read Whirl by Emma Raveling.  There is something about these three books that remind me of the others- I think it’s the main characters who are similar to me.
10. If you like An Ember In The Ashes by Sabaa Tahir, read Ink And Bone by Rachel Caine.  There is something about these two worlds and how much control the Empire (for Ember) and the Library (for Ink And Bone) have that make them a great pairing.

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers share their own bookish top ten lists based on the topic of the week.  You can check out Ten Tuesdays here.

Top Ten Books I Want To Read This Fall

It’s fall, which is weird, because I don’t associate the high 80’s/low 90’s with fall, even though that’s sort of normal for where I live.  But if I’m going to sit in a nice air-conditioned house with just enough energy to sit around and do nothing but read, these are the books I want to read!

1. The Iron Warrior by Julie Kagawa.  I want to read this so much, especially with how the last book ended.
2. Winter by Marissa Meyer.  I’ve been excited about this book for ages, and I need to know how it’s going to end. Especially after reading Fairest.
3. House Of Leaves by Mark Danielewski.  I’ve wanted to read House Of Leaves for a while, and fall seems to be the perfect time of year to read it.
4. Packing For Mars by Mary Roach.  I’m listening to The Martian right now, and it really makes me want to pick up Packing For Mars.
5. The Heart Of Betrayal by Mary Pearson.  Why I have not read this?  I need to know what happens.  And The Kiss Of Deception is awesome, so this is something I need to read this fall.
6. Positive by Paige Rowl.  This memoir about a girl born with HIV looks fascinating.
7. Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix.  It’s a mystery set in an IKEA-type store, and the print version apparently is designed to look like a catalog.
8. Among The Janeites by Deborah Yaffe.  This looks like a totally awesome book about the Jane Austen fandom.
9. Six Of Crows by Leigh Bardugo.  It’s a series set in the same world as the Grisha series, and I can’t wait to read it!
10. Welcome To Night Vale!  I am so excited that the book is almost here, and I’m totally going for the audio book, because it’s narrated by Cecil, and you can’t go wrong with that!  Also, if you’re not listening to Welcome To Night Vale, you should be.  It’s delightful!

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers share their own bookish top ten lists based on the topic of the week.  You can check out Ten Tuesdays here.

Top Ten Series I Have YET To Finish

This week is all about series I haven’t finished.  It was harder than I expected, because I had the hardest time remembering what series I have and haven’t finished.  At one point, I had a spreadsheet going of series I’ve finished and how far along I was in the unfinished series, but I can’t remember the last time I actually updated it.  Still, I managed to come up with 10 series that I really want to finish (but haven’t).

1. Queen of Hearts by Colleen Oakes.  Mostly because there’s no information on the next book, which makes it hard to finish the series.  I hope it comes out soon, because I really want to know what happens.  It’s such a cool re-telling of Alice In Wonderland.
2. Angels’ Blood by Nalini Singh.  I really liked the first one, but I haven’t picked up any of the other books.  It’s a long series, so it will be a while before I finish it.
3. The Atman City series by Michelle Reed.  I’ve read the first couple and really liked them, but kind of forgot about the series until I was working on this post.  I definitely like it enough to read the next book once it comes out.
4. The Remnant Chronicles by Mary Pearson.  I have The Heart Of Betrayal, which I have yet to read, but I am excited to read it, because I really like this series.
5. The Naturals by Jennifer Lynn Barnes.  I really need to see when the 3rd book is coming out, because I’ve really liked this series.
6. Splintered by A.G. Howard.  Mostly because of the covers but also because it’s a really cool take on Alice In Wonderland.
7. The Tudor Witch Trilogy by Victoria Lamb.  I really liked the first two books, and now I just need to read the last one.  It’s great combination of the paranormal and historical fiction.
8. Cinder by Marissa Meyer.  I am so excited about Winter, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
9. The Queen Of The Tearling by Erika Johansen.  I liked this one, and I’m curious to see where things go.  It’s a fantasy with a post-apocalyptic feel, and I really need to know what happened to make the world change so much.
10. Shadow Study by Maria V. Snyder.  I am so glad there’s another series about Yelena and Valek, and I feel like I’m catching up with old friends.  I can’t wait to see what happens next.
11. Fruits Basket.  I keep saying I am  going to finish, but I never do.  One of these days, I will.

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers share their own bookish top ten lists based on the topic of the week.  You can check out Ten Tuesdays here.

Top Ten Characters I Didn’t Click With

Or as I like to call it, 10 characters that it was hard to care about.  Sometimes, not clicking with characters (or liking them/caring about) make it hard to like a book.  While it is my overall preference to have characters I like and connect with, it’s not super-necessary.  Still, here are ten characters I didn’t completely connect with.

1. Hailey from The Education Of Hailey Kendrick.  I can relate to wanting to be perfect, but there was also something about Hailey that I couldn’t completely connect.
2. Eadlyn from The Heir by Kiera Cass.  It was so hard to care about Eadlyn- it won’t stop me from reading the rest of the series, and I hope she grows up a little, because I think she has a lot of potential.
3. Delilah from Fixing Delilah by Sarah Ockler.  I don’t have a particular reason for not clicking her, other than the very vague not completely caring reason.
4. Liz from Falling Into Place by Amy Zhang.  I think it was the jumping around in the timeline element of the book that made it hard to completely connect with her.  I felt for her, and I can empathize, but I didn’t completely connect, if that makes any sense.
5. Sam from Dear Mr Knightley by Katherine Reay.  I think in some ways, Sam and I are similar, and I think that’s why I had a hard time clicking with her…because I could see myself, to a small degree, being like what I didn’t like about her.
6. Justine from You Look Different In Real Life by Jennifer Castle.  Her story, of the 5 kids we see in the book, was the least interesting, and in comparison to the other characters, she had the least amount of stuff going on. It was hard to click with someone who I didn’t particularly interesting.
7. Bee from Beholding Bee by Kimberly Newton Fusco.  I had a hard time clicking with her because she seemed a lot younger then I expected and wanted her to be.  There are a lot of things I like about her, but the connection wasn’t completely there.
8. Nell from We Are The Goldens by Dana Reinhardt.  Nell seemed really whiny and unable to go through life without her sister.  I had a hard time connecting with her because of it.
9. Taylor from Counting Backwards by Laura Lascarso.  I think the big reason why I didn’t click with Taylor is because I felt like we didn’t see enough of her life before she was admitted to a psychiatric hospital.
10. Kiri from Wild Awake by Hilary T. Smith.  Kiri was too scattered and all over the place for my liking.

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers share their own bookish top ten lists based on the topic of the week.  You can check out Ten Tuesdays here.

Top Ten Books On My Classic YA Lit 101 Syllabus

I love this topic!  I could focus on one genre, but where’s the fun in that?  Not so fun, though, was trying to keep the list relatively short, because there are so many books I could go with.  And I may have expanded the definition of classic to include books that I think should be YA classics…a lot of them are relatively recent, but it’s so hard to picture YA without them!

1. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson.  This book is the first one I thought of, and while any book by Anderson would do well, I think if I had to pick one, it would be Speak.  Wintergirls and The Impossible Knife Of Memory would be be other two choices if I had time to do more than one Anderson book.
2. Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.  This is the book that got me into YA, and it did make dystopic novels huge.
3. Twilight by Stephanie Meyer.  This is a huge YA book (denying that would be weird, in my opinion) and it’s hard to deny its impact.
4. Harry Potter.  You can’t have a class on classic YA without Harry Potter on the syllabus!
5. A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L’Engle.  Meg is such an awesome character, and there’s adventure and mystery and it’s so full of awesome, and how could you not have it on a classic YA syllabus?
6. Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein.  The way the story is told would make for interesting discussion, and it’s loved by a lot of people (like the rest of the list) but it’s classic YA historical fiction.
7. The Giver by Lois Lowry.  It’s a classic YA dystopia.  It was dystopia before it was cool.  And I can’t imagine YA without this book.
8. Between Shades Of Grey by Ruta Sepetys.  I loved Lia’s story, and even though it’s come out in the last few years, it’s a classic story of overcoming some horrible circumstances.
9. Ash by Malinda Lo.  This is a totally awesome re-telling of Cinderella, and so deserving of being called a classic.
10. Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell.  It’s such a good coming-of-age story centering around a life-changing book, and I really think

Honorable Mentions: The Book Thief (couldn’t finish it, but I also had Code Name Verity & Between Shades Of Grey on my list and didn’t want a ton of WWII-era books), If I Stay and The Fault In Our Stars (there were too many other books that I’d rather have on the list), Meg Cabot (Princess Diaries are totally awesome) and Sarah Dessen (I haven’t read her, but I know a lot of have read her and love her books, which is why she’s close to being on the list, but not quite there)

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers share their own bookish top ten lists based on the topic of the week.  You can check out Ten Tuesdays here.

Top Ten Authors I Have On Auto-Buy

This was a topic originally done back in 2013, so it’s really fun to re-visit it as a topic!  I definitely had that post up, because I didn’t want to repeat anyone on that list.  The people on that list are still totally on my auto-buy list though. And I love having authors that are so awesome I will read anything they write, and not have to think about whether I’d read it!

1. Nnedi Okorafor.  I loved Akata Witch, to the point that I will buy her books, no matter what it is.
2. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.  I’ve only read Purple Hibiscus, but after that book, I will buy everything she’s ever written, and anything she writes in the future.
3. I.W. Gregorio.  If her future books are anywhere near as good as None Of The Above, it won’t matter what it’s about, because I will buy it.
4. Gail Carriger.  Her books are so much fun, and I know anything she writes will be hilariously awesome.
5. Anne Blankman.  After reading her Prisoner Of Night And Fog books, I’m looking forward to reading her other books!
6. Kasie West.  I loved On The Fence, and I’d totally read everything she writes, no matter what it’s about!
7. Stephanie Perkins.  She can do no wrong.  Her books are completely awesome.
8. Mary Roach.  She makes science so much fun.  I’m not the biggest fan of listening to non-fiction, but I really like listening to her books.
9. Robin Talley.  I loved Lies We Tell Ourselves, which earned her place on my auto-buy list.
10. Ruta Sepetys.  Between Shades Of Grey and Out Of The Easy were so amazing, which is why she’s an auto-buy!

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers share their own bookish top ten lists based on the topic of the week.  You can check out Ten Tuesdays here.

Top Ten Authors I’ve Read The Most

This is a fun list to work on!  It’s probably really similar to the list we did about the authors that we own the most books from, but I’m way too lazy to actually go back and check that list.  I really don’t stick with any one author as much as I thought. Either that, or a lot of the authors have only a handful of books, and not enough to make the list.

1. Rachel Caine with 28 books.  Weather Wardens, Outcast Season and the Morganville Vampire series are all awesome.
2. Natsuki Takaya with 15 books.  Fruits Basket is awesome, and I really hope I can finish it.
3. Julie Kagawa with 13 books.  I love her.  I really do.  Especially the Iron Fey.
4. Alison Weir with 12 books.  If she writes it, I will read it.  She makes Tudor history fun.
5. Sara Shepard with 10 books.  Only because I couldn’t keep reading the Pretty Little Liars series.  The t.v. show is addictive though.
6. Maria V Snyder with 10 books.  I am so glad she has a new series about Yelena and Valek.
7. Gail Carriger with 9 books.  She writes the most fun steampunk books ever.
8. JK Rowling with 8 books.  Harry Potter is awesome, and I really like the Casual Vacancy.  Now I just need to read the Robert Galbraith books.
9. Meg Cabot with 7 books.  I’ve read an assortment of Meg Cabot books, and I really should keep reading the Princess Diaries books just to see how it all turns out for Mia.
10. Rachel Vincent with 7 books.  I really liked her Soul Screamers series.  You don’t see banshees often in paranormal books.
11. Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl with 7 books.  Beautiful Creatures was a great series, and I really like Dangerous Creatures.