Top 10 Books I Read in 2017! (So far)

Welcome back to Top Ten Tuesday!! (I say, as though my blog hasn’t dropped off the face of the earth for a month.) Sorry for the unexpected hiatus – I’m almost a year into this blog and I still haven’t learned time management. Don’t worry, I’m back in full swing. Or, I will be tomorrow. I’m going to sleep and then I’ll be back.

Anyway, Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by the lovely people @ The Broke and The Bookish, and the theme this week isssssssssss: Best Books You’ve Read In 2017 So Far

The books on my list are ranked (but very roughly) from #10 to #1, with my favorite-favorite at #1! Also: not all the books were published in 2017, they just all happen to be books I read for the first time in 2017. And here they are:

10. The Heir

This is the fourth book of the Selection series and for some reason I liked this way more than the original 3 books. And I did like this better than the 5th. I would say why but I honestly can’t remember…this series is forgettable fluff at its most addicting.

Favorite quote:

“No one was more powerful than me.
So if they thought I was going down without a fight, they were sadly mistaken.”

9. Consider

I won’t spoil this book for you guys, because it’s super underappreciated and I want you all to read it, but the ending shocked me to my core. The second book in this series doesn’t come out until July and I’ve been silently freaking out about it since I finished this one in March.

Favorite quote: THIS WAS A LIBRARY BOOK AND THERE ARE NO QUOTES ON GOODREADS BUT TRUST ME THERE WERE GOOD QUOTES IN THIS BOOK

8. The Upside of Unrequited

I may be rating this a little too high since I just finished it and I’m still a lil emotionally distressed from the ending but I really liked this book! I really related to the main character and it was an easy story to slip into. It’s a cute & diverse contemporary and you can’t go wrong with that. Probably.

Favorite quote:

We might see each other every day. We might see each other once a year. Maybe it will ebb and flow and change with the decades. Maybe we’ll never pin it down. I think every relationship is actually a million relationships. I can’t decide if that’s a bad thing.

7. Throne of Glass

I was so happy that I liked this book after I finished it, since it’s the first book of one of the (if not the) most popular YA series currently. This book was really, really, good to me…with the 2nd and the 3rd being not so good. But disconnected from the other books, this deserves the #7 spot.

Favorite quote:

“Why, might I ask, are you so tired?”

She gulped down the rest of the pomegranate juice and wiped her mouth on a napkin. “I was up until four reading,”

or, you know, the ‘rattle the stars’ one. Whichever.

6. All You Need is Kill

Yeah…you can blame my sci-fi class for this one. I was expecting this book to just be a vessel for the author’s opinions on war, but it was actually an emotionally driven, surprisingly deep, and darkly comedic book that I ended up loving. Also: this is what the movie Edge of Tomorrow is based on, which is kinda one of my favorite movies.

Favorite quote:

“You shouldn’t assume everything you don’t understand is a message”

5. Finding Audrey

This book, written by Sophie Kinsella, one of my favorite authors, and featuring a protagonist living with social anxiety, was basically tailor-made to be on this list. Kinsella’s writing style mixed with a relatable main character who’s situation is familiar to me made this book instantly lovable. I couldn’t put this book down, and even though the end was a little too unlikely, I loved it all the same.

Favorite quote:

“Most people underestimate eyes. They’re infinite. You look someone straight in the eye and your whole soul can be sucked out in a nanosecond. Other people’s eyes are limitless and that’s what scares me.”

4. Heartless

It’s impossible for me not to love Marissa Meyer’s retellings. She’s just so good at them. The way she describes Wonderland and her characters is phenomenal; they fit so well with the classic Alice in Wonderland story that if someone told you Meyer stumbled across an unknown journal of Lewis Carroll’s ideas you would 100% believe them. Did that make any sense? I don’t know. I’m very tired. Please read this book.

Favorite quote:

I pictured to myself the Queen of Hearts as a sort of embodiment of ungovernable passion— a blind and aimless Fury.

Also here’s an example of the fantastic Wonderland style:

“That’s terrible. Why haven’t you fired her?”

The Duke’s eyes widened. “Fire her? For being a terrible cook? What cruelty.”

“But … she’s a cook.”

“Yes. And cook she does.” He squirmed. “Just not well.”

3. A Gathering of Shadows

Okay…so I’m not technically finished reading this yet…but I only have like 40 pages left and I know in my heart of hearts it deserves this #3 spot. This book. Is so good. The first book in this series was good too, but the characters and plot are so much better developed in this one that I get excited every time I think about it. Plus the beautiful cover doesn’t hurt.

Favorite quote:

“She’d survived magic doors and evil queens; she’d be damned if she died of catching cold.”

2. Scythe

This book was a strange one. It kinda snuck up on me; the love I felt for this fascinating futuristic world and all the diverse and wonderful characters that populate it hit me all at once. I didn’t even realize I was emotionally invested in this book until I was maybe 300 pages into it, and then suddenly I couldn’t put it down. You can see my rambling 5 star “review” here.

Favorite quote:

“My greatest wish for humanity is not for peace or comfort or joy. It is that we all still die a little inside every time we witness the death of another. For only the pain of empathy will keep us human. There’s no version of God that can help us if we ever lose that.”

 

1. The Memory Book

Okay, I have a whole review going on and on about how much I love this book here, but oh my god this book. This made me feel emotions I never knew I had. You know that scene in Pride & Prejudice (2005) where Darcy says “you have bewitched me mind and soul and I love, I love, I love you”? That’s me, but about this book. It completely enraptured me and still hasn’t let me go. You may be thinking “okay Jamie, that’s a little dramatic, jeez, take it down a notch” and you’re probably right, but this has become one of my all time favorite books.

Favorite quote:

“We have to get used to the idea that no one cares as much as us, because guess what, they don’t. Succeed, fail, whatever, no one is going to give you a pat on the back for spending all hours of the day studying, or researching, or giving up everything to write. So we’ve got to just do it for ourselves.”

---

 

Bonus! LEAST FAVORITE Book of 2017 (so far)

---

Those are my top 10 (and 1 worst) books for the first 6 months of 2017!! Do you guys agree with any of my opinions on this list? Are some of these books your favorites too? Do you hate any of these books? Let me know!