Tuesday Top Ten

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by the Broke and the Bookish. Book bloggers create their own lists based on the chosen topics and post links to our lists. It’s a way of all sharing our thoughts and our love of books.  And who doesn’t love lists??

So this week’s challenge was to list the top ten popular authors whose work I have not read.  It was easier than I thought it was going to be, there are just so many authors and so many books out there, even if I wanted to read them all I never could!

While these popular authors have immensely popular series, the books are really long and I haven’t been ready to make the commitment!

1. George R.R. Martin and his Song of Ice and Fire series.
2. Diana Gabaldon and her Outlander series.
3. Ken Follett and his Century trilogy

These mystery authors are popular at my library, but as much as I love a good mystery, these are authors I haven’t tackled yet!

1. Harlan Coben and his Mickey Bolitar series
2. Jeffrey Deaver and his Lincoln Rhyme series

Sorry, even though these authors are immensely popular, I just can’t do any more of the vampire thing right now…

1. J.R. Ward and her Black Dagger Brotherhood series
2. Sherrilyn Kenyon and her Dark Hunter series

And a couple of YA authors that are popular, and that I may get to eventually, but that I just haven’t had an opportunity to read yet…

1. Laini Taylor and her Daughter of Smoke & Bones series
2. Sarah Dessen

And even though she has written all kinds of books for quite a few years now, I just have never read anything by her.

1. Sophie Kinsella

Tuesday Top Ten

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by the Broke and the Bookish. Book bloggers create their own lists based on the chosen topics and post links to our lists. It’s a way of all sharing our thoughts and our love of books.  And who doesn’t love lists??

So this week’s challenge was to list the top ten worlds from books that we wouldn’t want to live in.  The first part of the list was easy, I’ve haven’t met many dystopian societies that have much to recommend them…  After that it got a little tricky since I don’t read a lot of books that take place in different worlds so I included some that take place in times/places that I wouldn’t want to live in.

1. Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins – There’s nothing good about a world that pits teenagers in a televised contest to the death.
2. Delirium series by Lauren Oliver – Love as a disease?  Not cool…
3. Divergent series by Veronica Roth – Being forced to choose a faction, serums that affect your brain, fighting, death – doesn’t sound like all that much fun to me.
4. The Giver by Lois Lowry – While things do improve some, eventually, in later books, who wants to live in a world without color, beauty, memory, emotion?
5. Burial Rites by Hannah Kent – Iceland in the early nineteenth century is brutal enough before you consider the whole beheading thing…
6. Lorien Legacies series by Pittacus Lore – Disgusting aliens shooting up everything and trying to take over the planet so they can ultimately destroy it – need I say more?
7. Lord of the Rings trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien – Lots of fighting and really repulsive creature hanging around in creepy places.
8. I Am A Man by Joe Starita – Being a Native American in this country in the nineteenth century is not something I would recommend.
9. Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra – Taking place throughout the wars in Chechnya, the brutality and poverty and fear are heartbreaking.
10. A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park – The story of one of the Lost Boys of Sudan, this heartbreaking tale brings forward this horrific war and its effect on the innocent and the children in the country.

Tuesday Top Ten

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by the Broke and the Bookish. Book bloggers create their own lists based on the chosen topics and post links to our lists. It’s a way of all sharing our thoughts and our love of books.  And who doesn’t love lists??

So this week’s challenge was to list the top ten things on our reading wish list, could be books or other bookish things.  Any books on my wish list tend to be extremely specific and hard-to-get – signed first editions and things like that.  Most of my day-to-day reading needs are served by the library and used book sales!

1. A signed first edition of The Book Thief!  No doubt about it, my #1 item on my wish list!  If I could meet Markus Zusak that would be even better!  🙂
2. A signed first edition of any of Louise Penny’s Inspector Gamache books and another author I would love to actually meet!
3. The complete collection of Louise Penny’s Inspector Gamache books – I got almost all of mine from the library to read…  😦
4. A continuation of my Indiespensables subscription (hint, hint sweetie!).  What a great way this has been to get introduced to new books and to collect beautiful signed first editions!
5. More book shelves, preferably built-in, to replace the crappy pressboard ones in my home office.
6. A special bookcase, with glass doors, for my collectible books – I need a way to keep them dust-free and displayed!
7. A really cool book-nook in my office for curling up and reading.
8. A new reading lamp for my office since mine just literally fell apart, crumbled into pieces on my floor – so weird!
9. Funding for public libraries so they can continue to serve their communities – nothing has the power to inform, educate, or inspire like the written word.  The greatest gift we can give is free access for everyone.
10. Time to Read!!!

Tuesday Top Ten

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by the Broke and the Bookish. Book bloggers create their own lists based on the chosen topics and post links to our lists. It’s a way of all sharing our thoughts and our love of books.  And who doesn’t love lists??

So this week’s challenge was to list the top ten debuts for 2014.  I wasn’t sure if that meant debut authors or just debut books, so I went with books since it’s hard enough for me to come up with my top ten list of new books for 2014 (I haven’t looked out that far into 2014!) without adding the complication of needing a debut author as well!   These are actually probably the top ten books I am looking forward to this winter since I haven’t really explored too much of what is coming out later in the year…

1. Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd – While I loved The Secret Life of Bees I admittedly never have read The Mermaid’s Chair (and even sadder, it might be in my TBR pile, but I’m not sure…), but I am not going to let this one slip by!
2. Perfect by Rachel Joyce – I adored The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Frye and am looking forward to her next book!
3. Orfeo by Richard Powers – My next Indiespensable that will be arriving this month!
4. The Museum of Extraordinary Things  by Alice Hoffman – While I have not read all of her novels, she has never disappointed me!  Her prose is always beautiful, thought-provoking, and engrossing.
5. Chestnut Street by Maeve Binchy – LOVE her books and grateful for the opportunity to read her one more time…
6. One Hundred Names by Cecelia Ahern – The concept sounds interesting, and while my enjoyment of some of her previous books has varied, I am looking forward to seeing where she takes us in her latest.
7. Dear Abigail: The Intimate Lives and Revolutionary Ideas of Abigail Adams and Her Two Remarkable Sisters by Diane Jacobs – I believe that Abigail Adams is one of the most interesting women in American history and after reading Book of Ages I am ready to re-immerse myself in this time in women’s history.
8. Fortunate Son: A Novel of the Greatest Trial in Irish History by David Marlett – This novelization of true events, combining Irish and American history, with results that still impact our judicial system today, sounds fascinating to me.
9. The Impossible Knife of Memory by Laurie Halse Anderson – Her gritty and realistic YA novels are disturbingly wonderful.
10. Landline by Rainbow Rowell – The best new-to-me author that I discovered in 2013, I thought Eleanor & Park and Fangirl were both wonderful real books for teens and I’m looking forward to seeing if she will do the same when writing adult fiction.

Tuesday Top Ten

 Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by the Broke and the Bookish. Book bloggers create their own lists based on the chosen topics and post links to our lists. It’s a way of all sharing our thoughts and our love of books.  And who doesn’t love lists??

So this week’s challenge was to list the top ten best and/or worst book series endings.  This was tough for me, because although it seems like I read a lot of series, I generally don’t have that strong of an opinion on how they end…  But I did what I could…  What series endings did you love/hate?

First, the best:

1. Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling – OK, probably everybody picked this one, but I don’t care.  The only thing disappointing about this ending was that it was the end.
2. Delirium by Lauren Oliver – I know some people were disappointed in the ending of this series, but I liked its relative realism – everything doesn’t always get wrapped up tidily!
3. Pendragon by D.J. MacHale – If you’ve never heard of this series, it’s worth checking out if you are a fan of young adult or fantasy fiction.  I enjoyed it all the way through, even to the ending.
4. Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer – In my opinion, the series got a little weak in the middle, but all the things that made me love Artemis were back for the final book!
5. The Giver by Lois Lowry – Finally!  All of our questions are answered!  I though the final book did a great job of bringing all of the other disparate stories back together and telling the story from a different point of view.
6. Chaos Walking by Patrick Ness – An engrossing series, amazing from beginning to end!

Now, the worst:

1. Twilight by Stephenie Meyer –OK, the whole series was ridiculous, but at least it was entertaining.  Unfortunately, there’s a point where it just got too ridiculous…
2. Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins – I LOVED Hunger Games – Catching Fire got there eventually – but I found Mockingjay disappointing…
3. Fallen by Lauren Kate – I liked the series when it started, but by the end I was just annoyed…
4. Infernal Devices by Cassandra Clare – I enjoyed the book, it was a fun read, but really?  Could her decisions have been any easier?  Could it all have come out any more perfectly?