Top Ten Tuesday #3: Best Books of 2016

Hello! Thank you for tuning in again, or welcome if you are new. Today is Tuesday so it's another Top Ten Tuesday and it's hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. I'll leave a link to their blog below. Today's topic is the best books I read in 2016 and I have to say a lot of these books are the same books that are on my other list as well. It's probably because I'm very hard to please when it comes to books. These books, however, are by far my favorites of the year so let's get started. Note: These are not in any particular order.

10.) To All the boys I've loved Before and P.S. I Still Love You by Jenny Han
I think I've mentioned this book three times already on this blog but it's so worth it. This book is so cute because Lara Jean is just so helpless when it comes to boys and then her little sister, Kitty, is the best side character ever. She's just so cute and then so funny to see. I love the family side of this book and I think that's why I really love this series.

9.) The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken
Some people say that this book is really slow and I have to admit that it is. But I enjoyed this book because of the characters. Not only was there a really diverse cast, but the characters actually sounded like people I could relate to. They were all so real and it was very refreshing to see. I'm currently reading the second book right now (I love the new characters) and I should have the review up soon. This book was also optioned for a movie and they made Amandla Stenberg Ruby's character. I'm so excited for that!

8.) The Wrath and the Dawn and The Rose and the Dagger by Renee Ahdieh
Yes, Renee Ahdieh is on here again but her books are so beautiful! The descriptions in these books are so good that I can imagine myself everywhere they go. I think the boys are what made me really love this book. I hate to say that because I'm far from a love sick teenager. These guys, however, they just sounded so good and then they were all some type of royalty. That is the perfect combination for me. Just look at the picture on the side of how I imagined Tariq and tell me that he is not the cutest love interest in young adult books.

7.) The Girl From Everywhere by Heidi Heilig
This book wasn't my favorite but I really enjoyed the story. I liked almost all of the characters. The only one I didn't like was the love interest because I was shipping the main character with someone else and then he came along. I really liked the world in this book, too. It was really pretty and different than other worlds I have read about. I also liked the idea of time traveling through time periods on a ship. That was a really unique idea that made the story better in my opinion.

6.) This Side of Home by Renee Watson
This book basically saved my life this year. I was so stressed out with my junior year of high school when I read this book but seeing this character face some of the same problems that I face sometimes and watching her get through it was very enlightening to see. I'm definitely going to reread this some day and I recommend it to everyone who's looking for a quick read.



5.) Cinder and Scarlet by Marissa Meyer
While I didn't enjoy Scarlet as much as Cinder, I still thought that these two books were some of the best books I read in 2016. The world that the book is set in is really cool and the characters, especially Thorne, were amazing. I'm definitely going to read the rest of the series next year.

4.) The Memory of Light by Francisco Stork
I would never have picked up this book if I hadn't won it in a giveaway but it was really good. It deals with suicide and it follows this girl getting treatment. I think this book does do a good job at showing the aftermath of someone trying to commit suicide and some of the factors that lead people to wanting to commit suicide. The main character was so real that it was easy to connect to her.

3.) The Young Elites by Marie Lu
Marie Lu is one of my favorite authors and when I read this book, I just fell in love with her stories again. Her books just play out in your head like movies but that doesn't make her writing bad. This book was about a girl who has superpowers because of a plague. But she can't really control them and there's others with powers, too. It sounds cliche but the book is really good. If you haven't already picked up any of her books, definitely do it soon. She's amazing!

2.) As I Descended by Robin Talley
This book was very interesting to read and I think I loved it because of how dark it was. It was a retelling of Macbeth (which is the only Shakespeare play I can stand) but it was set in a boarding school. A Macbeth story in boarding school, I was all on board and I'm glad to say that I wasn't disappointed. It was creepy and a quick read for me. There was a problematic trope in this book and it was the fact that most of the people of color and the LGBTQ+ people die at the end. This is very problematic in the sense that authors almost always kill off the characters that were diverse. So if that really bothers you, maybe you shouldn't pick up this book. I probably won't again, either.

1.) Exit, Pursued by a Bear by E.K. Johnston
I already wrote a review about how much I enjoyed this book but seriously, this book is a must read. Even if you don't like realistic fiction but you want to be a writer, maybe you can learn a thing or two about how to create realistic relationships between people because this book did that perfectly.







The Broke and the Bookish site:
http://www.brokeandbookish.com/p/top-ten-tuesday-other-features.html