Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.
This is such a fun topic for this week’s Top Ten Tuesday! I probably could have made a list of ten books I felt very positively or negatively about, but I’ve tried to mix it up a bit. Some of the emotions come from the content, others from…well, the quality, but it was fun going through what I’d read and picking these out.
Top Ten Books I Had VERY Strong Emotions About
The Furies: Women, Vengeance, and Justice by Elizabeth Flock
Genre: Non-Fiction – True Crime
Age: Adult
Format: ebook
Published: January 9th, 2024
Review
It would be difficult to read this and not have it elicit some strong emotion. Anger, frustration, sadness. These women’s stories are all dealt with in a way that presents the facts, both good and bad, and it’s still easy to see how they were treated poorly, unfairly or even experienced horror because of their gender. Whether it’s Brittany Smith unable to use the Stand-Your-Ground defence, Angoori Dahariya who started a gang to protect and see justice for her community, or fight Cicek Mustafa Zibo who battled against ISIS, there’s no way of coming out of this without feeling something deeply for these women and their circumstances.
Saga, Volume 9 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples
Genre: Sci-Fi
Age: Adult
Format: Paperback
Published: September 26th, 2019
Review
This one hurt, a lot, and made me cry, and once you get to Volume 9 of a series you’ve formed such deep connections with the characters…the ending of this had me sitting there for a long while just stunned. But this series has its claws in me and I will carry on with it. Eventually.
An Improbable Season by Rosalyn Eves
Genre: Romance – Historical (Regency)
Age: Young Adult
Format: ebook
Published: April 25th, 2023
Review
I found this book incredibly frustrating. The characters are really two-dimensional, and it feels like it’s trying to cram too much in with such a short space. It left me feeling like Regency doesn’t translate all that well to YA, for multiple reasons.
Confessions of a Forty-Something F**k Up by Alexandra Potter
Genre: Contemporary – Comedy
Age: Adult
Format: Paperback
Published: December 31st, 2020
Review
This book gave me so much joy! And at the points where I wasn’t laughing, I was tearing up, if not outright crying. I found this to be a wonderfully written, incredibly relatable book, which balances humour with a sincere outlook that leaves you feeling all warm and fuzzy inside.
A Curse of Blood and Wolves by Melissa McTernan
Genre: Paranormal Romance
Age: Adult
Format: ebook
Published: April 11th, 2024
Review
A steamy Red Riding Hood retelling shouldn’t be as disappointing as this was. It wasn’t quite bad enough to give 1 star, but it felt overall quite lacklustre, and unfortunately read more as a “jumping on the bandwagon” book that something written more organically.
A Terrible Kindness by Jo Browning Wroe
Genre: Historical
Age: Adult
Format: ebook
Published: January 20th, 2022
Review
There is so much that can be said and explored around the terrible, preventable Aberfan tragedy, an event that still has ramifications on the community and on Wales today; if you live in Wales, it’s one of those ‘never to be forgotten’ events. Wroe turns it into a backdrop for a selfish, self-centred Englishman who never seems to think beyond his own life. It uses Aberfan as a marketing tool, and left an incredibly bad taste in my mouth.
Genre: Romance – Historical (Regency)
Age: Adult
Format: Paperback
Published: January 5th, 2000
Review
Although I am loving the TV series Bridgerton, and it does make me want to pick up the other books in this series, I’m still waiting for my anger over this one to subside. I think it’s heightened by the fact I really, really enjoyed the first 2/3s of the book, but once Daphne and Simon married things got bad. They were so incredibly toxic to each other, to the point it reads very familiar to those who have been in toxic and/or abusive relationships. I get the impression the series does get better, so I might pick up Book 2 somewhere down the line.
The Foxglove King by Hannah F. Whitten
Genre: Fantasy
Age: Adult
Format: ebook
Published: March 7th, 2023
Review
I loved every second of this book – it really hit so many of my reading sweet spots, and had me totally engrossed throughout. It’s not a book that screams joy, but it gave me a lot of joy, and that’s what really matters.
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
Genre: Fantasy
Age: Adult
Format: ebook
Published: August 23rd, 2022
Review
This book was beautiful! It really taps into the warm and fuzzies, but gives just enough tension to draw you all the way through. This story of found family and community was absolutely perfect, 10/10, no notes. I think even with all I’ve read between this and now, this is still one of the firm favourites.
The Queen of the Tearling by Erika Johansen
Genre: Fantasy
Age: Young Adult
Format: Paperback
Published: July 8th, 2014
Review
I could have also included Twilight for similar but different reasons, but I went with this one. When I spotted this particular book in a charity shop, I got pretty excited – I remembered there being some hype around it, and I’d heard good things. So I read it. And I…couldn’t stand it. Honestly, the whole book was such a convoluted mess that ultimately didn’t make sense. At one point there was going to be a film with none other than Emma Watson, but thankfully it didn’t come to pass. I say thankfully because as well as this book just being poor, the writing isn’t very good, and there’s a lot of “not like other girls” going on along with heavy doses of fatphobia. If I’d picked this up now, it would have been a DNF early on.
Something I love about reading – everyone has such varied tastes. Sometimes a book I’ve loved seems to be disliked by almost everyone else, or a book I couldn’t stand turns out to have a big fanbase, and it’s great, really, to know even if some books aren’t for me, there’s still a home for them elsewhere in the world. Sometimes. Are there any books here you’ve read, did they make you feel similar or different? What about the books that gave you strong emotions?
Unwrapping Words 
Great list! Reading what you wrote about the first Bridgerton book makes me glad that I decided not to read it cos just hearing about what happened makes my blood boil and it’s also the reason why I’ve never watched the series. 🫣 Also, I felt the same about Irregular Witches and Saga! I loved both books so so so much!
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It’s a shame because the series is actually really great? Although as much as I enjoyed the first series I do think the second and now the third are a lot, lot better and dump the more toxic traits from the first.
And yes to Irregular Witches and Saga, so excellent!
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