Top Ten Tuesday: Hits and Misses

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly series hosted by The Broke and The Bookish.

I think in order for this list to make more sense, I first need to list the type of books that I normally do read. I read a lot of historical fiction. I love classics and anything set from the late 18th century to like, 1950-ish. I also read a bit of fantasy, like The Chronicles of Narnia and the Harry Potter series, with bits of contemporary thrown in. I like Y/A and coming of age, too. So I'm pretty all over the place, haha! I've read books from almost every main genre and enjoyed books in each, so that makes this post a little bit hard for me to write, but I'm up for the challenge. Basically, the only genre I refuse to read is erotica. No, just no. And I don't like much of the supernatural (i.e. vampires, ghosts, werewolves) genre.

A lot of the books on this list are contemporary romances. Normally when I read romance, I like for it to be of the historical variety, but sometimes I do find exceptions.  Some of these I rather enjoyed, while others, not so much.

Books I didn't enjoy

5: An Irish Christmas by Melody Carlson

I just couldn't get through this book.

4: Miranda The Great by Eleanor Estes

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3: Confessions of a Prayer Slacker by Diane Moody

There were certain parts of this book that I liked, like when she speaks of talking to Jesus over morning coffee as if He's sitting right across the table from you, yet there are moments where I feel like the author gets a bit "in-your-face." It's not a bad book, just not one that I particularly enjoyed.

2: Sisterchicks on the Loose! by Robin Jones Gunn

I just could not get into this book. There were certain moments that I liked, but for the most part I felt like it just tried too hard.

1: The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

I feel bad about putting this one on the list, but I just couldn't get through it. I liked the parts where Noah and Allie are older, but those were the only parts that grabbed my attention.

Books I enjoyed

5: The French Twist Series by Sandra Byrd

I'll admit that this wasn't my absolute favorite thing to read, but I did enjoy the series more than I expected to. I think that can be attributed to the bits of witty humor and the lovely French setting. Bon Appetite is my favorite from the series.

4: The Heir by Kiera Cass

This is a sort of dystopian, which I enjoy in moderation if it's well written. But it also has fairytale elements, which I love. I was a bit skeptical about it in the beginning, but it turned out to be a decent read.

3: The Bronte Plot by Katherine Reay

When I first heard of this book, I thought it was going to be like a retelling of one of the Bronte novels or something to that effect. In reality, it's a fan-fiction novel, which in this case means it's a contemporary novel about a woman who loves the Bronte's and many references to their works are scattered throughout the book. Normally I wouldn't find that concept appealing, but I really enjoyed this novel. Of course, there were certain elements of this book that I didn't really care for, but the good outweighed the bad.

2: How a Star Falls by Amber Stokes

I love the whimsical aspects of this novella. And the setting... so lovely! Makes me want to go to the Pacific Northwest even more!

1: While You're Awake by Amber Stokes

I like reading contemporary romance from Amber because she doesn't try too hard. A lot of contemporary romance writers just try too hard to be funny, but Amber just lets everything flow organically and that makes for a much better read.

So there's my top ten this Tuesday. I hope you all enjoyed this post and I thank you for stopping by. Let me know in the comments if there are books you were surprised that you liked or that just didn't cut the mustard. Until next time.....

-Miranda Atchley