Thursday, February 14, 2019

Discussion: The 15 Best Books I've Read In The Past 5 Years

The Discussion Challenge is hosted by Feed Your Fiction Addiction & It Starts At Midnight.



Have you ever looked back at your old Goodreads ratings and said, “WHY in the world did I give THAT rating to THAT book?” I have. As I looked back at my Goodreads ratings from 2014-2018, I noticed that there are a few 5-star books that I barely remember. I must have loved them if I rated them that highly, but they’ve sank into the bookish murk at the bottom of my brain. I only remember vague details.

On the other hand, there are some 3-star and 4-star books that have stuck with me. They may not be perfect, but they didn’t end up in the murk. They have staying power. I find myself thinking about them often and comparing other books to them.

I’m too lazy to go back and change old Goodreads ratings. Instead, I thought I’d examine all of my ratings from 2014-2018 and choose my 15 favorite books. This was a brutal task because I reviewed 487 books during that time period. The books on this list may not have gotten 5 stars from me, but they’re firmly lodged in my brain meat.




The 15 Best Books From The Past 5 Years





The Book Thief by Markus Zusak


It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will be busier still.

By her brother's graveside, Liesel's life is changed when she picks up a single object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger's Handbook, left behind there by accident, and it is her first act of book thievery. So begins a love affair with books and words, as Liesel, with the help of her accordion-playing foster father, learns to read. Soon she is stealing books from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor's wife's library, wherever there are books to be found.

But these are dangerous times. When Liesel's foster family hides a Jew in their basement, Liesel's world is both opened up, and closed down.


Why I love it: I’ve lost track of how many pages I’ve written about this book. A chunk of my graduate school experience was devoted to it. I’m pretty sure that I crammed so many sticky notes into my copy that it doubled the book’s weight. I love the nonlinear structure and the odd writing style. No matter how many times I read this one, I don’t get sick of it.








Battle Royale by Koushun Takami


Koushun Takami's notorious high-octane thriller is based on an irresistible premise: a class of junior high school students is taken to a deserted island where, as part of a ruthless authoritarian program, they are provided arms and forced to kill one another until only one survivor is left standing.





Why I love it: I read it shortly after finishing a college class with an extremely opinionated professor. She hated genre fiction. Real artists write literary fiction. Reading anything else is a waste of time. I went through a phase where I only read books that college professors like. Then I picked up Battle Royale because it had been on my shelf for too long. I loved it! It’s over-the-top violent, full of underdeveloped characters, and the Japanese-to-English translations confused me a few times. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Until I picked up this book, I hadn’t realized that one professor had briefly murdered my love of reading. Read whatever you want, no matter how trashy it is.








The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood


It opens with these simple, resonant words: "Ten days after the war ended, my sister drove a car off the bridge." They are spoken by Iris, whose terse account of her sister Laura's death in 1945 is followed by an inquest report proclaiming the death accidental. But just as the reader expects to settle into Laura's story, Atwood introduces a novel-within-a-novel. Entitled The Blind Assassin, it is a science fiction story told by two unnamed lovers who meet in dingy backstreet rooms. When we return to Iris, it is through a 1947 newspaper article announcing the discovery of a sailboat carrying the dead body of her husband, a distinguished industrialist.


Why I love it: According to academic types, this is one of Atwood’s weaker novels. I disagree. I like the bizarre (and sometimes jarring) mix of sci-fi and historical fiction. This is one of those rare books that hooked me from the first chapter. I wanted to know why the narrator’s sister drove a car off a bridge. What was she hiding? What did her death have to do with a science fiction story?








Different Seasons by Stephen King


This gripping collection begins with "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption," in which an unjustly imprisoned convict seeks a strange and startling revenge—the basis for the Best Picture Academy Award-nominee The Shawshank Redemption. Next is "Apt Pupil," the inspiration for the film of the same name about top high school student, Todd Bowden, and his obsession with the dark and deadly past of an older man in town. In "The Body," four rambunctious young boys plunge through the façade of a small town and come face-to-face with life, death, and intimations of their own mortality. This novella became the movie Stand By Me. Finally, a disgraced woman is determined to triumph over death in "The Breathing Method.


Why I love it: These stories are well-known for a reason. They’re really good! Whenever I read short story or novella collections, I usually forget most of the stories. Not this one. I vividly remember all 4 of them. They have intense characters and odd plots. This is one of my all-time favorite King books.








The Spectacular Now by Tim Tharp


Sutter Keely. He’s the guy you want at your party. He’ll get everyone dancing. He’ll get everyone in your parents’ pool. Okay, so he’s not exactly a shining academic star. He has no plans for college and will probably end up folding men’s shirts for a living. But there are plenty of ladies in town, and with the help of Dean Martin and Seagram’s V.O., life’s pretty fabuloso, actually.

Until the morning he wakes up on a random front lawn, and he meets Aimee. Aimee’s clueless. Aimee is a social disaster. Aimee needs help, and it’s up to the Sutterman to show Aimee a splendiferous time and then let her go forth and prosper. But Aimee’s not like other girls, and before long he’s in way over his head. For the first time in his life, he has the power to make a difference in someone else’s life—or ruin it forever.


Why I love it: I hate Sutter Keely. I think we all knew kids like him in school. They’re loud, obnoxious, always the center of attention, don’t understand no, always take things a step too far. I love this book because it’s relatable. I knew a lot of Sutter Keelys. Some of them have changed, and some of them haven’t.









Swamplandia! by Karen Russell


The Bigtree alligator wrestling dynasty is in decline—think Buddenbrooks set in the Florida Everglades—and Swamplandia!, their island home and gator-wrestling theme park, is swiftly being encroached upon by a sophisticated competitor known as the "World of Darkness."

Ava, a resourceful but terrified twelve-year-old, must manage seventy gators and the vast, inscrutable landscape of her own grief. Her mother, Swamplandia!’s legendary headliner, has just died; her sister is having an affair with a ghost called the Dredgeman; her brother has secretly defected to the World of Darkness in a last-ditch effort to keep their sinking family afloat; and her father, Chief Bigtree, is AWOL. To save her family, Ava must journey on her own to a perilous part of the swamp called the "Underworld," a harrowing odyssey from which she emerges a true heroine.


Why I love it: This novel has the textbook definition of a saggy middle, but it’s still the best magical realism novel I’ve ever read. The magic isn’t just there to be . . . well, magical. The magic has a purpose. It’s used to show how kids see the world and process the things that happen to them.








It’s Kind Of A Funny Story by Ned Vizzini


Ambitious New York City teenager Craig Gilner is determined to succeed at life—which means getting into the right high school to get into the right job. But once Craig aces his way into Manhattan's Executive Pre-Professional High School, the pressure becomes unbearable. He stops eating and sleeping until, one night, he nearly kills himself.

Craig's suicidal episode gets him checked into a mental hospital, where his new neighbors include a transsexual sex addict, a girl who has scarred her own face with scissors, and the self-elected President Armelio. There, Craig is finally able to confront the sources of his anxiety.


Why I love it: I’ve read a few books about suicidal teenagers, and this is the first one that made me say, “Yes, this author gets it.”








The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer


At his coming-of-age party, Matteo Alacrán asks El Patrón's bodyguard, "How old am I? I know I don't have a birthday like humans, but I was born."

"You were harvested," Tam Lin reminds him. "You were grown in that poor cow for nine months and then you were cut out of her."

To most people around him, Matt is not a boy, but a beast. A room full of chicken litter with roaches for friends and old chicken bones for toys is considered good enough for him. But for El Patrón, lord of a country called Opium—a strip of poppy fields lying between the U.S. and what was once called Mexico—Matt is a guarantee of eternal life. El Patrón loves Matt as he loves himself, for Matt is himself. They share identical DNA.


Why I love it: I considered leaving this one off the list because the sequel ruined it a little. That sequel was really not necessary. This novel is a dystopia about cloning, which has been done before, but it’s so well-written! I love the descriptions of Mexico. And, it’s creepily distressing that Matt uses rotting meat to attract bugs so he’ll be less lonely.









Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell


Cath is a Simon Snow fan.

Okay, the whole world is a Simon Snow fan.

But for Cath, being a fan is her life—and she’s really good at it. She and her twin sister, Wren, ensconced themselves in the Simon Snow series when they were just kids; it’s what got them through their mother leaving. Reading. Rereading. Hanging out in Simon Snow forums, writing Simon Snow fan fiction, dressing up like the characters for every movie premiere.

Cath’s sister has mostly grown away from fandom, but Cath can’t let go. She doesn’t want to.

Now that they’re going to college, Wren has told Cath she doesn’t want to be roommates. Cath is on her own, completely outside of her comfort zone. She’s got a surly roommate with a charming, always-around boyfriend, a fiction-writing professor who thinks fan fiction is the end of the civilized world, a handsome classmate who only wants to talk about words . . . And she can’t stop worrying about her dad, who’s loving and fragile and has never really been alone.

For Cath, the question is: Can she do this? Can she make it without Wren holding her hand? Is she ready to start living her own life? Writing her own stories?

And does she even want to move on if it means leaving Simon Snow behind?


Why I love it: I love all of Rainbow Rowell’s young adult books. I probably could have put any of them on this list and been happy. I chose Fangirl because Cath’s college experiences are pretty similar to mine, so I can confirm that it’s realistic. (Even though I’ve never written fan fiction and never will.)








Vicious by V.E. Schwab


Victor and Eli started out as college roommates—brilliant, arrogant, lonely boys who recognized the same sharpness and ambition in each other. In their senior year, a shared research interest in adrenaline, near-death experiences, and seemingly supernatural events reveals an intriguing possibility: that under the right conditions, someone could develop extraordinary abilities. But when their thesis moves from the academic to the experimental, things go horribly wrong.

Ten years later, Victor breaks out of prison, determined to catch up to his old friend (now foe), aided by a young girl whose reserved nature obscures a stunning ability. Meanwhile, Eli is on a mission to eradicate every other super-powered person that he can find—aside from his sidekick, an enigmatic woman with an unbreakable will. Armed with terrible power on both sides, driven by the memory of betrayal and loss, the archenemies have set a course for revenge—but who will be left alive at the end?


Why I love it: This is a similar situation to Fangirl. I love V.E. Schwab’s books. I could have put A Darker Shade of Magic on this list and been happy. I chose Vicious because it’s the first Schwab book I read. It started my obsession. It’s escapist literature about people who do bad things, and I had fun reading (and rereading and rereading) it.








Midwinterblood by Marcus Sedgwick


Have you ever had the feeling that you've lived another life? Been somewhere that has felt totally familiar, even though you've never been there before, or felt that you know someone well, even though you are meeting them for the first time? It happens.

In a novel comprising seven parts, each influenced by a moon—the flower moon, the harvest moon, the hunter's moon, the blood moon—this is the story of Eric and Merle, whose souls have been searching for each other since their untimely parting.


Why I love it: Have you ever had the feeling that a book was written just for you? If you took everything I love about stories and blenderized (totally a word) my story-loves, they would become this book. Midwinterblood is bizarre, atmospheric, violent, beautifully written, full of historical things, and set on a remote island. It’s basically my personality in composite novel form.








All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr


Marie-Laure lives in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where her father works. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel.

In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another.


Why I love it: I taught a class on this book and didn’t loathe the book by the end of the class. Normally, if I have to read something a billion times, I get bored and never want to look at it again. I love the setting and the well-developed characters. The characters are in a bad situation, but they try to do the right thing, even if they might be killed for it.








More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera


Sixteen-year-old Aaron Soto is struggling to find happiness after a family tragedy leaves him reeling. He's slowly remembering what happiness might feel like this summer with the support of his girlfriend Genevieve, but it's his new best friend, Thomas, who really gets Aaron to open up about his past and confront his future.

As Thomas and Aaron get closer, Aaron discovers things about himself that threaten to shatter his newfound contentment. A revolutionary memory-alteration procedure, courtesy of the Leteo Institute, might be the way to straighten himself out. But what if it means forgetting who he truly is?


Why I love it: That ending! Also, I love when authors can seamlessly blend the real and the weird. On the surface, this is a contemporary story about a teenager who makes a mysterious new friend. Under the surface, there’s some sinister sci-fi stuff going on. I still think this is Adam Silvera’s best book.








Most Dangerous: Daniel Ellsberg and the Secret History of the Vietnam War by Steve Sheinkin


A tense, exciting exploration of what the Times deemed "the greatest story of the century": how Daniel Ellsberg transformed from obscure government analyst into "the most dangerous man in America," and risked everything to expose the government's deceit. On June 13, 1971, the front page of the New York Times announced the existence of a 7,000-page collection of documents containing a secret history of the Vietnam War. Known as The Pentagon Papers, these documents had been commissioned by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. Chronicling every action the government had taken in the Vietnam War, they revealed a pattern of deception spanning over twenty years and four presidencies, and forever changed the relationship between American citizens and the politicians claiming to represent their interests.


Why I love it: I had to put something nonfiction on the list. I chose this one because it’s honestly one of the best nonfiction books I’ve ever read. Don’t let the serious suit man on the cover fool you. This book reads like a thriller. It’ll make you wonder what other secrets governments are keeping from us.








A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness, Jim Kay, and Siobhan Dowd


At seven minutes past midnight, thirteen-year-old Conor wakes to find a monster outside his bedroom window. But it isn't the monster Conor's been expecting—he's been expecting the one from his nightmare, the nightmare he's had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments. The monster in his backyard is different. It's ancient. And wild. And it wants something from Conor. Something terrible and dangerous. It wants the truth.



Why I love it: It’s so pretty! Seriously, the illustrations are the best. Very eerie and detailed. If you read this book, you need to read the illustrated version. The pictures add a lot to the story. The story itself is sad and sweet. This is another book where the supernatural elements serve a purpose other than being magical. They show how the character sees the world.






You made it to the end! If you read this entire post, you’re a hero. (Or a bored person.)


What are your favorite books from the past five years?







46 comments:

  1. I've given out a lot of four and five stars in the last few years-I couldn't narrow them down to 15 choices! I agree though-I gave out a lot of five stars to books in the last ten years and now I maybe don't read those genres and my overall tastes have certainly changed a bit. I do want to re-do my GR ratings but I don't currently have time!

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    1. Redoing my Goodreads ratings would take forever. I think it’s probably not worth the hassle.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  2. I love this! I haven't read THE SPECTACULAR NOW BY TIM THARP but I did see the movie. I LOVE The Book Thief, More Happy Than Not, Fangirl, and Vicious. I read Midwinterblood in grad school and it does make me want to read more by the author. I read It's Kind of a Funny Story in high school and really loved it. I hated hearing that the author eventually did commit suicide. :(

    -Lauren
    www.shootingstarsmag.net

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    1. I still haven’t seen The Spectacular Now movie. I was so excited when it came out, and then I didn’t bother watching it.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  3. I totally agree that some books I didn't rate 5 stars but totally stuck with me and maybe should have been 5 stars. You have some great ones here. Loved Fangirl and Most Dangerous!!! All the Light We Cannot See was great too.

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    1. It’s weird how some books stick with me, even though I didn’t love them at the time I read them.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  4. I get that unexpected longevity from books which might not have wowed me at the time, but have stuck in my memory. I find myself referencing them in other book reviews and am surprised, when I click back to link to their posts, that I hadn't awarded five stars!
    Totally agree with the three of yours here that I've read - The Book Thief, The Blind Assassin, and A Monster Calls. I need to get to those other twelve soon!

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    1. Yeah, I was surprised at how many of the books on this list got 4 stars from me. I guess I like them more now than I did when I read them.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  5. I'd have to put A Gentleman in Moscow at the top of my list. As for the other 14 books? Too hard to choose. But some of the books on your list might make it on mine after I read them. :)

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    1. People have recommended A Gentleman In Moscow to me. I’ll probably read it someday.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  6. This was one heck of an undertaking! The only one of these that I've read is Fangirl but there are several that are already on my TBR like: A Monster Calls, More Happy Than Not, and All the Light We Cannot See.

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    1. It was a stupidly huge undertaking. It took me days to choose favorites and format this post.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  7. Hey! I read some of these. I did like The Spectacular Now, but that ending made me want to throw the book out a window. It's Kind of a Funny Story was so fantastic. I read it after the author's death, and cried because the ending was so hopeful, and he had lost hope. That has really stuck with me. I love all that is Rainbow Rowell, and although Fangirl is not my favorite, it was still excellent.

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    1. The end of The Spectacular Now is frustrating. It was so hard to choose 1 Rainbow Rowell book. I wanted to put all of them on my list.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  8. Oooh from the past 5 years, this is hard! First I will comment on yours. Okay so I think More Happy Than Not was awesome. I think the Book Thief is awesome. I think A Monster Calls (and every book ever written by Patrick Ness) is awesome. I need to read Midwinterblood NOW please and thank you. As you know, I too am a Sedgwick fan. I wanted to read Battle Royale ever since the THG comparisons, but I never did. I do want to read Fangirl. I fear Schwab and I will never fully mesh, which is sad. I cannot read It's Kind of a Funny story because every time I think about it I cry, no lie.

    As for my favorites... oy. So the problem is the past 5 years! Okay. I think I am going to need to peruse my Goodreads and then do my own post- it's like you have created your very own tag here!

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    1. I didn’t know anything about the author when I read It’s Kind Of A Funny Story, so that probably made it less distressing for me. I hope you do steal this post idea. I want to see your favorite books.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  9. It would take me a long time to work out books I loved from the last five years. From your list The Book Thief is one that is memorable to me. The one I'd most want to pick up is Swamplandia because of the cover and the premise of the story.

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    1. It took me days to write this post. Choosing favorites was so hard!

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  10. I am so happy to see that Vicious made the list, but you're right - you could swap it with any of Schwab's books, because she is a queen. Have you read Vengeful? I still need to pick it up, but I'm waiting for the paperback to come out. Pretty soon now, I think!

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    1. Yes, I did read Vengeful. I loved it, but I love pretty much everything VE Schwab writes.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  11. That's ambitous! Last 15 years??? OK Forbidden by Tabitha Suzuma, Making Faces and From Sand and Ash both by Amy Harmon, Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens; Beartown by Fredrik Backman; Honor Among THieves by Rachel Caine and Ann Aguirre; A Charm of Finches by Suanne Laqueur, Wolfsong by TJ Klunes are some of my fav ;-)

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    1. Some of the books you mentioned are on my TBR list, so I hope I like them as much as you did.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  12. All The Light We Cannot See was a fantastic read. I have to admit - I didn't get The Book Thief and actually DNFed it!

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    1. A lot of people didn’t get The Book Thief. I learned that when I wrote a massive paper on it.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  13. I'm finally reading Fangirl now and I'm surprisingly enjoying it??? I don't read contemporary, but SO MANY people have suggested this one! And I definitely need to read Battle Royale ASAP! I'm debating whether to read it or watch the movie first.

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    1. I’m glad you’re enjoying Fangirl. I haven’t seen the Battle Royale movie. I’ve heard that it’s good, though.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  14. Oh man... There are so many books that I give 5 stars to only to look back and only remember the flaws of that book. Or I would only remember the general plot line of the book. Battle Royal I believe is one of the inspirations to The Hunger Games (I could be 100% wrong on this one)? Sounds like a book I'd be interested to read in.

    Elle Inked @ Keep on Reading

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    1. Battle Royale is very similar to The Hunger Games, but it doesn’t have any romance. It’s mostly just killing.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  15. So many of those books sound good I had to bookmark your post so I can add them to Goodreads. Man I loved Battle Royale! I read it AFTER Hunger Games. Battle Royale is so much better.

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    1. I read Battle Royale after The Hunger Games, too. I loved that it didn’t have any silly love triangles.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  16. omg I absolutely am with you for A Monster Calls (I cried tWICE?!? I never cry what is this) and also The Book Thief and Vicious. Vicious was also my first Schwab introduction and I was wholly hooked from there on. Such a good thing. I really need to read More Happy Than Not, but it isn't going to make me happy now, is it??? *gets duct tape ready to patch up heart*

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    1. Haha, no, More Happy Than Not will NOT make you happy. It’s a little bit devastating, actually.

      Aj @ Read All The Things!

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  17. I teach A Monster Calls. I love it and so do my students. Vicious and Fangirl are two of my favs, as well, and The Blind Assassin is one of all-time favorite books. The Robber Bride is my favorite Atwood, but it is a close second. Fun post!

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  18. I think it's SO interesting that sometimes books that we don't give 5 stars to are the ones that stick in our minds. I've written about that phenomena before too. I think our brains need time to decide if a book is going to be an all-time favorite or not. :-)

    Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction

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  19. Oh man, More Happy Than Not! </3 A metaphor for a *very* real experience that LGBTQ+ folks go through when we finally come out and stop self-editing our memories!

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  20. When I looked at Battle Royale's cover I thought it'd be about something else, but then I read the synopsis and...I was wrong.

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  21. I agree, More Happy Than Not is Silvera at his best and it was amazing. I loved the house of scorpion but I read it so long ago that I can't remember it DD: Of course I loved the book thief too. I am actually currently reading Fangirl! I need to read Vicious, All the lights we cannot see and It's Kind of A Funny Story at some point.

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  22. I've read "All the Light" and now am trying to think of what would be my favorite book of the past five years :)

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  23. I loved A Monster Calls and I want to read All the Light. My first attempt at The Book Thief left it as a DNF but I plan to try again some day.

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  24. OMG I thought I was the only one that read The House of The Scorpion! I loved it, never read the sequel and seems like that is a good thing!

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  25. Wow, that would be so hard to pick only 15 books from the last five years! I kinda even cheat on my top 10 books at the end of the year, because I lump all the books in a series together if I read them all in the same year.

    I've only read Fangirl from this list, but I think I picked up Vicious when it was on sale last year. I think my favorite book I read (although it was not released) in the last 5 years was Legend... it's a book that sticks with me to this day.

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  26. After this list - I realize we read nothing of the same books. That is ok tho. I like that you introduce me to new ones. I would love to read VE and Kings books. I might even get Fangirl.

    Mary

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  27. I still haven't read The Book Thief! 😱

    I'm putting Swamplandia and It's Kind of a Funny Story on my Goodreads tbr. 👍✨

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  28. This is such a great list and congratulations on picking only 15 books, I couldn't have done that AT all haha, or it would have taken me a couple days or weeks to pick them out haha. I'm so happy to see Fangirl on this list, I can't believe I haven't read it just yet, because it sounds exactly like the kind of book that would be on a favorite's list of mine :)

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  29. I LOVE this idea! Couldn't agree more on Fangirl - I swear that book never gets old. So many here that I've been meaning to read for so long.

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  30. Great list! I loved The Blind Assassin, had to read and study it at university. To be honest, I only realised at the lecture that all those stories are connected through mise en abyme. I felt like such a fool for not noticing it myself.

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