Top Ten Books I Thought I'd Like More Than I Did (20)

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by The Broke and the Bookish

I thought about doing this list half and half, but unless there's a book with a summary I FREAK OUT OVER, most books interest me. There are some I'll pass on, but not many. So instead of wracking my brains for 5 books I thought I'd like less, I'm just going to do the full 10 of books that let me down. Which sounds bad. Because you never want anything to disappoint you, but you can't love every since book, y'know?

1. You Have Seven Messages by Stewart Lewis

I just didn't love this one. Absentee parents and a lack of mystery, among other things. I didn't HATE it, I just wanted more from it. It really is a great premise, but that's pretty much where my interest in this book ends. [My Review]

2. Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

Everyone either loves or hates this one and I just kind of fell in the middle. I really did think I was going to like it. I'm not sure why. Probably because of the historical bits. I love that kind of stuff. But I dunno. This one just didn't do it for me. I'm pretty sure I even liked the movie better. [My Review]

3. Crewel by Gennifer Albin

I WANTED TO MUCH TO LIKE THIS BOOK. Really. The cover is brilliant, it was very much anticipated and the summary's GREAT. But at the end of the day this one was just a giant fail for me. I STILL can't picture what Weaving looks like, which drives me asbolutely crazy. [My Review]

4. The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling

I don't know what I thought this book was going to be, but I read the first 80 pages and then DNFed it. A bunch of my books were due back in the library in the next week or so and I was more interested in getting through those than plowing my way through J.K.'s adult fiction. I might give it another go, but it's never going to be what I want it to be, is it?

5. The Selection by Kiera Cass

I WAITED SO LONG TO GET THIS BOOK FROM THE LIBRARY. Truth? I was so DESPERATELY disappointed. It didn't feel dystopian and no one mattered to me except Prince Maxon. I'll still be reading The Elite, but I'm not sure I'm going to be happy about it. [My Review]

6. Requiem by Lauren Oliver

I think A LOT of people wanted to like this one more. I wasn't a HUGE fan of the series but I felt like the last book was a major cop out. Also, I'm still spinning for the abundance of characters featured. Seriously. I need a character map. [My Review]

7. Death & Co. by D.J. McCune

I'm not sure what I thought this book was going to be, but I wanted it to be better. I think I was optimistic because I had JUST finished Ferryman which is another book revolving around Death/a Grim Reaper type character and I LOVE IT. But this one just let me down big time. [My Review]

8. The Carrie Diaries by Candace Bushnell

I read this one as part of a read-along on my blog back when the TV show hit the airwaves. But I didn't like it. Just another book that wasn't what I wanted it to be. I did like the TV show. That was cute. And a lot more of what I wanted both it, as a TV show, and the book to be. [My Review]

9. City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

SO MANY PEOPLE love this book and I am just not one of them. I read the first three a while back and I hated myself for it. But once I started the series I couldn't not finish (it's a disease, I swear). I'm still debating as to whether or not I want to read The Infernal Devices series and I think I'm going to. I just hope I don't hate myself for that decision as well. 

10. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

Good old J.K. *sigh* What can I say about this one? I think I got mad at this series at the end of book 5 when Sirius died and nothing J.K. could say or do would make it better. But there's definitely more to it than that. I've had whole hour-long conversations regarding my negative feelings towards this book. It's not that I didn't want the magic to end. I was ready for it by the time this one came out. I just didn't think the final installment did the series justice. 

Tell me, did any of these books let YOU down as well? Or did you write a post about the Top Ten Books You Thought You'd Like Less? That's a much happier list, don't you think? Let me know in the comments below!

Review: Crewel by Gennifer Albin

Title: Crewel (Crewel World #1)
Author: Gennifer Albin
Release Date: October 16, 2012
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
Page Count: 368
Source: Borrowed from the New York Public Library
Rating: Nope. Not for me. At all.

Enter a tangled world of secrets and intrigue where a girl is in charge of other’s destinies, but not her own.

Sixteen-year-old Adelice Lewys has always been special. When her parents discover her gift—the ability to weave the very fabric of reality—they train her to hide it. For good reason, they don’t want her to become a Spinster — one of the elite, beautiful, and deadly women who determine what people eat, where they live, how many children they have, and even when they die.

Thrust into the opulent Western Coventry, Adelice will be tried, tested and tempted as she navigates the deadly politics at play behind its walls. Now caught in a web of lies and forbidden romance, she must unravel the sinister truth behind her own unspeakable power. Her world is hanging by a thread, and Adelice, alone, can decide to save it — or destroy it.

[Summary Source: Goodreads]

THE REVIEW

I saw this one in the library, recalled someone on my Twitter-feed writing a positive review for it and so I grabbed it. It sat on my nightstand for a while but I finally decided to read it, even though I was getting a bad vibe from it. Truth is: I probably should have just returned it unread.

Let's break this down:

Hold onto your deerstalkers, nerds, this one's a rant-y doozy.

First of all, the world building's not too convincing. I think I vaguely grasped the concept when Loricel was explaining stuff to Adelice (it's the MATRIX, Neo), but I still can't really describe what weaving looks like. I can't even tell you what pages to turn to in order to cobble together some semblance of what weaving looks like. I mean, at every turn it seems we're reminded that Adelice ISN'T practicing her skillz or learning how to harness her massively important talent instead of someone telling us how all of this fantastically awesome sounding stuff really works.

So what does happen in this book if not Adelice learning how to use her gift? A lot of misogynistic, patriarchal pageantry. I feel like this goes back to the shoddy world-building, but I don't understand how the men are in charge when the women are the Crewelers and Spinsters (i.e. the people who run The Show). If anything, this should be a world of Amazonian-esque women. But even if it somehow made sense that women should be subservient to men, the rampant sexism and homophobia in this book are outwardly offensive. A lot of books contain these elements, but I feel like this book kind of just beats you over the head with it, almost like it wants to indoctrinate you instead of encourage you to cheer the characters on as they work their way through this terrible scenario. It's honestly a little disturbing.

But world-building issues aside: The characters. Every single one of them was entirely black and white. You could draw a chart with columns. One side titled "Good Guys" and the other titled "Bad Guys". They're all completely one-dimensional and I don't really care for most of them. But to explain my feels for all of the characters to you, I put everyone into their own columns myself.

The "Good Guys":

Adelice wants her sister back and to maybe save the world? She's kinda snarky and demands some answers, which is nice, but ultimately she just gets wrapped up in pretty dresses and boys and just lets this story happen to her until she has NO CHOICE but to take charge. I mean, she knows what the government is capable of, how can she just SIT there and not even TRY and think up an escape.

Enora, well, that's a tragedy that falls kind of flat.

The boys. Ugh. Guys. Can I tell you? I saw that twist coming really early on. Also, can it please be noted that I totally don't understand why there had to be a love triangle. Seriously, she just kisses Erik and then completely forgets about him. It's almost like the boys are one person instead of two. But I will say that if I had to pick one, I'd pick Jost. His character is way more compelling than Erik's.

As for "The Bag Guys" (AKA: The Authority Figures):

Cormac wants to be Prime Minister at any cost. But what ARE those costs? It might help if I understood the government in any way shape or form. But seriously, could you be anymore generic?

Maela... I don't know what Maela's angle is. Does she want Cormac? Does she want Eric? Does she want world domination? What's really terrible is that even though she doesn't seem to have any direction she has plenty of ambition (the only female in the book with ANY) and she's made to seem like some kind of deranged psychopath who maims teenagers and throws them into cells when they're misbehaving. So basically she's a Disney villain. Which means she's totally evil, has no redeeming qualities and we're all obliged to cheer when she's done away with.

Pryana is the rule abiding hussy we all have to hate because she's awful to Adelice for indirectly killing her sister, clinging to powerful politicians, and supposedly being a scheming monster. Don't even get me started on the parody of a character because I will probably end up throwing something and that could end poorly.

I think the only one here who throws me for a loop is Lorciel, but that's because she just kind of steps aside and lets everything happen, both for the people in the good column and the bad column. So really she's just a placeholder.

This whole book basically boils down to bad world-building and more or less non-existant character motivations. There's a lot of potential, I think, especially for Adelice, and there's a TON that could actually motivate her (let's start with her parents and sister, shall we?) and some of it FINALLY hits her at the end. But it was too little, WAY too late for me. Maybe the ending of this book shows some promise for this series and the ONLY reason I'd pick it up when it comes out is because I want to see what happened to Earth (PS: saw that plot twist at the end coming, too). And because I generally need to finish a series. I'm terrible at abandoning series and DNF-ing books. It's a curse, really, no gift to be seen.

The long and short of it?

Plot: Plot? What plot? Nothing even really seems to happen until the VERY END.
World Building: I couldn't even tell you what Weaving looks like and it's the base of the story. Literally.
Character Development: Why do they want what they want? I don't know. What do they even want? Besides for Jost and Adelice's familial motivations, I have absolutely no idea.
Prose: It just didn't do anything for me.
Would I Recommend This Book?: No. Really, no. Maybe if you're curious grab it from the library but only the last, oh, 75 pages or so were in the least bit interesting.

Bout of Books 6.0: Goals

   

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, January 7th and runs through Sunday, January 13th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure, and the only reading competition is between you and your usual number of books read in a week. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 6.0 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. - From the Bout of Books 6.0 team

This is my first ever week-long read-a-thon. There are going to be challenges and Twitter chats and prizes and lots of books and I'M SO EXCITED because I love all of these things. So very many thanks to Amanda and Kelly for hosting. Monday really can't come soon enough!

MY GOALS

• Read at least 6 books from the list below.
• Participate in at least 1 Twitter chat.
• Network with bloggers and make awesome new friends.
• Participate in at least 3 challenges.

BOOKS TO CHOOSE FROM

    

       

1. Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler and Maira Kalman

2. Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo

3. You Have Seven Messages by Stewart Lewis

4. The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith

5. Crewel by Gennifer Albin

6. Dash & Lily's Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan

7. Fever by Lauren DeStefano

8. My Life Next Door by Huntley Fitzpatrick

Are you taking part in Bout of Books 6.0? What are your goals? Sound off in the comments below!