Top Ten Tuesday: Books That Will Make You Swoon

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created over at The Broke and the Bookish. This feature was created because they're particularly fond of lists at The Broke and the Bookish (and who isn't?). They're all about creating new lists including a little bit of everything and I've been meaning to participate for so long but always seemed to get behind. So here we are and hopefully you'll head over to their page and check out what everyone else put up for this week's Top Ten.

Romance will always be on the top of my list when anyone asks me what I like to read.  I'm fine if that files me away with all the other cliches about girls, because I can't help what I like, and that goes for my reading tastes as well.  I'm always going to love watching a romance bloom and unfold, seeing the characters discover their feelings for what they are and learn all the important things about their love interest as well as themselves throughout the adventure.  I love it all, and here are a few of my favorites.

Romantic Pick #1:  Just One Day (Just One Day, #1) by Gayle Forman

A breathtaking journey toward self-discovery and true love, from the author of If I Stay

When sheltered American good girl Allyson "LuLu" Healey first meets laid-back Dutch actor Willem De Ruiter at an underground performance of Twelfth Night in England, there’s an undeniable spark. After just one day together, that spark bursts into a flame, or so it seems to Allyson, until the following morning, when she wakes up after a whirlwind day in Paris to discover that Willem has left. Over the next year, Allyson embarks on a journey to come to terms with the narrow confines of her life, and through Shakespeare, travel, and a quest for her almost-true-love, to break free of those confines.

Just One Day is the first in a sweepingly romantic duet of novels.

 

Romantic Pick #2: The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith

 

Who would have guessed that four minutes could change everything?

Today should be one of the worst days of seventeen-year-old Hadley Sullivan's life. Having missed her flight, she's stuck at JFK airport and late to her father's second wedding, which is taking place in London and involves a soon-to-be stepmother Hadley's never even met. Then she meets the perfect boy in the airport's cramped waiting area. His name is Oliver, he's British, and he's sitting in her row.

A long night on the plane passes in the blink of an eye, and Hadley and Oliver lose track of each other in the airport chaos upon arrival. Can fate intervene to bring them together once more?

Quirks of timing play out in this romantic and cinematic novel about family connections, second chances, and first loves. Set over a twenty-four-hour-period, Hadley and Oliver's story will make you believe that true love finds you when you're least expecting it.

Romantic Pick #3:  Accordance (Significance, #2) by Shelly Crane

In the sequel, Maggie learns much more about all the strange things that happened to her, and has to face new ones. She rebels against it, but ultimately, must face it for her new families sake and maybe even her life. Bish went from being her biggest supporter to her biggest pain in the butt and Kyle's intentions to attract her interest may not be so innocent. Caleb and Maggie face many new obstacles together and fight to work through them but will one that should be a good thing be too much for Maggie to handle?

Romantic Pick #4:  Providence (Providence, #1) by Jamie McGuire

 

Struggling with her father's death, Nina meets Jared Ryel, presumably by chance. However it soon becomes clear that he knows more about her than even close friends. When her father's former associates begin following her in the dark, Nina learns that her father was not the man she thought he was, but a thief who stole from demons. In searching for the truth behind her father's death, she stumbles upon something she never expected, and something Hell wants, that only she holds the key for. Jared risks everything to keep the women he was born to save, by sharing the secret he was sworn to protect.

Romantic Pick #5:  Beautiful Disaster (Beautiful, #1) by Jamie McGuire

 

INTENSE. DANGEROUS. ADDICTIVE.

Abby Abernathy is a good girl. She doesn’t drink or swear, and she has the appropriate number of cardigans in her wardrobe. Abby believes she has enough distance from the darkness of her past, but when she arrives at college with her best friend, her path to a new beginning is quickly challenged by Eastern University’s Walking One-Night Stand.

Travis Maddox, lean, cut, and covered in tattoos, is exactly what Abby wants—and needs—to avoid. He spends his nights winning money in a floating fight ring, and his days as the ultimate college campus charmer. Intrigued by Abby’s resistance to his appeal, Travis tricks her into his daily life with a simple bet. If he loses, he must remain abstinent for a month. If Abby loses, she must live in Travis’s apartment for the same amount of time. Either way, Travis has no idea that he has met his match.

 

Romantic Pick #6:  Promise (Soul Savers, #1) by Kristie Cook

 

First installment of award-winning author Kristie Cook's bestselling Soul Savers Series
Alexis Ames has a life full of promise...but not all promises can be kept.

When Alexis Ames is attacked by creatures that can't be real, she decides it's time she learns who she really is, with or without the help of her mother, who guards their family's secrets closely. After meeting the inhumanly attractive, multi-talented Tristan Knight, however, Alexis retreats behind her façade of normalcy...until she discovers he's not exactly normal either. Then their secrets begin to unravel.

Their union brings hope and promise to her family's secret society, the Angels' army, and to the future of mankind. But it also incites a dangerous pursuit by the enemy - Satan's minions and Tristan's creators. After all, Alexis and Tristan are a match made in Heaven and in Hell.

Romantic Pick #7:  Love Story by Jennifer Echols

She's writing about him. he's writing about her. And everybody is reading between the lines..
For Erin Blackwell, majoring in creative writing at the New York City college of her dreams is more than a chance to fulfill her ambitions--it's her ticket away from the tragic memories that shadow her family's racehorse farm in Kentucky. But when she refuses to major in business and take over the farm herself someday, her grandmother gives Erin's college tuition and promised inheritance to their maddeningly handsome stable boy, Hunter Allen. Now Erin has to win an internship and work late nights at a coffee shop to make her own dreams a reality. She should despise Hunter . . . so why does he sneak into her thoughts as the hero of her latest writing assignment?

Then, on the day she's sharing that assignment with her class, Hunter walks in. He's joining her class. And after he reads about himself in her story, her private fantasies about him must be painfully clear. She only hopes to persuade him not to reveal her secret to everyone else. But Hunter devises his own creative revenge, writing sexy stories that drive the whole class wild with curiosity and fill Erin's heart with longing. Now she's not just imagining what might have been. She's writing a whole new ending for her romance with Hunter. . . . except this story could come true.

 

Romantic Pick #8:  Song of the Moon (Artemis Lupine, #1) by Catherine Banks

 

What if you found out that there was another world inside your own? What if all of the things you thought made you weird, actually made you powerful? Artemis's life is changed forever when the mysterious man from her dreams, Ares, comes to claim her as his mate. The seventeen year old girl must find a way to adapt to her true life and accept her fate or run from it. She must overcome her fears and human ideals to give her self to the dangerous world, and man, that is her destiny.

Romantic Pick #9:  Divergent (Divergent, #1) by Veronica Roth

 

In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago world, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue--Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is--she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself.

During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles alongside her fellow initiates to live out the choice they have made. Together they must undergo extreme physical tests of endurance and intense psychological simulations, some with devastating consequences. As initiation transforms them all, Tris must determine who her friends really are--and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes exasperating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers unrest and growing conflict that threaten to unravel her seemingly perfect society, Tris also learns that her secret might help her save the ones she loves . . . or it might destroy her.

 

Romantic Pick #10:  Unearthly (Unearthly, #1) by Cynthia Hand

 

In the beginning, there's a boy standing in the trees . . . .
Clara Gardner has recently learned that she's part angel. Having angel blood run through her veins not only makes her smarter, stronger, and faster than humans (a word, she realizes, that no longer applies to her), but it means she has a purpose, something she was put on this earth to do. Figuring out what that is, though, isn't easy.

Her visions of a raging forest fire and an alluring stranger lead her to a new school in a new town. When she meets Christian, who turns out to be the boy of her dreams (literally), everything seems to fall into place and out of place at the same time. Because there's another guy, Tucker, who appeals to Clara's less angelic side.

As Clara tries to find her way in a world she no longer understands, she encounters unseen dangers and choices she never thought she'd have to make between honesty and deceit, love and duty, good and evil. When the fire from her vision finally ignites, will Clara be ready to face her destiny?

Unearthly is a moving tale of love and fate, and the struggle between following the rules and following your heart.

Review: Accordance (Significance, #2) by Shelly Crane

In the sequel, Maggie learns much more about all the strange things that happened to her, and has to face new ones. She rebels against it, but ultimately, must face it for her new families sake and maybe even her life. Bish went from being her biggest supporter to her biggest pain in the butt and Kyle's intentions to attract her interest may not be so innocent. Caleb and Maggie face many new obstacles together and fight to work through them but will one that should be a good thing be too much for Maggie to handle?

Like I said...I couldn't wait to pick this sequel up and dive right in, and dive right in I did.  Picking up where the series opener left off, Maggie and Caleb still have not gotten their happily ever after, but are still hard at work and just as determined as ever to make it work out.  Who wouldn't want to route for a couple like that right?  While they had to face off with a rival family in the first go around, they've got more added to their plate in this follow up installment.

Maggie's brother Bish steps up his protective side and makes it very clear that he knows something isn't right and that everyone around him seems to be keeping things from him.  I couldn't blame the guy for wanting to look out for his sister and protect her from any harm, but since I'm loving Maggie and Caleb, I couldn't help but want to ring Bish's neck every once in a while when he took out his aggression on Caleb more than I thought was justified.  And please don't get me started on Kyle.  I get that the guy has been nursing far more than a crush on Maggie for way too long and that it's sad that things didn't go his way but let's face it...sometimes we all have had to just suck it up and accept that not everything is meant to be.

The book's description teases readers of new obstacles that stand in Maggie and Caleb's way and they weren't kidding around.  Crane had no intentions of giving her characters the easy way out in this series and she makes it a point to prove just how far she'll make the couple go before they think they'll get their happily ever after ending.  So once again Crane left her readers wondering what will happen next, and lucky for me, the third installment in the Significance series was already out on the shelves and I picked myself up a copy so I could read on and see what will happen next.

I gave Accordance (Significance, #2) 4 shamrocks!!!!

In My Mailbox (67)

This is a meme that I first heard about from Kristi over at The Story Siren and immediately wanted to jump on board. I'm always picking up new books, because I never tire of reading, but the other thing I like about this meme is that it gives everyone an opportunity to check out what other book fanatics, bloggers, etc... got for themselves. I've gotten great recommendations from this meme and hope that keeps up in the future.

Here's what I got, what did you guys get this week? 

For Review:

Miss Fortune Cookie by Lauren Bjorkman (Thanks to Henry Hold and Co.)

Meet Erin. Smart student, great daughter, better friend. Secretly the mastermind behind the popular advice blog Miss Fortune Cookie. Totally unaware that her carefully constructed life is about to get crazy.

It all begins when her ex-best friend sends a letter to her blog—and then acts on her advice. Erin’s efforts to undo the mess will plunge her into adventure, minor felonies, and possibly her very first romance.

What’s a likely fortune for someone no longer completely in control of her fate? Hopefully nothing like: You will become a crispy noodle in the salad of life.

Aradia Awakens (Ovialell, #1) by Tish Thawer (Thanks to Amber Leaf Publishing)

To claim her destiny, Aryiah must die...but dying's just the beginning.

After waking from a dream where all she remembers is the word Wicca, Aryiah is determined to re-educate herself with this magical religion of her youth.

When a gorgeous man materializes in her living room, vampires start knocking on her door, and books literally start to glow, she soon realizes this dream was just the beginning of a nightmare. 

Aryiah has been triggered to become one of The Witches, a coven charged with protecting the citizens of Ovialell with their magick and healing abilities. The only catch? In order to take her place with The Witches, Aryiah will have to die.

Significance (Significance, #1) by Shelly Crane

Maggie is a seventeen year old girl who's had a bad year. She was smart and on track but then her mom left, her dad is depressed, she's graduating, barely, and her boyfriend of almost three years dumped her for a college football scholarship. Lately she thinks life is all about hanging on by a thread and is gripping tight with everything she has.

Then she meets Caleb. She saves his life and instantly knows there's something about him that's intriguing but she is supposed to be on her way to a date with his cousin. But things change when they touch, sparks ignite. Literally.

They imprint with each other and she sees their future life together flash before her eyes. She learns that not only is she his soul mate, and can feel his heartbeat in her chest, but there is a whole other world of people with gifts and abilities that she never knew existed. She herself is experiencing supernatural changes unlike anything she's ever felt before and she needs the touch of his skin to survive.

Now, not only has her dad come out of his depression to be a father again, and a pain as well, but Caleb's enemies know he's imprinted and are after Maggie to stop them both from gaining their abilities and take her from him.

Can Caleb save her or will they be forced to live without each other after just finding one another?

Accordance (Significance, #2) by Shelly Crane

In the sequel, Maggie learns much more about all the strange things that happened to her, and has to face new ones. She rebels against it, but ultimately, must face it for her new families sake and maybe even her life. Bish went from being her biggest supporter to her biggest pain in the butt and Kyle's intentions to attract her interest may not be so innocent. Caleb and Maggie face many new obstacles together and fight to work through them but will one that should be a good thing be too much for Maggie to handle?

Defiance (Significance, #3) by Shelly Crane

In the third installment of the Significance series, we begin with Maggie and Caleb in the clutches of a new enemy; the Virtuoso council. Not only do they have to deal with the consequences of taking the lives of the Watsons and the council attempting to take Maggie away to keep their precious Visionary safe, but they must deal with Marla as well. All are determined to undermine, control and use Caleb and Maggie's rare gifts for their own uses, some wish to destroy them entirely. Then Maggie's father and Bish are threatened but the council forbids the presence of humans. Peter and the family fight and stand beside them every step of the way to save Maggie's father, to keep Caleb and Maggie together when the corrupted council is so set on keeping them apart and to stop Marla and whatever she has up her sleeve. Then Maggie has the shock of her life when she discovers something about her real father. It may change everything for everyone. Stay tuned as the story continues.