Top Ten Tuesday: Books Dealing with Tough Subjects

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.

While I'm always a fan of fun and light reads like we talked about it in last week's post, I also try not to shy away from books with serious topics, and ones that might not be so easy to get through.  I might not want to take these to enjoy while on vacation at the beach, they're often the ones that once I'm finished end up having special places in my heart forever!

Tough Reads Pick #1:  The Color of Rain by Cori McCarthy

If there is one thing that seventeen-year-old Rain knows and knows well, it is survival. Caring for her little brother, Walker, who is "Touched," and losing the rest of her family to the same disease, Rain has long had to fend for herself on the bleak, dangerous streets of Earth City. When she looks to the stars, Rain sees escape and the only possible cure for Walker. And when a darkly handsome and mysterious captain named Johnny offers her passage to the Edge, Rain immediately boards his spaceship. Her only price: her "willingness."

The Void cloaks many secrets, and Rain quickly discovers that Johnny's ship serves as host for an underground slave trade for the Touched . . . and a prostitution ring for Johnny's girls. With hair as red as the bracelet that indicates her status on the ship, the feeling of being a marked target is not helpful in Rain's quest to escape. Even worse, Rain is unsure if she will be able to pay the costs of love, family, hope, and self-preservation.

With intergalactic twists and turns, Cori McCarthy's debut space thriller exists in an orbit of its own.
This is a story about survival above all else!  Rain must fight to survive on so many levels that it was impossible not to immediately sympathize with her character and hope with all hope that she could come out of this triumphant.

Tough Reads Pick #2:  The Shack: Where Tragedy Confronts Eternity by Wm. Paul Young

Mackenzie Allen Philips' youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation, and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later in the midst of his "Great Sadness," Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend.

Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack's world forever.

In a world where religion seems to grow increasingly irrelevant The Shack wrestles with the timeless question, "Where is God in a world so filled with unspeakable pain?" The answers Mack gets will astound you and perhaps transform you as much as it did him. You'll want everyone you know to read this book!
I know this book doesn't fall into the YA category, but it was one of the harder ones for me to get through given the subject of the book.  Tragedy affects everyone differently and we all find our own ways of dealing with it, but after reading this book, I'll admit that I see things differently now.

Tough Reads Pick #3:  If I Stay (If I Stay, #1) by Gayle Forman

In a single moment, everything changes. Seventeen-year-old Mia has no memory of the accident; she can only recall riding along the snow-wet Oregon road with her family. Then, in a blink, she finds herself watching as her own damaged body is taken from the wreck...

A sophisticated, layered, and heart-achingly beautiful story about the power of family and friends, the choices we all make, and the ultimate choice Mia commands.

If anyone's read this title, it speaks for itself.  I read this one a little while ago and it's still staying with me, as I'm sure it will for years to come.  I cried throughout the majority of these pages, but I would recommend it over and over again!  Forman has a way of engaging her readers that I'm not sure many other authors have.  It's a gift and one that I was so glad to have the chance to experience.

Tough Reads Pick #4:  Where She Went (If I Stay, #2) by Gayle Forman

It's been three years since the devastating accident . . . three years since Mia walked out of Adam's life forever.

Now living on opposite coasts, Mia is Juilliard's rising star and Adam is LA tabloid fodder, thanks to his new rock star status and celebrity girlfriend. When Adam gets stuck in New York by himself, chance brings the couple together again, for one last night. As they explore the city that has become Mia's home, Adam and Mia revisit the past and open their hearts to the future-and each other.

Told from Adam's point of view in the spare, lyrical prose that defined If I Stay, Where She Went explores the devastation of grief, the promise of new hope, and the flame of rekindled romance.
Again, just like the series opener, this sequel touched me and will stay with me for a long time to come I'm sure.

Tough Reads Pick #5:  Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

Clay Jensen returns home from school to find a mysterious box with his name on it lying on his porch. Inside he discovers thirteen cassette tapes recorded by Hannah Baker, his classmate and crush who committed suicide two weeks earlier.

On tape, Hannah explains that there are thirteen reasons why she decided to end her life. Clay is one of them. If he listens, he'll find out how he made the list.

Through Hannah and Clay's dual narratives, debut author Jay Asher weaves an intricate and heartrending story of confusion and desperation that will deeply affect teen readers.
I'll be very surprised if this title doesn't make quite a few lists for today's post.  I read this a few years ago and still think about it to this day.  I'm not sure if it was just the topic of the book, but that combined with Asher's writing and the strong voice that came out of the narration still haunts me.  Again, not a book that I think many will want to read over and over again, but still one that I can't help recommending to anyone on the lookout for a read that will touch them.

Tough Reads Pick #6:  Glimpse by Carol Lynch Williams

In one moment,
it is over.

In one moment
it is gone.

The morning grows
thin, grey
and our lives-
how they were-
have vanished.

Our lives have
changed
when I walk in
on Lizzie
my sister

holding a shotgun.

Twelve year old girl Hope's life is turned upside down when her older sister Lizzie becomes an elective mute and is institutionalized after trying to kill herself.
A haunting read, that unfortunately took me quite some time to get through.  I found myself having to take breaks and give myself some space, because of the heavy issues being dealt with within these pages.

Tough Reads Pick #7:  Hunger (Riders of the Apocalypse, #1) by Jackie Morse Kessler

“Thou art the Black Rider. Go thee out unto the world.”

Lisabeth Lewis has a black steed, a set of scales, and a new job: she’s been appointed Famine. How will an anorexic seventeen-year-old girl from the suburbs fare as one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?

Traveling the world on her steed gives Lisa freedom from her troubles at home: her constant battle with hunger, and her struggle to hide it from the people who care about her. But being Famine forces her to go places where hunger is a painful part of everyday life, and to face the horrifying effects of her phenomenal power. Can Lisa find a way to harness that power — and the courage to battle her own inner demons?

While Kessler found a unique and at times ironic way of telling this tale, nothing can change the fact that the subject matter is very real and very scary.

Tough Reads Pick #8:  Flawed by Kate Avelynn

Sarah O’Brien is alive because of the pact she and her brother made twelve years ago — James will protect her from their violent father if she promises to never leave him. For years, she’s watched James destroy his life to save hers. If all he asks for in return is her affection, she’ll give it freely.

Until, with a tiny kiss and a broken mind, he asks for more than she can give.

Sam Donavon has been James’ best friend — and the boy Sarah’s had a crush on — for as long as she can remember. As their forbidden relationship deepens, Sarah knows she’s in trouble. Quiet, serious Sam has decided he’s going to save her. Neither of them realizes James is far more unstable than her father ever was, or that he’s not about to let Sarah forget her half of the pact . .

Another read that I had a very hard time with.  I think I cried from start to finish, maybe not throughout every page, but for the most part when I was crying I was still incredibly sad for these characters and the circumstances they were forced to live.  After I finished the last page of this book I thought maybe I'd be able to pull it together, but it turned out to take quite a while before I calmed down enough to really look back and reflect on all that Avelynn put into this work.  Her writing was amazing and the story will always haunt me.

**I have more titles that I could add to this list but when I went looking back through my library these eight really were the titles with the hardest and toughest subjects, so I don't want to add two more titles just to say I finished the list.  These eight will always stay with me and hopefully despite their darker natures and tougher subject lines, you'll give them a chance if you haven't already.

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Favorite Books Before I Became A Blogger

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.

I know it sounds silly, but it was hard to remember the titles I read before I started this blog outside of the classics and school assigned mandatory books.  I've fallen in love with the blogosphere and forget easily that I've only been at this for a few years now.

Favorite Pre-Blog Book #1:  Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

So begins Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen's witty comedy of manners--one of the most popular novels of all time--that features splendidly civilized sparring between the proud Mr. Darcy and the prejudiced Elizabeth Bennet as they play out their spirited courtship in a series of eighteenth-century drawing-room intrigues. Renowned literary critic and historian George Saintsbury in 1894 declared it the "most perfect, the most characteristic, the most eminently quintessential of its author's works," and Eudora Welty in the twntieth century described it as "irresistible and as nearly flawless as any fiction could be."

It was the first book I fell head over heels in love with.  I'm aware that it makes me a horrible cliche, but Austen's writing was just ahead of her time and her characters feel like family members after so many re-reads.

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #2:  Twlight (Twilight, #1) by Stephanie Myers

Isabella Swan's move to Forks, a small, perpetually rainy town in Washington, could have been the most boring move she ever made. But once she meets the mysterious and alluring Edward Cullen, Isabella's life takes a thrilling and terrifying turn. Up until now, Edward has managed to keep his vampire identity a secret in the small community he lives in, but now nobody is safe, especially Isabella, the person Edward holds most dear. The lovers find themselves balanced precariously on the point of a knife-between desire and danger.Deeply romantic and extraordinarily suspenseful, Twilight captures the struggle between defying our instincts and satisfying our desires. This is a love story with bite.

A series for YA that I think shocked the system.  Harry Potter may have been adult friendly but still fell more into MG and so this series I think did a lot for showing everyone that great series can be found within the YA literature world and are ripe for the reading.  I also have to say that I think this series had a lot to do with the fact that now we're all lucky enough to see so many more YA books being turned into movies, who isn't excited about that?

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #3:  The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (Chronicles of Narnia, #1) by C.S. Lewis

When Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy took their first steps into the world behind the magic wardrobe, little do they realise what adventures are about to unfold. And as the story of Narnia begins to unfold, so to does a classic tale that has enchanted readers of all ages for over half a century.

My dad read this and the rest of the series to me before bed for so long when I was little.  The witch terrified me, but this series and most especially this book really bring back great memories for me and even after all these years any time I see a copy or hear about the series I can't help but smile and think back to the good story times we had.

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #4:  The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1) by Suzanne Collins

Could you survive on your own, in the wild, with everyone out to make sure you don't live to see the morning?

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV. 

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives alone with her mother and younger sister, regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister’s place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before—and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. 

If she is to win, she will have to start making choices that will weigh survival against humanity and life against love.

I later reviewed the series as a whole once the blog was up and running but I thank Collins for getting me excited about the dystopian genre.

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #5:  I Do, But I Don't (Crandell Sisters, #1) by Cara Lockwood

"She creates perfect days."In spite of her incorrigible curly hair, Lauren Crandell is a neat-freak and organizational guru, qualities that make her the perfect wedding planner. But when two weddings in one day go haywire, and hunky firefighter Nick Corona comes to the rescue -- twice -- Lauren realizes there are a few important details in her own life she hasn't been tending to since her divorce. Namely, her sex life.

"She lives lonely nights."

Sweet and sexy Nick seems hell-bent on fanning the flames between them, and Lauren definitely feels sparks flying. But she's scrambling to plan nuptials for her most challenging client yet -- a beautiful, cunning, and certifiable Psycho Bride. With the big day rapidly approaching, a series of misunderstandings, mishaps, and mistaken identities threatens to ruin not one, but two happily ever afters. But with her career and her love life on the line, the wedding planner just might learn that you can't plan "everything, " least of all true love.

Not YA but a hilarious read.  Its one of the first books I can actually remember laughing out loud at points while I was reading.

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #6:  Lady Audley's Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon

This Victorian bestseller, along with Braddon's other famous novel, Aurora Floyd, established her as the main rival of the master of the sensational novel, Wilkie Collins. A protest against the passive, insipid 19th-century heroine, Lady Audley was described by one critic of the time as "high-strung, full of passion, purpose, and movement." Her crime (the secret of the title) is shown to threaten the apparently respectable middle-class world of Victorian England.

A requirement for one of my literature classes in college and the mystery throughout the pages made the chore of mandatory reading under a very small time frame completely tolerable.

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #7:  P.S. I Love You by Cecila Ahern

A novel about holding on, letting go, and learning to love again.

Now in paperback, the endearing novel that captured readers' hearts and introduced a fresh new voice in women's fiction Cecelia Ahern.

Holly couldn't live without her husband Gerry, until the day she had to. They were the kind of young couple who could finish each other's sentences. When Gerry succumbs to a terminal illness and dies, 30-year-old Holly is set adrift, unable to pick up the pieces. But with the help of a series of letters her husband left her before he died and a little nudging from an eccentric assortment of family and friends, she learns to laugh, overcome her fears, and discover a world she never knew existed.

The kind of enchanting novel with cross-generational appeal that comes along once in a great while, PS, I Love You is a captivating love letter to the world!

Saw the movie before I knew it was a book.  Couldn't believe I did that so I decided to check the book out anyways and discovered, not surprisingly that I enjoyed it more than the movie.

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #8:  The Shack by Wm. Paul Young

Mackenzie Allen Philips' youngest daughter, Missy, has been abducted during a family vacation, and evidence that she may have been brutally murdered is found in an abandoned shack deep in the Oregon wilderness. Four years later in the midst of his "Great Sadness," Mack receives a suspicious note, apparently from God, inviting him back to that shack for a weekend. Against his better judgment he arrives at the shack on a wintry afternoon and walks back into his darkest nightmare. What he finds there will change Mack's world forever.

If you've read this one you'll understand that it never leaves you.  I can't recommend it enough whether you're religious or not, it's a book worth taking the time to check out and see what's it all about.

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #9:  I'll Be Seeing You by Mary Higgins Clark

The murdered woman could have been her double. When reporter Meghan Collins sees the sheet-wrapped corpse in a New York City hospital, she feels as if she's staring into her own face. And Meghan has troubles enough already without this bizarre experience. Nine months ago, her much-loved father's car spun off a New York bridge. Now, investigators are saying that there's no trace of his car in the river, and they suspect he faked his own death. With frightening speed, links start to appear between Meghan's father and her dead lookalike. Meghan may be in danger herself, but she's determined to find the truth to the mystery. In a nightmare journey spiraling from New York to Connecticut to Arizona, Meghan finds that the truth can sometimes be deadly.

She's a machine and a staple in the literary world.  With so many books to choose from (and I did read a lot of them) I loved them all.  With her soap opera style of flashing from one scene and character to another...love it!

Favorite Book Pre-Blog #10:  Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter, #1) by J.K. Rowling

Harry Potter has never played a sport while flying on a broomstick. He's never worn a Cloak of Invisibility, befriended a giant, or helped hatch a dragon. All Harry knows is a miserable life with the Dursleys, his horrible aunt and uncle, and their abominable son, Dudley. Harry's room is a tiny cupboard under the stairs, and he hasn't had a birthday party in ten years.

But all that is about to change when a mysterious letter arrives by owl messenger: a letter with an invitation to a wonderful place he never dreamed existed. There he finds not only friends, aerial sports, and magic around every corner, but a great destiny that's been waiting for him... if Harry can survive the encounter.

Has anyone not read this series?