Top Ten 2012 (It's Nat's Turn!)

Wow.  Is it the end of the year already?  Where did the time go?  2012 was a rough year for all of us in one way or another.  And because of that each of us went through long lasting reading funks.  But even with that funk I managed to read 78 books this year. That is high for me on a normal year so I won't complain...

As usual, I had a hard time deciding which books to include in my Top Ten of 2012.  I, of course, cheated a little by adding a few honorable mentions at the end. How I narrowed those down to only three is byond me...So here it is.  My Top Ten of 2012.  In no particular order.





The Lovers Dictionary by David Levithan - A modern love story told in single words and definitions. So many pages resonated with me and how I feel about the Executive Officer. I still go back and re-read passages.  And the best part?  David Levithan continues to define life, love and relationships through words on Twitter @loversdiction








Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir by Jenny Lawson Hands down, my favorite book of the year.  Yeah, you all thought I would choose a romance, didn't you?  Well I didn't.  I chose this amazingly hilarious (and rarely serious) memoir by Jenny Lawson, The Bloggess.  I can't begin to tell you much how I laughed.  And laughed.  And laughed.  And cried a little.  And laughed some more.









Chase In Shadow by Amy Lane - Thanks to Bel, this is where my love of Amy Lane began.  This is a brutally emotional story of a young man struggling to remain in the closet while using the gay-for-pay porn industry as an outlet.  Oh don't worry.  There is definitely some happy in this story.  But first, Ms. Lane will stomp on your heart a good five or six times.  Because she's kind of awesome like that.  And apparently that's my thing since I have read about a dozen more of her books since Chase in Shadow.







Rockoholic by C.J. Skuse - This one snuck up on me.  It was nothing what I expected.  Instead it was so much more.  A brilliant dramatic comedy  that is in turn hilarious and disturbing.  As I stated in my review, C.J. Skuse should be applauded her sheer awesomeness.










Dash and Lily's Book of Dare by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan - I am so happy that I read this right before Christmas.  A perfect romantic comedy that not only put me in the holiday spirit but also had me giggling well into the early hours of the morning.  I believe this has been optioned for a movie and I will be absolutely thrilled if it makes it to the big screen. AND if I can put a Dash on hold for youngest daughter, that would be most excellent.








Pushing the Limits by Katie McGarry - The chemistry between Echo and Noah not only drips off this hot cover, it also drips off every single page within the book.  It was steamy.  It was angsty.  It was romantic.  And it made me cry.  A quadruple threat.  I can not wait until the companion novel, Dare You Too, is released in May 2013.

Making Promises by Amy Lane - I was instantly smitten with forever-boy (or forever-man in this case since this isn't YA and he is 30-something) Shane.  His patient pursuit of the adorably prickly and bitchy Mikhail is so understanding and loving that I just couldn't help but fall in love with him.  Also, how could I not love a book with this beautiful quote, "I cannot face you if you think I look at you and see anything less than the man you are.  I am not settling for you, I am reaching for you, and there is a difference..." 

The Fault In Our Stars by John Green - I find it impossible to discuss this book with someone that hasn't read it.  The sheer beauty and sadness of it is overwhelming.  All I will say is that John Green is a genius.  His previous stories are great but this one….well there is a reason that it has been so well received by so many.  Once you read it, check out this to answer to any and all of your questions regarding Hazel and Augustus:  http://onlyifyoufinishedtfios.tumblr.com/







Unbreak My Heart by Melissa Walker - So often books are about being hurt by someone else.   Melissa Walker is one of the rare authors that chose to focus on the character that did the hurting.  We all make mistakes in our lifetime.  Some of those mistakes are bigger than others.  This story was about learning to live with those mistakes and how to rebuild your life after suffering the damage you caused.  This story was beautiful and I think is a must read for teens just so they know that life does move on and it does get better.

Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi - This was one of the first books I read this year.  So often I will read something early in the year that I really enjoy but then it is overshadowed by something else.  In twelve months, Under The Never Sky has never swayed from my Top Ten.  This is a perfect combination of romance, fantasy and sci-fi and the second in the series will be an auto-buy for me when it is released the first week of 2013.

 

 

Honorable Mentions:

 

The Curiosites by Maggie Stiefvater, Tessa Gratton and Brenna Yovanoff & Boys of Summer Edited by Steve Berman - As I have mentioned numerous times, I do not like short story compilations.  This year, a number of YA authors set out to teach me a lesson.  Both The Curiosities (a collection of supernatural and horror stories) and Boys of Summer (an anthology of Gay YA shorts) proved to me that there are not only some amazing short stories out there but also a number of great authors that I can't wait to read more of.

 

 

 

 

 

Gambling Men by Amy Lane - To be honest, I could have added Amy Lane books to most of my Top Ten.  And it was REALLY difficult for me to choose between Gambling Men and Making Promises.  So this gets honorable mention. The biggest reason (besides the hilarious use of poker metaphors) is that I married a Quentin.  Yeah, that's right.  If you have read this you know to be super jealous ;-)

 

Unbreak My Heart by Melissa Walker

* * * * 1/2 

Sophomore year broke Clementine Williams’ heart. She fell for her best friend’s boyfriend and long story short: he’s excused, but Clem is vilified and she heads into summer with zero social life. Enter her parents’ plan to spend the summer on their sailboat. Normally the idea of being stuck on a tiny boat with her parents and little sister would make Clem break out in hives, but floating away sounds pretty good right now. Then she meets James at one of their first stops along the river. He and his dad are sailing for the summer and he’s just the distraction Clem needs. Can he break down Clem’s walls and heal her broken heart? Told in alternating chapters that chronicle the year that broke Clem’s heart and the summer that healed it, Unbreak My Heart is a wonderful dual love story that fans of Sarah Dessen, Deb Caletti, and Susane Colasanti will flock to. (Taken from Goodreads)

Last year I read Melissa Walker’s Small Town Sinners which was a religious coming of age story.  It ended up not being my cuppa but no matter how much I disliked the subject matter and the story, I couldn’t deny the fact that Melissa Walker is an amazing author.  When I heard she had another book coming out and that it was a cotemporary romance I was absolutely thrilled.   

Melissa Walker doesn’t pull any punches in this book.  There are no false hopes.  There are no promises of perfection that is so easy to find in fiction.  Every single person in this story makes a mistake.  Some are disastrous and some are barely noticeable.  The story brings home the fact that not a single one of us is perfect and we will all screw up at least once in our life.  What’s important, though, is what we do with the knowledge our mistakes give us. 

This book brought back lots of memories. We’ve all been there one way or another.  We have all hurt or have been hurt.  And when we are teens we feel like those hurts are the end of the world and there is no redemption.  In this story, Clem did something really horrible.  She betrayed a friend in one of the worst ways possible.  And that betrayal doesn’t necessarily deserve forgiveness.  And when you do something like that and you KNOW that you were in the wrong, how do you move on?  How do you start over?  It’s hard to figure that out.  Especially when you are young and you bottle it in and don’t confide in someone.  As Clem’s summer progresses, she learns to trust her family and new friends with what has turned her world up side down.  And in doing so she doesn’t necessarily earn forgiveness but she learns that life does go on and it does get better. 

I loved this story.  It was honest without being brutal.  Hopeful without being dishonest.  And romantic without being unrealistic.  If you are a fan of Contemporary YA, I can not recommend this book enough.  This book is definitely a Top Ten contender for 2012.

Nat

Small Town Sinners by Melissa Walker

***

Synopsis taken from the author’s website:

Does falling in love mean falling out of faith?

“Lacey Anne Byer is a perennial good girl and lifelong member of the House of Enlightenment, the Evangelical church in her small town. With her driver's license in hand and the chance to try out for a lead role in Hell House, her church's annual haunted house of sin, Lacey's junior year is looking promising. But when a cute new stranger comes to town, something begins to stir inside her. Ty Davis doesn't know the sweet, shy Lacey Anne Byer everyone else does. With Ty, Lacey could reinvent herself. As her feelings for Ty make Lacey test her boundaries, events surrounding Hell House make her question her religion."

Let me preface this review by stating that this is NOT the type of book I would normally pick up.  And had I really known what I was getting into I am not sure I would have checked it out from the library.  But I don’t regret this read.  It was equal parts fascinating and upsetting.  It was so upsetting (for me, anyhow) that I texted my fellow Bibliojunkies at 1:30 in the morning to vent my frustration.  Hopefully I didn’t wake either of them up with text alerts screaming from their phones.

So, why did I pick up this book? Because of the following quote from a review found in Book Page – “For the first time in her life, Lacey is forced to stop and think about her faith, her friendships and what she wants for her future”.   Due to my strict religious upbringing and how it affected me, I could completely identify with this statement and thought I might really relate to Lacey, the main character in this book.  Thankfully, the person I am now couldn’t relate to her or her way of life but I saw my teenage-self more than a few times in this story. 

Extreme religious sentiments in this book abound.  Anti-gay, anti-abortion, anti-premarital sex…the list could go on.  And let’s not forget to mention the Hell House in which all these sentiments are delivered.  (If you didn’t know already, Hell Houses do exist.  Look it up.  You will be horrifically fascinated.)  Also, scriptures are often quoted by characters in this book (Lacey in particular) to both argue for and against certain religious beliefs. 

Melissa Walker does not try to send a pro or anti religion message.  However, she does stay so true to her setting and characters’ evangelical upbringing that this book can be very difficult to read if you can’t look past the extremes and see the message she is trying to make clear to her readers. 

I don’t agree with the path Lacey takes in the end.  It’s not the route I would have taken.  Nor is it the path I did take in life.  But that isn’t the point of this book.  The point that Melissa Walker so eloquently makes is that it is okay to question our faith and make our own decisions based on what we learn in life.

If you think you can handle reading about the extreme ideals of the far Christian right, then I would recommend this books as it is an interesting read.

~Nat