Playing favorites

I have decided to do a "Best of" list for this year, except I'm breaking the rules because these are not all from this year. I'm doing my top 5 favorite books that I've read this year (and also breaking the rules because a series counts as one book). So here goes:

1. The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. Honestly, if you didn't see this coming, I don't know what you're doing reading my blog. I realize that the last book came out in 2010, but I just read them for the first time in March (and the second time 3 months after that) and I don't think it's ever been safer to call myself obsessed with something. I cannot choose a favorite. All three of them are tied for my favorite book ever. No explanation necessary, as I have explained my love for this series countless times.

2. Looking for Alaska by John Green. Yes, this book came out in 2005. No, I didn't read it until this year (honestly, I didn't read much of anything until this year-- let's not talk about that). I love this book. I love that it made me cry. I love that it made me laugh. I love Alaska Young, and "I will always love Alaska Young, my crooked neighbor, with all my crooked heart." She is one of the most complex and unknowable characters I've ever encountered, and I love that. I love that she's sad and mean for no apparent reason, because I feel like a lot of times in books it seems like every character has to have a specific reason why they act the way they do. And it's not like that in real life. Sometimes people are just sad. It doesn't make you a bad person.

3. Divergent by Veronica Roth. This is the only dystopian book I've read that even comes close to The Hunger Games. And by "close," I don't mean that it's similar; I mean that it's dark and has good characters and serves a purpose. The main character is not a whiney teenaged girl who's incomplete without a boy. She's smart and she fights for what she believes in, but at the same time she isn't a robot. She's vulnerable and she misses her family and she questions her choices and she has fears (seven of them, to be exact). The thing about Tris, though, is that she isn't fearless; she acts in spite of her fears.

4. Anna and the French Kiss and Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins. I know, I know, these are not a series, but they are companion novels so I'm counting them as one book because I can't pick a favorite. Allow me to tell you the story of my relationships with these books. I read Anna in September and it took me two days (50 pages the first day, 300-something the second day). It brings the funny. When I was finished, I immediately went looking for more Stephanie Perkins books because I was not aware that this was the only one thus far. I did, however, find that another one came out in exactly two weeks: Lola. I had the same exact experience reading this one as I did with Anna (50 pages the first day, 300-something the second day). It brings the adorable. Both books bring the awesome. See next year's list for Isla and the Happily Ever After, because I guarantee it will be there.
(*update: Isla will NOT be on the list for next year on account of its released was pushed back to 2013. I'm a little bitter.)

5. The Infernal Devices trilogy by Cassandra Clare. There seem to be mixed feelings out there about Cassandra Clare and her books, but I am pretty sure the haters have not read these books. Granted the plots I actually care about appear to be secondary to the automatons and the Magister and those types of things, which I don't care about, but the characters make up for this. Every single one of them is complex and flawed and occasionally infuriating, but that's what I love about them. Do I always agree with Tessa? No. Do I sometimes want to scream at her and rip her head off? Yes. But that doesn't mean I don't like her. And Jem is unhatable, even if you love Will as much as I do. Which brings me to my next point: William Herondale. That is all.

Some Honorable Mentions:

A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart

Wild Roses by Deb Caletti

The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson

Delirium by Lauren Oliver

If I Stay/Where She Went by Gayle Forman

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak