Teaser and Top Ten Tuesday (#9) 04/23/13

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:
• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers! 

How to Lead a Life of Crime by Kirsten Miller

From page 13:
The kids are all gawking at me, and it isn't because they've never met a pagan.  They want to know what happened to my face--but they won't break one of Joi's cardinal rules. Always listen, never ask.

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

Top Ten Books I Thought I'd Like MORE/LESS Than I Did:

It is of course easier to think of books that I didn't like as much as I thought I would, but I'm going to try to split it 50/50.

Books I thought I would like More:

The Beginning of After by Jennifer Castle
This was a HUGE disappointment for me. I picked up the ARC at BEA in 2011, and immediately started to read. I was billed as being a Sarah Dessen like book. Not only was in nothing like Sarah Dessen, I just didn't get it. I didn't understand the romance in it all. I have been hesitant to start her next book, because I have such bad feelings about this one.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (Miss Peregrine #1) by Ransom Riggs
I may have mentioned this book before, but I really disliked this book.  I was SO excited to read it, and while the pictures were really cool, and I enjoyed the first few chapters, it completely fell apart, and I really don't think I can even give the second one a chance.

Where It Began by Ann Redisch Stampler
Contemporaries are my favorite books, so I usually head into them with high expectations. This book seemed like it would be a great fit for me.  I was really disappointing. 

Darker Still (Magic Most Foul #1) by Leanna Renee Hieber
I'm not sure what the problem with this book was, but I found it to be almost unreadable. I wasn't invested in any part of the story. It was confusing, and boring.

The Thing About the Truth by Lauren Barnholdt
 I'm including this book on here because while it looked like the type of book I would love, but I didn't rate it very high, and honestly I can't remember a single thing about it.  Even reading the synopsis, I still have no clue.  I know I read it but it was completely unmemorable. There are a handful of books I have read that would probably fit in this category.


Books I thought I would like LESS:

The Name of the Star (Shades of London #1) by Maureen Johnson

I was actually surprised at how much I liked this book.  There have been so many poorly done Jack the Ripper books written, but I thought this was unique and uniquely creepy.  I kind of loved this book.  That's why the second book could easy fit into my first set of books as being a HUGE disappointment.

Playing Hurt by Holly Schindler
I had read so many mixed reviews of this book, that I actually hadn't planned on reading it.  I had borrowed it from the library and it went back unread.  One day I was looking at the books that were available digitally from the library and decided to download it.  I was hooked.  As soon as I finished, I waited about 3 hours, and ended up buying a copy.

Where She Went (If I Stay #2) by Gayle Forman
I was actually angry when I found out there was a second book.  If I Stay is one of those books that I view as being perfect, and I honestly thought a second book would soil it in some way.  I was completely blown away by Where She went, in a good way.

Not That Kind Of Girl by Siobhan Vivian
For the entire first half of this book I HATED it.  The main character was the worst.  I disliked her and everything else about the book. By the end though?  I kind of loved it. It was one of those books that just stuck with me, and I found myself remembering it even months later. 

Wither (The Chemical Garden #1) by Lauren DeStefano
This was in the "not another dystopian" category before I started reading it.  I ended up kind of loving it.  It's so different than any other dystopian and quietly became one of my favorite reads of 2011.