Best Books I’ve Read In 2018 (So Far)

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl.

You only realise how many rereads you've done in a year when you look through your Goodreads to find a list of new reads for the year... anyway. In no particular order:

1. The Cruel Prince by Holly Black: While I prefer the slightly more muted quality that The Darkest Part of the Forest had, I did really enjoy reading this one. Holly Black is really playing with dubiously likable characters and I really liked the political component. I'm so intrigued by what will be happening in the story.

2. Wild Beauty by Anna-Marie McLemore: This is such a strong sophomore novel. It's beautiful and very visual and meaningful.

3. Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse: In terms of grit and action this was pretty much my favourite this year. Maggie is a really fantastic lead character. 

4. Smoke and Iron by Rachel Caine: This has become one of my favourite series. It does an admirable job of creating a vivid cast and compelling plot, and does an admirable job of juggling these things in a really interesting world.

5. The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers: Soft sci-fi!

6. Daughter of Smoke and Bone trilogy by Laini Tayor: I'm just going to list this as one because I whipped through these books back-to-back. I listened to the audiobooks and found that was super helpful for me, as someone who had struggled to get through the series before. (I had read Daughter of Smoke and Bone quite a long time ago but, while I found the writing beautiful, the series didn't pull me along like I needed it to. Audiobooks were really helpful on that front because I could listen to them while doing other things as well and I found that worked really well for me. I could appreciate the story without feeling like I was stuck anywhere.)

7. Shades of Milk and Honey series by Mary Robinette Kowal: I did get through the first two books in the series a while ago but I finally sat down and read the rest of the book. It was really interesting how the magic was interwoven with the regency world.

8. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid: This one still kind of sticks with me as a book which... I can't figure out if I exactly liked it, but I definitely admire how it was crafted.

9. Bygone Badass Broads by Mackenzi Lee: This is an excellently illustrated and wonderfully informative book that started off as Mackenzi Lee's tweets.

10. The Goblins of Bellwater by Molly Ringle: Admittedly I wasn't crazy about everything in this book but I did like the concept and also am kind of nostalgic because this was my first review back.