July 16, 2018

Top Ten Tuesday: Favorite Novellas/Short Stories

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

Topic:

Favorite Novellas/Short Stories

1. A Court of Frost and Starlight (ACOTAR #3.1) by Sarah J. Maas - So I know a lot of people didn't like this because it didn't really have a plot. But you know what, I liked it. I thought it was a fun little novella. I loved getting to see our favorites enjoying the solstice. I loved the cute annual tradition we find out about between Cassian, Azriel and Rhysand (snowball fight). I loved Feyre's gift to Rhys. I loved getting to see Feyre do art again and use it to help the community. I just really enjoyed this. 

2. Queen Song (Red Queen #0.1) by Victoria Aveyard - So despite the fact that I have many issues with the Red Queen series and the only book I actually really enjoyed from it was Red Queen itself, I did LOVE Queen Song. Its all about Cal's mother Coriane. I loved getting to see who Coriane was and getting to know her through this since we never actually get to meet her in the series. I loved seeing what she wanted for her son, I loved that her and Cal's father just fell in love and married despite the rules of the kingdom and not doing Queenstrial. But it definitely also made me sad because we see what Elara does just to get her hands on the crown to put her disgusting plan with her future son into action. 

3. Zombies vs The Living Dead (Surviving The Evacuation #0.5) by Frank Tayell - So for those that don't know, the Surviving the Evacuation series is a Zombie series where a huge outbreak occurs. We follow the characters around London and the surrounding areas. Our character in this book is one we later meet in book 3 of the series. I thought this was a fun little background on him. When the outbreak occurs he's in a nursing home. He seems to be the only one who will believe there's actually an outbreak happening and trying to find out whats going on. It was a great intro seeing him survive the initial outbreak and get out of the nursing home.

4. The Assassin's Blade (Throne of Glass #0.1-0.5) by Sarah J. Maas - So yes, this technically has 5 novellas, but I'm going to count this all together. I thought these were a fantastic group of novellas. It gives a great introduction to Celaena and the events that happen to her prior to Throne of Glass. It also does a great job of explaining how she got into the situation she's in with being in the salt mines where she starts out Throne of Glass. Such a great background to the series. 

5. Just One Night (Just One Day #2.5) by Gayle Forman - I really enjoyed this little novella that takes place after Just One Year. I was a bit disappointed that Just One Year literally left off at the same place Just One Day did but from Willem's POV instead of Allyson's. I was hoping we'd get to see what happened after they see each other again. Well Just One Night filled that gap for me. I would have preferred more than just seeing one night, but hey, I'll take what I can get. You get to see the happiness and the bond and the love these two have come back together. It was incredibly sweet.

6. Destroy Me (Shatter Me #1.5) by Tahereh Mafi - So I actually didn't like this novella much at first because I didn't like Warner. I feel like if I were to go back and reread this now that I've jumped ship to Team Warner, I'd probably just love it. However, I did give this novella a 4/5 stars when I read it regardless because I did think it gave some good insight to Warner and his father and it was a good bridge book between Shatter Me and Unravel Me. Even though I didn't like Warner at the time, I definitely liked this novella more than Adams. Adam turned into a douchecanoe in Fracture me. 

7. Die For Her (Revenants #2.5) by Amy Plum - So it's been a long while since I read this novella, but I remember really loving it, it was about Jules, Vincent's best friend and how he's in love with Kate, our main character who is hopelessly in love with Vincent. It talked about how hard it was for him to deal with the fact the person he loved was in love with someone else, but even though he couldn't fix that, he was still there for Kate and Vincent and tried to help and protect them both. Jules!!

8. Roar and Liv (Under The Never Sky #0.5) by Veronica Rossi - This was a great novella. I really came to like Roar in the series and I thought this was great to show us Roar and Liv's backstory. We kinda get to see how they were close and in love and then how Liv's brother, the leader of the Tides, Vale, just tossed his sister out in a trade for food. That part of the novella really broke my heart. Vale was such a selfish, pathetic excuse for a leader. Trade your sister for food instead of being a big boy and get it yourself. We see how this event leads up to where we find Liv in the series. 

9. Daimon (Covenant #0.5) by Jennifer L. Armentrout - This is another novella like The Assassin's Blade. It gave some good background for Alex and the events leading up to Half-Blood. It was good to have read this and have the info from it so you could understand when the events from this were brought up in Half-Blood and throughout the rest of the books. It was only 88 pages, but it was very good and introducing us to the Covenant series. 

10. Shadows (Lux #0.5) by Jennifer L. Armentrout - Like Daimon, I thought Shadows gave us some good background for the Lux series. Shadows follows Daemons brother Dawson in the events before Obsidian. We find out more about Dawson and Bethany and why Daemon is like he is in Obsidian due to the events of Shadows. It definitely gave me a better understanding of Daemon and his not wanting to get in the same situation as his brother and Bethany did.