Hi everyone, it's Sandy and in today's video, I'm going to share with you my
favorite books that I read in 2017. 2017 was a lot of a slower reading year for
me, especially towards the end of the year. As some of you may know, I studied
abroad during my fall semester and while I studied abroad, I only read one book in
the course of four months, so there was not a lot of reading that got done towards the
end of the year. The videos that I've posted during the last four months were
all pre filmed videos and this is the first video that I'm actually filming in over
four months. So I'm definitely very excited to get back into filming videos,
watching videos, and reading. So let's go ahead and get started with the 13 books
that I have to talk about. They aren't in any particular order other than the fact
that I'm mentioning them based on when I read them, so I'm gonna start off from
the beginning of 2017 all the way towards the end of 2017. The first book
I'm going to talk about is History is All You Left Me by Adam Silvera. This is
actually the first book that I read in the year of 2017, and it automatically
became a favorite of mine. So my 2017 was off to a fantastic start.
This book follows Griffin, whose ex-boyfriend Theo has recently passed
away in a drowning accident. Throughout this book, Griffin is grieving Theo's
death, and reminiscing on the memories that he's had with Theo. He's also struggling
with his worsening OCD. I do have a full book review on this book, so if you want
to hear more of my thoughts, definitely check out that book review. I will leave
a link down below. But one of my favorite things about this book is Adam Silvera's
writing. Within the very first page, he hooked me. I was immediately in
love with his writing. Adam Silvera's writing is beautiful yet heartbreaking. I
also really love the format of the story. The story switches between past and
present and it allows readers to learn more about the history of Griffin and
Theo. Adam writes in a way that makes you feel all the feels. You feel the rawness
and the realness of Griffin's emotions. This is an own voices book and I love
the representation we had in it. Griffin is gay, has OCD. This is a book that I
really loved and if you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend that you do so. My
next favorite book of 2017 is The Female of the Species by Mindy McGinnis. I don't
have a physical copy of this book, which I need to get my hands on soon. This is a
dark book that discusses rape culture and I feel like it's not talked about a
lot on BookTube. I definitely do see a handful of people talking about it, but I
don't think the amount of people talking about it is enough and I think it
deserves a lot more hype. This book follows three different people. I'm not
going to go into their backgrounds but each character has a really important
role in exemplifying certain themes and messages. I think that this is an
incredibly powerful book that everyone needs to read. Rape culture is relevant
to our society today and it needs to be talked about. This book talks about
important subjects that people don't really talk about. This book talks about
the treatment of women, slut-shaming, and so much more. In just over 300 pages, it
leaves an incredibly powerful impact on you, and I think it's a book that
everyone needs to read. The next book I'm going to talk about is We Should All Be
Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. This is actually a book that was adapted
from her TED talk, so if you can't get access to the book, I highly recommend
watching that TED talk video. I think it's like 30 minutes.
I love the discussion of feminism in this book, especially coming from a
person of color. The author is a Nigerian woman, so it was really interesting to
read about her views of feminism. Since this book is so short and you can access
the TED talk version of it, I think this should be required reading everywhere. I
feel like so many people can learn so much from this woman.
My next favorite read of 2017 is The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. This book
follows Starr Carter, who is 16 years old and witnesses one of her best friends
being shot and killed by a police officer. I thought this book was
phenomenal. It discusses police brutality, which is also something that's really
relevant to our society today. I thought Starr was a fantastic main
character. She felt so authentic and real to me.
I really enjoyed seeing her character growth and I absolutely love the family
dynamic in this book. I'm so pumped for The Hate U Give movie. Angie Thomas
seems to be pretty happy about the movie, so if an author is happy about a movie,
you know that the readers should be happy about the movie as well.
My next favorite read of 2017 is Queens of Geek by Jen Wilde. This book follows
Charlie and Taylor who are best friends and are attending a convention. Charlie
is actually a Chinese-Australian Youtuber who recently starred in a movie,
and Taylor wants to meet the author of her favorite book series, but she also
has anxiety and is on the autism spectrum. What I loved about this book is
that it's really relatable. I related to both Taylor and Charlie. With Taylor,
I related to her anxiety. A lot of the sentences in this book that describes
how Taylor felt when she was feeling anxious perfectly describes how I feel
when I have anxiety. I also really love the setting of this book. It takes
place at a convention, which is super cool. There are also a lot of great
messages in this book. There were messages that challenges biphobia. There
is a biphobic scene in this book and Charlie was able to shut that down super
quick. There were also messages surrounding
slut-shaming and fat shaming, and overall, I thought this was a really fun and cute
read. And the two romances in this book are also super cute as well. My next
favorite book of 2017 is Lord Of Shadows by Cassandra Clare. Since this is the
second book in The Dark Artifices trilogy. I can't really go much in depth
about my thoughts on this book. I do have a full review and discussion on this
book. If you're interested in checking that out, I will leave a link down below.
But briefly, I love this book. I love the plot. I love the characters. I love the
Blackthorn family. And this book destroyed me... but I still love it.
My next two favorites are part of a duology and I read them during the same
year, so I'm going to mention them at the same time, and that is The Fixer and The
Long Game by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. So at the moment, this is just a duology, so
there's only two books in the series. This series is really similar to the
premise of Scandal. The main character Tess has an older sister named Ivy, who
is known as the Fixer, which means she makes scandals disappear. AKA Olivia
Pope 2.0. I love that these books are very plot driven, and they keep you
engaged the entire time you're reading it. These books are also super
suspenseful and the author will throw in so many twists at you that you will
never in a million years expect. The author continues to blow me away with
every single twist that is revealed over the course of these two books, so if
you're looking for a mystery thriller book, I highly recommend these two books.
My next favorite of 2017 is The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli. This
book follows Molly, who has had 26 crushes but has never been in a
relationship. I adored this book and I love how there are so many diverse
characters in this book. We have Molly and Cassie, who are sperm donor babies
to two moms. Cassie is in a relationship with a Korean American girl who is
pansexual. Molly is also Jewish, she has anxiety, which she is on medication for,
and she also has an underrepresented body type. In
book, she describes herself as being fat. I also read Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens
Agenda for the first time in 2017, and while I really enjoyed that book, I think
I love this book a lot more than Simon vs. mainly because I related to Molly
a lot more than I did with Simon's character.
I found myself connecting to Molly's character when it comes to how she felt
in certain situations, the way that she thinks, and with boys and relationships. I
also love the portrayal of the sibling relationship between Molly and Cassie.
Overall, this was such a great read and I look forward to all the future books
that Becky Albertalli will be publishing in the future. My next favorite of 2017
is A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab. This book has to do with parallel worlds
and I really enjoyed reading about that. The parallel worlds revolve around
different types of Londons and I really enjoyed reading about how the author
would explain all of that. It was also cool to see the differing political
dynamics between these different Londons. I love how complex the
characters were. I loved reading from both of their perspectives.
I did like Lila's perspective a little bit more. I read this book in the summer
and I did intend on finishing the trilogy before the end of the year but
did I do that? No, but I hope to soon. My next favorite of 2017 is Far From You by
Tess Sharpe. This is a mystery thriller book. This book follows Sophie, who has
nearly died twice. First, it was a car accident that left her disabled and with
an addiction to drugs that helps her cope with her chronic pain. And second, it
was what everyone thinks was a drug deal gone wrong where her best friend Mina
was shot and killed in her presence. However, Sophie has been in recovery for
months when Mina was killed. She is now determined to piece together the truth
of why Mina was targeted and who the murderer was. When I picked this book up,
I did not expect this book to have the impact on me the way that it did. It was
such an emotional and compelling story that took me by complete surprise. The
book is told in alternating past and present timeline and I love the way that
it was told. I loved the way it was written. The writing was just so
beautiful. Sophie is also bisexual, so I really like that we have this
representation in the story, and I love the portrayal of Sophie's relationship
/ friendship with Mina. This book discusses a lot of tough subjects such
as chronic pain, sobriety, drug addiction, losing a loved one. The story
and the writing is beautiful yet gut-wrenchingly tragic. I think
this is such a great underrated book and I would highly recommend it. My next
favorite is I Believe in a Thing Called Love by Maurene Goo. This book follows
Desi Lee, who is determined to get this new guy who recently transferred to her
school to fall in love with her, and she does so by creating this step-by-step
guide, which is based off Korean dramas. This book can be pretty ridiculous at
times and Desi does make a lot of questionable choices. In no way am I
trying to excuse the decisions that she makes during this book but I am able to
sort of look past it because of the whole Korean drama aspect. I don't watch
Korean dramas but I do have friends that do and from what I've heard from them, a
lot of crazy things happen in those dramas that usually wouldn't happen in
real life, so that is why I was able to sort of look past some of the crazy
things that happen in this book. But I think those crazy things do add a
comedic aspect to the story. I really love the development of the romance
between Desi and Luca, and I also really love the friendship in this book. Desi
has two best friends, Wes and Fiona, and I really love seeing their interactions
throughout the entire book. Desi is Korean-American and I really enjoyed
seeing the relationship she had with her dad, along with the incorporation of
Korean culture in this book. I also find myself relating to Desi a lot. She's
quirky, nerdy, and can be pretty awkward at times. This was such a cute
contemporary. I think it's the perfect rom-com book. This book is very easy to
get into and it had a great balance of heartwarming and hilarious moments. And
the last book I'm going to talk about in my favorite books of 2017 video is
Warcross by Marie Lu. This book follows Emika Chen, who is a bounty hunter, which
means that she hunts down people who bet illegally on this game called Warcross.
One day, as an attempt to make some money, she accidentally glitches herself into
the game Warcross during the championships, and so she thinks she's
going to get arrested but instead, the creator of the game Warcross offers her
a job opportunity. This was such an action-packed book that was so thrilling.
It kept me engaged the entire time I thought the world-building was really
well done and I thought the world of Warcross itself was incredibly unique. The
whole concept of virtual reality does remind me of Ready Player One but this
book does add a lot of very unique and refreshing elements that I haven't read
before. I love seeing how virtual reality and reality was
combined and used in everyday life. The main character is also really likable,
witty, and clever. I also love the different types of representation that
we had in this book. There were side characters from all around the world, a
side character who is disabled, and two other side characters who had feelings
for someone of the same-sex, and our main character is also Chinese-American. I
really enjoyed the romance scenes in this book and how it was written. The
romance didn't feel rushed and it was also a bit slow burning, which is exactly
how I like romance scenes to be written. Overall, this was a really great sci-fi
read, and I highly recommend it if you have it picked it up already.
Those are all my favorite books that I read in the year of 2017. If you've read
any of these books, let me know your thoughts in the comments below, and let
me know some of your favorite books in the comments below. Thank you so much for
watching this video. I hope you enjoyed it, and I will see you next time. Bye!
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