Top Ten Tuesday (1): Top Ten Books I Thought I'd Like MORE/LESS Than I Did

(Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly book meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. To join in on this weekly meme, visit the blog here)

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

I'm excited to be joining in on this meme, and I like that I'm starting out with this topic! I'll start with the negative, so bare with me.

The books I enjoyed less than I thought I would...

Beautiful Creatures (and the entire Caster Chronicles series) by Margaret Stohl and Kami Garcia.

I like the idea of this book, but the writing wasn't there. There was too much description where there didn't need to be, and the books were so slow-moving it felt like nothing even happened. Add that to endings that were virtually the same "cliff-hanger" for each book (except the last), and *yawn*

Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld

This whole series, again, was a huge disappointment. The first book was decent, but this series had so much potential! It could have been an adventurous and inspiring book where the main character and everyone in the society/world realised that looks were not everyone, so surgery was completely unnecessary and just something the government stuck in everyone's mind to make them all mindless identical drones, but instead the series was about how much of a special snowflake the main character was, when for me she was unlikeable (but not more so than her best friend Shay) and annoying, and her ability to evade the brain modifications was never really explained.

The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer

This is turning into series I liked less than I thought I would instead of books, haha.
And yes, I had to do it, guys. With the hype this series was getting back before all of the books were out, I had to check it out (my friends in the outernet would not shut up about this series, after all). Interesting story, but the writing and characters just put this on my thumbs down list. I used the Breaking Dawn cover because it was the book of the series that angered me most. Talk about a cop-out ending (build-up to a vampire war that's stopped with one's power to shield everyone? Boring!).

My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult

Borrowed this one from a friend back in university, and reading it put me into the worst reading slump of my entire life (I didn't read anything for several, depressing months afterward). I couldn't finish this book. The writing was dull, the plot boring, and man, did it drag. It went from an interesting idea (my reaction to the book's blurb) to me not caring about any of the characters. And when a friend later told me how it ended, I am glad I never wasted more time reading it, because like my friend said, it would have made me angry, and I was happy just not caring.

Immortal City by Scott Speer

A book where angels are celebrities and humans pay for their guardianship? This idea sounded great and I was expecting to enjoy this fluff read. But I didn't. The writing was seriously lacking and the characters were flat. I tried giving the sequel a chance and couldn't make it more than 50 pages in. So this one makes it onto this list, regrettably.






The books I enjoyed more than had I expected to...

Cinder by Marissa Meyer

This one had been recommended to me like crazy, but me, not being much of a sci-fi reader (at the time), was apprehensive. However, the premise was cool (a cyborg Cinderella?), and so I finally picked it up. And loved every second of it. The rest of the series too is great, and this book is the one that made me realise I can enjoy sci-fi.

The Immortal Rules by Julie Kagawa

The first book in a vampiric dystopia by the author of another series I thoroughly enjoyed, The Immortal Rules caught my eye. I was hesitant, however, because while I love dystopias, I thought I was done with vampires. Julie Kagawa changed my mind on that one, because this book is amazing! And the sequel? Even better (and it comes out at the end of this month!). If you haven't given this series a shot yet, I highly suggest you do, even if you think you're done with vampires and dystopias. It was an easy 5/5 stars from me.

The Host by Stephenie Meyer

What can I say? After my experience with her Twilight Saga, I just did not have high hopes for this book at all. But my mom bought it back when it was still available in hard cover, and with the movie having been announced, I figured I might as well give it a shot. And this book is one of my favourites I have read this year so far. Meyer's writing has improved immensely, and the characters were actually likeable. She's supposed to be writing sequels, but I'd be cool if this were the only one as well. Funny enough, as much as I enjoyed this one and she impressed me with it, I'm hesitant about the sequel. We'll see!

The Maze Runner trilogy by James Dashner

I knew I would enjoy this series, I just did not think I would like it as much as I did. When it came around to the second book and I began hating a main character with all my being, I was terrified the protagonist would end up forgiving the character. But when the main character stayed as adamant about that character as I did, it was such a relief. That's just one small element as to why I enjoyed this series so much, but I felt the need to point it out (vaguely so as not to spoil anything for anyone who has yet to read this series -- which you should totally do, like right now). I still need to read the prequel, but I will get to that one. Eventually.

Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling

"What? She didn't expect to enjoy Harry Potter? Huh?"
If that's what you're thinking, then I am sitting here with a knowing smirk. I know, right? But I did not expect to enjoy this series even one tenth as much as I did. Back in 6th grade, a friend of mine would not shut up about this series (I believe PoA was out by then - in hardcover, but not GoF had not even been released). So what did I do? I turned my 'I'm-not-going-to-read-or-even-like-a-book-that-has-so-much-hype-for-the-pure-reason-of-I-don't-even-know' defences and refused to read the books. Until about a month or so later when my mom bought the first two books through a Scholastic book order for my brother (because there was a train on front and my brother liked trains). So while my brother read Philosopher's Stone, I was like well all right. I'll read Chamber of Secrets. AND IT FRUSTRATES ME TO NO END THAT I WILL NEVER BE ABLE TO EXPERIENCE READING THE BOOKS IN ORDER FOR THE FIRST TIME! I should have told my friend Meriam way back when that I wanted to borrow her copy of the first book so that I could have that experience! My one real regret in life, guys, was not picking up this series when it was first recommended to me. And reading it in order. It hurts, guys. It hurts.

So those are the books I thought I'd like more/less than I did.
Thoughts? Concerns? And which books did you guys choose for this week's Top Ten Tuesday?
I'm loving this meme already!