Top Ten Tuesday – Books I Don’t Even Remember Adding to My TBR

 

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 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.  Top Ten Tuesday has been one of my favorite memes ever since I started blogging, so huge thanks to Jana for taking over the hosting duties!

This week’s TTT topic is Books I’ve Added to my TBR and Forgotten Why.  This topic made me laugh because I do this a lot.  I’ll be scrolling through my TBR on Goodreads and will come across titles where I’m just like “Who added that? How did that get there?”  But then, as in the case with almost all of the titles I’m sharing this week, I’ll read the synopsis, think the book sounds good and will leave it on the TBR.  I’m guessing some of them were based on blogger reviews, some are maybe from when I entered a giveaway and adding it was a requirement. Some of the pre-blogging ones, I honestly have no clue.

Out of the titles below, the only one I actually deleted as I was working on this post was The Silent Waters. It sounds good, but it’s the third book in a series I’ve never read and I didn’t even have the first two books on my list. Go figure.  Anyway, I decided I need to focus on the umpteen series I’ve started and never finished, so off went The Silent Waters.

 

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Books I Don’t Even Remember Adding to My TBR

 

1. THE ONE by John Marrs

How far would you go to find The One?

A simple DNA test is all it takes. Just a quick mouth swab and soon you’ll be matched with your perfect partner—the one you’re genetically made for.  That’s the promise made by Match Your DNA. A decade ago, the company announced that they had found the gene that pairs each of us with our soul mate. Since then, millions of people around the world have been matched. But the discovery has its downsides: test results have led to the breakup of countless relationships and upended the traditional ideas of dating, romance and love.

Now five very different people have received the notification that they’ve been “Matched.” They’re each about to meet their one true love. But “happily ever after” isn’t guaranteed for everyone. Because even soul mates have secrets. And some are more shocking than others…

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2. THE MUSE by Jessie Burton

A picture hides a thousand words . . .

On a hot July day in 1967, Odelle Bastien climbs the stone steps of the Skelton gallery in London, knowing that her life is about to change forever. Having struggled to find her place in the city since she arrived from Trinidad five years ago, she has been offered a job as a typist under the tutelage of the glamorous and enigmatic Marjorie Quick. But though Quick takes Odelle into her confidence, and unlocks a potential she didn’t know she had, she remains a mystery – no more so than when a lost masterpiece with a secret history is delivered to the gallery.

The truth about the painting lies in 1936 and a large house in rural Spain, where Olive Schloss, the daughter of a renowned art dealer, is harbouring ambitions of her own. Into this fragile paradise come artist and revolutionary Isaac Robles and his half-sister Teresa, who immediately insinuate themselves into the Schloss family, with explosive and devastating consequences . . .

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3.  NOW IS EVERYTHING by Amy Giles

The McCauleys look perfect on the outside. But nothing is ever as it seems, and this family is hiding a dark secret.

Hadley McCauley will do anything to keep her sister safe from their father. But when Hadley’s forbidden relationship with Charlie Simmons deepens, the violence at home escalates, culminating in an explosive accident that will leave everyone changed.

When Hadley attempts to take her own life at the hospital post-accident, her friends, doctors, family, and the investigator on the case want to know why. Only Hadley knows what really happened that day, and she’s not talking.

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4. GOING PLACES by Kathryn Berla

Hudson Wheeler is a teen for whom everyone had high expectations, but since his father was killed when he was ten, he’s felt unmotivated to pursue much other than his art. During his senior year, he decides to home school, thinking he will get to relax and focus on his two lazy businesses. But instead, he experiences love and rejection for the first time; meets an athletic girl who shows him by example what it means to be a man; and solves the painful mystery of the WWII vet whose poignant plight forces Hudson out of the comfort zone of boyhood.

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5. SOMETHING LIKE HAPPY by Eva Woods

With wry wit and boundless heart, Eva Woods delivers an unforgettable tale of celebrating triumphs great and small, seizing the day, and always remembering to live in the moment.

“It’s simple, really. You’re just meant to do one thing every day that makes you happy. Could be little things. Could be big. In fact, we’re doing one right now…”

Annie Hebden is stuck. Stuck in her boring job, with her irritating roommate, in a life no thirty-five-year-old would want. But deep down, Annie is still mourning the terrible loss that tore a hole through the perfect existence she’d once taken for granted—and hiding away is safer than remembering what used to be. Until she meets the eccentric Polly Leonard.

Bright, bubbly, intrusive Polly is everything Annie doesn’t want in a friend. But Polly is determined to finally wake Annie up to life. Because if recent events have taught Polly anything, it’s that your time is too short to waste a single day—which is why she wants Annie to join her on a mission…

One hundred days. One hundred new ways to be happy. Annie’s convinced it’s impossible, but so is saying no to Polly. And on an unforgettable journey that will force her to open herself to new experiences—and perhaps even new love with the unlikeliest of men—Annie will slowly begin to realize that maybe, just maybe, there’s still joy to be found in the world. But then it becomes clear that Polly’s about to need her new friend more than ever…and Annie will have to decide once and for all whether letting others in is a risk worth taking.

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6. TWO GIRLS DOWN by Louisa Luna

When two young sisters disappear from a strip mall parking lot in a small Pennsylvania town, their devastated mother hires an enigmatic bounty hunter, Alice Vega, to help find the girls. Immediately shut out by a local police department already stretched thin by budget cuts and the growing OxyContin and meth epidemic, Vega enlists the help of a disgraced former cop, Max Caplan. Cap is a man trying to put the scandal of his past behind him and move on, but Vega needs his help to find the girls, and she will not be denied.

With little to go on, Vega and Cap will go to extraordinary lengths to untangle a dangerous web of lies, false leads, and complex relationships to find the girls before time runs out, and they are gone forever.

* * * * *

 

7. THE REFUGEES by Viet Thanh Nguyen

From a young Vietnamese refugee who suffers profound culture shock when he comes to live with two gay men in San Francisco, to a woman whose husband is suffering from dementia and starts to confuse her for a former lover, to a girl living in Ho Chi Minh City whose older half-sister comes back from America having seemingly accomplished everything she never will, the stories are a captivating testament to the dreams and hardships of immigration.

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8. THE IMPOSSIBLE VASTNESS OF US by Samantha Young

I know how to watch my back. I’m the only one that ever has.

India Maxwell hasn’t just moved across the country—she’s plummeted to the bottom rung of the social ladder. It’s taken years to cover the mess of her home life with a veneer of popularity. Now she’s living in one of Boston’s wealthiest neighborhoods with her mom’s fiancé and his daughter, Eloise. Thanks to her soon-to-be stepsister’s clique of friends, including Eloise’s gorgeous, arrogant boyfriend Finn, India feels like the one thing she hoped never to be seen as again: trash.

But India’s not alone in struggling to control the secrets of her past. Eloise and Finn, the school’s golden couple, aren’t all they seem to be. In fact, everyone’s life is infinitely more complex than it first appears. And as India grows closer to Finn and befriends Eloise, threatening the facades that hold them together, what’s left are truths that are brutal, beautiful, and big enough to change them forever…

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9. THE SILENT WATERS by Brittainy C. Cherry

Moments.  Our lives are a collection of moments. Some utterly painful and full of yesterday’s hurts. Some beautifully hopeful and full of tomorrow’s promises.

I’ve had many moments in my lifetime, moments that changed me, challenged me. Moments that scared me and engulfed me. However, the biggest ones—the most heartbreaking and breathtaking ones—all included him.

I was ten years old when I lost my voice. A piece of me was stolen away, and the only person who could truly hear my silence was Brooks Griffin. He was the light during my dark days, the promise of tomorrow, until tragedy found him. Tragedy that eventually drowned him in a sea of memories.

This is the story of a boy and girl who loved each other, but didn’t love themselves. A story of life and death. Of love and broken promises.  Of moments.

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10. WHAT LIES BETWEEN US by Nayomi Munaweera

In the idyllic hill country of Sri Lanka, a young girl grows up with her loving family; but even in the midst of this paradise, terror lurks in the shadows. When tragedy strikes, she and her mother must seek safety by immigrating to America. There the girl reinvents herself as an American teenager to survive, with the help of her cousin; but even as she assimilates and thrives, the secrets and scars of her past follow her into adulthood. In this new country of freedom, everything she has built begins to crumble around her, and her hold on reality becomes more and more tenuous. When the past and the present collide, she sees only one terrible choice.

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Question:  Have you read any of these? Do you ever add books to your TBR and later forget why you wanted to read them?

48 replies
  1. Sam@wlabb
    Sam@wlabb says:

    I am guilty of the never ending TBR, but I cull it every once in a while. I won’t add sequels, if I have not read the previous book. It’s a rule for me. I have read, and LOVED, two of these. Going Places was heartwarming, and I liked that it took on alternatives to college post high school. And, Now is Everything was really emotional story about domestic abuse. Liked them both very much

    • Suzanne
      Suzanne says:

      Yeah, those both sounded really good when I re-read the blurbs. I think I just have a terrible memory about books since I pay attention to so many of them, lol.

  2. Jonetta (Ejaygirl) | Blue Mood Café
    Jonetta (Ejaygirl) | Blue Mood Café says:

    It drives me crazy when I can’t figure out why I added a book to my shelf. That’s why years ago I started adding the reason in the private notes section on Goodreads. It’s become invaluable as my TBR has long been out of control. I’m hoping you added The One because of me as I raved about it a few months ago. And, I recently featured Two Girls Down in my Saturdays at the Café as one I added. It was selected as a group read in one of my Goodreads groups and those that have finished really enjoyed it.

    Hope that helps!

  3. verushka
    verushka says:

    I’ve actually read Two Girls Down and the One, which were both intense in their own ways. The others though are all new to me — and I am totally guilty of wanting something that sounds good and getting distracted and forgetting about them entirely!

  4. Tammy @ Books, Bones & Buffy
    Tammy @ Books, Bones & Buffy says:

    This prompt is very funny! I never remove books from my GR TBR because it’s tedious, but I’m sure I could have easily come up with a list. The John Marrs book caught my eye because I read The Passengers recently and had fun with it.

  5. Tanya @ Girl Plus Books
    Tanya @ Girl Plus Books says:

    The Silent Waters is on my TBR, too. I love Brittainy C. Cherry. The “series” is really in name only and the books are all stand alone. I loved The Air He Breathes and I’ve heard that The Silent Waters is even better.

    • Suzanne
      Suzanne says:

      Good to know those are all standalones. Maybe that’s why I added it then. The guy on the cover is really cute so that could be why too, lol.

  6. Brittany
    Brittany says:

    I haven’t even heard of any of the books on your list, but I also add books to my TBR all the time and then go back later and wonder what I was thinking!!

    • Suzanne
      Suzanne says:

      Yeah, a few people have commented on this post that that’s actually a great read so hopefully I’ll get to it some day.

  7. Leah
    Leah says:

    I’m pretty sure there are some books I added to my Goodreads To Read list based on the cover or title. I have to go through there and remove some of them because let’s face it, I probably won’t get to them.

  8. ShootingStarsMag
    ShootingStarsMag says:

    The book from your list that I DO want to read is The One. I’ve heard good things. I didn’t really start using Goodreads until a few years or so ago, so most of what I add is from blog recommendations. However, there are definitely tons of books on the list so I can’t remember why I added most, or even remember the summary (but I tend to like the sound of most of them even after the fact).

    -Lauren

    • Suzanne
      Suzanne says:

      Several people have commented about how good The One is so I’m glad I kept it on my list. Hopefully I’ll actually read it some day.

  9. Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction
    Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction says:

    Every once in a while I’ll go through my TBR and realize I have no idea what some of the books are. I’m sure I added them because a blogger I trust loved them, but time has passed and I don’t remember the details anymore. I tend to leave some of them and delete others.

  10. RS
    RS says:

    I think I might be the only person on earth who didn’t like Now Is Everything, at least for reasons of not liking the main character, but good lord, she nearly gave me apoplexy. Months later that cover is still a rage trigger. Hopefully you’ll be among the legions who feel the opposite of that.

    To end on a positive note, The Muse does look intriguing.

  11. Flora Gatehouse
    Flora Gatehouse says:

    Lol! I joined in with soooo many reading challenges in 2018 and 2019 that my Kindle is still full of the books I downloaded for a particular task because the blurb interested me. 😉 I’m not sure if I’ll ever read all the books on my TBR pile.

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