Top Ten Tuesday is hosted every week by The Broke and The Bookish, and this week's theme is Top Ten Books On My Fall 2013 TBR List (you could do top ten fall releases you plan on reading or just your planned reading list).
I'm not great at keeping up with books coming out, mostly because there are so many out already I need to read. So I decided to list what I am reading next, summaries courtesy of Goodreads.
1. Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock: Today is Leonard
Peacock's birthday. It is also the day he hides a gun in his backpack.
Because today is the day he will kill his former best friend, and then
himself, with his grandfather's P-38 pistol.
But first he must
say good-bye to the four people who matter most to him: his Humphrey
Bogart-obsessed next-door neighbor, Walt; his classmate Baback, a violin
virtuoso; Lauren, the Christian homeschooler he has a crush on; and
Herr Silverman, who teaches the high school's class on the Holocaust.
Speaking to each in turn, Leonard slowly reveals his secrets as the
hours tick by and the moment of truth approaches.
In this
riveting book, acclaimed author Matthew Quick unflinchingly examines the
impossible choices that must be made—and the light in us all that never
goes out.
2. Empire Falls: Miles Roby has been
slinging burgers at the Empire Grill for 20 years, a job that cost him
his college education and much of his self-respect. What keeps him
there? It could be his bright, sensitive daughter Tick, who needs all
his help surviving the local high school. Or maybe it’s Janine, Miles’
soon-to-be ex-wife, who’s taken up with a noxiously vain health-club
proprietor. Or perhaps it’s the imperious Francine Whiting, who owns
everything in town–and seems to believe that “everything” includes Miles
himself. In Empire Falls Richard Russo delves deep into the blue-collar heart of America in a work that overflows with hilarity, heartache, and grace.
3. The Book Thief: It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will become busier still.
Liesel
Meminger is a foster girl living outside of Munich, who scratches out a
meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something
she can’t resist–books. With the help of her accordion-playing foster
father, she learns to read and shares her stolen books with her
neighbors during bombing raids as well as with the Jewish man hidden in
her basement.
4. Atlas Shrugged: This is the story of a
man who said that he would stop the motor of the world—and did. Was he a
destroyer or the greatest of liberators? Why did he have to fight his
battle, not against his enemies, but against those who needed him most,
and his hardest battle against the woman he loved? What is the world’s
motor—and the motive power of every man? You will know the answer to
these questions when you discover the reason behind the baffling events
that play havoc with the lives of the characters in this story.
Tremendous
in its scope, this novel presents an astounding panorama of human
life—from the productive genius who becomes a worthless playboy—to the
great steel industrialist who does not know that he is working for his
own destruction—to the philosopher who becomes a pirate—to the composer
who gives up his career on the night of his triumph—to the woman who
runs a transcontinental railroad—to the lowest track worker in her
Terminal tunnels.
You must be prepared, when you read this novel,
to check every premise at the root of your convictions. This is a
mystery story, not about the murder of a man’s body, but about the
murder—and rebirth—of man’s spirit. It is a philosophical revolution,
told in the form of an action thriller of violent events, a ruthlessly
brilliant plot structure and an irresistible suspense. Do you say this
is impossible? Well, that is the first of your premises to check.
5. Freedom: Patty and Walter
Berglund were the new pioneers of old St. Paul—the gentrifiers, the
hands-on parents, the avant-garde of the Whole Foods generation. Patty
was the ideal sort of neighbor, who could tell you where to recycle your
batteries and how to get the local cops to actually do their job. She
was an enviably perfect mother and the wife of Walter’s dreams. Together
with Walter—environmental lawyer, commuter cyclist, total family
man—she was doing her small part to build a better world.
But
now, in the new millennium, the Berglunds have become a mystery. Why has
their teenage son moved in with the aggressively Republican family next
door? Why has Walter taken a job working with Big Coal? What exactly is
Richard Katz—outrĂ© rocker and Walter’s college best friend and
rival—still doing in the picture? Most of all, what has happened to
Patty? Why has the bright star of Barrier Street become “a very
different kind of neighbor,” an implacable Fury coming unhinged before
the street’s attentive eyes?
6. World War Z: The Zombie War came
unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. Max Brooks, driven by the
urgency of preserving the acid-etched first-hand experiences of the
survivors from those apocalyptic years, traveled across the United
States of America and throughout the world, from decimated cities that
once teemed with upwards of thirty million souls to the most remote and
inhospitable areas of the planet. He recorded the testimony of men,
women, and sometimes children who came face-to-face with the living, or
at least the undead, hell of that dreadful time. World War Z is
the result. Never before have we had access to a document that so
powerfully conveys the depth of fear and horror, and also the
ineradicable spirit of resistance, that gripped human society through
the plague years.
7. Middlesex: So begins the
breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides and three generations of the
Greek-American Stephanides family who travel from a tiny village
overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit,
witnessing its glory days as the Motor City, and the race riots of 1967,
before they move out to the tree-lined streets of suburban Grosse
Pointe, Michigan. To understand why Calliope is not like other girls,
she has to uncover a guilty family secret and the astonishing genetic
history that turns Callie into Cal, one of the most audacious and
wondrous narrators in contemporary fiction. Lyrical and thrilling, Middlesex is an exhilarating reinvention of the American epic.
8. Thirteen Reasons Why: Clay Jensen returns home
from school to find a mysterious box with his name on it lying on his
porch. Inside he discovers thirteen cassette tapes recorded by Hannah
Baker, his classmate and crush who committed suicide two weeks earlier.
On tape, Hannah explains that there are thirteen reasons why she
decided to end her life. Clay is one of them. If he listens, he'll find
out how he made the list.
Through Hannah and Clay's dual
narratives, debut author Jay Asher weaves an intricate and heartrending
story of confusion and desperation that will deeply affect teen readers.
9. The last Harry Potter: Harry Potter is preparing
to leave the Dursleys and Privet Drive for the last time. But the
future that awaits him is full of danger, not only for him, but for
anyone close to him — and Harry has already lost so much. Only by
destroying Voldemort's remaining Horcruxes can Harry free himself and
overcome the Dark Lord's forces of evil.
In this dramatic
conclusion to the Harry Potter series, Harry must leave his most loyal
friends behind, and in a final perilous journey find the strength and
the will to face his terrifying destiny: a deadly confrontation that is
his alone to fight.
10. The Lightening Thief: Percy Jackson is about
to be kicked out of boarding school... again. And that's the least of
his troubles. Lately, mythological monsters and the gods of Mount
Olympus seem to be walking straight out of the pages of Percy's Greek
mythology textbook and into his life. And worse, he's angered a few of
them. Zeus' master lightning bolt has been stolen, and Percy is the
prime suspect.
Now Percy and his friends have just ten days to
find and return Zeus' stolen property and bring peace to a warring Mount
Olympus. But to succeed on his quest, Percy will have to do more than
catch the true thief: he must come to terms with the father who
abandoned him; solve the riddle of the Oracle, which warns him of
betrayal by a friend; and unravel a treachery more powerful than the
gods themselves.
Im also reading the book thief this fall. cant wait and the movie looks good too!
ReplyDeleteyou can check out my list here: http://caitstruelife.wordpress.com/2013/09/17/top-ten-tuesday-top-ten-books-on-my-fall-2013-tbr-list/
I didn't know they were making a movie. I will definitely need to read it before I see that!
DeleteI've been meaning to go back and finish Empire Falls; I started reading it years and years ago but then it was due back at the library and I never bothered renewing it again.
ReplyDeleteHope you enjoy The Book Thief! :) And Middlesex is on my "I will get to it eventually" list, lol; I enjoyed his first novel, The Virgin Suicides. Great list!
My TTT
I have done that more than a few times with books. It the one downside to going to the library for my books.
DeleteGood list, I loved The Lightening Thief, The Book Thief and Thirteen Reasons Why. I also want to read Middlesex.
ReplyDeleteI have heard nothing but good things about those three books.
DeleteI must admit I'm a little scared of The Book Thief. Everyone seems to gush about it and it worries me that I won't love it like the rest of the world seems to.
ReplyDeleteMy TTT List
I totally understand. There are more than a few books people seem to love and I'm like "Um.....did I miss something?"
DeleteI keep wanting to read The Book Thief, but not getting to it. I don't know if I will ever feel ready!
ReplyDeleteI tried reading Atlas Shrugged once, and failed miserably. I'm okay with that now.
Thirteen Reasons Why is really good, but I suggest having a fluffy book nearby to save you.
Great list!
Ha ha ha, thanks for the suggestion! And Atlas Shrugged looks rather intimidating!
DeleteThe Book Thief is one of my favorites!
ReplyDeleteGreat!
DeleteThe Book Thief and Percy Jackson are two of our absolute favorites!
ReplyDeleteMore encouragement! I love it!
DeleteGreat list! I can say that I enjoyed "WWZ" and "Middlesex" a lot, and I hope to get to "Empire Falls" one day. Happy reading!
ReplyDeleteI love getting endorsements for books I want to read. It helps me pick them up quicker!
Delete