So a while back I was tagged by Lina, and now I’ve been tagged by Meg, so it seems it’s time for me to get a move on with this tag that honestly terrifies me a little… I mean, I have to select books I might hypothetically be willing to burn? It just seems so wrong! But it’s also all in good fun. I used a random number generator to help me select my read books from Goodreads by row and column. Here we go…
Round One: The Naturals, These Broken Stars, Insurgent
BURN: These Broken Stars
Let me be clear: I do not hate this book. I rated it 3.5 stars. It’s not even my least favorite out of this group. But… I just don’t have to have it. I’m terribly sorry; I do love that cover.
REWRITE: Insurgent
This one is my least favorite of this round, yet it was easier for me to think of how to rewrite this one than These Broken Stars, plus it is kind of in the middle of a trilogy. What happens in the end of the book that sets up Allegiant is great. Almost everything else… ehhhh. And ugh, this book crushes me with Caleb being bad. And I never even get to find out why! And Tris and Four are in the worst relationship ever… just break up already… so yeah, this one could benefit from some rewrites for sure to help make the trilogy stronger.
REREAD: The Naturals
The Naturals could use a little bit of rewriting too, but oh well. I do like it the most out of all these and it is a fun/plot-twisty story that I probably would like to reread again one day. Just that love triangle, UGH.
Round Two: What’s Left of Me, Not A Drop to Drink, Across a Star-Swept Sea
This is a crazy easy round…
BURN: Not A Drop to Drink
I could not connect with this book at all. Don’t need it.
REWRITE: What’s Left of Me
This one was enjoyable but not perfect. Though I think the third book would benefit most from a rewrite, this one could benefit from it as well, especially more detailed worldbuilding.
REREAD: Across a Star-Swept Sea
This one’s a 5-star book for me; I adore it! Definitely a reread!
Round Three: Seraphina, The Shack, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Another easy round! Yay!
BURN: The Shack
This book fell pretty flat for me. I understood its intent, but there was so much talktalktalk and it wasn’t all interesting.
REWRITE: Seraphina
OK, so I really love a lot about Seraphina. In fact, I’m even rereading it right now! But the beginning is a bit slow and feels a little… wandering… like what’s the purpose/plot of the story? I don’t think it’s going to bother me much during the reread, but it’ll be nice for new readers to be engaged a little more quickly because SERAPHINA AND KIGGS. I ship them for life. And Orma is fabulous.
REREAD: Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire
My favorite of the Harry Potter books (so far, I’ve still got two to go), a solid 5 stars from me, and I just think it’s pretty close to perfect.
Well, round one was a little rough but thankfully those next two were easier! I’m tagging:
– Charlene @ Bookish Whimsy
– Kayla @ The Thousand Lives
– Shannelle @ The Art of Escapism
– And anyone else who’s interested!
Do you agree or disagree with my choices?
I could totally burn The Shack too but I actually loved Not A Drop to Drink, so I would burn What’s Left of Me instead!
Missie @ A Flurry of Ponderings
I read Not A Drop to Drink with my book club, and we all felt sort of meh about it, but it seems we’re in a minority!
I’d love to rewrite Insurgent – it could have been about 100 pages shorter and with a lot less angst!
I STILL need to read Across a Star-Swept Sea – and it’s so pathetic because The Scarlet Pimpernel was one of my favorites in school.
I highly approve of The Goblet of Fire choice 😉 The only one that beats it for me is The Deathly Hallows, but they’re pretty much equal for me.
Thanks for the tag! I can’t wait to do this one 😀
Less angst = amen! I hope you enjoy Across a Star-Swept Sea; I saw where someone else who loved The Scarlet Pimpernel first was a little disappointed by it because she was caught up in trying to parallel the two, but hopefully if you don’t do that and just enjoy what comparisons there are you’ll be good!
Faced with rewriting Seraphina or Goblet of Fire, I would go the entirely unpopular route and pick Goblet of Fire. I mean, not a lot of rewriting, but I love Seraphina too much to touch it!
Well that’s just fine too! I really wish I could have made them both rereads!
I haven’t read The Naturals so it’s totally not fair to play – but I’d reread These Broken Stars and rewrite Insurgent (for so many reasons) which only leaves The Naturals left to burn. I like the idea of this game, though 🙂
Finally getting around to commenting; I’m so sorry it took me this long! Haha, it’s a pretty tough challenge, isn’t it? >:) The hardest was definitely the first round, though I think I would burn The Naturals because I just didn’t love it enough, and re-read These Broken Stars and rewrite Insurgent. TBS wasn’t one of my favorites too, but it did pleasantly surprise me (I was expecting one of those stupid “timeless romance” stories in space *rolls eyes*), and Insurgent was quite underwhelming after Divergent.
Noooo, I was looking forward to Not A Drop to Drink! 😦 But yeah, you’re not the only one who disliked it… I’ve seen plenty of other mixed to negative reviews for the book, unfortunately. And I think I would rewrite What’s Left of Me to include more world building, too. It had an interesting concept and a great story, but the world was so. freaking. shallow. Have you read the second book? Is it any better? And eep, I really have to read For Darkness Shows the Stars soon. It was one of the first YA books I remember hearing about, but for some reason I still haven’t gotten to it yet.
Heh, I don’t know what I would have done if you had chosen to burn or rewrite Harry Potter. 😉 I’m so glad that Goblet of Fire is your favorite! I love the entire series equally, but if I had to choose, Order of the Phoenix would be at the top. And I’ve heard of Seraphina’s slow-movingness… which is kind of worrying. But at least the rest of the story makes up for it, and I tend to be more lenient toward slow-starting fantasy novels. 😛
I KNOW, the book gods were so merciful — we didn’t have to make too many difficult choices! Thanks for doing the tag, Amy!
Unfortunately, the second book of What’s Left of Me was just fine and the third book was really just OK. A very underwhelming trilogy overall, really, which is too bad because I saw the potential and think Kat Zhnag seems like a really neat person.
Yeah, Seraphina is definitely worth it. I just reread it and didn’t think it felt slow at all, but that’s probably because I was already familiar with the story!