Have you ever finished reading a book or a series that made it hard for you to pick up anything else for a while? Both Chelsey and I have. In this Top Five Wednesday video we talk about our biggest book hangovers.
Book Hangovers can come in many different shapes and sizes. Sometimes it’s because a story was so good you’re convinced nothing will live up to it, so you can’t bring yourself to try and read something else. Sometimes the book was so profound and you need to take a few days to sit there and think about what you just read. Or sometimes you didn’t like the book you’ve just finished and can’t bring yourself to try and read anything.
There are a few of each on this list.
Top Five Wednesday is a book tag started by GingerReadsLainey. Join the goodreads group to get each week’s topic and participate yourselves!
5. Carry On – Rainbow Rowell
The romance in this book broke me. It’s so cute and sweet and perfect and I’m I’m never going to find a romance that is this well paced ever again. When I finished Carry On, I didn’t want to read anything, all I wanted to do was reread this stupid book. The problem was that I wanted to read it like it was the first time I had read it.
Both Chelsey and I came out of this book feeling like we’d never find another book like this. Which is heartbreaking. If you haven’t checked out Carry On, go and give it a chance. Even if you’re not the biggest romance fan, this might change your mind a little.
Chelsey and I somehow managed to film a review for this novel. Check it out here.
4. The Young Elites – Marie Lu
Finishing The Young Elites is like waking up after being black out drunk. You’re not exactly sure what just happened, you’re sure it was a wild night and a cool story but you still kind of regret it a little bit. The Young Elites was a very dark novel, but it never felt like it was dark for dark’s sake.You’re following the main character Adelina Amouteru and at the time of the story her choices and actions make sense. The progression from heroic to villainous was so slow that you hardly even notice it until the very end. You look back at the novel and realize the world is burning behind you.
After I finished The Young Elites, I had to go outside to feel the sun and wind on my face and hear the birds chirping. It was at that time that I decided, maybe I should take a break from the dark fantasy for a while.
We reviewed The Young Elites, you can watch it here.
3. Glass Sword – Victoria Aveyard
To follow up with The Young Elites black out metaphor: finishing Glass Sword is like when you wake up and swear off drinking for the rest of your life. For this book everything went wrong for us. From the characters to the writing style to the plot (which could have been really interesting) there was nothing that kept us wanting to finish this book. The main character Mare was probably our biggest issue with this novel. Throughout the story all she ever did was whine and somehow managed to come off as a brat and a martyr at the same time. There was just too much of Mare’s inner monologue and repetitious negative outlooks on life that it just sucked ant likability out of the novel.
We did a review on Glass Sword and you can find out more about our thoughts on the novel here.
2. Vicious – V.E. Schwab
I loved this book so much. All of the my favourite tropes are here and they’re done really really well. Not to mention V.E. Scwhab is an amazing writer. Vicious is her super hero super villain mashup novel that leaves you wondering if anyone is actually a super hero. When I finished this novel I fell into a miserable book hangover because this was a standalone and I was never going to be able to read about these characters ever again. I was able to drag myself out of my funk after doing a bit of research. Turns out there’s a short story following one of the novels characters and Schwab announced that she’s turning Vicious into a series! Now I just have to wait for who knows how long.
Check out my text review of Vicious here.
1. The Golden Compass/His Dark Materials – Philip Pullman
This is the first series that Chelsey remembers left her feeling devastated. I remember feeling a similar way, but probably not to the same extent. His Dark Materials showed both of us that you don’t have to write a happy ending to leave your story with the best possible conclusion. We both had a really hard time going back to the more fun, fluffy stories that we were supposed to be reading at that age. It set some pretty high standards for heartbreak in books and we have yet to find something that is it’s equal.
We did a look back on the first book in the trilogy The Golden Compass, you can watch that here.
Sometimes book hangovers just happen. There have been a few times where I’ve just fallen into a reading slump and have found myself drawn to other forms of entertainment like podcasts, TV or movies. It’s fine though, every once in a while you need to take a break from reading and change it up a bit. Reading hangovers are natural.
What books gave you the biggest book hangovers? Tell us about them in the comments below. Until next time, happy reading!
