My Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 8/10 Author: Tillie ColeGenres: Romance novel, Young adult literature, Young adult romance literatureOriginally Published: 2016Number of pages: 352 “A Thousand Boy Kisses” is dedicated to those who believe in true and epic love. I do, and I have never given up on love. But did I like the book?…
My Rating: ★7/10. When I first read “The Alchemist” at twenty years old, I was so driven by it. I thought it was teaching me so much – entirely new perspectives and ideas. At that time, it felt genuinely transformative. When I decided to write a summary, I wanted to be honest with my readers, so I reread it – especially since it’s a relatively short book. I was also curious: how would I feel reading it now, at thirty-four.
My Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 7/10 Author: Shelby Van PeltGenres: Mystery, Drama, Domestic FictionOriginally Published: 2022, May 3Number of pages: 500 Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt is one of the few contemporary books that I really enjoyed, although the ending could have been more revealing. The…
If you enjoy mystery, intrigue, and investigation, this might be the book for you. I first came across The Last Thing He Told Me when I saw the poster for its movie adaptation. Since the film received such widespread attention, I decided to read the book before watching it.
My Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 8/10 In the novel, Shafak tells two parallel stories centered around two families: the Turkish Kazanchis and the Armenian Chachmakhchians. What I found especially interesting is that even the surnames carry meaning. Kazanchi and Chachmakhchian are both common surnames found among Armenians and Turks.
In the list below of the hardest books to read, I’ve included only the ones I’ve personally read and found extremely challenging to finish. I’ve also included the number of pages for each book, so you know how long the journey will be, along with Goodreads ratings and a link to each book. The list is ordered from the highest-rated books to the lowest-rated ones.
My Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 9/10I don’t remember another Turkish writer becoming as famous in Armenia as Elif Shafak, especially considering the historically complex and often strained Armenian-Turkish relationship. So, you can imagine my skepticism when I first started reading The Forty Rules of Love.
My Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 7/10, Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary is a story about expectations and the illusions that ultimately destroy us. It feels surprisingly contemporary, even though it was written in the 19th century.
My Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 2/10 Honestly, I don’t even know what made me pick up the second book in this trilogy, since I didn’t enjoy the first one enough to write about it. I barely remembered any details from it. I found the second book a little more engaging, though it still took me over a month to finish.
My Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ 5/10 The book begins with the story of Constance and Hilda, the daughters of Sir Malcolm, and their carefree youth—the time when they were 18 or 19 years old. It describes their relationships with the young men they met during those years. But when World War I broke out, those young men were sent to the front lines, and many of them never came back.