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The ‘Books That Made Your Year’ Book Tag

Reader Fact: Books keep us from losing our damn minds—Usually.

Well, we’ve made it to the New Year..
What better time to share your favorite reads from 2021!

I picked reading up again after a ten-year hiatus this last January (2021) and, I have to tell you, it’s been such an incredible reading adventure. I don’t know about you but.. I’ve had the pleasure of reading so many fun, fantastic, and phenomenal books that I can’t believe I had given it up.

This tag is my way of sharing some of the books that made this year a great experience for me.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I did!

Rules:

  • Link back to the creator: Sheri @ ReadBetwixtWords
  • Pick a favorite book/character that you were able to read this past year. (No TBR’s)
  • Answer with the book that you think fits each question the best.
  • Add a link back to any reviews/posts of each book
  • Just have fun with it!
  • Tag a friend or two to keep it going! (optional)

(Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. Any purchases made through my links may earn me a small commission at no additional cost to you.)

Your favorite book of the year that was:

Haunting
A ghost story:

The Broken Girls by Simone St. James 4.5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

Vermont, 1950. There’s a place for the girls whom no one wants—the troublemakers, the illegitimate, the ones too smart for their own good. It’s called Idlewild Hall, and local legend says the boarding school is haunted. Four roommates bond over their whispered fears, their friendship blossoming—until one of them mysteriously disappears….

Vermont, 2014. Twenty years ago, journalist Fiona Sheridan’s elder sister’s body was found in the overgrown fields near the ruins of Idlewild Hall. And although her sister’s boyfriend was tried and convicted of the murder, Fiona can’t stop revisiting the events, unable to shake the feeling that something was never right about the case.

When Fiona discovers that Idlewild Hall is being restored by an anonymous benefactor, she decides to write a story about it. But a shocking discovery during renovations links the loss of her sister to secrets that were meant to stay hidden in the past—and a voice that won’t be silenced….

Funny
A book that had you laughing out loud:

The Wallbanger by Alice Clayton 4.5/5
Book 1 of 4: The Cocktail

See my review here!

Caroline Reynolds has a fantastic new apartment in San Francisco, a Kitchen Aid mixer to die for, and no O (and we’re not talking Oprah here, folks).

She has a flourishing design career, an office overlooking the bay, a killer zucchini bread recipe, and no O. She has Clive (the best cat ever), great friends, a great rack, and no O.

Adding insult to O-less, she also has an oversexed neighbor with the loudest late-night wallbanging she’s ever heard. Every moan, spank, and—was that a meow?—punctuates the fact that not only is she losing sleep, she still has—yep, you guessed it—no O.

Enter Simon Parker. When the wallbanging threatens to literally bounce her out of bed, Caroline, clad in sexual frustration and a pink baby-doll nightie, confronts her heard-but-never-seen neighbor. Their late-night hallway encounter has…well…mixed results. Because with walls this thin, the tension’s gonna be thick. A delicious mix of silly and steamy, this is an irresistible tale of exasperation at first sight.

Family
An inescapable bond:

Mirrorland by Carole Johnstone 5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

Cat lives in Los Angeles, far from 36 Westeryk Road, the imposing gothic house in Edinburgh where she and her estranged twin sister, El, grew up. As girls, they invented Mirrorland, a dark, imaginary place under the pantry stairs, full of pirates, witches, and clowns. These days, Cat rarely thinks about their childhood home, or the fact that El now lives there with her husband, Ross.

But when El mysteriously disappears after going out on her sailboat, Cat is forced to return to 36 Westeryk Road, which hasn’t changed in twenty years. The grand old house is still full of shadowy corners, and at every turn Cat finds herself stumbling on long-held secrets and terrifying ghosts from the past. Because someone—El?—has left Cat clues: a treasure hunt that leads back to Mirrorland, where the truth lies waiting…

A brilliantly crafted story of love and betrayal, redemption and revenge, Mirrorland is a propulsive, page-turning debut about the power of imagination and the price of freedom.

Wtf
A book you couldn’t wrap your head around:

Baby Teeth by Zoje Stage 4/5
Standalone

See my review here!

MEET HANNA: 
Seven-year-old Hanna is a sweet-but-silent angel in the eyes of her adoring father Alex. He’s the only person who understands her. But her mother Suzette stands in her way, and she’ll try any trick she can think of to get rid of her. Ideally for good.

MEET SUZETTE: 
Suzette loves her daughter, but after years of expulsions and strained home schooling, her precarious health and sanity are weakening day by day. She’s also becoming increasingly frightened by Hanna’s little games, while her husband Alex remains blind to the failing family dynamics. Soon, Suzette starts to fear that maybe their supposedly innocent baby girl may have a truly sinister agenda.

Romance
A love you loved to love:

The Duke and I by Julia Quinn 4/5
Book 1 of 8: Bridgertons

See my review here!

Can there be any greater challenge to London’s Ambitious Mamas than an unmarried duke?—Lady Whistledown’s Society Papers, April 1813

By all accounts, Simon Basset is on the verge of proposing to his best friend’s sister—the lovely and almost-on-the-shelf—Daphne Bridgerton. But the two of them know the truth—it’s all an elaborate ruse to keep Simon free from marriage-minded society mothers. And as for Daphne, surely she will attract some worthy suitors now that it seems a duke has declared her desirable.

But as Daphne waltzes across ballroom after ballroom with Simon, it’s hard to remember that their courtship is a sham. Maybe it’s his devilish smile, certainly it’s the way his eyes seem to burn every time he looks at her . . . but somehow Daphne is falling for the dashing duke . . . for real! And now she must do the impossible and convince the handsome rogue that their clever little scheme deserves a slight alteration, and that nothing makes quite as much sense as falling in love.

Unique
A story or characters that were one of a kind:

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire 5/5
Book 1 of 7: Wayward Children

See my review here!

Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children
No Solicitations
No Visitors
No Quests


Children have always disappeared under the right conditions; slipping through the shadows under a bed or at the back of a wardrobe, tumbling down rabbit holes and into old wells, and emerging somewhere… else.

But magical lands have little need for used-up miracle children.

Nancy tumbled once, but now she’s back. The things she’s experienced… they change a person. The children under Miss West’s care understand all too well. And each of them is seeking a way back to their own fantasy world.

But Nancy’s arrival marks a change at the Home. There’s a darkness just around each corner, and when tragedy strikes, it’s up to Nancy and her new-found schoolmates to get to the heart of things.

No matter the cost.

Fairy tale/Retelling

Echo North by Joanna Ruth Meyer 4/5
Standalone

See my review here!

Echo Alkaev’s safe and carefully structured world falls apart when her father leaves for the city and mysteriously disappears. Believing he is lost forever, Echo is shocked to find him half-frozen in the winter forest six months later, guarded by a strange talking wolf—the same creature who attacked her as a child. The wolf presents Echo with an ultimatum: if she lives with him for one year, he will ensure her father makes it home safely. But there is more to the wolf than Echo realizes.

In his enchanted house beneath a mountain, each room must be sewn together to keep the home from unraveling, and something new and dark and strange lies behind every door. When centuries-old secrets unfold, Echo discovers a magical library full of books- turned-mirrors, and a young man named Hal who is trapped inside of them. As the year ticks by, the rooms begin to disappear and Echo must solve the mystery of the wolf’s enchantment before her time is up otherwise Echo, the wolf, and Hal will be lost forever.

Intense
Had you on the edge of your seat:

The Noise: A Thriller by James Patterson and J. D. Barker 5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

If you hear it, it’s too late. 

“A really entertaining thriller [that] like Michael Crichton . . . keeps racheting up the suspense.” –Booklist

In the shadow of Mount Hood, sixteen-year-old Tennant is checking rabbit traps with her eight-year-old sister Sophie when the girls are suddenly overcome by a strange vibration rising out of the forest, building in intensity until it sounds like a deafening crescendo of screams. From out of nowhere, their father sweeps them up and drops them through a trapdoor into a storm cellar. But the sound only gets worse . . .

Weird
An unusual book or character:

Follow Me to Ground by Sue Rainsford 4.5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

 Ada and her father, touched by the power to heal illness, live on the edge of a village where they help sick locals—or “Cures”—by cracking open their damaged bodies or temporarily burying them in the reviving, dangerous Ground nearby.

Ada, a being both more and less than human, is mostly uninterested in the Cures, until she meets a man named Samson—and they quickly strike up an affair.

Soon, Ada is torn between her old way of life and new possibilities with her lover, and eventually she comes to a decision that will forever change Samson, the town, and the Ground itself.

Sweet
A heartwarming story:

A Dog’s Courage by W. Bruce Cameron 5/5
Book 2 of 2: Dog’s Way Home Tale

See my review here!

Bella was once a lost dog, but now she lives happily with her people, Lucas and Olivia, only occasionally recalling the hardships in her past. Then a weekend camping trip turns into a harrowing struggle for survival when the Rocky Mountains are engulfed by the biggest wildfire in American history. The raging inferno separates Bella from her people and she is lost once more.

Alone in the wilderness, Bella unexpectedly finds herself responsible for the safety of two defenseless mountain lion cubs. Now she’s torn between two equally urgent goals. More than anything, she wants to find her way home to Lucas and Olivia, but not if it means abandoning her new family to danger. And danger abounds, from predators hunting them to the flames threatening at every turn.

Can Bella ever get back to where she truly belongs?

Boring
You just weren’t feeling it:

Winter Harvester by Nik Dekasha 3/5
Book 1 of 2: Other Magic Series

See my review here!

Verna Harvester has disappeared, and everyone is suffering because of her absence even though practically no one—aside from her three sisters—knows who she is.

Winnie, the oldest of the four siblings, fears the worst, and knowing her sisters’ true natures means she knows how important it is not just for them but for the whole world to get Verna back.

When a message Winnie suspects is from Verna appears on her sidewalk, she endeavors to find her, but she’ll need help from reluctant beings with extraordinary powers, and she’ll have to leverage her own abilities—and confront her own weaknesses—to hunt for her sister.

A search to the ends of the earth may not be enough to find Verna, but it just might be a good place to start.

Unexpected
A book you didn’t expect much from.. but ended up really enjoying:

In My Dreams I Hold a Knife by Ashley Winstead 5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

Six friends.
One college reunion.
One unsolved murder.

Ten years after graduation, Jessica Miller has planned her triumphant return to her southern, elite Duquette University, down to the envious whispers that are sure to follow in her wake. Everyone is going to see the girl she wants them to see—confident, beautiful, indifferent. Not the girl she was when she left campus, back when Heather Shelby’s murder fractured everything, including the tight bond linking the six friends she’d been closest to since freshman year.

But not everyone is ready to move on. Not everyone left Duquette ten years ago, and not everyone can let Heather’s murder go unsolved. Someone is determined to trap the real killer, to make the guilty pay. When the six friends are reunited, they will be forced to confront what happened that night—and the years’ worth of secrets each of them would do anything to keep hidden.

Writing
The writing stood out:

House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland 5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

Iris Hollow and her two older sisters are unquestionably strange. Ever since they disappeared on a suburban street in Scotland as children only to return a month a later with no memory of what happened to them, odd, eerie occurrences seem to follow in their wake. And they’re changing. First, their dark hair turned white. Then, their blue eyes slowly turned black. They have insatiable appetites yet never gain weight. People find them disturbingly intoxicating, unbearably beautiful, and inexplicably dangerous.

But now, ten years later, seventeen-year-old Iris Hollow is doing all she can to fit in and graduate high school on time–something her two famously glamourous globe-trotting older sisters, Grey and Vivi, never managed to do. But when Grey goes missing without a trace, leaving behind bizarre clues as to what might have happened, Iris and Vivi are left to trace her last few days. They aren’t the only ones looking for her though. As they brush against the supernatural they realize that the story they’ve been told about their past is unraveling and the world that returned them seemingly unharmed ten years ago, might just be calling them home.

Young adult
Your favorite YA read of the year:

Be Not Far From Me by Mindy McGinnis 5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

The world is not tame. Ashley knows this truth deep in her bones, more at home with trees overhead than a roof.

So when she goes hiking in the Smokies with her friends for a night of partying, the falling dark and creaking trees are second nature to her. But people are not tame either. And when Ashley catches her boyfriend with another girl, drunken rage sends her running into the night, stopped only by a nasty fall into a ravine.

Morning brings the realization that she’s alone—and far off trail. Lost in undisturbed forest and with nothing but the clothes on her back, Ashley must figure out how to survive with the red streak of infection creeping up her leg.

Middle grade
Your favorite MG read of the year

Small Spaces by Katherine Arden 4.5/5
Book 1 of 3: Small Spaces

See my review here!

After suffering a tragic loss, eleven-year-old Ollie only finds solace in books. So when she happens upon a crazed woman at the river threatening to throw a book into the water, Ollie doesn’t think—she just acts, stealing the book and running away. As she begins to read the slender volume, Ollie discovers a chilling story about a girl named Beth, the two brothers who both loved her, and a peculiar deal made with “the smiling man,” a sinister specter who grants your most tightly held wish, but only for the ultimate price.

Ollie is captivated by the tale until her school trip the next day to Smoke Hollow, a local farm with a haunting history all its own. There she stumbles upon the graves of the very people she’s been reading about. Could it be the story about the smiling man is true? Ollie doesn’t have too long to think about the answer to that. On the way home, the school bus breaks down, sending their teacher back to the farm for help. But the strange bus driver has some advice for the kids left behind in his care: “Best get moving. At nightfall they’ll come for the rest of you.” Nightfall is, indeed, fast descending when Ollie’s previously broken digital wristwatch, a keepsake reminder of better times, begins a startling countdown and delivers a terrifying message: RUN.

Only Ollie and two of her classmates heed the bus driver’s warning. As the trio head out into the woods—bordered by a field of scarecrows that seem to be watching them—the bus driver has just one final piece of advice for Ollie and her friends: “Avoid large places. Keep to small.”

And with that, a deliciously creepy and hair-raising adventure begins.

DNF
Did Not Finish and don’t plan to:

Survive the Night by Riley Sager
Standalone

It’s November 1991. Nirvana’s in the tape deck, George H. W. Bush is in the White House, and movie-obsessed college student Charlie Jordan is in a car with a man who might be a serial killer.

Josh Baxter, the man behind the wheel, is a virtual stranger to Charlie. They met at the campus ride board, each looking to share the long drive home to Ohio. Both have good reasons for wanting to get away. For Charlie, it’s guilt and grief over the shocking murder of her best friend, who became the third victim of the man known as the Campus Killer. For Josh, it’s to help care for his sick father—or so he says.

The longer she sits in the passenger seat, the more Charlie notices there’s something suspicious about Josh, from the holes in his story about his father to how he doesn’t want her to see inside the trunk. As they travel an empty, twisty highway in the dead of night, an increasingly anxious Charlie begins to think she’s sharing a car with the Campus Killer. Is Josh truly dangerous? Or is Charlie’s jittery mistrust merely a figment of her movie-fueled imagination?

One thing is certain—Charlie has nowhere to run and no way to call for help. Trapped in a terrifying game of cat and mouse played out on pitch-black roads and in neon-lit parking lots, Charlie knows the only way to win is to survive the night.

Five Stars
A favorite read of the year:

The Twisted Ones by T. Kingfisher 5/5
Standalone

See my review here!

When Mouse’s dad asks her to clean out her dead grandmother’s house, she says yes. After all, how bad could it be?

Answer: pretty bad. Grandma was a hoarder, and her house is stuffed with useless rubbish. That would be horrific enough, but there’s more—Mouse stumbles across her step-grandfather’s journal, which at first seems to be filled with nonsensical rants…until Mouse encounters some of the terrifying things he described for herself.

Alone in the woods with her dog, Mouse finds herself face to face with a series of impossible terrors—because sometimes the things that go bump in the night are real, and they’re looking for you. And if she doesn’t face them head on, she might not survive to tell the tale.

From Hugo Award–winning author Ursula Vernon, writing as T. Kingfisher, The Twisted Ones is a gripping, terrifying tale bound to keep you up all night—from both fear and anticipation of what happens next.

Cover
A book you picked up for the cover:

Violet Grenade by Victoria Scott 4/5
Standalone

See my review here!

Her name is Domino Ray.

But the voice inside her head has a different name.

When the mysterious Ms. Karina finds Domino in an alleyway, she offers her a position at her girls’ home in secluded West Texas. With no alternatives and an agenda of her own, Domino accepts. It isn’t long before she is fighting her way up the ranks to gain the woman’s approval…and falling for Cain, the mysterious boy living in the basement.

But the home has horrible secrets. So do the girls living there. So does Cain.

Escaping is harder than Domino expects, though, because Ms. Karina doesn’t like to lose inventory. But then, she doesn’t know about the danger living inside Domino’s mind.

She doesn’t know about Wilson.

And.. that’s a wrap!

Thanks so much for stopping in to check out this tag, I hope you enjoyed it. Any and all are welcome to join in the fun!
(If you do? Be sure to drop a comment or link back.. I would love to see the books that made your 2021 great!)

What do you think?
What were some of your favorite reads this last year?

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This Post Has 4 Comments

  1. Lady Tessa

    I loved Mirrorland and I heard Survive the Night is very good. I have it but haven’t had a chance to read it yet. Excellent list!

    1. Sheri Dye

      Mirrorland was pretty great, every time I was sure I had figured something out, it surprised me. Survive the Night, on the other hand, not so much.. I am curious about what your response will be though. 😆
      Thanks so much and happy reading!

      1. Lady Tessa

        So is Mae. Maybe I’ll finally get to it sometime this year. I actually have a physical copy and they always make me feel more guilty than the digital ones. 😂

        1. Sheri Dye

          You’ll get to it when you get to it.. Heaven knows there are enough to choose from!
          And I agree. It’s almost like they have some kind of book version of puppydog eyes.🤭

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