5 Books That Have Stayed With Me | SBB ☕︎

OMIGOD YOU GUYS !!!

Today's post is both very exciting and nerve-racking. I don't know why, I never thought I'd feel this way about something so silly, but apparently I'm a weirdo. I thought about doing this post for a really long time but never really felt like it. 

I am so nervous about this, sharing with people my favorite FAVORITE books of all time. I never wanted to really, I always thought of this secret list that existed only in my head as something very private and intimate, it just didn't feel right to share it with others. But as I was writing this post, I felt more and more comfortable about it. Having all these books "written" down in a blogpost -with a certain date and allowing me to update it every year or so- actually feels reassuring. 

All 5 books that are listed below are not just my favorite books, not just books that have stayed with me, they are books that when I read their title, see their cover, my heart feels like bursting and my eyes start to water with emotion. They are books whose characters I feel closer to than some of my family, they are a world I sometimes feel more comfortable in then my own. Books that whenever they get good reviews, I feel a great feeling of accomplishment and pride. These are stories I don't believe have been made up in their author's mind, but simply the tales of real people I know but don't know me. 

The Summer I Turned Pretty

 Belly measures her life in summers. Everything good, everything magical happens between the months of June and August. Winters are simply a time to count the weeks until the next summer, a place away from the beach house, away from Susannah, and most importantly, away from Jeremiah and Conrad. They are the boys that Belly has known since her very first summer--they have been her brother figures, her crushes, and everything in between. 

But one summer, one terrible and wonderful summer, the more everything changes, the more it all ends up just the way it should have been all along.

 

Fangirl

Cath is a Simon Snow fan. Okay, the whole world is a Simon Snow fan... But for Cath, being a fan is her life—and she’s really good at it. She and her twin sister, Wren, ensconced themselves in the Simon Snow series when they were just kids; it’s what got them through their mother leaving. Cath’s sister has mostly grown away from fandom, but Cath can’t let go. She doesn’t want to.

Now that they’re going to college, Wren has told Cath she doesn’t want to be roommates. Cath is on her own, completely outside of her comfort zone. She’s got a surly roommate with a charming, always-around boyfriend, a fiction-writing professor who thinks fan fiction is the end of the civilized world, a handsome classmate who only wants to talk about words... And she can’t stop worrying about her dad, who’s loving and fragile and has never really been alone.

Anna and the French Kiss

Anna is happy in Atlanta. She has a loyal best friend and a crush on her coworker at the movie theater, who is just starting to return her affection. So she's not too pleased when her father decides to send her to a boarding school in Paris for her senior year. But despite not speaking a word of French, Anna meets some cool new friends, including the handsome Étienne St. Clair, who quickly becomes her best friend. Unfortunately, he's taken--and Anna might be too. Will a year of romantic near misses end with the French kiss she's been waiting for?

 

Beautiful Disaster

The new Abby Abernathy is a good girl. She doesn’t drink or swear, and she has the appropriate number of cardigans in her wardrobe. Abby believes she has enough distance from the darkness of her past, but when she arrives at college with her best friend, her path to a new beginning is quickly challenged by Eastern University's Walking One-Night Stand.

Travis Maddox, lean, cut, and covered in tattoos, is exactly what Abby needs—and wants—to avoid. He spends his nights winning money in a floating fight ring, and his days as the ultimate college campus charmer. Intrigued by Abby’s resistance to his appeal, Travis tricks her into his daily life with a simple bet. If he loses, he must remain abstinent for a month. If Abby loses, she must live in Travis’s apartment for the same amount of time. Either way, Travis has no idea that he has met his match.

After

 Tessa is a good girl with a sweet, reliable boyfriend back home. She’s got direction, ambition, and a mother who’s intent on keeping her that way.  But she’s barely moved into her freshman dorm when she runs into Hardin. With his tousled brown hair, cocky British accent, tattoos, and lip ring, Hardin is cute and different from what she’s used to.

But he’s also rude—to the point of cruelty, even. For all his attitude, Tessa should hate Hardin. And she does—until she finds herself alone with him in his room. Something about his dark mood grabs her, and when they kiss it ignites within her a passion she’s never known before.

Tessa already has the perfect boyfriend. So why is she trying so hard to overcome her own hurt pride and Hardin’s prejudice about nice girls like her?  Unless…could this be love?

As a 20 year old girl, I've never fallen in love, with anyone. I don't know the feeling of love or affection outside my close family and friends. But if falling in love makes me feel a quarter of the feelings I'm drowned in when one of these books is mentioned, I shall be very happy and my husband, a very lucky man.