Top Ten Tuesday

I'd planned to post a review today but as I am in the middle of reading a book I'm posting in another meme. This one is Top Ten Tuesday, hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

This week's question was actually a freebie, so I'm doing my 
Top Ten Contemporary Novels. 


I'm sure this topic has been touched on before but I love contemp and want to discuss it again.


10. Anna and the French Kiss/Lola and the Boy Next Door 
I'm grouping these together because they are in a series but I loved their cute and charming dashes of humor, excitement, and of course romantic interests.


9. Eighth Grade Superzero

This book is really unknown, but essentially it's about a boy who decides to become a superhero through community service. The description is lame but the book really is fascinating, with hints of spiritualism and questions on romance, faith, family, and the community woven through the narrative. 




 8.  Please Ignore Vera Dietz
A Printz Honor book! This book is so strange and unusual, but it explains grief and death so well, with narratives from dead people and talking pagodas (pluses). 








7. Amy and Roger's Epic Detour 
Road trip stories certainly can become overused, but this book stays fresh with a great romance and awesome extra features like reciepts and bills woven into the narrative. This is a detour I love taking (sorry, bad pun). 




6. Stargirl/Love Stargirl

This is an older book known as a contemp classic, and one of my favorite older contemporaries. The book celebrates nonconformity and the people who fight against nonconformity. It doesn't seem too popular in the blogosphere but I still love it. 

5. The Fault in Our Stars

This has been lauded everywhere. I'm going to say one thing only: yes, it did make me cry. 












4 Like Mandarin

Another unappreciated gem about small towns, the people that live there, and a maniac pixie dream girl taken to the extreme. It's a brilliantly written book and one of my favorite contemp favorites though it is basically under-appreciated and tanked in the market. 






3. Jellicoe Road

Yes, yes, everyone loves this book and everyone says its awesome, blah blah blah we get it. It really is fantastic though. If you enjoy contemp, read this book for its fantastic characters, plot, and amazing writing. People don't blab it all over the planet for nothing. 




2.  If I Stay/Where She Went
This is a fantastic duology about a broken couple, in the essence, and it is so sweet and charming and sad and beautiful and aghhhh. I really don't know what to write. Both these books made me cry. (Yes, I'm a crier. Deal with it.) 






And finally, number one is a book that.......................not many people know. And it remains my favorite contemporary of all time.


1. Red Glass
This book came out in 2007. It's been critically acclaimed but very few people know it. The book is fantastic, a travel book weaving together the sights and sounds of Mexico as you journey with a heroine that really changes and her adorable love interest, a cute refugee boy, and their chaperones. If you love travel books this is a must read. If you love contemp this is a must read. The writing is goregous and the characters amazing. I could go on about this book forever. But here's the thing: just read it. 




What's in your Top Ten? Leave a link in the comments and I'll try to check it out. :D