2014 End of Year Book Survey

Friday 2 January 2015


Just like last year, The Perpetual Page Turner is hosting an end of year survey. And just like last year I've decided to fill it out. All the book mentioned can be found here. Enjoy.



Stats
Number Of Books You Read: 179
Number of Re-Reads: 0
Genre You Read The Most From: young adult



Best In Books


Best Book You Read In 2014
The Immortal Rules by Julie Kagawa. I just... love it. Best vampire book ever.

Book You Were Excited About & Thought You Were Going To Love More But Didn’t
It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini. I love books about mental illness, as awful as that sounds, because psychology is something that really interests me and is (hopefully) going to be the career path I go down. This book, however, made me disgustingly angry. I don't even want to talk about it.

Most surprising (in a good way or bad way) book you read in 2014 
Fire & Flood by Victoria Scott. I didn't think I'd like it, because I'm not a massive dystopian fan. But I loved it. The whole concept was amazing and I can't wait to get my hands on the second one.

Book You “Pushed” The Most People To Read (And They Did) In 2014
I feel like I mentioned The Walking Dead a lot, but I don't really recommend books to people. I'm just going to go with graphic novels in general for this.

Best series you started in 2014, best sequel of 2014, best series ending of 2014
Best series I started was Burn for Burn by Jenny Han and Siobhan Vivian. Best sequel was Crown of Midnight by Sarah J Maas. And best ending was Doctor Sleep by Stephen King

Favourite new author you discovered in 2014
Victoria Scott because I just fell in love with Fire & Flood and flew through it.

Best book from a genre you don’t typically read/was out of your comfort zone
Slated by Teri Terry. Like I mentioned before, I'm not a huge fan of dystopia, and this was quite a science-fiction type book. In the end, though, I gave it 5 stars.

Most action-packed/thrilling/unputdownable book of the year
Mother, Mother by Koren Zalickas. I found this by chance in a little bookshop in King's Cross station and was immediately pulled in by the title and synopsis. I've recently started reading thrillers and this was perfect for a beginner in the genre. I read a lot of it whilst waiting for the train and then actually on the train because I couldn't wait to find out what happened. 

Book You Read In 2014 That You Are Most Likely To Re-Read Next Year
Honestly, none of them. I don't really re-read because my unread books are just too many to do that. I've been saying I want to re-read The Hunger Games and A Game of Thrones since last year and that still hasn't happened. So we'll see.

Favourite cover of a book you read in 2014

Most memorable character of 2014
Celaena Sardothien from the Throne of Glass series by Sarah J Maas.

Most beautifully written book read in 2014
Linger by Maggie Steifvater. Although I didn't think it was as good as Shiver, the writing was still beautiful. We Were Liars by E Lockhart is a close second, although I felt at times that it was a bit too poetic.

Most Thought-Provoking/Life-Changing Book of 2014
Before We Met by Lucie Whitehouse. It didn't change my life, but it's a thriller so it really did get me thinking.

Book you can’t believe you waited UNTIL 2014 to finally read
Psycho by Robert Bloch. I'd been thinking about watching the film for ages, and I'd been talking about reading more classics and adult books and horror, and then I saw this in Waterstones when I was spending my birthday money and snatched it up. It did take me two months to pick it up after buying it though, but that's not the point.

Favourite Passage/Quote From A Book You Read In 2014
Be true to yourself. But that's something everyone says and no one means. No one wants you to be yourself. They want you to be the version of yourself that they like.

The Young Elites - Marie Lu

Shortest & Longest Book You Read In 2014
Longest was Needful Things by Stephen King at 933 pages. Shortest was Lyra's Oxford by Philip Pullman.

Book That Shocked You The Most
Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill made me gape at quite a  few points and I did not see the ending coming.

OTP OF THE YEAR 
Zeke and Allie from the Blood of Eden trilogy by Julie Kagawa. 

Favourite Non-Romantic Relationship Of The Year
Alina and Mal from Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo. I didn't see it as romantic, just two very close friends who cared deeply about in each other in a purely platonic way. I guess I can see how it can be viewed as romantic, but personally I didn't get that feeling.

Favourite Book You Read in 2014 From An Author You’ve Read Previously
Percy Jackson and the Greek Gods by Rick Riordan. I love Greek mythology, I love Percy Jackson, I love Rick Riordan's books. This was a no brainer.

Best Book You Read In 2014 That You Read Based SOLELY On A Recommendation From Somebody Else/Peer Pressure
I don't really listen to recommendations because I very rarely find ones I end up enjoying, but Eeny Meeny by MJ Arlidge was recommended to me and it set me off into wanting to read more thrillers. So yeah, we'll go with that.

Newest fictional crush from a book you read in 2014
I don't count it as a crush or anything romantic, but I definitely admire Sophronia from the Finishing School series by Gail Carriger. I think she's funny and smart and I wish I could climb around an airship like she does. But, y'know, I'm petrified of heights.

Best 2014 debut you read
Girl Online by Zoe Sugg and her ghostwriter.

Best Worldbuilding/Most Vivid Setting You Read This Year
The post-apocalyptic setting from The Walking Dead graphic novels. I've been really into them and the whole apocalypse thing lately, and I could really get into it. It's not the nicest of places, admittedly, but the artwork really made me appreciate it.

Book That Put A Smile On Your Face/Was The Most FUN To Read
Loki: Agent of Asgard. I love graphic novels, Norse myths, Marvel, and just anything to do with Thor or any of the characters connected to him, and this was such a fun and easy read.

Book That Made You Cry Or Nearly Cry in 2014
I'm going to go with The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King. I don't cry at books, but this one did unsettle me. The whole thought of being lost in the woods - and at such a young age! - really made me uncomfortable, which I guess is as close to crying as I'll get.

Hidden Gem Of The Year
The False Prince by Jennifer A Nielsen. I got this pretty cheaply and the cover isn't the best, so I wasn't expecting much from it. I thought it would be one of those fantasy novels that you find in charity shops - you know, the ones you've never heard of and are always in bad condition - but I was very pleasantly surprised. I got a Throne of Glass vibe from it, which I was not expecting.

Book That Crushed Your Soul
The DUFF by Kody Keplinger had an effect like soul crushing on me, although not quite that intense because overall, I found it to be uplifting.

Most Unique Book You Read In 2014
Every You, Every Me by David Levithan. It was... interesting. I'll leave it at that,

Book That Made You The Most Mad (doesn't necessarily mean you didn't like it)
I got pretty mad at Meghan whilst reading The Iron King, but I ended up really enjoying the book.


Blogging/Bookish Life

New favourite book blog you discovered in 2014
I recently discovered Prescription Fiction and A World Between Folded Pages, but Paperback Princess is another favourite I found earlier in the year.

Favourite review that you wrote in 2014
The Assassin's Blade by Sarah J Maas

Best discussion/non-review post you had on your blog
Book Talk: Do Pages Matter?

Best event that you participated in
End of 2014 Read-a-Thon

Best moment of bookish/blogging life in 2014
Honestly, just getting my blog set up and running how I wanted it with a nice clean layout and a schedule.

Most Popular Post This Year On Your Blog
Liebster Award

Post You Wished Got A Little More Love
Book Recommendations: Fantasy

Best bookish discovery
It's not really a discovery, but I signed up for a Waterstones card. It's going to make me spend a lot of money there but I am okay with that.

Did you complete any reading challenges or goals that you had set for yourself at the beginning of this year?
I wanted to read a lot more graphic novels and I certainly achieved that. I also wanted to read all of my owned books before buying more new ones, but that didn't even last until the end of January.



Looking Ahead

One Book You Didn’t Get To In 2014 But Will Be Your Number 1 Priority in 2015
The Forever Song by Julie Kagawa. I need to know how the series ends before I forget too much of the first two books!

Book You Are Most Anticipating For 2015
Manners and Mutiny by Gail Carriger. I've read the first two Finishing School books and I thought they were such fun reads. I'm holding out on reading the third until I know when to expect the fourth.

2015 Debut You Are Most Anticipating
I honestly don't pay much attention to debuts - or publishing dates or new releases or anything like that - so I'm going to have to say I'm not anticipating any.

Series Ending/A Sequel You Are Most Anticipating in 2015
The next Throne of Glass instalment. I still need to read Heir of Fire, but that's not the point.

One Thing You Hope To Accomplish Or Do In Your Reading/Blogging Life In 2015
Post more discussions for my Book Talk feature!

A 2015 Release You’ve Already Read & Recommend To Everyone
I haven't read any 2015 releases yet, sorry.

10 comments:

  1. There's so many books that you mentioned that I still have to read like Slated, The Immortal Rules, Crown of Midnight and so on :p
    I lived your answers and I feel the same way about Mal and Alina!!!

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    Replies
    1. I highly recommend all of them and I'd love to hear your thoughts on them once you do read them! Thank you and I really want to continue with the Grisha trilogy just for those two. :)

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    2. I should be reading them in 2015 anyway :p So do I!! I still have to read them :p

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    3. Yay! I look forward to any reviews you post. :)

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  2. I really wanted to read It's Kind of a Funny Story, but decided against it because I thought that it would be too sad. I also really need to read We Were Liars soon. I didn't like Girl Online as much as I though I would, but I kind of knew that she probably used a ghostwriter from the beginning. I am impressed however that she did something out of her comfort zone.

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    Replies
    1. It's not that it's sad, it's that it deals horribly with depression and mental health in general, and as someone who has problems with their own mental health and who feels very strongly about it, I could not just sit back and take what it was spewing. I actually ended up enjoying Girl Online more than I thought (which is surprising!). I'm not too shocked that it was ghost written, it's more the scandal surrounding it that I'm bothered about. I did like Zoe's input to it though, and felt that it was very 'her'.

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    2. That's too bad :( I too am very vocal for mental health, and I now feel like if I read it, that would bother me a lot. And I agree, Girl Online was very personal to Zoe, she kept with themes she could relate to.

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    3. Without saying too much, it was the fact that he was 'cured' from what was supposed to be crippling depression in 5 days, mainly because he met a girl. And don't even get me started on how the female characters were portrayed and depicted. I think that's why I enjoyed Girl Online so much, because I was able to relate to it so much - anxiety and blogging are two things that feature in my life. It was a very easy light read, so I don't regret it.

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  3. Great post, great books! ♥
    I so want to do this survey too but I don't know if it's already too late for it.. -.-
    well. anyway love it ♥ and your blog :D

    xo Anne @ anne-books.blogspot.com

    I even nominated you for the Sisterhood of the World Bloggers Award! For informartion just click at my post (:
    http://anne-books.blogspot.de/2015/01/sisterhood-of-world-bloggers-award.html

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    Replies
    1. Thank you! It's definitely not too late for this survey! I feel like it can be posted any time in January because 2014 has only just ended. I'd be interested in reading your answers to it if you do decide to do it. :)

      Thank you so much! I'll be sure to let you know when I post it!

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