My Top Ten New Releases of 2015

December 15, 2015 Top Ten Tuesday 14

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature/meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week’s topic is Top Ten Best Books I Read in 2015.

Last week I posted my top ten new-to-me authors; this week, I’m listing the 10 best new releases I read this year. (In other words, I’m not including books published before 2015. Except I couldn’t help mentioning a few standouts at the bottom of the post.)

 5 Stars

Uprooted (Naomi Novik)
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  • Uprooted (Naomi Novik) This fantasy novel, an original fairy tale sprinkled with familiar elements, blew me away. Powerful, deep, and satisfying, Uprooted is probably the best book I read all year. (review to come)
  • A Curious Beginning (Deanna Raybourn) Raybourn kicks off a new and promising series with this historical mystery (with romantic overtones) set in Victorian England.  https://bookwyrmshoard.com/book-reviews/a-curious-beginning-deanna-raybourn/
  • Winter (Marissa Meyer) What can I say about the fourth and final book of the Lunar Chronicles, except that I loved it and I didn’t want it to end?  (review to come)

 

 4.5 Stars

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  • Beastkeeper (Cat Hellisen) Beastkeeper is gorgeously written and darker than I expected; it plays with the “Beauty and the Beast” tale without being in any sense a retelling.
  • Valiant (Sarah McGuire) is a marvelous, MG, gender-bending retelling of “The Brave Little Tailor” that charmed me from the first page.
  • Home by Nightfall (Charles Finch) maintains the high standards I’ve come to expect from this historical mystery series, and introduces more moral ambiguity than I’ve seen in any of Finch’s books so far.

 

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  • Orphan Train (Christina Baker Kline) Orphan Train is a beautiful, heartwrenching, and ultimately hopeful book. I’m so thankful my book group chose it, since I never would have picked it up on my own.
  • The Sword of Summer (Rick Riordan) Riordan’s latest brings the Norse myths to life — literally. I was hoping for something as fun and exciting as the Percy Jackson books, and I got it.

 

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  • The Rogue Not Taken (Sarah Maclean) may be the best historical romance I’ve read this year, though it has some stiff competition from Tessa Dare, Lisa Kleypas, and Mary Balogh.
  • Murder at Barclay Meadow (Wendy Sand Eckel) Eckel’s well-written sort-of-cozy mystery eschews the light-and-funny approach  in favor of a deeper, more realistic exploration of the main character’s feelings.

 

Honorable Mention (4.5 stars and 4 stars)

 

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention a few books that came out prior to 2015, but that I read for the first time this year: The Night Circus (Erin Morgenstern), The Martian (Andy Wier), and Summers at Castle Auburn (Sharon Shinn), all three of which really deserved to be on this list.

 

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14 Responses to “My Top Ten New Releases of 2015”

  1. Lory @ Emerald City Book Review

    These all look so delicious! I haven’t read any except Uprooted. I was torn about not including that on my list, but there were other books I liked better. I should have honorable mentions as well (except then my list would be about 100 books long).
    Lory @ Emerald City Book Review recently posted…Gems of 2015My Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      “except then my list would be about 100 books long” LOL! I know what you mean; it was really hard to keep the honorable mentions down to a very few. And if I were making the list today, A Desperate Fortune would be on the top ten, and something else would have to drop to honorable mention. It’s so difficult to choose!

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I really need to finish my review of Uprooted. I wrote a fantastic review, one I was really proud of, and WordPress lost it entirely. I was very upset and didn’t had the heart to try to recreate it. But maybe enough time has gone by that I can try again.

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      Well, we do seem to like some of the same books! I hope you get a chance to read some of these. Especially Uprooted; I really think you’ll love it.

  5. Lindsay

    I’m so glad I finally read “Orphan Train” this year too. I really only picked it up after being urged by a few people who thought I’d like it, and the story turned out to be totally different than I expected. I had never heard of orphan trains before and I was horrified by the way those poor kids were treated!

    I only recently came across “Uprooted” but I think it sounds fantastic it’s at the top of the list for 2016. I’m trying to read more fantasy, and it sounds like a perfect fit for me!
    Lindsay recently posted…The Best Books I Read In 2015My Profile

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      Uprooted was really wonderful; I hope you enjoy it! I knew about the orphan trains but hadn’t realized until I read the book that they took place in the 20th century, not the 19th. Like you, I was appalled at how those poor children were treated.