Books I LOVED in Genres I 'HATE'

[@Larissa_KD]

I thought that I wasn't really into crime/mystery until I read The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle (per your recommendation), which is actually one of my alltime favourite books now, absolutely loved it!

[@LiteraryKnitterary]

It took me a long time to give romance a try too-I was a bit of a genre snob through the first two years of my English degree and kind of looked down on all commercial fiction in general. Thankfully I’ve gotten over myself haha. I remembered while watching your video that a library I used to volunteer at shelved all their romance paperbacks alphabetically by first letter of the author’s last name, but not within that (so Tessa Dare’s books wouldn’t necessarily all be together, all the “D” books would be mixed together). The attitude was basically “don’t bother to try.” As if the books were basically interchangeable and nobody would ever want to find a specific one?

[@mdzuracka]

Eleanor Oliphant, yay! I loved that book, not usually into contemporary fiction either. Listened to the audiobook, the lady pulled off both the English and Scottish accents Glen was my fave 😄 Glad you liked it too! 🤗

[@read-a-lotte9927]

I totally get this. I just read The Places I’ve Cried in Public by Holly Bourne which is a YA Contemporary. Had no idea that’s what it was when I picked it up and would have avoided it, but it was really great. It’s about an abusive relationship and is such an important read for anyone. Really spoke to me and has made me give the genre a rethink.

[@noname1314100]

For Amanda Palmer, I would really recommend an audiobook version. Yes, she narrates it, and yes, it has music and songs. It feels like a performance

[@christinacampbellbooks]

The synopsis of The Girl with All the Gifts sounds wonderful! Definitely adding to my Goodreads TBR :)

[@JeansThoughts]

It is SO good.

[@caitferg_]

It’s amazing! There’s also another book called The Boy on the Bridge, set in the same world at the same time, just surrounding different characters. It’s fantastic too!

[@christinacampbellbooks]

@@caitferg_ Thanks for letting me know! :)

[@RoisinsReading]

I'm trying to get outside my comfort zone at the moment. I read mostly literary fiction and I never really read genre fiction but I'm making a series for the next six weeks where I try a different genre every week, just to see if I can expand my tastes a bit. Trying to read a broad variety of each genre and see how I go.

[@alb0zfinest]

Are there any recommendations you can give for literary fiction?

[@themermaidandtheowl6573]

That’s a super cool idea, it’s great to try stuff that you not done before.

[@eynuh]

I feel the same way as you about contemporary YA! I’ve found books by John Green and Holly Bourne really great to read even as an adult. Now I’m interested about historical romance after you’ve mentioned it in this video.

[@RamblingsOfAnElfpire]

I feel similar about Turtles All the Way Down. It was the first (and only) book that I've read that explained what OCD feels like. I read it at 25/26 too and it was the first time I'd seen something similar to my experience in a book. My OCD is mostly intrusive thought cycles so I do experience it differently but it was a unique read for me.

[@rachaels7893]

Interesting video. Almost every genre you mentioned I was like yeah, same. But there's always exceptions that I do love because I still try and give everything a go

[@cindyrobert2118]

I agree with you because I used to not enjoy romance in general. However, Tessa Dare made me want to read historical romance especially the Girl Meets Duke series!

[@reading_with_k]

Love love love what you said about historical romances. I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately!

[@TheBookishMom]

I have been wanting to pick up Girl with All The Gifts and Dread Nation.. I will have to get around to them soon!

[@JeansThoughts]

Yes! They are both amazing ^_^

[@misguidedghostsx3]

The genre I tended to avoid was always poetry because I thought it would be too difficult to understand and a lot of it would go over my head but I read Feminine Gospels by Carol Ann Duffy because of the Feminist Orchestra and was pleasantly surprised and then went on to read The World’s Wife ⭐️😁

[@JeansThoughts]

That’s wonderful! I definitely think poetry is so personal. I quite like explicit poetry myself aha - stuff that’s very upfront about what it’s saying rather than tonnes of metaphor.

[@misguidedghostsx3]

Jean Bookishthoughts yess definitely agree with this!

[@AthynVixen]

Interesting to hear your take on these titles as I have read quite a few of them myself. I had similar reactions to Girl with all the gifts and Eleanor Oilphant.YA baffles me in that a lot of Book tubers etc seem to read a lot of YA and they are way over the target age range. I don't think there is any place for ageism in readership, but just cant get why they want to read about teenagers as you commented.BLANKETS is a graphic novel I enjoyed a lot even though i don't normally read that genre.

[@JeansThoughts]

I mean I do read YA and enjoy it I just don’t want to read about teen romances at high school with nothing else that makes the story different - probably because I didn’t like high school 🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@AthynVixen]

@@JeansThoughts Same.. i just find it interesting when I see Booktuber after Booktuber in their mid 20s plus read YA. Some of them almost exclusively. Now thats' curious to me..

[@missburn]

@@AthynVixen I think it is because most of their audience do too so they want to make content for them. Also, many of them are sponsored by publishers. That might be dictating what they want to read - because it sells.

[@vedette68]

I’m excited to pick up Dread Nation based on your rec! Wow, I read Turtles a few years ago and think that John Green wrote the best description of anxiety I’ve ever read.

[@JeansThoughts]

It was incredible right!? I did not expect that going in aha.

[@TheAbbieScreams]

You might enjoy Promethea by Alan Moore if you're dipping your toes into superhero comics? It's my favorite comic series and it's got a fantasy and even a bit of a Sci fi twist. Promethea is a story that takes different hosts in the human world when people research/become fascinated by her or obsessed with the story of Promethea. She resides in the realm of the Immateria which is the collective imagination. She also is supposed to bring on the apocalypse. Maybe you'd enjoy it? Loved this video and the idea that you never really know if you'll hate something until you give it a go. I definitely must read the Girl with All the Gifts soon! Sounds so good!

[@bicho6313]

You should try fredrik backman for adult contemporary. He's really good at writing slice of life stories.

[@Jossegossegrisfis]

I was going to recommend him too, so I second this! "adult contemporary" is definitely a genre I usually stay away from, but Backman is just magical. It's ordinary people written in the most extraordinary way and I've loved them all!

[@missdead1]

A thousand times yes!

[@outi3852]

Ha, I had the exact same thing with Eleanor Oliphant 😄 I also didn't think I would classic books like Middlemarch or Cranford but I've totally fallen in love with both & have gotten interested in several new authors &books from 19th century (I've always read classics but more of adventures, horror etc.). The Girl with All the Gifts sounds interesting, might give it a go even though I'm not that into zombies either.

[@Iry951]

For me that happened to Y/A fantasy. I had a few months long break from it (just decided I wasn't interested in it at all, because most of the books I read from that genre, I didn't enjoy). And then recently I read The Beautiful by Renée Ahdieh, and really enjoyed it! To the point that I pre-ordered myself a sequel! That's considering I'm almost never interested in sequels. Sorry to bore you more, but there's another example of it. I have a few Y/A fantasy left on my TBR, because I used to be subscribed to Fairyloot. And just recently I decided to pick one of them, to read about 70 pages and then DNF it. But, an hour an a half later,having read 108 pages, I thought 'Nope, not DNFing that one!' And as a result, I REALLY enjoyed it, and again ordered a sequel and really can't wait to go straight into it! It just doesn't feel like a typical Y/A fantasy, although I've heard just average things about it. It's Circle of Shadows by Evelyn Skye, by the way. Sorry for such a long comment, if you even read it 🤭

[@josephinewinter]

most self-help is not for me, but 'feel the fear and do it anyway' is good motivationally, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi 'flow' is good, Dorothy Rowe 'breaking the bond' on depression (her later books are dreadful), Getting Things Done the book on time management, very practical!, and The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey is very good, about morality and stuff in fact, very in-depth, it's not like normal self-help despite being super common recommendation for it, and 'how to make friends and influence people' the original book isn't bad. I don't think you'd want to keep any of them, but the flow and 7 habits books are a bit too long to just read by browsing and the time management one is useful for being practical. My mother has a good book on cleaning - one of those cheap ones you see in catalogues everywhere - 'how to clean everything with vinegar' type title, this one has vinegary lemon juice, bicarb eucalyptus oil and salt and that's just solid recipes. I need to find one that motivates me in terms of cleaning and not hoarding, but so far they do nothing for me.

[@caffeinated-bibliophile8629]

I didn't give romance a fair chance until last year, and now I am absolutely in love with historical romances, thanks to Tessa Dare. I thought I would hate westerns, even though I'd never read one, but I read Vengeance Road earlier this year and really enjoyed it.

[@laurenrodriguez918]

Also try Julia Quinn I LOVE the Bridgerton series. It’s a historical romance series about siblings and each book is about a different sibling.

[@readilykatie8312]

I’m also not a big fan of YA contemporary either, but John Green definitely still fully immerses my heart and soul! 💁🏻‍♀️❤️

[@theimperfectscrapper5313]

I’m not that into DC or Marvel either, but my hubby and two sons love this genre. However, I would highly recommend “The Legend of Wonder Woman: Origins” by Renae De Liz. It’s absolutely fantastic - the artwork is stunning and the story is quite gripping. It’s the sort of graphic novel you want to savour as you read it.

[@clairebearbooks6248]

I would also put myself as someone who doesn't like Zombie books, but loved The Girl With All the Gifts (even if one of the key plot twists got ruined for me by a review in a book shop!). Have you read the sequel? :)

[@patrickthornton840]

Not sure if this really counts as it's not a genre but a style, but I did read my first book written in the present tense recently - "The Power" by Naomi Alderman. Normally I've never gotten on with books written in the present tense, I'm just one of those people that often finds it distracting and off-putting when I try to read, and it did take me a little while to get into this one, but the book was so good I kept reading and eventually got used to it.

[@darlingclementine94]

I’m also not a zombie person, but Mira Grant’s Newsflesh series is an exception. I’ve read the whole series twice - it’s so twisty and fun, with great protagonists. It’s about bloggers following a dramatic presidential campaign a few decades after the zombie apocalypse. The zombie theme is so creative and well-developed!

[@JeansThoughts]

I really want to read some Mira Grant anyway so thanks a lot for the heads on that one!

[@book3311]

I love your books, definitely different then mine but that’s a good thing. Let’s open up my mind to fresh data. 👍✅

[@maartjedegroot9598]

This was great. Maybe you should try A heart in a body in the world by Deb Caletti and Girl made of stars by Ashley Herring Blake as YA contemporaries.

[@Tinahgirl83]

Have you ever done an entire video just on your favorite YA? (I don’t remember; I know you’ve done videos with YA in them, but I’m not sure about a whole video.) I know what some of them are, but I would love to see a list. I’m not into zombies either, and I would have said that I don’t like YA or romance either, but almost all my favorites of the year that aren’t rereads are all YA and romance. 😂 Go fig.

[@JeansThoughts]

I have ^_^ it's here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/d6DSkJ-HpqqLqLM But it is a little out of date aha - I filmed it three years ago and would probably switch it around now. I'm going to do a top ten YA fantasy in the next few weeks. Aha we can always be proven wrong. It's kind of great!

[@Tinahgirl83]

Jean Bookishthoughts An updated YA mystery list would be great as well! I’m definitely going to watch the older one. Have you read Sorcery of Thorns? I absolutely loved it. A lot of YA connoisseurs said they’d seen it before, but I hadn’t and so I really enjoyed it. It was my first ever YA fantasy apart from Strange the Dreamer ( where I ADORED the first half and hated the second half). Thank you!

[@australischenberline]

Interesting concept! I don’t know if I’ve even read much in genres I don’t like... I just end up DNF’ing them.

[@KirstyWardBooks]

Yes, totally with you on Ms. Marvel for the same reason. I’m not into superhero stuff at all, yet picked it up on a whim and loved it! I think I’ve read three volumes so far, so I also need to carry on with the series.

[@MaijaReads]

I'm the same with contemporary: for some reason contemporary comics, especially manga, suits me much better! For example, I loved Princess Jellyfish, which is about these five geek women roommates who (for reasons) start a fashion line with a boy who loves dressing in women's fashion. Oh, and I loved the ending of The Girl with All the Gifts, too!

[@JeansThoughts]

Ooooh OK I am 100% going to check this one out - that sounds brilliant! It's so interesting how you can enjoy different genres in prose and comics (even TV isn't it).

[@readsomethingwonderful6546]

Oh, I had forgotten how much I enjoyed The Girl with all the Gifts! 😀 That ending though! 🤯

[@JeansThoughts]

I loved that ending! One of the best aha.

[@qualitystreetmoment]

Have you read the Heartstopper comics? They're the absolute cutest - they're British high school slice of life/romance between 2 boys, but with such great writing, beautiful art, laugh out loud moments, amazing depictions of friendship groups and not just focusing on the central couple. Mostly just wholesome feel-good, but also with such good representation of consent, and deals a lil bit with realistic high-schooly homophobia and eating disorders. Definitely check them out if you haven't already!

[@qualitystreetmoment]

Oh and there's trans rep too!

[@SparklesBooks]

You've absolutely sold The Girl With All The Gifts to me, I would have initially been put off because of the zombies too if I'm honest but I might give it a go :)

[@JeansThoughts]

Yaaas my work here is done.

[@leticiatoraci9855]

The Girl with All the Gifts was quite interesting and I also don't like zombies. I also almost never read romance but one I liked was "What Kitty Did Next" by Carrie Kablean.

[@melissapolk2029]

So, I'm curious. On the topic of contemporary (I felt the same way and am working on breaking myself of that preconception) - how do you feel about contemporary romance? I thought I would hate it but a friend of mine writes it (and it's brilliant) and she recommended Alyssa Cole to me (who is also brilliant), so I've definitely changed my tune about it.

[@freshparchment]

If you loved Ms. Marvel, I'd recommend G. Willow Wilson's other books. She wrote a historical fantasy novel called The Bird King that's set during the Muslim occupation of Spain and The Butterfly Mosque, a wonderful memoir about her conversion to Islam and the years that she lived in Egypt post-9/11.

[@YasmeenKhan]

I love the Girl with all the Gifts & can thoroughly recommend the film adaptation with Gemma Arterton. I also enjoyed the follow-up novel, The Boy on the Bridge, although I know people don't feel it's quite as strong.

[@laurenrodriguez918]

I enjoyed The Girl With All the Gifts. I really want to read Dread Nation. I’m definitely not a zombie fan either.

[@TheLunarFire]

Oh I get what you mean about romance. I find them very relaxing to read and have begun to enjoy them over the last few years. No shame!

[@JeansThoughts]

Yay for discovering romance!

[@paperback_cat]

I also didn't think I liked zombies until I read the Girl with all the Gifts! Have you read the sequel??? It's also great. I guess I should get to Dread Nation too :)

[@JeansThoughts]

I haven't actually but thank you for the reminder!

[@tara5742]

Giant Days is available on Hoopla for me. I also don’t care for YA contemporaries. Or any contemporaries. (Or so I thought)This graphic novel is great! I stopped this video to see if it was available and ended up reading the whole thing XD

[@theimperfectscrapper5313]

Have you filmed a video about your favourite comics? I would love to see your recommendations.

[@JeansThoughts]

I'm actually planning on doing that very soon :D

[@theimperfectscrapper5313]

Jean Bookishthoughts fabulous - I look forward to it. When I was a teenager, I used to love Archie comics. I’ve just gotten back into reading the Road to Riverdale series and they are so great. Looking forward to seeing what you recommend.

[@lucyjoseph7378]

Train to Busan is probably one of the best zombie movies. Everyone should watch it in my opinion lol. It's Korean btw.

[@megz_riley4264]

I have feel the same way about zombies. They are not my thing but I also really enjoyed The Girl With all the Gifts. I definitely want to try Dread Nation too.

[@hailey5784]

I haven't read Dread Nation but I know it has been critiqued for it's inaccurate and sometimes problematic Native American representation. Dr. Debbie Reese has made a post about it, and while she concludes that this was unintentional on the author's part, she points to sections that could have been handled better. I just wanted to point this out so people are aware if they are picking this book up.

[@JeansThoughts]

Thanks for highlighting this!

[@AthynVixen]

That's interesting Hailey. I left a comment on one of Jean's other videos about Justina Ireland which she must have removed . In a nutshell she criticised a white author who had put a black character in one of their novels because she felt that authors should not write about POC unless they are a POC.Interesting to hear that she has been commented on.

[@crazybooklady8682]

I used to think that WWII fiction wasn't for me, though apparently I just like the adult ones way more than the middlegrade ones on that topic. Also I don't like football at all, but when it is portrayed as a subtopic, than it's not such a big problem for me. As long as it isn't focused on all those football terms and trainings and matches,, yikes haha

[@day1swithcjtfent978]

You gotta review this book called sike a dyke on Amazon, its a great read.

[@meljstephan]

I usually avoid books set in elementary through high school because it gives me terrible flashbacks to terrible times in my life.

[@beth_shoe_addicted_reader]

Eleanor Oliphant is one of my favorite literary characters ever. The friendships in this book are so lovely.

[@IngaLangfeldt]

I always thought I’d dislike non-fiction, cause it would be like school, or it would be too hard. I freaking love non-fiction now. This video was really interesting 😊

[@mery5989]

The reason I don't want to read realistic historical romance is not because I think I wouldn't like it but because they are meant to be the same as the romance books written by people at the time, except they are actually made up. I can't trust them to get all their facts right and even if the author does extensive research it will never be the same as someone for whom that was their present, the way they think and the way they know exactly what is going on in their time, as opposed to just pretending to be written from someone from their time. To me it's like reading a biography about sailing around the world that is made up. There are beautiful real ones out there (like Tamata and the alliance), and it's a very realistic thing so I wouldn't want to read a made up one by someone who has never sailed and just did the research. I do love fantasy set in historical settings but when it comes to something so realistic as a slice of life romance and we have many real books those people were writing, it seems strange to me to pretend to add to those books by making them up. what do you think?

[@elenathegreat]

oooh The Girl With All the Gifts sounds great! i normally don't like zombie books either

[@BookishWitch777]

I did the exact same thing with the Girl with all the Gifts. So good. Read the companion book, for sure. It's wonderful as well. I hate zombie books so much and I loved both.

[@BookishWitch777]

I just thought of another one I really liked. It's a series that starts with Ella the Slayer by A.W. Exley. It's part fairy tale, part zombie, part historical and it sounds soooo weird but for some reason it's great.

[@EudaemonicGirl]

Eleanor Oliphant is set in Glasgow?! I've never been interested in this book, but I live in Glasgow too and I might find myself relating to it more than I initially expected.

[@JeansThoughts]

Yeah aha and I'm the same - I love reading books set in cities I've lived in. It really adds to the atmosphere ^_^.

[@JoshsBookishVoyage]

I feel like we have very similar nonfiction tastes. I like the same types and dislike self help haha

[@moeppps]

Hi Jean, I just wanted to let you now that the video did not show up in my subscriptions even though it's been 12 hours since you posted it. I don't know whether that is just my problem or youtube acting funny, but I thought you should know just in case!

[@JeansThoughts]

Ugh so frustrating. KZbin just doesn't seem to send videos to everyone's sub feed anymore based on some elusive algorithm I have no idea about. Sorry about that. I usually tweet about or share my videos on instagram as well if that helps or you can set up notifications for every upload by pressing the bell button. Thanks for letting me know though and glad you found it ^_^

[@KittyAndTheBooks]

I really love YA contemporaty that deals with stigmatized or marginalized teens like trans teens or fat teens or teens whose parents migrated to the US or another Western country from Asia.

[@JeansThoughts]

That's such a good point!

[@AlioH89]

Contemporary literature is such a huge and varied genre to blanket disregard

[@JeansThoughts]

I mean contemporary in the sense that it is often used on bootube. I don't tend to pick up books that are slice of life style stories following people in the contemporary world living as I might myself. I usually like my books to be something I wouldn't experience myself or else I like nonfiction. But as I said in the video, just because I think it's not my thing doesn't mean it's true - these books proved me wrong aha.

[@JeansThoughts]

Also I'd argue the same for all genres aha - they're all expansive so that was kind of my point. We all disregard genres sometimes but there is a good chance we've just not found the right thing yet.

[@moonbook12]

Cool idea

[@moonbook12]

The Art Of Asking, I think it was a miss or hit because some of the self help and Autobiography felt like sometimes they were in fight. But smiler to that self help and mimmor is All Boys Aren't Blue by George M Jeason

[@moonbook12]

Book that fit to any age ,is a middle grade book that was the first time I sew myself in books (mc and I both smart but also have disabilities) called Out My Mind

[@agustochanel5895]

Buen día Saludos desde Perú me agrada mucho su trabajo gracias por compartir Suscríbete a mi canal😊😊😊👍👍

[@stephanieparnell8454]

I used to love the superhero genre but the movies were so cheesy that it killed it for me

[@pratistha8420]

I love Ms. Marvel 😍

[@Operation_Dark]

So Sweet And Nice

[@Brenda-jo7cn]

Giant days is GREAT!

[@ExcaliburBooksgb]

How many times can you say ‘zombie book’ 😂😂😂

[@JeansThoughts]

many more I'm sure aha

[@HNGuthrie]

I loooove Turtles All the Way Down. I need more hopeful, own voices mental health rep!

[@JeansThoughts]

100%

[@tiborkovacs5317]

Take it you had a love hate relationship with these books then...hahah

[@missburn]

I don't see self-help books as a way to know yourself better. It seems like nowadays they are a product of society where there is a huge focus on the individual and how they can live a "better life" and how everything wrong in their life is because they "think negatively" and are their own worst enemies and me me me. I don't understand this lack of knowledge of how we all are a product of society and not everything is our own fault and because we think negatively. It is a very liberal way of thinking and I don't like it. And so many of them say things that should be logical for most people, I mean, why do people need another person to tell them how to live and see themselves, especially in a monetary context? Self-help is not therapy. It creeps me out that someone can earn a lot of money by telling other people what to do. It is a huge industry, there is a lot of money to be made. It is weird to me. But these books are popular for a reason, I just don't agree with them. :) Wow, that was a bit of a rant. I just see the whole self-help "genre" as a big scam, sorry.

[@mohammedjerjawi2528]

awsome

[@DrinkingByMyShelf]

I've also never liked the idea of zombie books but both of these sound amazing. And this year I read Severance and it was a zombie book and one of my favourites of the year so far!