Bookworm Wednesday

Name your favourite book series.

From standalone books to series that seem to go on forever, I love all kinds of books and when I find a series I really enjoy, I have a tendency to buy the entire series (if they're out already) so that I can continue it as I presume most book bloggers do; the blogs I read do at least.

I adore the Missing series; I adore the main story and the story in each book of the series.  I recommend Meg Cabot's Missing series to anyone, especially teenage girls because that's who it is aimed at.  I always loved Jess as a protagonist and I always had a crush on Rob - and I know he's fictional, I understand that - because he was always so protective of Jess yet let her do her own thing and help missing children but he would be there if she needed him; even though it was mainly about Jess, and Rob, helping someone to find missing children, the love story behind it was wonderful.  When it originally ended after the fourth book, I was gutted because it was left off just when Jess and Rob had finally settled but then Cabot wrote a fifth book and I was ecstatic and bought it immediately.  We got to see Jess and Rob in a different situation as they broken up during the hiatus between the fourth and fifth book and now Jess has to use her ability to find someone closer to home.  I loved it and this series and I plan to reread this series again.

Anthony Horowitz is one of my favourite authors and The Power of Five series is one of my favourite series of all time as well as my favourite series from Horowitz.  I know I mentioned it in last week's post because I received the first and most of the rest of the series as gifts so I won't waffle on too much about it.  However, I love that it is so different from my other series for a few reasons: one is the genre because I don't read horror novels very often, two is the protagonist is primarily male and I seem to read novels with female protagonists, and three is how dark it is for a teen novel which is refreshing because death isn't being sugar-coated, it's brutal but so is the world in which these characters live in.

The Selection series is a great series about a teenage girl, America, who is chosen along with thirty-four other girls to be a prospective bride for the prince.  The girls comes from a variety of castes, which this society organises its people into, and if they are chosen, they become a One, part of the royal family and will be able to contribute something to the society as Queen in the future.  The series follows America through this competition, through the ups and downs, the happy times and sad, and when her ex-boyfriend comes along and throws a spanner in the works.  I loved this series because it was different from other post-apocalyptic/dystopia fiction I have read and I recommend it to anyone who enjoys that particular genre.

I adore the Study series and its spin-off series, Glass series, and its characters.  It's a great series for fantasy fans both older teenagers and adults.  Yelena was initially arrested for killing a general's son even though it was in self-defence but is sentenced to be a food taster for the commander of Sitia but then begins to learn she has magic and is not from Sitia.  The story across the series progresses to Yelena becoming powerful and saving both her real home and Valek's (her lover) home.  There is a variety of characters and settings that Yelena and her friends come across and I think it's a wonderfully imaginative series.  Initially, there was only going to be three in the Study series but Snyder has decided to continue it and the fourth book is out in February so I am very excited but I haven't read it for ages so I'm going to reread the series before the new one.

Greek myths have always fascinated me and fortunately I found the Starcrossed series which focuses on those that have descended from Greek warriors from the myths as well as mythic creatures and are modern incarnations of Greek characters.  In the Starcrossed series, Helen Hamilton is a modern-day reincarnation of Helen of Troy and much like Helen of Troy, Helen Hamilton could trigger a new Trojan War if she were to fall for a certain boy, Lucas, who is a modern-day reincarnation of Paris of and as you would predict, they fall for one another.  Despite the forbidden love, the progression of Helen's power development and the revelations about her past and family are wonderful as she and the other characters she becomes close to struggle with the new information.  I love the fact that there is a link to Greek myths as they are the corner stone of our culture and all of our stories derive from them in some way from Shakespeare to more recent stories.

When the Twilight series kicked off the fascination of vampires, I found the Morganville Vampires series much more interesting because Claire wasn't an irritating protagonist, whining about her vampire boyfriend, and rather than getting a boyfriend, initially, Claire makes friends with people who live in Morganville and is brought into the vampire world because of what Morganville is really like and discovering what has happened to her friend and housemate.  Some characters are bizarre, especially Myrnin - an eccentric vampire scientist with a tendency to wear vampire bunny slippers, but most are wonderful and over the series I like each main character for different reasons.  Claire's love interest, Shane, who tries to deny his feelings for her due to his past, was a lot more interesting than other vampire genre love interests, such as Edward, because he isn't a vampire yet still thinks he'll destroy Claire's life by being with her because of his history with the vampires and his family.  While the ending of the series is vastly different from the beginning, it was a good read and I recommend it to anyone who enjoys vampire books because it is definitely better than others as it has a more grown-up vibe due to being set in a university town, and the protagonist is not a high school student.

Moira J. Moore's Hero series is by far one of my favourite book series because of the main characters, Lee and Taro, and how their powers work.  I read books about mythical creatures and magic but nothing like this where Taro's powers can change the natural disasters and prevent them from hurting people and Lee's powers protect him.  On the powers alone it is interesting because they can tell you a lot about these characters as both characters want to help others but in different ways; Taro trying to save everybody physically and Lee trying to keep them alive or that's how I see it at least.  It's mostly an adventure in each book about Lee and Taro but there is an underlying romance story that is slowly progressing as they become closer and closer and their experiences become more intense as they rely on each other more.

Lords of the Underworld focuses on a demon-possessed group of men plus one woman who only want to continue living but are slowly being dragged into a war because of a former Lord and his army.  I adore that each book focuses on a different lord each time while the main story progresses and each of the lords becomes involved in some kind of relationship despite their affliction.  This series has triggered my fascination with paranormal romance books and I have bought a large proportion of this series and other works by Gena Showalter and a handful of other books from different authors so they will be other paranormal romance books on my blog in the future.

While I started reading Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series first, I became fascinated with the spin-off series from that, Lizzy & Diesel which focuses on Diesel, a character from the Stephanie Plum holiday books (Plum Lucky, Plum Lovin' etc.), who is a bounty hunter but for the supernatural.  In this series, he is on a mission to find seven stones which happen to have powers like the seven deadly sins with the help of Lizzy, a young woman who can detect the stones.  Diesel and Lizzy have to fight for the stones against Wulf, Diesel's cousin, who is after the stones for his own means. I love that there is a clear idea behind it and that the seven deadly sins has been used because they always make a good story as they are man's greatest flaws and at least one is used as a plot device in most media.  It's a wonderful spin-off of the Stephanie Plum series which is becoming repetitive as it progresses and I can't wait for Wicked Charms (co-authored by Phoef Sutton) which is out this year.

The moment I picked up The Hunger Games series, I knew that they were going to be one of my favourite series and still are because I loved the story of rebellion that was drawn out over the trilogy and it was triggered by the love one girl had for her sister then her friends.  The films focus on the love that develops into a love triangle but I think this draws away from the rebellion that Katniss sparks just because she loves her sister and those she cares about which is one thing I love about The Hunger Games and Katniss, though they do touch on this every so often in the films.  I love the films because I like the way they have adapted it, even though parts are missed, but this is something you have to accept when they adapt anything because it is impossible to be truly loyal to the original text as the moment you change the media type, you've taken away the fidelity of a text.

I highly recommend any of these series because there is something different about them that makes them stand out from others.

Bookworm out!