2020 Book Tag

Welp, here we go with yet another tag. It seems like ever since I started with the tags, I’ve just been doing them constantly. I’m sorry about that guys, I’ll try to get a discussion post or review up soon, we’ll see!

Before you ask, yes. You read this right. A book tag about 2020, the year as a whole. Because what better year to do one on? 2020 has been the biggest roller coaster of a year that anyone could possibly imagine and there are just so many ideas for a book tag. I will separate the tag into a few different sections so that you all know what part of the year I’m talking about. (Please note: I live in the USA so depending on what country you live on, different things may have happened throughout the year, but this is just what’s up in the US. You can definitely still do the tag even if you live in a different country!)

Here are the rules for this book tag:

• Link back to the original creator, Phoenix @Books With Wings
• Thank the person who tagged you
• Answer all the questions
• Tag at least 4 people
• At the bottom, talk about some other books you read in 2020! (this isn’t required, just suggested!)

Please note: Just because this is a book tag about 2020, the books you talk about do not have to have been read by you in 2020
ALSO: This tag is about 2020. However, it does not need to be done DURING 2020. The year is almost done but this tag doesn’t have to be! It’s only a tag about the year, there’s nothing in it that requires it being that year.

Okay! I really hope you all enjoy this tag and find a little light in this year that has been sub-par. I know that it’s a ‘2020 book tag’ but you can do it anytime, not just in 2020! This tag is not time sensitive like the monthly book tags that I have tried and failed to get popular, so don’t worry!

Here is a list of the questions and below I will post my answers:

Part one: Beginning of the year
1) A book that you were really excited for
2) A book that started out really well (to be fair, I’m not certain if it started well, but it was certainly better than the rest of the year)

Part two: The world goes on hold
3) A book that had an unexpected plot twist
4) A book where you felt like nothing happened
5) A book where two main characters were separated (quest, disease, forbidden, etc.)

Part three: The world tries to reopen (and begins a second wave of the pandemic)
6) A book in which the characters made a bad decision
7) A book with an impatient/overly eager character

Part four: The world adjusts (not sure this ever actually happened but…I’ll bend this a little)
8) A book in which the character’s goals change midway.

Part five: The end and looking forwards
9) A book whose sequel you really anticipated/are anticipating
10) A book whose sequel was better than its original (we’re all hoping….)
11) A book that you read just to finish it (didn’t like it but wanted to finish it anyways)

And here are my answers to all of these questions!

1) A book that you were really excited for

A book that I was really really excited to read this year was ‘House of Dragons’ by Jessica Cluess. I thought it had a very interesting concept and I always love books that sort of have trials the characters have to complete. Plus, we get dragons. Unfortunately, House of Dragons did not live up to my expectations – there were some parts that were interesting but overall the writing style wasn’t very good and I knew almost nothing about the world.
You can find my goodreads review of ‘House of Dragons’ here.
Another posts by me featuring this book is my November Monthly wrap-up and book tag

2) A book that started out really well

A book that I thought had a good beginning was Scavange the Stars. The writing style was great for the whole book and we got to see this harsher, worn side of Amaya who’s really just trying to stay alive. It jumps right into the action, making you wonder why on earth Amaya is on the ship and that keeps you reading for the entire book.
You can find my review of ‘Scavenge the Stars’ on my blog here as well as my goodreads review here
Another post featuring this book on my blog is my November monthly wrap-up and book tag

3) A book that had an unexpected plot twist

Okay, this book I read a while ago. When I say a while, I mean like early 2020, sometime in January, but for me that is a while. I have a memory with as many holes as swiss cheese when it comes to books – I read so many of them and then immediately forget the plots. Still, this plot twist is so memorable that I remember it almost a year later. The book ‘Four Dead Queens’ is such an amazingly weaved book, told so skillfully and beautifully that you can’t put it down. I will not tell you the plot twist for spoiler-y reasons but let me just say that this book is very much worth reading and you need to pick it up immediately if you have not already. (proof that the plot twist was great: I mentioned it in my 3-sentence review of this which book I wrote at the beginning of the year before I really started using goodreads a lot) (And can we talk about that cover though? Beautiful)

4) A book where you felt like nothing happened

Ah! Ha ha ha ha (*laughs in disappointment*). Oh boy do I have the book for you. ‘The Future Was Now’ by JR Harbor.
Let me say right now that I miiight be a little biased against this book. Because of other problems that I have with it (many, many problems. I recommend you check out my rant of this book here to see me roasting it farther)
So, things did happen in this book. Here’s the thing: it ends basically exactly where it started. We get no character growth, no nothing. Asa could have just gone to the city, found a pretty girl and gone back home (more about the ‘pretty girl’ in my review rant)

5) A book where two characters were separated

I absolutely loved ‘I’ll Give You the Sun.’ Basically the main reason that, well, everything happened in this book, was because our main characters, Jude and Noah, were separated.
Not physically, mind you. But the twins, who were practically inseparable for most of their lives, were in a giant fight and were barely talking to each other. Given how close they were before this, I’m saying that they were separated in this scenario. You can find my blog post about this book here. You can also find it mentioned in my (less than adequate) October wrap-up.

6) A book in which the characters made a bad decision

I’m going to call this book one giant bad decision.
It’s not that the book itself was bad. In fact, it was a very interesting book. But the entire book was quite literally about making bad decisions. Here’s some background:
The girls of the Danvers field hockey team are determined to win the state championships – in any way possible. Including dappling with some dark magic. But their dark magic needs recharging every now and then…by doing the worst things they can. Stealing the book copies from a classroom. Replacing chemicals in the science lab with water. And more. Like I said, all bad decisions.

7) A book with an impatient or overly eager character

Literally the second I looked at this prompt I thought of Spensa from ‘Skyward’ by Brandon Sanderson. Maybe I wouldn’t call Spensa overly eager but she certainly is extremely eager and definitely a little impatient. She wants to be up in the air, flying like her father was, no matter what it takes. And then, once she begins to get training, she just wants to actually fly, to actually be up there, in the first few days where she’s sort of just stuck on the ground learning the basics.

8) A book where a character’s goals changed midway

‘Tarnished are the Stars’ is the only book I can really think of in which this happens. At the beginning, Anna has a grudge on Nathaniel because he hurt a child from Anna’s village. Eventually, the child dies and Anna is so angry that she goes searching for Nathaniel to kill him. But then Eliza arrives on the scene and they suddenly have another goal – reveal what the tarnish that is affecting the hearts of everyone in the village is and stop it. Anna went from wanting to kill Nathaniel to working alongside him (and thankfully, it is NOT the enemies-to-lovers trope, they’re just friends!)

9) A book whose sequel you were/are anticipating

NEVER ask me this and expect me to list only 1 book. For your convenience, I managed to lower it to four anticipated releases, but let me tell you it was HARD. Also, images are from the book whose sequel I’m anticipating (because the third book of Children of Blood and Bone’s cover isn’t out yet).
The books that I am anticipating are book 2 of All the Stars and Teeth, All the Tides of Fate, the third book in the Children of Blood and Bone series (untitled), A Vow so Bold and Deadly (ACSDAL 3) and book 3 in the Crown of Feathers book, Wings of Shadow. I love all four of these serieses and can’t wait to read the…woah, for all four, the final book! Especially with that cliffhanger at the end of both Heart of Flames and Children of Virtue and Vengeance.

10) A book whose sequel was better than the original

This so rarely happens to me but fortunately I have the perfect example here. The Shadow and Bone series DEFINITELY improved as it went on, the third being…still not amazing, but SO MUCH better than the first book. I think that, since this was Leigh Bardugo’s debut series, her writing improved a lot as the series went on (but Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom are still WAAAAY better)

11) A book that you read just to finish it.

I mean….almost every book I was assigned to read for school? But if we’re going reading for pleasure, I’ll have to say the Shadow and Bone series again. The main reason I picked up Shadow and Bone was to get through it so I could read King of Scars. Shadow and Bone was just…not very good. But I knew that there were characters in it that were in KoS so I just barrelled through it…. (I still haven’t picked up King of Scars, ha).
But also…I’m one of those people who NEVER DNFs so I probably have a few others that I’m forgetting. (anyone think that goodreads should just have a ‘DNF’ button?)

Well, there’s my tag! I really hope you enjoyed this because I thought it would be a fun way to end the year and it’s just an all around original tag! (I hope) Here are the people that I will tag:

Em @Cats, Bibliophiles and Baguettes
Katie @The Storybook Sisters
Alex @The Scribe Owl
April Lee @Booked Till Midnight

Weren’t tagged? I know a lot of people in the blogging community (most of whom I met in the last three days because I’ve actually been making an effort to talk to people) so I can’t tag everyone! But even if you weren’t tagged, please go ahead and do it! I would love to see your answers!

One more thing! Some of you may have noticed the ‘Monthly Wrap-Up Book Tag’ that I’ve been hosting. Yeah, it’s not going so well, probably because it’s sort of on a time crunch and I’m not posting it soon enough and people have already started their monthly wrap-ups, etc. etc. SO. I’m changing how this is going. I will put up a page for the three monthly questions each month. Questions will be put up at the BEGINNING OF THE MONTH. If you want to stick your monthly questions into your wrap-up, just for a fun little ‘learn more about the books’ thing, please do so! If you link your post back to my wrap up I will be sure to present it on my blog so that anyone can see it!
For those of you who are interested in using the questions for this month, the questions are:

• A book you read this month with a strong bond (friends, family, etc.)
• A book you read this month in which the characters feasted
• The book with characters that you would love to invite to your house for thanksgiving (pre-covid)(note: if you do not live in the USA you can talk about the characters you would invite to your house for a feast)

You can find the rest of my monthly wrap-up and check out my answers to these questions here.

Have you read any of these books? What do you think of my anticipated releases? Do you believer that goodreads should add a ‘DNF’ button? Please, tell me what you think in the comments! I always love to hear your opinion on my opinion as long as you’re respectful! As alwaus, thank you for stopping by to read this post and this blog. It means the world!
Stay safe and keep reading,