A great way to start a new year, a new month, a weekend or any time is to crack open a good book! Reading is beneficial to everyone. No matter what genre, a good book can reduce stress and enhance your learning.
Don’t know where to start? Here are 12 great books everyone should read.
Starting with a personal favorite, Fourth Wing, by Rebecca Yarros is a newly published fantasy book. I had first heard of it from TikTok, where many people said it reminded them of The Hunger Games. The book is about a young girl, Violet Sorrengail, the daughter of the school’s headmaster. While all of Violet’s life she’s been trained to be a scribe, her mom forces her to join the rider’s quadrant. Everyone doubts her ability and the majority of her class wants her dead. Throughout the book, you read about Violet’s growth, relationships and all the twists and turns she goes through. You truly never know what is going to happen next, and as soon as you shut Fourth Wing you’ll immediately want to open the sequel, Iron Flame.
Next is Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. While I haven’t read it yet, it’s definitely on my reading list. The crime thriller novel was published in 2012 and soon turned into a movie in 2014. Gone Girl follows Amy Dunne and her husband, Nick (Nicholas) Dunne, after a big move to Nick’s hometown. Amy soon finds out that Nick is unfaithful to her and she develops an elaborate plan. The book dances around the ideas of personality disorders, dysfunctional coping skills, and authenticity vs role-playing. “It’s one of the most twisted books I’ve read. Halfway through there’s a major plot twist that uproots everything you thought you knew,” 12th and 11th-grade English teacher Sara Behnke said.
The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton is a classic. Many people have seen the film, but I firmly believe in reading the book before the movie since the book is typically better. The book gives you all of the main character, PonyBoy Curtis’s, thoughts and it’s very enlightening compared to the movie. The book follows two rival gangs based on their social status, the Greasers and the Socs. The Greasers are seen as “lesser” than the Socs. Three Socs attack two Greasers, PonyBoy and his friend, Johnny Cade. The story follows what happens after that, and how mistreated the Greasers are.
Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton is a memoir following her mid-twenties experience. Between all the ups and downs with friends and bad dates, this book resembles the young adulthood of a girl. While it is about a woman’s life, anyone can enjoy Dolly Alderton’s hilarious writing. I’m still reading it, but so far, behind all the humor Alderton adds, she gives you a good perspective on the good and bad of growing up.
Next, The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides. This book is a psychological thriller. After Alicia Berenson murders her husband, she goes silent. Alicia ends up being sent to a psychiatric hospital. Theo Faber, a therapist, tries to understand why she killed her husband and why she remains mute. “This book and Gone Girl are my all-time favorite books and my first recommendations,” Sarah Behnke said. The twist will leave you sitting, staring at the book with your jaw wide open.
Lastly, I suggest, If He Had Been with Me by Laura Nowlin. This book is targeted towards young adults. Nowlin writes a tragic yet beautiful love story about Autumn Davis and Phineas (Finny) Smith. They grew up next to each other and their moms have been best friends forever. Finny and Autumn were close growing up, but eventually, they drifted apart. In middle school, Autumn had felt pushed out of their shared friend group, which led to Finny becoming a popular boy at their school. For the majority of high school, they’re both in their own relationships but it’s obvious they still have feelings for each other deep down. Autumn falls into a state of depression and Finny comes around again to help her through it. The book is a great portrait of teenage love, grief, pity and the impacts others have on you.
6 Notables:
Somewhere between The Hunger Games and The Handmaid‘s Tale exists this story about sixteen-year-old Tierney James and the year she spent away from home. While she made it back many of her friends didn’t.
The Song of Achilles is a beautiful and creative retelling of Homer’s Iliad. It is changed into a love story told from the perspective of Patroclus. The story follows the loss of love and two people going through many struggles to stay together.
A struggling writer gets asked to ghostwrite for a bestselling author, Verity Crawford. Lowen Ashleigh digs through Verity’s notes and almost replaces her by living with her husband, Jeremy Crawford. Lowen finds things she wishes she didn’t, things that make her question her sanity and safety.
This book follows Eden McCrorey’s high school experience, cut into four parts, each dedicated to a year of school. In the beginning, Eden gets sexually assaulted by her best friend’s brother. The rest of the book talks about how she handles and deals with the trauma.
Britney Spears’ memoir of her career and what she went through. Spears went through some tragic and traumatic events, but overall her story is very enlightening and provides a good outlook on life and what to make of the experiences you go through.
This series is Sarah J. Maas’s way of retelling the classic Disney movie, Beauty and the Beast. Feyre finds herself at the fairy/human border, where she is given the choice to die or to come live with the faeries as their human prisoner.
While all of these 12 books are incredibly well written and widely read, if they aren’t your cup of tea, there are still millions of books out there. There’s always a book for someone.
Remember, it starts with a turn of the page and you’re off into a new adventure.
