Every Romance (or Romance-Adjacent) Book I’ve Read | TTT

Posted on by Lauren

Hello, everyone! I wasn’t planning on doing a Top Ten Tuesday post this week as the prompt was a “Love Freebie”, and I wasn’t sure where to go with that because I’m not a big romance reader. I was going to go for a “Top 10 Platonic, Familial, and Romantic Relationships in Books” type of thing but I wasn’t sure if I would’ve been able to do ten. As I thought about it more, I realized I’ve probably read about ten romance books in my reading overall, and I thought I’d shine some light on them.

This is a little bit of an untraditional list because it will have some books I didn’t like along with the ones I did. Pretty much just most of the romance (or romance-adjacent) books I’ve read!

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

1. Shatter Me (Shatter Me, #1) by Tahereh Mafi

Now, I know you may be thinking, “hey! that isn’t a romance!” and I guess you’d be right. I read this book–*checks notes*–seven years ago now, and while I enjoyed it at the time, I left it with the resounding opinion that it was much more of a romance than a dystopia. I did briefly revisit the first few chapters of it a year or so ago and found that it definitely would not work so well for me now but I did enjoy it when I was much younger!

2. Flipped by Wendelin Van Draanen

I saw the film adaptation of this one many, many years ago, and I didn’t really love it. When I got to the point where I started reading out of the YA section of my local library over the children’s, this was one of the earliest ones I picked up just because I was familiar with it. I also didn’t really love the book but it is one of the few romances I’ve read, so it goes on the list!

3. If I Stay (If I Stay, #1) & Where She Went (If I Stay, #2) by Gayle Forman

Of the two books in this duology, I actually far preferred Where She Went. When I read If I Stay, I remember it feeling sort of lacking, and though the premise was intriguing, the story didn’t super work for me. Where She Went really surprised me, though, and while I don’t remember too much from it now, I do remember enjoying it!

4. The Princess Diaries (#1-?) by Meg Cabot

If you asked, I really couldn’t tell you how many of these books I actually read but I think it was a good deal of the ones published in the 2000s. Like the Flipped and If I Stay books, this was one of the earliest YA books/series I started reading as a young/pre teen. I actually recall not really loving them and far preferring the movie adaptation but I still read quite a few and feel they’re worth mentioning.

5. The Summer I Turned Pretty (Summer, #1) by Jenny Han

I started this as a buddy read last summer but unfortunately, I ended up being the only one who read it — and, even more unfortunately, it wasn’t much my cup of tea. However, though it isn’t something I would’ve picked up without prompting, I enjoyed it for the melodramatic teenage silliness that it is and did my best to block out the bits I found more obnoxious (*cough cough* Conrad. *cough* Before you massacre me, though, I thought the show rendition of his character was better).

6. Words in Deep Blue by Cath Crowley

I liked this book well enough. I know some other people who read it really, really loved it, and I think my opinion of it is just through the lens that I tend not to pick up this sort of book. The main couple was very sweet, and I appreciated them to an extent but it was actually the romantic travails of the side characters that hooked me more. That, and the bookstore setting. A detail that still sticks with me is that the bookstore had a section of books that people would write in, leaving notes for other people to find which I loved the idea of. I do think this is a pretty solid read!

7. The Selection (#1-#5) by Kiera Cass

Alright, now we’ve moving into the books that I unabashedly enjoyed. I know that if I reread this series, I’d have much harsher opinions on it but this was one of my all-time favorites as a preteen/young teen. I read every single book, every single novella, every single fragment of The Selection series possible. Anything Kiera Cass would put out, I would read. Honestly, I miss loving something as much as I loved these books when I was a wee one.

8. Heartstopper (#1-#4) by Alice Oseman

I read the first four installment of this graphic novel series back in 2022 after seeing the Netflix adaptation, and what a sweet series it is! They’re such quick reads, and although they tackle some heavier subject matter as the books progress, they’re overall home to lots of heartwarming feelings. Of the Nick-and-Charlie-centered stories in the Osemanverse, I’ve read these first four, as well as the two novellas, This Winter and Nick and Charlie. Of those two, I preferred This Winter but think it’s all pretty good! (Solitaire is actually my favorite book by Alice Oseman but I wasn’t sure if it counts as a romance, especially considering the tagline is “this is not a love story”.)

9. She Drives Me Crazy by Kelly Quindlen

I actually just mentioned this one in my last TTT post–“Top 10 Quick Reads/Books to Read When Time is Short“–but this is a likely place for it to be. I’d say this book is actually the one that made me really get the draw of the romance genre. It was such a fun, heartwarming, quirky (and not used derisively) read. I hope it gets a film adaptation because I think it would transfer very well to the big screen!

10. Normal People by Sally Rooney

Again, this was featured in my last post and, again, I think this is a likely place for it to be. I’ve reread this book once before, and I think I’ll probably continue to reread it. These characters are such a mess, and I think there’s a lot of toxicity in all of it but there are parts that resonate so deeply and are so thoroughly evocative that I can never put it down for too long.

Have you read any of the books on this list? Did you like them? Why, or why not? What books did you mean to read/finish last year that you didn’t get to? I’d love to hear your thoughts below!

[DISCLAIMER: Photos in this post may be paired with Amazon affiliate links, meaning I’d earn a small commission from qualifying purchases. Thank you for your support!]

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Published by Lauren

Hi! I’m Lauren (she/her, 22), and I like to read and write; I’m still trying to figure out the rest.

14 thoughts on “Every Romance (or Romance-Adjacent) Book I’ve Read | TTT”

  6. I am utterly in love with the TV show The Summer I Turned Pretty – I can’t watch it without sobbing my heart out! I haven’t read the series yet but I just saw that Fairyloot are doing special editions of them and they look divine! 😍 Shatter Me has been on my TBR list forever and I’ve always been keen to see how the Princess Diaries match up to the films (which I also loved!). Great list!

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    1. I quite enjoyed the The Summer I Turned Pretty show myself! I think it was a good adaptation in that I think it even improved on the books (I only read the first book, though, so I can’t attest for the rest of the book series). If you read it, I hope you enjoy it, as well as all the others you mentioned! 🙂

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