Top Ten Tuesday: Ten Romances That I Actually Liked

Ten Romances That I Actually Liked

I’m notoriously picky about romances. There’s been very few that I liked right off the bat and less that stuck with me after I put the book down.  So you can imagine my despair when I found that this week’s Top Ten Tuesday was (in honor of valentine’s day) all about Romance Tropes. 

Then I figured that I'd probably only liked ten romances every fifty on average anyway.

Scheherazade and Khalid from The Wrath and Dawn by Renee Ahdieh

              Of course, I didn’t like them at first. That was the point after all. Still they were sweet and I was impressed by the author’s ability to make me care about Khalid specifically. 

The attraction was slow and believable even which is usually one of my main complaints. Basically, it was adorable.

Gansey and Blue from The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater

              I didn’t expect to like Gansey and Blue, after all Blue and Adam were a thing and they were equally adorable. But what do you know they were sweet. Then of course everything went crazy and they destroyed my heart.

Elend and Vin from Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson

              I wasn’t sure about Elend and Vin. In fact when the first book ended I was annoyed to pieces that it was implied that they got together. Elend, at least compared to Vin, was just sort of bland and way too idealistic. 

Again, compared to the con artist, war criminals and other pessimistic characters. But Elend’s character development was amazing and utterly beautiful. They also broke my heart into a million pieces.

All the Romances in Ranger’s Apprentice by John Flanagan

              What’s better than liking one of the romances in a book? Liking all of them. Do you guys even know how often that happens? 

 That’s how often it happens. And that’s part of the reason why I love Ranger’s Apprentice so much.

 Whether it’s Halt and Pauline or Will and Alyss they were all fabulous.

Sorcery & Cecilia by Caroline Stevermer and Patricia C. Wrede

              Admittedly the love interests weren’t the most ‘complicated’ of characters but part of the reason I liked Sorcery and Cecilia so much was because of its simplicity. Sometimes you just want a nice squishy romance without too many near death experiences. 

Not to mention it also cuts out some of the more questionable relationship tropes that YA puts to use way too often.

Thirrin and Oskan from The Cry of the Icemark by Stuart Hill

              Man I’ve got to reread the Cry of the Icemark. It’s so beautiful. While Thirrin was a kick-butt heroine and Oskan was one of the best fantasy hero’s I’ve read. In high fantasy guys are so rarely allowed to be anything but giant brutish warriors or at most stoic rangers. Oskan was a healer who only wanted to help people. And they were just kids, trying to steer a kingdom through a war. If physically crying isn’t a sign that they’re awesome then I don’t know what is.

Megan and David from Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson

              Again I wasn’t interested in them at all in the first book. 

And in all honesty if I didn’t like the books themselves so much (and happened to have been buried under bad romances for a while) I probably wouldn’t have even bothered to care about them. Still Sanderson pulled both original and cliché ideas into their relationship and at the very least I appreciated them for their good writing.

Lockwood and Lucy from Lockwood and Co. by Jonathan Stroud

              For the love of Pete would they just kiss already. It’s been four whole books! Get your crap together guys. I like Lucy the best out of the two. Then again I’m always impressed by characters that can be strong female heroines and have emotions at the same time 

(yes authors that is completely possible). 

However my love for Lockwood grows with each book, and it’s definitely not because he’s turning into what I can only equate as a tiny Sherlock Holmes. Good taste in coats, horrible at communicating with other human beings.

Kaz and Inej from The Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo

              Ah yes the most heart breaking of heart breakers. Do you guys ever have characters where you just know that you shouldn’t like them? But you like them anywhere. Hello Kaz you are a terrible human being but I love you anyway. BTW I totally need a spin off series with Inej sailing around and kicking slavers into the bottom of the ocean. 

so if you could just get on that Bardugo that would be brilliant.

Marasai and Wax from The Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson

This is less of a like and more of a hope. Because for goodness sake Wax you don’t know whats good for you sheesh. As I’ve said before Marasi’s character development was fabulous and I totally want to see a point where she surpasses Wax. Not a lot, just a tiny bit in a way he wouldn’t expect. At the very least it would be hilarious. 

And might convince him that he’s making a terrible mistake in letting her leave. But probably not because Wax is as stubborn as a pig.

Thanks for putting up with my confused ramblings about random romances. And thanks again to the ladies at the Broke and the Bookish for starting Top Ten Tuesdays (even if they do require me to talk about romances) you can check them out here if any of you are interested.