Top Ten Tuesday: Books I Really Liked, But Can't Remember Much About

I remember - vividly - sitting in Freshman year English class in high school, and having a teacher ask, "Who here has read Bram Stoker's Dracula?" My hand shot up into the air. I was the only one. The teacher then cheerfully ventured, "Right, and what kind of book was Dracula? What format was it written in?"

I had read the book when I was 12; I was then 15. That's a significant year gap. I just remembered that I had read the book, liked it, and the fuzzy details of its main characters... I feel like questions of format were asking a lot. (After my ears turned what one of my friends informed me "one of the brightest shades of red I've ever seen," and I was struck with a sudden and powerful inability to speak, the teacher sighed, moved on, and said, "Letters... the story was told through letters." Because a Freshman is totally going to remember what an epistolary novel is, right?)

But as book lovers, we're all bound to have had those moments, some time or other. That's one of the reasons I was so excited to see today's "Top Ten Tuesday" theme was exactly that: Books I Really Liked, But Can't Remember Much About! 

1. Bram Stoker's Dracula 
Obviously. This book forced me into such a state of terror that I would close and lock the windows and blinds every night from 6th grade through 12th grade - even during the dog days of summer - in a habit that I wouldn't break until joining a sorority in college. I have to think that my inability to recall specifics of this book has to do, at least partially, with deep mental repression.

2. Pretty much all of S J Maas' Throne of Glass series, including the novellas
Let's be real: especially the novellas. I absolutely lived for these books during my first few years of college, even actively tweeting at SJ Maas and descending into ecstasies when she randomly responded. Now I'm much more invested in her other series - A Court of Thorns and Roses - and have next to no recollection of the former... a super bummer, when you consider how many books I'd had to read to catch up with where the series is now.

3. Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina
I spent over a month during my freshman year of college trying to read this book - it was the last thing I read before my College Fashion column took over my reading material, which was why it was the first book I covered - and think I retained that information until maybe the end of that year. I remember most of the main characters, and the general vibe, and even the fact that I was obsessed with Tolstoy's astounding ability to evocatively describe action, rather than character or setting... but really need a refresher course on the rest of it all.

4. Pretty much every Agatha Christie mystery, except the famous ones
I've talked on the blog before about how I've been collecting Agatha Christie books since I was in middle school. However, due to the sheer volume I've read - and how uneven they can be in quality, depending which of her canon you consume - there are only a few I actually remember. (Murder on the Orient Express, Death on the Nile, and And Then There Were None are among the few that come to mind!)

5. Jasper Fforde's the Thursday Next series 
Now here's a funny one: not only have I gone through each of this series multiple times, but I've even reread each of them quite a few times in recent years. However, I've read them together so frequently, that by this point, the plots all kind of blur, and I really don't know how to keep each of them separate. I recently came into a quandary when reorganizing my shelves, when I found the latest installment of the series, and couldn't actually remember whether I'd read it or not...

6. Bridget Zinn's Poison 
I remember reading this book years ago, in one of my first years of college, and immediately being smitten with its straightforward and cute fantasy plot, while also mourning the premature loss of the author. It came up in my Goodreads ramblings this past week, and while I still have nothing but positive feelings towards it, I have absolutely no idea what the story actually entails!

7. Shane Kuhn's The Intern's Handbook
My enjoyment of this book upon its first reading was only heightened by the fact that my Dad had gone totally crazy for it, too. Stylish and smart, with a gorgeous cover, I remember falling in love during a summer vacation... and promptly forgetting about it thereafter. It was only when the two of us purchased the sequel, Hostile Takeover, that I realized that I didn't recall any of the plot.

8. Stephanie Perkins' Anna and the French Kiss 
The book that transformed Perkins nearly overnight into a YA romance writer du jour - despite having a truly horrendous cover - was one of my favorites, prompting me to plow through an uninspiring Lola and the Boy Next Door and even halfway through the insipid Isla and the Happy Ever After before calling it quits. But despite my fervent heart eyes for the original, I really don't remember much of it, except how it pushed aside my traveling anxiety and made me think, for just a second, that living abroad might not be so bad.

9. Libba Bray's The Diviners series 
And speaking of truly horrendous covers, perhaps this series' serial identity issues are to blame for my amnesia. Not only did I crash hard for this series, but I even got my kid brother into it, too... but when he bought me the third installment as a birthday present last October, the first thing I did was tell him he was going to be waiting to borrow it for a while. I'm going to need to review the previous two in the series first!

10. Erika Johansen's The Queen of the Tearling 
If there was ever a book I recommend the most without being able to recall a discernible reason for doing so, it's this one. While I remember enjoying its heavy fantasy feel and exceptional world-building, I remember little else, except for one or two scenes. I own the second in this series, so I should probably do a quick review session before I chance it... or maybe I could just recommend it to one of you, and you could remind me of some of the details when you're finished?

What's in your Top Ten? Let me know, in the comments below!