Ranking every YA Dystopian Books I’ve Read

A couple of months ago, I posted a blog about popular YA Dystopian books that I want to read. It is a genre that I am into back in the days, and I want to relive the feeling and the nostalgia of reading about this kind of story line.

Looking back at all the YA Dystopian books that I have read, I realized that I read fewer series than I expected. And out of the blue, I have the urge to rank each series that I completed.

But before diving into my ranking, I wanted to mention that this ranking is solely base on the completed series that I have read. In addition to that, since reviving a series is a trend these days, I will be ranking these series based on the original trilogy or series. Furthermore, the rank was based on the whole series and not by each book.

I have eight trilogy/series that I want to talk about, so let’s get into it!

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie

RATING: 🌕🌕🌕🌖🌑

Published: March 17, 2009 (First published June 1926)

Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks

Format: e-Book

Pages: 286

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Synopsis:

Considered to be one of Agatha Christie’s most controversial mysteries, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd breaks all the rules of traditional mystery writing.

The peaceful English village of King’s Abbot is stunned. First, the attractive widow Ferrars dies from an overdose of veronal. Not twenty-four hours later, Roger Ackroyd—the man she had planned to marry—is murdered. It is a baffling, complex case involving blackmail, suicide, and violent death, a cast that taxes Hercule Poirot’s “little grey cells” before he reaches one of the most startling conclusions of his fabled career. 

Her Eyes Under Water by Romona Simon

RATING: 🌕🌕🌕🌗🌑

Published: April 19, 2020

Publisher: Self-published

Format: e-Book

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Synopsis:

People have been disappearing in the vast and pristine wilderness of 1970s Montana. One evening, restless university student Julia Strauss meets the captivating Alex Bowman and finds him irresistible. He is handsome, polite, and mysterious. If someone seems too good to be true…

This is a romantic suspense novel inspired by true events. The hero is Mr. Perfect when he is with the heroine. However, this cultivated persona melts away to reveal something frightening and unforgiving when they’re apart. Will Julia be able to see beyond the haze of her infatuation before it’s too late?

Banned Book Club by Kim Hyun Sook & Ryan Estrada

RATING: 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌑

Published: May 19, 2020

Publisher: Iron Circus Comics

Format: e-ARC

Pages: 204

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Synopsis:

When Kim Hyun Sook started college in 1983 she was ready for her world to open up. After acing her exams and sort-of convincing her traditional mother that it was a good idea for a woman to go to college, she looked forward to soaking up the ideas of Western Literature far from the drudgery she was promised at her family’s restaurant. But literature class would prove to be just the start of a massive turning point, still focused on reading but with life-or-death stakes she never could have imagined.

This was during South Korea’s Fifth Republic, a military regime that entrenched its power through censorship, torture, and the murder of protestors. In this charged political climate, with Molotov cocktails flying and fellow students disappearing for hours and returning with bruises, Hyun Sook sought refuge in the comfort of books. When the handsome young editor of the school newspaper invited her to his reading group, she expected to pop into the cafeteria to talk about Moby Dick, Hamlet, and The Scarlet Letter. Instead she found herself hiding in a basement as the youngest member of an underground banned book club. And as Hyun Sook soon discovered, in a totalitarian regime, the delights of discovering great works of illicit literature are quickly overshadowed by fear and violence as the walls close in.

In BANNED BOOK CLUB, Hyun Sook shares a dramatic true story of political division, fear-mongering, anti-intellectualism, the death of democratic institutions, and the relentless rebellion of reading.

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

RATING: 🌕🌕🌕🌕🌕

Published: June 04, 2007 (First published 1934)

Publisher: HarperCollins

Format: audiobook & e-Book

Pages: 347

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I believe, Messieurs, in loyalty—to one’s friends and one’s family and one’s caste.

Synopsis:

Just after midnight, a snowdrift stops the Orient Express in its tracks. The luxurious train is surprisingly full for the time of the year, but by the morning it is one passenger fewer. An American tycoon lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside.

Isolated and with a killer in their midst, detective Hercule Poirot must identify the murderer—in case he or she decides to strike again.

Tour the World in 30 Books ft. Patron Saints of Nothing

Hello friends and welcome to the 6th stop of the Tour the World in 30 Days: A Diverse Book Blog Tour hosted by Sammie of The Bookwyrm’s Den. Each stop features different diverse books from all around the world, and I am so excited to be a part of this tour. This is a blog tour created to support the CCPL – a small, rural library in an area with a very homogeneous population and a high poverty rate where people rarely have the means to travel or experience a different perspective. But that should not stop these people from experiencing the world, which is why this Diverse Book Drive would bring the world to their small county instead, and with the focus on MG & YA books, the CCPL aims to expose especially its young patrons to new and diverse perspectives and cultures. If you want to donate and support this book drive, I will be listing out all the donation details at the end of this post.

With that being said, I am very excited to introduce you guys to the book that I chose for this tour. Hopefully, by the end of this post, I have convinced you to pick it up. The book that I chose does not highlight a character that I could relate to, but it was set in my country and showcase bits and pieces of my culture. After reading Sammie’s post back in August, I immediately thought of this book because like her I don’t know what it’s like to see myself in a book until this certain book comes along. I could already tell that this will be a long post, so let’s get into it!

Pages: 1 2

Five Little Pigs by Agatha Christie

RATING: 🌕🌕🌕🌗🌑

Published: December 15, 1985 (First published May 1942)

Publisher: Berkley

Format: e-Book & audiobook

Pages: 224

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Synopsis:

It was an open and shut case. All the evidence said Caroline Crale poisoned her philandering husband, a brilliant painter. She was quickly and easily convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
Now, sixteen years later, in a posthumous letter, Mrs. Crale has assured her grown daughter that she was innocent. But instead of setting the young woman’s mind at ease, the letter only raises disquieting questions. Did Caroline indeed write the truth? And if she didn’t kill her husband, who did?

To find out, the Crale’s daughter asks Hercule Poirot to reopen the case. His investigation takes him deep into the conflicting memories and motivations of the five other people who were with the Crales on the fatal day. With his keen understanding of human psychology, he manages to discover the surprising truth behind the artist’s death.

August 2020 Wrap-up and Book Haul

🎶But I can see us lost in the memory August slipped away into a moment in time, ’cause it was never mine.🎶

Yup, that’s me taking the chance to reference a Taylor Swift lyrics whenever I can. But the chorus of August is definitely what I feel about this month. It felt like it pass by so fast. This is probably the most stressful month for me. I only managed to finish 3 books which is quite low for my usual reads. But to my defense, a certain book takes up my entire month, and given that I only squeeze my reading when I am not busy or tired, reading more than half of that book is something to celebrate. But I’ll get to that later. For now, let’s get into the wrap up!