Top Ten Tuesday: Unexpected Books

This week's is Top Ten Tuesday, hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, is the Top Ten Books that Deceived me, or I've interpreted it as books that were Unexpected, either good or bad when I expected the opposite.  I would like to note that often, this expectation was an incorrect assumption on my part, not necessarily the book's fault.  But that happens too.  Here are a smattering of those books:

Drought by Pam Bachorz 
This is one that I expected to be a sort of dystopian society that was dealing with a scarcity of water, but turned into a kind of paranormal something.  A case of me expecting it to be one thing and it being another.

Reckless by Cornelia Funke
I was pretty disappointed by this one, simply because the premise sounded like a fun middle grade fairy tale kind of book.  Turned out to be about an adult and not so fun in the fairy tale department.  A little misleading in its labeling, I think.


It Started with a Dare by Lindsay Faith Rech
This one actually was deceptive in its cover, which gives off a happy fun vibe.  The story is actually really kind of dark and twisted.  Definitely not what I expected, but then again they say not to judge a book by its cover :)

Academy 7 by Anne Osterlund
I was really excited to read a sci-fi story about this intergalactic society and an elite school for geniuses.  Definitely didn't deliver on that, since there was ridiculously little mention of anything space-like or sci-fi.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
I think this book came with so many expectations that it was inevitably doomed to not deliver on them all.  Also, the soft blue of the cover and the free bird seemed to imply a lighter sort of story than it gave. 

Sleepless by Cyn Balog
This book just didn't deliver on an interesting premise.  I thought it would be so cool to read about sandmen and the afterlife.  Instead, it was weird and had not enough detail to make it stand up.

Unearthly by Cynthia Hand
This was surprised me with how good it was.  I expected to have the typical paranormal romance that was ridiculously overdone in the genre.  Much to my surprise, the heroine made interesting choices and I was happy to enjoy it.

Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko
Just reading that title, doesn't that give you certain ideas about this book?  It's a mobster book, right?  So. Much. More.  Loved it from beginning to end, even if it was totally not what I expected.


Breadcrumbs by Anne Ursu
This book was also not what I expected from the description and cover.  I thought that it would be a fairy tale through and through.  I mean, it's a fairy tale retelling, right?  So when the first half of the book discussed realistic problems in a real world, I found myself a little let down.  Still a fabulous book, though.


Plain Kate by Erin Bow
This is another that I had an impression of based on the cover and maybe even the description.  It looked kind of like a light-hearted fairy-tale-esque story, featuring a cat.  It had most of those things, but turned out to have a depth and sincerity to it that made me fall madly in love with it.  So happy to report it exceeded my expectations.

What books were unexpected for you?

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