Fans pick 100 books like The Selection

I loved Margaret Atwood’s book, a cautionary story that shows how the extreme distortion of religious ideologies can lead to devastating outcomes. Offred endures unimaginable hardship under the guise of religious piety, but the reality is much more twisted.

Her determination to survive in such harrowing circumstances is inspiring and challenges us to reflect on our views and norms. 

I fell in love with Katniss from the very beginning. I was the oldest daughter in a single-parent family and had to take over and care for my younger sisters a lot of times because my father was dysfunctional. So I get it. The whole concept is horrifying to me—children forced to kill each other—but following along as Katniss manages to defeat the fate waiting for her inspired me.

I related to how she did most of it on her own, seeing as she had been let down by her mother, her country, and, later, those she thought were friends. Trust is so important and valuable for young people to have, and so easy to destroy.

I loved these books. The mystery of this society and its strict divisions fascinated me. I related to Tris immediately and her need for more excitement than her Abnegation family could provide. The detachment felt by so many of the characters in their daily roles resonated in my soul as something I have felt as well when confined by societal definition.

As I reflected in our own society, those at the top scheme to gain power for themselves, regardless of the effect on the rest of the people. I was proud of Tris and her colleagues, who joined together to create a better, more just society.

Talk about crazy experiments! Maze Runner is an epic quest combined with a nod to those who love solving puzzles on steroids. This is truly an end-of-the-world scenario, or I surely hope it is. While I can see some mad scientists excited about such an experiment today, it is still frowned upon. Thank goodness. But Maze Runner explores “science” gone rogue.

Indifference again plays a central role in the plot as those outside the experiment use a variety of psychological warfare techniques to keep the participants engaged in the game. The reader feels sorry for them having to overcome everything that’s thrown at them or die. I loved how the group of teens had to work together to figure out what was going on and then face the difficulty of extracting themselves from the maze. Ultimately, I loved that friendship and working together triumphed at the end of the day.

This is more suited to the YA market with an appealing darkness that had me gripped from page one.

An allure of illusions, rich description, and magic. I loved this book! Every sentence was beautiful and intriguing–it was quite unlike anything I’ve ever read before. Add in the mystique of a carnival, and this makes for a remarkable read.

Scarlett was a strong female protagonist, and her desperate need to escape had me reading this long into the night. 

Quite simply, Erin Morgenstern’s book is the finest example of urban fantasy I have ever read. Besides a plot rich in sorcery and romance, with a circus (think Bradbury’s Something Wicked This Way Comes) that appears mysteriously, vanishing just as suddenly and the shadowy game of two great sorcerers playing out their competitiveness through the lives of their young apprentices, this is a beautifully written book. The writing is elegant, rounded, and rich. What a writer! The imagery is transporting without clobbering the reader over the head. The characters are each fully drawn, but in slow increments as the story steams inexorably ahead like the mysterious train that carries the circus from locale to locale. 

This book showed me that you do not need blazing dragons or drooling werewolves to create menace, sinister characters, and mystery. Morgenstern places this world of circus magic just out of reach but so… show more.

Branded is one of my favorite dystopian novels and really inspired how I write my own dystopian because it explores the dystopian realm beyond chosen ones and government overthrows. This book gave me permission to make my fans cry because I put their hearts in a blender and laughed just like these authors did to me. Branded is about a girl thrown in prison, branded with the sin of lust, and forced to rely on her gorgeous guard…who puts us through a whirlwind of emotions as we see his hatred…and not-hatred…expressed throughout the story. Tissues are required for several different exciting and heartbreaking reasons.

I enjoyed Perfected because it was a very, very soft and gentle take on dystopia where young girls are genetically engineered in labs and trained with special traits as young girls only to be sold to wealthy families as pets. They’re treated as puppies who are dressed in fancy clothes, paraded through events, sat on pretty couches and chairs, and very, very few make it through without being manipulated and used in worse ways. When she falls in love with her owner’s son, and he starts to fall for her, bad things happen. I love putting twists on dystopian worlds so this one was a brilliant, unusual concept that brought such a unique look into the genre and its possibilities and gave me permission to do the same.

This one was very unique in that it barely introduces the dystopian world in the first book and focuses on it much later in the series despite the significant impact it has on the characters from the very first page. The lead is male, which is becoming less common these days, and gives us a more calculating look into the world of dystopia. I enjoyed seeing things from another angle as that really reminds me to explore those less-common threads in my own writing as well. And what could be more interesting than people disappearing on their birthday and then finding out who is taking them, right?

Similar to my story, this is about a girl forced to marry the son of a dictator against her will…only instead of fighting to save her own life as she’s about to be murdered, this girl is the murderer trying to take out her new husband. She’s being manipulated by her family to act as an assassin and starts to waiver in her mission when her new husband proves to be absolute book boyfriend perfection. It’s kind of the opposite of mine where my leading lady is cunning and manipulative to save her life, this leading lady is trying to be stumbling through being stealthy enough to murder a man who was supposed to be her older sister’s victim—not hers.