Top 5 Wednesday: Friendships

Dear Reader,

Welcome to this week's Top 5 Wednesday, where I list my Top 5 whatever-the-topic-is-for-this-week. 

This brilliant idea was the brain child Lainey from gingerreadslainey on youtube, though I first came across it on The Readables. The series is fun and easy to write/watch, and is open to all who want to participate. If you, dear reader, want to know more or want to join in the fun, this is the link for the goodreads group. 

This week's theme is fictional Friendships. So without further ado:

5) At number 5 we have Albert and Joey (the horse) from War Horse by Michael Morpusgo. Over the years, I have read plenty of books that contain a strong bond between stead and rider, e.g. Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater and The Horse and His Boy by C.S.Lewis; even in the novel I'm currently working on, the only friend of my main character, Sharon, is her mare Honey. But their is something about the length that Albert and Joey go to, the tragedies and horrors they encounter, on finding their way back to each other; which I find so moving and which puts their friendship (as opposed to all the others) in my Top 5.    

4) Next come Sherlock Holmes and John Watson from the amazing books by Sir Arthus Conan Doyle. Granted I was never really interested in this phenomenon until I watched BBC's Sherlock when it first came on TV. But since then I've read 3 of the 6 A.C. Doyle books and I now completely understand why Sherlock and Watson have become such an iconic friendship; one name cannot be mentioned without the other. 

3) In third place, I have my favourite trio: Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, children of the brilliant J.K.Rowling. They have the most exciting adventures and the most heartwarming character development. Sure they've had their ups and downs, but it's their love for each other, their friendship, that sets Harry apart from Voldemort. From the moment when they first met on the Hogwarts Express to the Battle of Hogwarts, their's is a friendship to concur all evil and be passed on from generation to generation. (There is another beloved trio: Percy, Annabeth and Grover, from Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson & The Olympians, but they just haven't had as much impact in my life as Harry, Ron and Harmione.)

  

2) Second on my list is the friendship of Elizabeth Bennet and Charlotte Lucas from Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen. They don't go on lift-altering or world-saving adventures. They don't battle evil forces or catch deadly killers. They're friendship is subtle but still strong. They have most realistic friendship in this list. Their personalities and opinions differ greatly and they fight; but in the end they both come out stronger and closer to each other. In a way, I love Lizzie and Charlotte so much because their friendship greatly resembles my own friendship with my best friend Codename: Pixie. I am the quiet, unremarkable pragmatist while she come from a large family full of sisters, is overt, passionate and won't settle for anything less than true love.

1) And finally, my favourite friendship of all time is Will Herondale and Jem Carstairs from Cassandra Clare's The Infernal Devices Trilogy. They are two halves of a whole, one soul in two bodies. But, no matter what I say about these two, I cannot possibly explain Will & Jem. Dear Reader, to truly understand why these two have the most amazing friendship of all time, you will just have to read the books.   

In the comments section, tell me about you top 5 favourite friendships.

Until the next tag, the next blog, take care and keep reading.
Nida  

Top 5 Wednesday: Genres

Dear Reader,

So I've joined the #T5WFamily. What is the T5WFamily? you may ask. Well, T5W stands for Top 5 Wednesday (as you can see by the title) and it is a "family" of booktubers and bloggers, who list their Top 5 whatever-the-topic-is-for-that-week every Wednesday. This brilliant idea was the brain-child Lainey from gingerreadslainey on youtube, though I first came across it on The Readables. The series is fun and easy to write/watch, and is open to all who want to participate. If you, dear reader, want to know more or want to join in the fun, this is the link for the goodreads group.  

This week's topic is favourite Genres. Here are my Top 5:

5) Autobiographies - as opposed to regular biographies, because I prefer to read the story as told by the person who lived through it. I mostly enjoy reading autobiographies of writers or other historical figures. My favourites include: 

• The Butterfly Mosque by G. Willow Wilson, 
• Falling Leaves by Adeline Yen Mah, 
• Love in a Headscarf by Shelina Zahra Janmohamed,  
• The Dairy of a Young Girl by Anne Frank and
• From my Sisters' Lips by Na'ima B. Robert.  

4) Historical Fiction - in my opinion this is fiction that's been written in modern times but is set in the past, for example: 

• The Daughter of Venice by Donna Jo Napoli,
• The Book Thief by Markus Zusak,
• The Sally Lockhart Series by Philip Pullman,
• To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and
• even those accursed-guilty-pleasure-books by Julia Quinn. 

3) Sci-Fi/Dystopian - I've grouped these two together because there is usually (though not always) a lot of overlap and also because I became a fan of this two genres around the same time and only very recently. Some books I've read from these genres are:

• The Hunger Games by Susanne Collins,
• Uglies Quartet by Scott Westerfeld,
• Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, 
• The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells and
• Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne.  

2) Classics - but more particularly Fiction from the 19th Century (and Shakespeare). My love of Classics began when I first picked up Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen at the tender and impressionable age of 14. Since then I've made it my goal to read 3 to 4 new classics each year. Here are five of my favourites:

• North & South by Elizabeth Gaskell,
• A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens,
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte,
• Persuasion by Jane Austen and     
• A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthus Conan Doyle.

And finally, number one on my list is (yes you've guessed it),

1) Fantasy - I'm an escapist reader and I love fantasy. From the fairytales I enjoyed listening to and reading as a child, to the first book I remember actually falling in love with, to the section I head to first whenever I enter book shop; all relate to by desire for that fantastical. There are many different sub-genres within fantasy but for now I'll now talk about the Top 5 I like reading most.

• High-Fantasy: this is when the story is set in a completely new/made-up world with their own rules and physical laws, for example The Lord of The Ring by J R.R. Tolkien, The Inheritence Cycle by Christopher Paolini or The Graceling Realm by Kristen Cashore. 
• Low-Fantasy: where the story can be set in the real-world or a fictional one but follow real-world laws but with many fantastical elements. The distinction between the two can be blurry at time but here are a few favourites that are definitely "low" fantasy: Harry Potter Series by J. K. Rowling, The Inkheart Trilogy by Cornelia Funke and The Once & Future King by T.H. White. 
• Fairy-tales: are self-explanatory and which I've already written about several times on my blog. My favourite of all time is The Beauty & The Beast, which is discus in much detail in another post. Fairy tale re-tellings are also rather enjoyable; there are the Jackson Pearce books (Sisters Red, Sweetly and Fathomless) and mostly recently I fell head-over-heals for The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer which I've also reviewed on this blog.        
• Urban-Fantasy: are stories set in the real (usually modern) world, only with some fantastical elements to them, e.g. Percy Jackson & The Olympians by Rick Riordan, Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson and Labyrinth by Kate Mosse.  
• Paranormal: stories about vampires, werewolves, witches, angels, demons, ghosts etc.. hanging out among the human population (though without any of the 'horror' elements). The majority of the YA that I've read falls into this sub-category, for example Cassandra Clare's The Infernal Devices and The Mortal Instruments, The Wolves of Mercy Falls by Maggie Stiefvater or Dracula by Bram Stoker.   

Until the next book, the next review, the next Wednesday, take care and keep reading.

Nida