GoodReads Choice Awards 2019 pt 1

So one of the challenges I made for myself was to read the selections for the Good Reads Choice Awards 2019. I divided them into 4 categories and made a goal to read each category was set up to read in 3 months.

Link of the announcement: https://magisreading.blogspot.com/2019/11/good-reads-choice-awards-2019-part-1.html

So here are the books I planned to read:

Fiction:

The winner was:
The Testaments, Margaret Atwood.
I liked this story I gave this 4.0 stars.
I enjoyed it better than the first installment of the series, which I did not expect. I enjoy the struggle of the forced servitude women are forced to have and yet you get to see everything happening on the background of the society where not everyone really feels and believes what they hold as the pillar of the society. 
This is amazing and I feel that it complements the handmaid's tale so we, that you just need to read them together to feel the full potential be reached. 
I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it.

The second one I read was Ask again, yes by Mary Beth Keane.

This seemed like a very interesting story but I was mainly disappointed. The message it was trying to give, was very good, I wholeheartedly agree and approve; the characters were just very forgettable and I felt meh about them really. 
We follow the lives of several couples, first as they move to live side by side, how their children interact, how they develop teen love and how they fight for each other.
But then too much drama, it felt too long and dragged out. There were some parts that felt very powerful, how do you separate the actions of the person you love from those of the parents when they had such negative consequences on your own family?
It was powerful but not interesting enough, at least 3/4 felt very good but towards the end, it felt like it was being ragged on forever.

I did not read any of the other choices so I have a very bad comparison point, one of them I liked a lot (the winner) and the second choice I had, well it felt meh. So I 100% agree with the winner in this case.

Mystery/Thriller
The winner was:

The silent patient, Alex Michaelides. This story is about a woman who has spent a few years in a mental institution after she was tried for the murder of her husband. She was found guilty but she has not spoken since she was apprehended. There are two separate timelines we follow, that I was not really sure, nor did I know why the need to jump from one to another.
It is interesting, but I was very annoyed by the change in not only the timelines, we see the "now" of her and how her doctors are trying to get the truth of what happened that night she killed her husband as their life did not show any sign of issues until that fateful night she was found in her house by the police covered in his blood and the murder weapon in her possession.  I could not put down the book, I read it super quick. I did not like the changes as I did not see the point of the doctor sharing his life, I mean a few bits here and there was ok, but so much page taken for him, making the reveal of what happened in the night of the murder did annoy me.
I did not predict the plot twist in this one.
I gave it 4 stars. For more thoughts, you can view my review written right after I finished reading it here.

The book that was in second place was My sister the serial killer

by Oyinkan Braithwaite. I enjoyed the read, less than the previous book that's for sure. If you want more thoughts on it you can find them in the specific review for this book here. The story made me very frustrated, the main character does not stand up for herself, she finds herself in love but without knowing the man she loves really. The relationships between sisters was not close and supportive as I expected. 
It was a good read but not something I will come back to, it was an interesting thing, the best parts were the nurse-patient in a coma and when he woke up he remembers everything so we become close....But I expected that to go different, it would have been awesome if they had stayed friends.
I gave this 3 stars.

The third runner up was The turn of the key, Ruth Ware s if you need a bit more thoughts here it is the first review. I really enjoyed this one. It was about a nanny, she goes to help out a family who is living in a technological house, but overly so. She has secrets regarding her motivation to go to the interview of the position. When one of the children dies and she is being blamed for it, we have the timeline division, she is retelling what happened but from way in the back as she just started to work there.
I was a bit surprised but the end. The few reveals were not what I expected I guess. 

Another book I read from this selection was the line between here  

is the review I did originally. This is an interesting story about a girl who escapes from a religious sect, we see the life she had and how she is facing the outside, it was very interesting in that aspect. We also see the "end" of the world in progress as there is a disease spreading and she gets caught up in it. 
The ending was very convenient but oh well. I gave it 3 stars, it was an ok read, but I do not feel it to be super remarkable.

So, in the end, I really liked the turn of the key better than the winner, I do not agree with the winner. But I do not feel extremely powerful about it. Personally, I would have picked the turn of the key as the #1 for this category.


Historical Fiction

The winner was Daisy Jones and the Six by Taylor Jenkin Reid. I read this and loved it! It was the first one of the sections I picked.  So here it's the original review with my thought of me finishing the book. I loved it, the characters are charming and even if it was a very uncomplicated story you fall for it and feel them for real. I understand why so many people were raving about it as it was released. 
It is very atmospheric and it felt so realistic, I want to read it as an audio, it might be a better experience. I still gave it 4.0 stars but not sure why. I really enjoyed it but the fact that was given in an interview and everyone had their own perspective about the same events was a bit jarring.

The Huntress, Kate Quinn a story about survivors from WWII who

have their own life but they are fighting to capture the Nazi officials who are hiding, they hunt them down and force them to face trial for their war crimes. It was an interesting story. Here is the review I did originally for that book. I gave it 4.0 stars.
I loved the search, but we did not only have the hunt of the scary mean woman known as the huntress but we have several snips of the current life of a girl who wants things to be different for her life, yet social expectations are set she is expected to just marry after high school, even if what she wants the most is to make a living based on pictures. The characters are very charming, you fall for them, but the hunt is still happening in the background, it was very entertaining and the expectation just made you want to finish the read.

Once upon a river by Diane Setterfield, this one was interesting but not as much as the previous ones. It tells the story of a town close by a river and the tales revolving about the people who find themselves trapped in the waters. We have several people sharing their life, it is very confusing as each person has a story about the same single girl, we do not know who she really is and who her family is for real. 
I don't think I did a specific review for this. But I really liked it. I gave it 3.0 stars.
We see excellent examples of good families, we see very selfish manipulative people and love above between parents-children. It is interesting but as I was reading it felt to be dragging too much. Weird mixed feelings.

So, in the end, I only read 3 of the books in this section. I was I do agree with the winner simply because it was interesting. It felt like reality tv more than a book. 

Fantasy is a genre that was supposed to be included but I dd not manage to get to it on time. I'll try to finish this one and do a separate analysis. This whole thing is not super analytic, to begin with, but at least I want to try to get to the winner and a few other choices to be able to compare. 
But this does mess up my timeline set up for this challenge, oh well, better luck for the next section.