Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s theme is, as the title says, Books I Enjoyed That Are Outside My Comfort Zone.
So right off the bat, we have the book I reviewed yesterday, Hollow Kingdom. Joining it, for many of the same reasons, are World War Z and I Am Legend. Though those last two gave me nightmares, and Hollow Kingdom did not. All three are excellent zombie apocalypse books, but Hollow Kingdom has enough eccentricities to make it stand out from the pack. (To begin with, it’s narrated by a crow!)
Also outside my comfort zone, because they brought up things I’d rather forget about my childhood, are Educated, a memoir, and The Book of Essie, which is fiction but felt all-too-familiar.
Tears We Cannot Stop, Eloquent Rage, and This Will Be My Undoing are all about racism in America. I’m not sure “Outside my Comfort Zone” is exactly the right term, but “made me uncomfortable” is. I read them on purpose, knowing they would. It’s hard to read about racism as a white person without being profoundly uncomfortable at what we’ve done in America. It’s some pretty abhorrent stuff. All the more reason to read it.
I read An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth as part of the Read Canadian challenge. Commander Hadfield is a Canadian and wrote the book after his stint on the International Space Station. I’m not usually interested in nonfiction about space, but I really enjoyed Hadfield’s voice.
Last on my list is an entire series, actually. I haven’t read a lot of translated books, though I’d like to read more, and I also don’t usually read murder mysteries. So a series of historical murder mysteries originally written in German? Definitely out of my comfort zone. But The Hangman’s Daughter series is one of my favorite series ever. I’ve featured it in a few Top Ten Tuesdays now, because it’s just that good.
This was actually a really hard Top Ten to write, because I don’t consider many subjects “outside of my comfort zone.”Ā I read so eclectically in general! I’m looking forward to reading what other people post today.
Goddess In The Stacks 
Great list! The Hangman’s Daughter looks interesting, I’ll have to check it out. š
Educated seems so interesting! I’ve heard quite a lot about it and it ties in well to my profession. What did you think about it? š Great list!
It was a tough read, because it reminded me of how I grew up. My family was not nearly as extreme or as abusive as hers, but had a lot of the same ideas and beliefs. So it was a hard, difficult read, but really, really good. The link in the post is to my full review of the book, if you’d like more details.
I’m so sorry it was a hard read for you! It’s hard to relate to for me, not that I had a perfect childhood or anything, but sometimes it’s good to have stories like this that share things in the open. They make people more aware of issues that we’re still struggling to deal with as a society. I’m glad you still enjoyed the book in the end though š I’ll definitely check out the full review.
You’re making me so curious about Hollow Kingdom. I hadn’t heard of that book!
My TTT.