TGIF {16}

TGIF is a weekly meme hosted by Ginger at GReads. Each week she poses a question and everyone is invited to join in and share their answers :]

This week's question: Love Stories: What are some of your favorite fictional love stories?



So let's just get this out of the way: I'm not really sure how many of these are "love stories". I'm definitely not an expert when it comes to romance as it's not usually my genre of choice, but I enjoy a good lovey-dovey story every now and then. Yeah, I have a gooey heart under this tough exterior...okay, we all know there's no tough exterior here, just a weird combination of a love of mushy stuff and gritty dystopian & post-apocalyptic :P
Without further rambling, my list!

Amy & Roger's Epic Detour by Morgan Matson
We can all agree that road trips are awesome, right? And on the off chance that we can't, you should read this. The romance here is one seriously awesome slow build. Slow builds are great, but the thing even more awesome than a slow build also happens to be found here: a super adorable romance. Sexy is awesome and all, but I really love adorable romances that just make my heart swell and force silly girlish giggles to burble up in me.

Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
Predictable? Yeah, but that's because it's just that awesome. Now, I can see why some people think St. Claire is a jerk and he's not my favorite YA boy of all time, BUT he's not what makes this romance for me. The thing that made me fall in love with Anna was how different the story was. It was so much more realistic than anything else I've come across. I love a good mushy gushy happily-ever-beginning-middle-and-after as much as the next person, but a little reality check can be refreshing every now and then too :]

Paranormalcy (series) by Kiersten White
I absolutely ADORE Lend and Evie's relationship! It's so cute and innocent and sweet despite all the utter craziness that exists in their lives. On top of that, they actually act like normal teenagers! They hang out together, but they also still have that nervous/embarrassed vibe when it comes to relationship stuff. They actually have a relationship that we can watch grow from a tiny little seed and I love that.

The Forest of Hands and Teeth (series) by Carrie Ryan
You probably think it's nearly impossibly for a story about zombies to also be a fantastic love story, but you are so, sadly mistaken. Ryan creates a devastatingly bleak world and then plops a romance down in the middle of it (more than once) and coaxes it to life. The result is beautiful. And heartbreaking, but fantastic all the same. If you think you hate zombie or that they don't mix at all with romance, give these books a try. I have a feeling you'll be pleasantly surprised.