Most Disappointing and Worst Books of 2018 | Michelle's Lists

Hello everyone,
This list is long overdue, but I just couldn't find the time to sit down and put it together. I had hoped to put together and post my end of 2018 lists in early January, but this month was unexpectedly a very busy month for me.

Without further ado, out of the 93 books I read in 2018, I bring you the most disappointing books I read and the one book that was the absolute worst.

First up are the books I thought I would like--love even--when I picked them up.

Now, just to preface, I hardly step out of comfort zone when it comes to reading. And I'm more than okay with that. 🤷 I know what I like, and 95% of the time I pick up books I am very sure I will enjoy.

However, this leaves me very disappointed when a book doesn't live up to my expectations. Here are the five books that disappointed me the most in 2018, ranked from least disappointing to most disappointing.

5. The Last King by Katee Robert

This was my first read by Katee Robert, but I've seen a lot of romance readers hyping her books for a long time. I was very excited to pick up The Last King because the synopsis had a lot of my buzz words: rivals-to-lovers, forbidden romance, hate-to-love, warring families, family secrets, murder plot. But, ultimately, both the hero and heroine both ended up being meh, the plot didn't grab me, and I dragged myself to finish it.

Side Note: The second book I picked up by Katee Robert ended up being one of my favorites of the year, though. Check out my 2018 favorites here.

4. On Dublin Street by Samantha Young

On Dublin Street have been on my shelf for YEARS--btw, I own a physical, e-book, and audiobook edition of this book. I bought the different editions in different years in the hopes that that will be the edition that will finally make me pick up the book. Well, I finally picked it up in 2018 (reading both the e-book or physical simultaneously with the audio) and I didn't like it. I couldn't connect with Jocelyn and I never warmed up to Braden so I didn't care about them.

And then there was the overuse of the word "panties"--it bothered me so much that that I looked it up on my Kindle and "panties" was used in the following chapters: 3, 4, 10 (3x!), 12 (twice!), 13, 14 (3x!), 15 (twice!), 16 (3x!), 18 (twice!), 23, 25 (twice!)--21 times total! And the narrator had this extra annoying way of saying it... ARGH!!! 🙉🙉🙉

3. Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren

If you asked me three years ago to list some of my favorite authors, Christina Lauren would be at the top of my list. I adored their Beautiful Bastard and Wild Seasons series and they remain two of my all-time favorite romance series. Love and Other Words was the first of their newer books that I picked up ever since they started to shift more towards "women's fiction" (rather than contemporary romance with a lot of on-page steamy sex, which the Beautiful Bastard and Wild Seasons series were). I. Didn't. Like. It.

The heroine was meh. The hero was boring and for a supposed "smart" person he was really stupid. They had zero chemistry. I couldn't care less whether they get together or not. (Read my full thoughts here.)

I initially gave it 3 stars because I did like some side stuff, but I think that's too generous. It's more of a 2-star read.

I also tried reading Christina Lauren's Josh and Hazel's Guide to Not Dating and I DNF'd it at 20%. I don't think I gel with their books now, which sucks because I L-O-V-E Beautiful Bastard and Wild Seasons series. Oh well. I'll always have those two series adore.

2. Just the Sexiest Man Alive by Julie James

This one breaks my heart to list on here because Julie James is one of my top favorite romance authors if not my #1 favorite romance author. But, I HATED Just the Sexiest Man Alive. Okay, I didn't hate it because it's impossible to completely hate a Julie James novel. But, basically, in the end I wished the heroine took the promotion and dumped the hero's self-centered, spoiled, whiny baby ass to the curb. He was the worst!

I mean I get it--this book was her debut and she was still finding her footing in the genre. But, if you're a Julie James fan I highly suggest you skip this one and go right on to her sophomore novel Practice Makes Perfect, which is the ULTIMATE enemies-to-lovers workplace romance and then all the other books she has written because they're all absolutely AMAZING. I reread Practice Makes Perfect via audiobook every year (btw, audiobook is the way to go for PMP) and it's just as brilliant as the first time I read it.

1. Wildcard by Marie Lu

I debated whether to put Just the Sexiest Man Alive or Wildcard as my most disappointing, but when all is said and done I went with Wildcard as my most disappointing book of 2018.

Warcross was one of my favorite reads of 2017 (I gave it a rare 5-star rating) and I was 100000% sure Wildcard was going to blow me away. I mean, it's Marie Lu, for goodness sakes! She wrote the epic Legend series, one of my all-time favorite YA dystopian and Warcross ended on such a high! I was so sure I was going to love Wildcard that I shelled out a shit-ton of money (and then even more money for shipping because it was coming from Canada) to buy a special subscription box filled with Warcross/Wildcard merch because I FRIGGIN' NEED MERCH FOR WHAT I WAS **SURE** WILL BE MY NEW FAVORITE SERIES!!!

Wildcard SUCKED. And I'm still angry about it and don't want to talk about it. I did write some of my thoughts on Goodreads right after I finished reading it so if you're curious it's here.

And the one absolute W-O-R-S-T book I read this year was Loving Lord Ash by Sally MacKenzie.

I picked up Loving Lord Ash on a whim. I was in the mood to listen to a historical romance while I practiced with my new watercolors and didn't feel like doing my usual lengthy review scouring to make sure I'll like it. I read it via the audiobook and after listening to the first few chapters I knew it wasn't going to be good. But, for some unknown reason, I kept listening until the very end and then afterward hated myself for putting myself through listening to the most horrible book told by a narrator I didn't like.

Annoying, spineless heroine; the "hero" was A-W-F-U-L awful; and the so-called plot was entirely unbelievable and eye-rollingly ridiculous. I rated it a one star on Goodreads because I couldn't give it any less than that there, but, really, this book gets ZERO stars from me.

Look for my next "Michelle's List" post next week where I list my most anticipated books of 2019/my 5-star predictions. 😄😄

Happy reading,
Michelle