Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish and is now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. Each week a new theme is suggested for bloggers to participate in. This week’s prompt is Books that Make Me Hungry (They could have food items on the cover, foods in the title, be about foodies or have food as a main plot point… they could be cookbooks or memoirs, etc.). But, SURPRISE, I did a bit of a twist this week.
Hello Readers! I can’t believe I’m saying this, but September has arrived. Just around the corner is the first day of fall! (At least in the northern hemisphere. 😉 ) When I started working on this week’s Top Ten Tuesday, I noticed I’d read more books that sounded like they should be about food than actual books that made me hungry, so that’s the prompt I went with. Let’s wander in!
(Link to Goodreads synopsis through book title.)
1
The Dinner List by Rebecca Serle
The Dinner List was my first book by Rebecca Serle and I loved it! But this one is more about the dinner guests than what’s on the menu.
At one point or another, we’ve all been asked to name five people, living or dead, with whom we’d like to have dinner. Why do we choose the people we do? And what if that dinner was to actually happen? These are the questions Rebecca Serle contends within her utterly captivating novel, The Dinner List, a story imbued with the same delightful magical realism as One Day, and the life-changing romance of Me Before You.
2
Feast Days by Ian MacKenzie
While Feast Days sounds like it might be about a lengthy holiday gathering centered around a smorgasbord of delicious food, it’s not. And while I didn’t love this book, it made an impression on me.
Feast Days is a sharply observed story of expatriate life, as well as a meditation on the hidden costs of modern living and how easily our belief systems can collapse around us
3
The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom
Unpopular opinion, but I didn’t love The Kitchen House, either. In my review on Goodreads, I stated that I probably wouldn’t remember much about it, and that’s true. I don’t. I do remember it’s not about food.
When a white servant girl violates the order of plantation society, she unleashes a tragedy that exposes the worst and best in the people she has come to call her family.
4
Eight Hundred Grapes by Laura Dave
I DID enjoy Eight Hundred Grapes, but it’s not really about the grapes. 😉
Growing up on her family’s Sonoma vineyard, Georgia Ford learned some important secrets. The secret number of grapes it takes to make a bottle of wine: eight hundred. The secret ingredient in her mother’s lasagna: chocolate. The secret behind ending a fight: hold hands. But just a week before her wedding, thirty-year-old Georgia discovers her beloved fiancé has been keeping a secret so explosive, it will change their lives forever.
5
Night of Cake & Puppets by Laini Taylor
This novella focuses on a couple of side characters from the Daughter of Smoke & Bone series. It’s been years since I’ve read it, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t mostly about desserts.
New York Times bestselling author Laini Taylor brings to life a night only hinted at in the Daughter of Smoke & Bone trilogy—the magical first date of fan-favorites Zuzana and Mik.
6
The New Hunger by Isaac Marion
The New Hunger is a novella from the Warm Bodies series. And it most definitely is NOT about food. At least not human food.
The end of the world didn’t happen overnight. After years of societal breakdowns, wars and quakes and rising tides, humanity was already near the edge. Then came a final blow no one could have expected: all the world’s corpses rising up to make more…
7
The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray
It’s been years since I read the Gemma Doyle series, but I remember it was more magical than culinary.
The gripping conclusion to the critically acclaimed New York Times, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly bestselling Gemma Doyle trilogy, an exhilarating and haunting saga from the author of The Diviners series and Going Bovine.
8
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
Yeah, not so much about the grapes.
Steinbeck’s Pulitzer Prize-winning epic of the Great Depression chronicles the Dust Bowl migration of the 1930s and tells the story of one Oklahoma farm family, the Joads—driven from their homestead and forced to travel west to the promised land of California.
9
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
Loved, loved, loved this book (and film), and while there is food involved, it’s not about the food.
Written with warmth and humor as a series of letters, this novel is a celebration of the written word in all its guises and of finding connection in the most surprising ways.
10
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
And finally, if you knew nothing about The Hunger Games, you might think it involved epic food fights. But these games are not fun ones.
WINNING MEANS FAME AND FORTUNE.
LOSING MEANS CERTAIN DEATH.
THE HUNGER GAMES HAVE BEGUN. . . .
Can you think of other book titles that sound like they should be about food? Let me know in the comments!
Happy Wandering!
I like your twist on this weeks TTT. I didn’t participate in TTT this week.
Thanks! Hopefully you can join back in next week. <3
I remember seeing “The Dinner List” around when it was new, but I’ve since forgotten about it. “Guernsey” is fabulous. Fun way to spin the topic. 🙂
I really enjoyed The Dinner List, but I know not everyone loved it. 🙂
Loved your clever, unusual take on the topic. I have 800 grapes on my bookshelf and keep meaning to read it but haven’t yet – it made my list too.
my list: https://www.bookshelfjourneys.com/post/top-10-tuesday-hungry-books
Thank you! I really enjoyed Eight Hundred Grapes! I hope you get to it soon. 🙂
Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is one of my all time favorite books! What did you think of the Netflix movie? Great list!
Here’s my Top Ten Tuesday List!
Yes! I loved the film, as well. I thought it was such a great adaptation. <3
I love this spin on the topic so much.
Thank you! <3
Guernsey makes you hungry if only because you know the characters were during the war.
Yes, it’s definitely more of a sad food association.
Haha I love your spin on this week’s topic! I almost included The Hunger Games this week too, for different reasons (Katniss hunts, they’re starving).
Thanks! Yes, so many layers to The Hunger Games. 🙂
Hi Dedra! I love what you did here! At least the potato peel pie were really present in The Guernsey Literacy and Potato Peel Pie society. I love that book!
Excellent post! Here’s my 10 Books that make me hungry
Thanks! Yes, it’s such a great book. I thought it was perfect. <3
Once again I’m skipping TTT this week, but I love your take on this week’s subject! 😀 It made me wonder how many books are there with the world “hunger” in the title… Hmm…
Oooh, there’s an idea for another TTT! 😉 One of these days I’ll have to skip. Each week I’m later and later to having it ready. Ha!
The Sweet Far Thing does sound like it should be about a bakery haha.
Right?? Ha!
Great twist on this week’s topic! I remember loving the way Katniss described the food in the Capitol, despite the series not really being about food. I still need to read the Gemma Doyle series!
Thank you! Yes, the Capitol food was such a great dichotomy of how the rest of the districts were lacking. I didn’t love love the Gemma Doyle series, but I enjoyed it enough to finish. 🙂
Love your twist on this week’s topic!
Thank you!
Love your take on this week’s topic! ? I’m surprised that some of these aren’t more about food! Haha I just got Eight Hundred Grapes the other day and I’m looking forward to giving it a try 🙂 Great list!
Oooh, I hope you enjoy Eight Hundred Grapes! I thought it was a really sweet story. Plus, it made me want to buy a vinyard! Ha!
Love your spin on this week’s topic! I actually included The Hunger Games in my list as well, but not for the same reason.
My TTT: https://jjbookblog.wordpress.com/2020/09/01/top-ten-tuesday-279/
Thanks! Heading over to check out your list now. 🙂
I adore grapes, especially of the concord/slip skin variety. I’ve never eaten eight hundred of them at a time, but now I’m tempted. Haha.
My post .
Haha! I adore vineyards, and that book made want to go live on one, pronto! 😉
I love your take on this week’s prompt. I skipped it because I just drew a blank. Though why I didn’t think about The Hunger Games I do not know. *sigh*
Yeah, books don’t often make me hungry when I’m reading them so I had to come up with something else. 😉
Love your twist on the topic this week! These books definitely foster some wrong expectations haha 🙂
Ha! Thank you. <3
Someone listed a recipe book inspired by Hunger Games. I don’t even recall any food from the book except maybe the stuff they had on the train. My TTT list of books that make me hungry
Oh really? Yeah, I do remember the food at the Capitol, but reading it never made me hungry because I knew the dichotomy of the hunger in the rest of the districts. But it has been a long time since I’ve read them. 😉
Fun twist! An you’re right, there are a lot of books whose titles seem like they should be about food, yet they aren’t. Many paranormal romance books would fit here, since there’s a lot of vampire & werewolf books with “hunger” in the title.
Ha! You’re so right. I didn’t even think of those. 😉
This is my favorite post so far today. It’s so clever!!!
Awww! Thank you! <3
Wow, this is brilliant!!! Could you imagine the Hunger Games about food?! haha. I love this post!! Great job. <3
Ha ha! Thank you! <3
LOL! I love this idea! I can’t believe the Hunger Games is not about food! Awesome list!
Ha! Well, in a way it’s about the lack of food, but so many other things, as well. 😉
What a fun take on this week’s topic! Here is our Top Ten Tuesday.
Thanks! <3