Last week, I posted about all the 49 books I read and how my reading year went. Although I kept out my rating for all those books to now do a little world cup/tournament bracket/let’s find my favourite book of 2022 by comparing them against each other. This “game” has been going around the online book communities and looks fun. Also, I’m curious to see how the results compare to the rating I gave to each book.

So, I went to my reading spreadsheet and grabbed the title of my top 16 books. All of them are 4 stars or above. I needed a multiplier of 2 for the brackets to work perfectly, and I’m not doing 32 books (mostly because there is no point in going so far back). The order of the books is completely random and doesn’t reflect the rating I gave. Without further ado, let the battle begin!

Round of 8

The 16 books in competitions are divided into 4 groups to make it easier to write this post:

Group 1

1. Chrysalis by Brendan Reichs
2. The Girl in the Ice by Robert Bryndza
3. Deception by Teri Terry
4. Saga Volume 1 & 2 by Brian K Vaughan, Fiona Staples

Group 2

5. Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve
6. The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan
7. A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson
8. Sinful by Katherine Hawthorne

Group 3

9. The Chalk Man by CJ Tudor
10. In a Dark, Dark Wood by Ruth Ware
11. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
12. The Book of You by Claire Kendal

Group 4

13. Evolution by Teri Terry
14. Turning by Joy L Smith
15. Into the Darkest Corner by Elizabeth Haynes
16. Rainbirds by Clarissa Goenawan

In group 1, the first battle is between Chrysalis and The Girl in the Ice. A sci-fi and a murder mystery. Both are part of a series. One is the last and the other the first, respectively. And both series have won a place in my heart. Although The Girl in the Ice let me down a bit with the ending while Chrysalis was heartwarming. Chrysalis will move forward!

Between Deception and Saga, I’m not going to beat around the bush, Deception wins. It has a crazy plot twist that left me on my knees. And even though Saga has a great cast of characters, the story develops differently, and it isn’t as gripping as Deception ends up being.

In group 2, we have Mortal Engines and The Bookshop on the Corner. The first one, I listened to the audiobook, and I know that if I had read it, either as an ebook or physical copy, I would love it even more. Meanwhile, The Bookshop on the Corner, gave me a tremendous need to open my own bookshop van. It’s a sweet and delicious crafted book for readers, but my heart tells me Mortal Engines is my new favourite series.

Oh no! A battle I didn’t want to do. A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder or Sinful. Both are very different books. A Good Girl’s Guide is an Agatha Christie-esq murder mystery, while Sinful is a crime mystery erotic romance. One is a fun and highly entertaining read, and the other is a guilty pleasure and my favourite within the genre. I have to go with A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder.

In group 3, The Chalk Man and In a Dark Dark Wood. Both mystery thrillers, both were addictive. The Chalk Man has the most satisfying ending I’ve ever read. But overall, I was more invested in Dark Wood from the first page to the last. Ruth Ware takes the win.

A Little Life and The Book of You. Both deal with traumas and violent stuff. The Book of You is focused on harassment, sexual assault, stalking and what it does to a victim. And A Little Life probably has every content warning that exists. It’s an extremely heavy story, but a great psychological study. Looking at both, A Little Life explores the psychological impact on the victim much better.

The final group 4, between the end of the Dark Matter series, Evolution, or Turning, a YA novel about dealing with a life-changing accident. Of all the 3 books that make the Dark Matter series, Evolution is my least favourite one. And since I loved everything about Turning, it takes the win.

The last elimination is between Into the Darkest Corner and Rainbirds. This is going to be very hard. Into the Darkest Corner has similar topics to The Book of You, but the execution was better. Although Rainbirds, it’s hard to classify or compare to anything. I was hypnotised by the story from the first page, but there isn’t anything special about it. To help me decide, I’ll go with how I felt while reading, and Rainbirds was a book I was more eager to pick back up again than Into the Darkest Corner.

Quarter-final

Group 1

1. Chrysalis by Brendan Reichs
2. Deception by Teri Terry

Group 2

3. Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve
4. A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson

Group 3

5. In a Dark, Dark Wood by Ruth Ware
6. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Group 4

7. Turning by Joy L Smith
8. Rainbirds by Clarissa Goenawan

Now things are getting tricky. From group 1, there’s Chrysalis and Deception. My two favourite series I finished last year. While Chrysalis is why Project Nemesis was so good, Deception was mind-blowing. I forgot the last time a book made my jaw drop. But thinking about the book overall, from start to finish… Deception was more unpredictable. That’s decided!

For group 2, between Mortal Engines and A Good Girl’s Guide, it’s an easy decision. As much as I enjoyed Mortal Engines, I couldn’t fully experience it, unlike A Good Girl. For that reason, I need to choose the latter to move forward.

Another easy choice. In group 3, In a Dark Dark Wood or A Little Life. A Little Life was superior in every way. I loved In a Dark Wood, but A Little Life gave me much to think about and reflect on, while In a Dark Wood is a treat. It’s a novel for entertainment more than anything.

And finally, in group 4, between Turning and Rainbirds. The latter is slowly becoming my nemesis. How can I make this decision when I can’t make any argument in favour or against Rainbirds? There’s one very distinct difference between the two. One is more cheerful, and the other more mellow. They have very different tones. Although which one do I prefer? There’s a voice inside me saying I can’t choose Turning over Rainbirds. So it moves forward in the competition.

Semi-final

1. Deception by Teri Terry
2. A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson
3. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
4. Rainbirds by Clarissa Goenawan

My very own top 4 of the year! Now is the time to find the finalists. Between Deception and A Good Girl’s Guide, the second one wins. There is no point in dragging anymore. I love both so much, but A Little Girl gave me a reading experience like no other. One that I was yearning for. I also can’t wait to read the rest of the series.

And the other finalist, between A Little Life and Rainbirds… Could it be A Little Life won’t go any further than this? It has a story far greater than Rainbirds. It also has more than double the number of pages. Although, there is one detail here and there that I wish was done differently in A Little Life. And I can’t think of anything negative about Rainbirds (nothing positive either). I’m doing something crazy! Rainbirds wins over A Little Life!

Final

The final is upon us. The battle I’ve been waiting for. The whole reason why I decided to write this post – and also because it looks fun. My best book of 2022. A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson, the first in the trilogy. Or Rainbirds by Clarissa Goenawan, one very addictive book. A Good Girl was a great experience. It’s a book to take my time reading while going back and forward to try and solve the mystery alongside the main character. Meanwhile, Rainbirds is the opposite. It’s a book to spectate. To sit back and watch the story unravel. Even though there’s a mystery, there’s never an urge to solve it. It works more as a motive to move the characters than to incite the reader. But who am I kidding? A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder was by far the best book I discovered this year, and it should take the crown!

How do these results compare with my rating?

Starting with the winner, I always thought of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder to be my favourite book of the year, and I was curious to see if this was going to prove me wrong. It didn’t. But that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t be surprised. I’ve 3 more books with 5 out of 5 stars I couldn’t figure out an appropriate order for them. This means that those are my top 4 in rating, and they are: Into the Darkest Corner, In a Dark, Dark Wood, Chrysalis, and of course, A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder. As you can see, it’s already very different. Except for the winner, none of them made it that far!

My top 8 in rating, there are also two astray, The Book of You and The Girl in the Ice. And the other two places left belong to a match for a semi-final spot: Turning and Rainbirds. Fun fact: I gave Turning 0.05 stars – yes, I’m THAT specific – over Rainbirds! So in my rating, the duel would go very differently.

The remaining books kept their ratings accurate compared to the ones they were facing against. I’ll probably use this fun game to give a proper rating to those 5 stars. And, who knows? Maybe even start using this model as a mini-game every time I get stuck on a rating. It could be a helpful tool to decide.