Nov 1, 2025
JOMP day 30
Read in October
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JOMP day 30
Read in October
Read in October 2025
I had a pretty good month. my reading felt kind of broken up because I had a lot of busy days where I couldn't get much read but I still managed all this so I guess it wasn't too bad 😂
my favourites of the month were Cinder House by Freya Marske and The Haar by David Sodergren which are both just perfect for joining in with Novella November btw 👀
Nonfiction:
Free by Lea Ypi - 4/5
Familiar authors:
One Of Us Knows by Alyssa Cole - 4/5
Spread Me by Sarah Gailey - 3/5
The Stand by Stephen King - 4/5
The Dead Zone by Stephen King - 3/5
What Stalks the Deep by T Kingfisher - 3/5
Hemlock and Silver by T Kingfisher - 4/5
A Treachery of Swans by AB Poranek - 4/5
The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett - 4/5
Model Home by Rivers Solomon - 4/5
Mothered by Zoje Stage - 3/5
Other reads:
Dead Silence by SA Barnes - 2/5
My Dearest Darkest by Kayla Cottingham - 2/5
This Delicious Death by Kayla Cottingham - 4/5
Cinder House by Freya Marske - 5/5
The Book of Cold Cases by Simone St James - 3/5
The Haar by David Sodergren - 5/5
A Sweet Sting of Salt by Rose Sutherland - 4/5
We Came to Welcome You by Vincent Tirado - 4/5
Butcher & Blackbird by Brynne Weaver - 4/5
October 2025 reads
[loved liked ok nope dnf bookclub*]
The Gate of the Feral Gods • The Hounding • Kill The Beast • The Graceview Patient • Natural Palettes: Inspiration From Plant-Based Color • Riders of the Purple Sage* • A Room With a View • The League of Lady Poisoners • Where There's Room For Us
Soooooo funny story, halfway through October I learned I was moving! I've also been extremely busy with podcast editing, traveling to Minnesota for a friend's wedding, and the local fiber arts clubs I'm involved in... with the result that I only managed to read 7 books this month (well, kind of 9, but two were rereads.) I did manage to squeeze in 2.5 ARCs and some nonfiction, so at least that feels like an accomplishment. Also, the new place has an office with huge built-in shelving that is destined to become a library, so at last I'll be able to arrange my books nicely instead of cramming them 2+ deep on a single ugly shelf! Can't wait to do some bookshelf styling.
Longer (GR) reviews linked where I felt like including them!
Gate of the Feral Gods ★★★★★ - This series continues to slay. The Chris drama?? More assassinations? The thing with the dog!? (All my homies hate Quan Ch, I hope someone rips his other arm off.) Every moment I'm not reading the next book feels like a devastating blow tbh
The Hounding [GR review] ★★★1/2☆ - Solid little book. I enjoyed the writing and vibes (it wants to be an A24 film soooooo bad) but found the messaging a smidge too on the nose for my taste.
Kill the Beast [GR review] ★★★☆☆ - An iiinteresting ARC (that has since come out!) I liked the characters and how much they smacked of gender. But without spoiling too much, I now have two nickels in a deeply "weird that it happened twice in two different books in the span of two months" way re: this book and one I read in September. The highly specific trope in question felt a little more justified here (despite or perhaps because of being the world's most guessable twist), but unfortunately the third act was bogged down by too many characters infodumping their backstories. Still kinda fun? I'm not mad I read it.
The Graceview Patient [GR review] ★★★☆☆ - Could not tell you a single thing about this ARC (also now out) because my experience of reading it was that I was fighting not to pass out the whole time. Was it good? Bad? I have no idea. I deserve a medal for making it to the end even though I couldn't feel my legs. At one point I started giggling hysterically because I was reminded of the Children's Hospital tumblr post. Asking me to review this book would be like asking Indiana Jones to review a snake. Asking Superman to weigh in on the quality of a given piece of Kryptonite. The answer is "I don't fucking know, get me out of here"
Natural Palettes: Inspiration from Plant-Based Color ★★★★1/2 - I get to attend one of this author's workshops later this month, which is a total coincidence because last month this book was being passed around at my Natural Dye Club. Really liked the simple and aesthetically pleasing layout!
Riders of the Purple Sage ★★★1/2☆ - I didn't make my book club read this book because I like it or think it's good (I don't) but because the discussion was every bit as interesting as I knew it would be. I loved hearing everyone's takes and I especially enjoyed the readalong in which we all had to repeatedly read names like "Bern" and "Jerd" and say the word "sage" 5,029,331 times
A Room With a View ★★★★1/2 - You can tell I'm having a stressful month when I reach for this comfort reread. Something about this calm writing style really does the trick. Anyway I'm campaigning to start calling the new place Windy Corner (*it's not on a corner)
The League of Lady Poisoners [GR review] ★★★1/2☆ - Theee prettiest book, holy wow. Struck kind of a weird "poisoning is feminist praxis" tone after promising not to do exactly that, but tbh I was too distracted looking at all the illustrations to notice it too much. Poisons are a special interest of mine, so it was nice to learn some related history!
Where There's Room For Us N/A - Yeah this ARC is just here so I could have an even 8 books pictured, I've pretty much DNFed it. Suffice to say I've read many ARCs this year and none of them were this level of rough on a sentence level. Good thing Hayley Kiyoko doesn't have a day job to not quit sorry, that was mean It's okay, Hayley, we can't all be talented at everything and your music is already giving the gays everything they want! Even though this particular book is, uhhhhh, not the best, I'm glad the fluffy lesbian historical romance genre is gathering steam.
DNFs: See above (as a name nerd I also could not stand the historically inaccurate and totally non-cohesive 1879 British aristocrat sibling set of "Marigold, Angelica, Freya, and Dani." Really???) I've also stalled out a bit on reading Mad Sisters of Esi. It's not bad by any means (and is not, as I initially feared, "Piranesi But With Whale"), it just has weird disjointed pacing and isn't trying to be a gripping page-turner. I'm like, 60% sure I'll finish it this week if I get any actual free time
October superlatives: here
Next up:
I have no idea how much time I'll have to read this month (it's T-minus 4 days before the big move and the house is nowhere near packed), but I'd love to participate in @thereadingchallengechallenge 's Novella November and cross some short books off my TBR. I also just got word that Queen Demon is ready at the library!
previous months:
2024: july august september october november december
2025: january february-june july august september
Day 30: JOMPBPC: Read In October
My reading wrap-up for October, 2024! 🩷
My 2023 reading wrap up through October!
My no-five-star streak is over! I got three 5 stars this month and 2 more were 4.5 stars and I loved this month's reading. It was supposed to be a thriller month but I ended up reading a lot more romances than I thought. More than half of the books I read this month were part of series so I've now caught up on a bunch of series! Here's the wrap up:
The Neighbor Favor ⭐⭐⭐⭐
The Mill House Murders ⭐⭐
Midnight is the Darkest Hour ⭐⭐
Swimming in the Dark ⭐⭐
The Coworker ⭐⭐⭐
Murder in the Family ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Desire or Defense ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Dark Corners ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Once Upon a Broken Heart ⭐⭐⭐
The Good Lie ⭐⭐⭐⭐
King of Greed ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Glimmers of You ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Nine Liars ⭐⭐
Shadows of You ⭐⭐⭐⭐
The Woman in Me ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Read in October 🎃 👻
La Belle Sauvage
Tales of the Peculiar
The Turn of the Screw
The Talisman
Some things are too terrible to grasp at once. Other things - naked, sputtering, indelible in their horror - are too terrible to really grasp ever at all. It is only later, in solitude, in memory that the realization dawns: when the ashes are cold; when the mourners have departed; when one looks around and finds oneself - quite to one's surprise - in an entirely different world.
Donna Tartt, The Secret History