Password-protected posts contain heavy spoilers and are there to prevent accidental spoiling. They can each individually be accessed with the password "SPOILME(#of the post)". That means if the post is numbered #0000, the password is SPOILME0000 - SPOILME all in caps, no space in between.
Enter at your own risk. And have fun!
Jack Torrance’s new job at the Overlook Hotel is the perfect chance for a fresh start. As the off-season caretaker at the atmospheric old hotel, he’ll have plenty of time to spend reconnecting with his family and working on his writing. But as the harsh winter weather sets in, the idyllic location feels ever more remote…and more sinister. And the only one to notice the strange and terrible forces gathering around the Overlook is Danny Torrance, a uniquely gifted five-year-old.
The last time I read this was more than a decade ago and it’s the BOTM for my online bookclub.
The Quotes
“Monsters are real. Ghosts are too. They live inside of us, and sometimes, they win.”
“Small children are great accepters. They don’t understand shame, or the need to hide things.”
“He would write it for the reason he felt that all great literature, fiction and nonfiction, was written: truth comes out, in the end it always comes out. He would write it because he felt he had to.”
“That’s your job in this hard world, to keep your love alive and see that you get on, no matter what. Pull your act together and just go on.”
The Narrator(s)
Campbell Scott. Great narration, I was immersed.
My Thoughts
I think the last time I read this book was so long ago, my memories of it was interwoven with the movie because of how prominent the movie is. This time, my memories of both the book and movie have faded quite a bit so I was surprised by a great many things I had long forgotten.
What I loved most about reading it this time is seeing more of Wendy’s and Danny’s POVs. I think Jack stood out too much in the movie, which isn’t surprising, but the book gave a lot more depth to Wendy’s and Danny’s characters. I also loved Hallorann; he might be one of my favorite characters in the book even though we don’t see him very much. He’s the kind of character that makes an impact on you even just crossing paths with him randomly.
I also feel like I got a lot more out of the book this time around; maybe because I’m rereading it, maybe because I’m older now and seeing it with a new perspective, maybe because it’s a BOTM and I’m reading it with other people and seeing their perspectives.
My Rating
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐/5 stars.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
In 1910, eleven year old Iris Villarca lives with her father at Rawblood, a lonely house on Dartmoor. Iris and her father are the last of their name. The Villarcas always die young, bloodily. Iris knows it’s because of a congenital disease which means she must be strictly isolated. Papa told her so. Forbidden to speak to other children or the servants, denied her one friend, Iris grows up in solitude. But she reads books. And one sunlit autumn day, beside her mother’s grave, she forces the truth from her father. The disease is biologically impossible. A lie, to cover a darker secret.
The Villarcas are haunted, through the generations, by her. She is white, skeletal, covered with scars. Her origins are a mystery but her purpose is clear. When a Villarca marries, when they love, when they have a child – she comes and death follows.
Iris makes her father a promise: to remain alone all her life. But when she’s fifteen, she breaks it. The consequences of her choice are immediate and horrific.
Iris’s story is interwoven with the past, the voices of the dead – Villarcas, taken by her. Iris’s grandmother sets sail from Dover to Italy with a hired companion, to spend her final years in the sun before consumption takes her. Instead she meets betrayal, and a fate worse than death. Iris’s father, his medical career in ruins, conducts unconscionable experiments, to discover how she travels in the Villarca blood. Iris’s mother, pregnant, walks the halls of Rawblood whispering to her, coaxing her to come. As the narratives converge, Iris seeks her out in a confrontation which shatters her past and her reality, revealing the chasm in Iris’s own, fractured identity. Who is she? What does she desire? The answer is more terrible and stranger than Iris could have imagined.
I’ve heard good things about Catriona Ward but have never read her books. This was a buddy read so I thought it might be a good opportunity to try one.
The Narrator(s)
Liz Pearce, Steven Crossley, John Keating, Elizabeth Sastre, Jenny Sterlin. This was painful to listen to on audio. The narrators were fine, but the sound engineering was so bad and it really detracted from my listening experience. The volumes between chapters were inconsistent, and there was one chapter where the volume varied so much I had to keep turning it higher and lower as I was listening to it! The soft parts were so difficult to hear and the loud parts were sudden and hurt my ears. I didn’t enjoy listening to this on audiobook at all!
My Thoughts
I feel like I missed a lot of details and the nuances of the story because of the audiobook production, and it made me doubt my listening comprehension of the book. This book is told in multiple POVs, across multiple timelines, and it jumps about a bit. There were many times when the story jumps to something that wasn’t mentioned in previous chapters and I had to wonder if I missed something or if it was a stylistic choice. I enjoy time jumps and missing pieces of the puzzle as stylistic choices, but I couldn’t be sure that was what was happening here while listening to it. I had to repeat entire chapters of the book because I was so confused.
Having said that, I love the vibes of the book and the writing style. It feels very gothic and is reminiscent of Frankenstein, which is one of my favorite books. The vibes and writing style is enough to make me want more, but I think next time I’ll try a print version of Catriona Ward’s books.
My Rating
⭐⭐⭐/5 stars.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
Welcome to the Sunday Post, a weekly meme hosted by Kimberly @ Caffeinated Reviewer to share weekly news and updates on what we’ve been up to on our blog, with our books, and book-related happenings.
One Book Finished, Five New Books Added to the TBR
The Neverending TBR, amirite? Now it’s worse because last week I finished 3 buddy reads, and signed up for… I lost count, but it’s a lot more buddy reads. A lot. I’m told that it’s normal to get addicted because I’m new to the group and there are so many attractive buddy reads happening, but once I get my sea legs, I’ll probably slow down. 🤞
On the plus side, I’ve managed to finally finish a couple of books that have been on my TBR for ages because of the buddy reads! I also managed to work on a crochet WIP that had been untouched for weeks but finally finished since I’ve been spending more time listening to audiobooks.
All the happy things:
I finally went and ordered my new glasses. I had been putting it off since April. They should be here in about two weeks.
I also put in my Hobonichi order for next year. This was my first year using it and I love it so I’m sticking to it for next year too!
We had KFC last week! We only get it once a month for health reasons, but it’s a treat every time!
Still making those blueberry milkshakes and absolutely loving them!
Husband and I are rewatching Chuck and really enjoying it!
The Books
Books I read last week:
After I Do by Taylor Jenkins Reid – I love TJR and I think she’s a master at writing about relationships. This one is about marriage, and it’s narrated by Julia Whelan, so of course, I got on it!
Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield – I had heard so much about this and had been wanting to read it for a while. It became a buddy read, so I suddenly had the motivation to finally read it.
Dark Places by Gillian Flynn – I read this before and forgot. It became a buddy read and I got excited about it, so I signed up and really enjoyed it because I forgot how it ended too.
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky – It’s been on my TBR for ages but I’ve always felt daunted by it. I finally read it, because it was a buddy read and because there’s a Will Poulter narration for the free audiobook on Audible. It wasn’t as daunting as I expected, but I did get easily confused with the names, especially since I was on audio.
Book(s) I’m reading:
The Girl from Rawblood by Catriona Ward – I’ve heard a lot about Catriona Ward and got curious. This happened to also be buddy read so I thought why not try, but the reviews are quite polarizing so I’m not sure if I’ll end up finishing. I’m only about 15% in.
Miri thinks she has got her wife back, when Leah finally returns after a deep-sea mission that ended in catastrophe. It soon becomes clear, though, that Leah is not the same. Whatever happened in that vessel, whatever it was they were supposed to be studying before they were stranded on the ocean floor, Leah has brought part of it back with her, onto dry land and into their home.
Moving through something that only resembles normal life, Miri comes to realize that the life that they had before might be gone. Though Leah is still there, Miri can feel the woman she loves slipping from her grasp.
Our Wives Under The Sea is the debut novel from Julia Armfield, the critically acclaimed author of Salt Slow. It’s a story of falling in love, loss, grief, and what life there is in the deep deep sea.
The Reason
This has been on my TBR forever! I’ve heard so much about it and it intrigued me because the plot sounds a little like an old favorite book of mine, The Season of Passage by Christopher Pike. I finally read it because it was a buddy read and that gives me motivation!
The Quotes
“I used to think there was such a thing as emptiness, that there were places in the world one could go and be alone. This, I think, is still true, but the error in my reasoning was to assume that alone was somewhere you could go, rather than somewhere you had to be left.”
“I want to explain her in a way that would make you love her, but the problem with this is that loving is something we all do alone and through different sets of eyes.”
“To know the ocean, I have always felt, is to recognize the teeth it keeps half hidden.”
“When something bad is actually happening, it’s easy to underreact, because a part of you is wired to assume it isn’t real. When you stop underreacting, the horror is unique because it is, unfortunately, endless.”
My Thoughts
This is a gorgeous book with so many quotable quotes. It’s beautifully written, so lyrical and emotional. It’s not what I initially expected, but I did end up loving it, especially since it was a buddy read and reading everyone else’s thoughts added a lot to my own reading experience.
It’s listed as horror and I expected some tangible sea monster kind of story, but some of the other readers mentioned the horror of losing a loved one, or watching as bad things happen and there’s nothing you can do about it. I loved that take on it. I also love that the book was divided into sections corresponding to the zones of the ocean, and the deeper you go into the zones, the deeper you go into uncharted territory of the mind as well.
It’s so haunting and beautiful, and I’m glad I finally read it.
My Rating
⭐⭐⭐⭐/5 stars.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
In April of 1846, twenty-one-year-old Sarah Graves, intent on a better future, set out west from Illinois with her new husband, her parents, and eight siblings. Seven months later, after joining a party of emigrants led by George Donner, they reached the Sierra Nevada Mountains as the first heavy snows of the season closed the pass ahead of them. In early December, starving and desperate, Sarah and fourteen others set out for California on snowshoes and, over the next thirty-two days, endured almost unfathomable hardships and horrors.
In this gripping narrative, Daniel James Brown sheds new light on one of the most infamous events in American history. Following every painful footstep of Sarah’s journey with the Donner Party, Brown produces a tale both spellbinding and richly informative.
I’ve been curious about the Donner Party for a while, but I recently listened to The Last Podcast on the Left’s episodes on the Donner Party and that made me even more interested in reading more.
The Quotes
“Science is not the truth. Science is finding the truth. When science changes its opinion, it didn’t lie to you. It learned more.”
“Choosing to be curious is choosing to be vulnerable because it requires us to surender to uncertainty. We have to ask questions, admit to not knowing, risk being told that we shouldn’t be asking, and, sometimes, make discoveries that lead to discomfort.”
“In fact, research shows that the process of labeling emotional experience is related to greater emotion regulation and psychosocial well-being.”
The Narrator(s)
Michael Prichard. His narration was clear and easy to listen to, it was good.
My Thoughts
I never knew their ordeal lasted so long! Things just kept getting worse and worse and they never got a reprieve. A lot of it happened because of bad decisions made by stubborn and egotistical men, but there was also so much bad luck involved that made bad situations worse. I’m also aware of the Andes plane crash incident and the cannibalism that happened due to desperation, but it felt so much worse here with the Donner Party, probably because their ordeal lasted a lot longer, but some of it was just cruelty and depravity. It is absolutely horrifying to read about.
My Rating
⭐⭐⭐⭐/5 stars.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
A woman is determined to stay in her dream home even after it becomes a haunted nightmare in this compulsively readable, twisty, and layered debut novel.
When Margaret and her husband Hal bought the large Victorian house on Hawthorn Street—for sale at a surprisingly reasonable price—they couldn’t believe they finally had a home of their own. Then they discovered the hauntings. Every September, the walls drip blood. The ghosts of former inhabitants appear, and all of them are terrified of something that lurks in the basement. Most people would flee.
Margaret is not most people.
Margaret is staying. It’s her house. But after four years Hal can’t take it anymore, and he leaves abruptly. Now, he’s not returning calls, and their daughter Katherine—who knows nothing about the hauntings—arrives, intent on looking for her missing father. To make things worse, September has just begun, and with every attempt Margaret and Katherine make at finding Hal, the hauntings grow more harrowing, because there are some secrets the house needs to keep.
It was one of the nominees for the Goodreads Choice awards and I saw it on another blogger’s post. It caught my attention because I love a good haunted house story, and this one had a protagonist that was determined to stay. I was hooked immediately!
The Quotes
“I had grown accustomed to solo trips through hell over the years. It seemed counterintuitive to invite company.”
“Didn’t you just tell me that people can change? You can change.” I hadn’t the first clue what she was talking about. I changed all the time. I was flexible. I bent. I had changed little by little, steadily over the years, until by all accounts I was a person who should have been unrecognizable but to me was just who I was. I ought to have been a stranger to myself, but it didn’t bother me at all.”
“Everything is survivable.”
The Characters
Margaret, I’m not sure what to say about her. She’s one of the most interesting characters I’ve ever known. She’s relatable, she’s got a sense of humor about dark things, she’s loyal to a fault (literally), and she’s strong in her own way. In her own words, her best asset was her ability to bend, be flexible.
And a whole bunch of ghosts, who I will not introduce because it’s so much more fun for the reader to meet them in the book.
My Thoughts
This book was incredible! There were so many surprises, both good and bad, and I couldn’t help but get sucked in. I love Margaret as a character. She had a dark sense of humor, and so much stoicism for enduring the circumstances she found herself in. I love the way the story was written, the insight into Margaret’s thought processes. I don’t want to say more, for spoilers, but I did take notes on my e-reader as I was reading in real time, and I’ve posted them up for anyone who’s interested!
For my notes and reactions on the book – with SPOILERS – check out Notes & Reactions | The September House by Carissa Orlando. This post has SPOILERS and assumes you have already finished the book. It is password-protected to prevent accidental spoiling. Password is “SPOILME0002”. Proceed at your own risk.
My Feels
It’s funny because this book felt heavy and light at the same time. It was heavy stuff, but handled in a light-handed manner, and I found myself going with it. I mean, why not look on the positive sides? Why not focus on the successes? The small celebrations? Interestingly, at the end of it all, Margaret, whose greatest asset is her ability to bend, also has the strongest boundary that she won’t allow anyone to cross. She doesn’t have many rules, but she has that one, and it’s non-negotiable. I have so many feels about this whole book, in so many different ways. They’re all very confusing and I don’t think I can categorize them. It’s just, I loved it!
My Rating
5/5 stars. It’s just so good!
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
Welcome to Top Ten Tuesday, a weekly bookish meme hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl that features a different bookish topic every week.
Today’s topic is Most Anticipated Books Releasing in the First Half of 2024
There are so many that I’m so excited for!!! Almost all of these are authors I have read and loved, and I would read anything they write so that’s why I can’t wait for these. I know they are going to be good!
Top Ten Most Anticipated Books Releasing Jan-Jun 2024
Top-Bottom, Left-Right:
The Fox Wife by Yangsze Choo – releasing Feb 13. She’s a Malaysian author writing about Malaysian Chinese folklore. I’ve read The Ghost Bride and The Night Tiger, both written by her and I loved them. I’m very excited for this one.
The Bride Bet by Tessa Dare – releasing Jan 15. This is the fourth book in the Girl Meets Duke series, and I’ve read the first three, so obviously this is next on the list!
What Feasts at Night by T. Kingfisher – releasing Feb 13. I love T. Kingfisher, and I loved the first book in this series. I didn’t even know there was going to be a second book, but of course I have to read it too!
Funny Story by Emily Henry – releasing Apr 23. I’ve read several of Emily Henry’s books and always enjoy them. This one has a storyline that is just too good to pass up.
The Girl in Question by Tess Sharpe – releasing May 14. The first book I read by Tess Sharpe is the first book in this series, The Girls I’ve Been, and I was hooked. I love her strong female protagonists, and I was so excited to find out she wrote a sequel.
The Dark Fable by Katherine Harbour – releasing Jan 30. The only author on this list whom I’ve never read. I’m not sure what to expect and I hope I won’t be disappointed, but I love the premise and I love fantasy stories, so I’m excited to read this!
You Like It Darker by Stephen King – releasing Mar 21. I mean, it’s Stephen King. I haven’t read all his books but I’m sure going to try, and his new stories keep getting better so of course I’m going to read this.
The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo – releasing Apr 9. I loved many of Leigh Bardugo’s books, and I am very interested in this story too. Anticipating it very much!
The Bad Weather Friend by Dean Koontz – releasing Jan 23. I’ve only read one of Koontz books so far and I loved it, and I keep meaning to read more. I love the premise of this book, it sounds so deliciously creepy and I just can’t wait to read it.
Have you read any of these authors? What did you think of them? What are your most anticipated books this year?
When Penny Dahl calls the Finders Keepers detective agency hoping for help locating her missing daughter, Holly is reluctant to accept the case. Her partner, Pete, has Covid. Her (very complicated) mother has just died. And Holly is meant to be on leave. But something in Penny Dahl’s desperate voice makes it impossible for Holly to turn her down.
Mere blocks from where Bonnie Dahl disappeared live Professors Rodney and Emily Harris. They are the picture of bourgeois respectability: married octogenarians, devoted to each other, and semi-retired lifelong academics. But they are harboring an unholy secret in the basement of their well-kept, book-lined home, one that may be related to Bonnie’s disappearance. And it will prove nearly impossible to discover what they are up to: they are savvy, they are patient, and they are ruthless.
Holly must summon all her formidable talents to outthink and outmaneuver the shockingly twisted professors in this chilling new masterwork from Stephen King.
I’m a huge fan of Stephen King’s works. I haven’t read all his older books, but I’ll always jump on his new releases when I can. When Holly came out last year, I didn’t realize it was part of a series, nor that her story started from the Mr. Mercedes series – which I hadn’t read at the time. So I started reading the Mr. Mercedes books first, and finished them, then I checked out the Holly Gibney series, and realized I’d already read the first one, The Outsider, and loved it, although I didn’t realize at the time who Holly was. I just finished the second one listed as part of the series, If It Bleeds, so I finally got to read Holly, the series ender! (I’m hoping there will be more books, I love Holly and I want more!)
The Characters
Well, Holly, of course. I love her in this book and I love her even more because I read the Mr. Mercedes books first and saw her growth. I wrote about it in my review for If It Bleeds, that Holly can appear to be timid and vulnerable, but she is one of the most courageous characters I have ever had the privilege to get to know. She’s smart and resourceful, dedicated and loyal, organized and determined. But she’s not infallible. She is flawed and makes stupid mistakes, but she calls herself out on them.
I also really love Barbara and Jerome, siblings who are also Holly’s closest friends, and who help her with some of her investigations. We meet them in the Mr. Mercedes series, and through all these stories, their bond have only gotten stronger.
Now, the villains in this book, Professors Rodney and Emily Harris; I hate them, but they are such well-written characters. It’s fascinating to sort of see through their POV, and not be able to fathom how there can be people capable of such evil, and the cognitive dissonance they must cultivate in order to justify their actions.
The other villain in this book is even more interesting, not because she is more evil than the professors, but because her kind of evil is more common, and her victims more close to home. Holly Gibney’s mother, Charlotte Gibney. We meet her from the Mr. Mercedes series, and we see a bit more of her in If It Bleeds too. In this book, Charlotte isn’t even present except in Holly’s mind and we see the psychological and emotional toll Charlotte’s evil takes on Holly.
The Quotes
“Gifts are fragile. You must never entrust yours to people who might break it.”
“Just when you think you’ve seen the worst human beings have to offer, you find out you’re wrong.”
“Sometimes the universe throws you a rope. If it does, climb it. See what’s at the top.”
“Does anyone ever get complete closure? Especially from a parent?”
“Holder-onners are never able to understand let-goers. They are tribes that just can’t understand each other.”
My Thoughts
I love that the villains were elderly and used their frailty as bait and alibi. I love that they are scary and terrifying to the reader who knows their true nature before the characters in the book do. Personally, I don’t think old people are so easily exempted from suspicion, especially if their eccentricities have been noted by their students and colleagues, as it seems they have with the professors in this book. I also like the way Stephen King incorporated Covid and differing political standpoints into the storyline. It’s true to life, and it’s true to Holly’s character, and I think it makes sense for authenticity, even if some people may not agree with Holly. She’s the MC of this book, so her viewpoint is the one that matters to the story.
For more discussion on the book – with SPOILERS – check out Notes & Discussion | Holly by Stephen King. This post has SPOILERS and assumes you have already finished the book. It is password-protected to prevent accidental spoiling. Password is “SPOILME0001”. Proceed at your own risk.
My Feels
This book was so intense, especially towards the end. I was at the edge of my seat and I literally finished more than 50% of the audiobook, about 6-7 hours, in one day because I needed to get to the end. There were parts of it that broke my heart, others that filled me with rage and disgust, and still more that sent shivers down my spine. There were also parts that filled my heart and made me happy. I was worried for Holly, proud of her, exasperated at her, and I love her so, so much.
My Rating
5/5 stars. Was there any doubt?
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
