Open Thread for Readers for October 2023
Got a book you want to talk about? Frustrated with a book or series? In love with a new one? Found a buried treasure? An issue that keeps popping up in the books you are reading? Just want to chat about stuff in general? Post about it here!
Has anyone got any Halloween romance novels to recommend?
@Jayne: There’s an old Halloween vampire romance I can think of–Forever and the Night by Linda Lael Miller. I’ve never liked any of her other books but this vampire series worked for me. I just think it was so much more interesting and better written than her westerns, and I wish I knew why. Anyway, the book takes place during Halloween and is pretty good from what I recall; I’d give it a B. A later book in the series, Time Without End, was a keeper for me and really unique. That one isn’t set during Halloween though.
If you’re willing to try an urban fantasy novel, I recommend An Artificial Night by Seanan McGuire (disclosure: I share an agent with her). It’s the third book in the October Daye series but I recommend starting there because the first two books are weaker and I think you can still follow the series from there. This one is probably my favorite in the series. I can’t recall if it takes place during Halloween actually but it’s creepy and eerie in a satisfying way and just made for Halloween reading, IMO. I’d give it an A.
Speaking of unsettling reads, I’m reading Never a Hero by Vanessa Len right now, a time travel YA. I’m only at 16% so I can’t speak for how good it is but this was possibly my most anticipated release of 2023 and so far it’s very good. I don’t recommend starting with it, though–start with Only a Monster. Only a Monster has a conventional and unpromising beginning but then it takes all the familiar YA fantasy tropes and turns them on their heads.
Besides this I’m reading the latest Rachel Reid (I mentioned my thoughts so far in Katerin’s thread review) and rereading the Murderbot novellas. I just started the third one and I’m happy to say that the first two held up. In fact I think I liked All Systems Red even a little better than I liked it the first time.
I also recommend Ink Blood Sister Scribe by Emma Torzs, a fantasy novel for adults that I liked a lot. The worldbuilding is really unique and has to do with books and a library. The first half was stellar and the second half was still good. There are two semi-romances, one f/f and one m/f, but the latter is rather slight. My main disappointment was a feeling that the book felt too self-contained and could have been expanded into an amazing trilogy. There is so much more that could be done with it. This looks like a standalone, though. I’d give this one a B/B+, I think.
I recently noticed that 2023 has been a slumpish year for me in the sense that I’ve read a lot of older books because I’m not that drawn to newer ones. There’s been no 2023 book I’d rate as an A so far. The last Kate Daniels novella probably came closest, at a B+.
Is it just me, or has it been a slump year so far for you, readers of this thread?
@Janine: reading is about the only thing I never get into a slump with (baseball is probably a close second in the “I never get tired of this” category), but I have read fewer books so far this year because I’ve changed jobs and my hours are a bit different, plus I have been bringing some work home to complete (I don’t like doing that—but we were slammed for a while), so overall my reading numbers are down, but it has nothing to do with slumping.
I just read Cate C. Wells’s very good RETURN TO MONTE CARLO, which is simultaneously an homage to Harlequin Presents and a deconstruction of that genre of romance. It might not work for a reader not fully versed in HP template & tropes, but I loved it. Plus, Wells dedicated the book to Lucy Monroe, one of the queens of HP. I really think Wells is one of the best romance writers publishing today—she uses standard romance types & tropes to address thorny issues about class, gender, money, sex, and patriarchy.
@Jayne: The Rivals of Casper Road by Roan Parrish is a M/M Halloween category romance that includes a decorating contest which initially pits the two MCs against each other. It’s not my favorite Parrish but it’s perfectly fine.
@DiscoDollyDeb: You’re really tempting me to try Cate C. Wells again. I don’t read much HP these days but I used to and I love deconstructions. BTW Ilona Andrews’ SFR Silver Shark is a great deconstruction of the HP subgenre. It might be worth trying for you even if SFR isn’t your favorite genre.
@Janine: Other than the two K.J. Charles DOOMSDAY books, Cat Sebastian’s WE COULD BE SO GOOD, and T. Kingfisher’s THORNHEDGE, I’ve only 5-starred three books published in 2023:
WHEN THE ANGELS LEFT THE OLD COUNTRY by Sacha Lamb
ANDER AND SANTI WERE HERE by Jonny Garza Villa
IN THE LIVES OF PUPPETS by T.J. Klune (I’m not a huge Klune fan, but this one just worked for some reason)
I’ve read a lot of non-fiction this year, mostly memoirs and books about pop culture. I guess at least part of the reason for that is a dearth of novels that interest me.
@Janine: Is it just me, or has it been a slump year so far for you, readers of this thread?
It was slumpish for me before mid summer when I finally read some A reads. Before that though, I was thinking that my “Best of” list was going to be made up only of B reads.
@Janine: Thankfully my library loves Seanan McGuire and I’ve put this one on hold. Thanks.
@SusanS: Is this the one with the arachnophobe living with the guy with a pet tarantula he lets wander through the house?
@SusanS: @SusanS: Ander and Santi Were Here sounds good from the description. I think I’ll check it out.
@Jayne: I hope you like it. I’d love to hear.
@Jayne: No, that’s The Lights on Knockbridge Lane, which is a Christmas romance. Same series though.
@SusanS: Oh, good. I was looking at both of them when they came out and someone mentioned the spider and I noped out of reading that book.
@DDD you’ve turned me on to Cate C Wells (and a few other authors in the KU Universe—thank you!). I also always check out the HPs you mention. I generally tend to enjoy them even though I don’t tend to do angst! I’m off to read the title you mentioned!
It’s been a very slumpy year for me and I’ve only read a few books that I remember clearly. One of those is The Connelly’s of County Down by Tracey Lange (Jayne, you might like this one) It features three siblings, a sweet kid and a little romance. It was my first five star read of the year and led to a few more great reads. One of which was the new Thursday Murder Club book, Last Devil to Die,
@Jayne: Just thought of another Halloween romance, or at least Halloween adjacent, since this one is more about Day of the Dead. Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas. Queer YA UF romance.
@cleo: I should have been more specific and mentioned I’m looking more for adult romances but I’ll look into this one. Thanks.
This isn’t a romance at all but just in case anyone is looking for a Halloween appropriate read, a friend recently mentioned a book to me, A Night in the Lonesome October, by Roger Zelazny. She described it as a gentle and cute read in which some of the famous horror narrative figures and their pets get together to decide whether to summon the Elder Gods using a spooky rite.
The main characters and their pets are Frankenstein (rat), Jack the Ripper (dog), a witch (cat), Rasputin (snake), Dracula (bat), Wolfman (himself) Morris and McCabe (white crow), Sherlock Holmes (Watson!), and a druid (squirrel). She said there may have been one other one she couldn’t remember. She said she reads it every October.
Unfortunately when I looked for it at my libraries only one of them had it and that was an audiobook.