Bailing too soon to make a "formal" review. I only got about 40 pages in. The language of olden times feels incredibly forced And the dark cult like vibes with abused children just isn't something I can stomach at this time. I cannot remember why I bought this but I am clearing it from my shelf.

Found on Pinterest 😂

Taking a walk. Supplementing reading the tagged book with the audiobook.

Photo: Neighbors Halloween decor! 🎃💀

Taking a mental health day. I had a bit of a crash out yesterday, you know those days were it stats getting out of the house late then getting stuck behind a school bus picking up kids, and then it snowballs? Everyone has them. I also had some bad health news I haven't processed I am lucky to have a job where I can take off with no excuses. So mental health day it is.
Cleaning house, exercising, reading the tagged and just getting back to okay.

#10BeforeTheEnd apparently my first because I read something over the weekend I thought was on my list but was not 😂

This was fine. I think if you are into Gothic crime you will like this. I am meh on it and was meh on this. I thought it was very well written and the characters well drawn I just personally struggled paying attention to it and I do not think it will stick with me.

Ready or Not

#Bookspin
@Thearomaofbooks

#weeklyforecaat

I finished 1 #10BeforeTheEnd looking to finish a couple more this week with Careless People, Edinburgh Twilight and going to try and start Anne of Green Gables. I know people love Anne but I have struggled all year to pick it up.

My oat milk latte didn't seem to come with espresso today 😂. So pale!

Hughes wrote a column in a Chicago newspaper of stories about Jesse Semple, a Black Harlemite in 1910-1920 people called him Simple. He is a drinking, womanizer who waxes poetic about life in America. Overall I thought it was good for the vibe and place in time but Simple was so annoying it took me a month to read b/c I just didn't want to hang with him

I am going to need to sit with this for a bit it was very intense. Such an interesting juxtaposition to read this on the weekend of Ireland's national elections. I think I could have separated this more if it was released and I read it in say 2020 now everything feels much to real and close.
I think a lot of people are struggling with the structure, but as a big fan of Jose Saramago I didn't have a problem there (Lynch even uses more punctuation)

Reading this feels like listening to Curtis during the NYC mayor debates?

"Not only am I half dead right now from pneumonia, but everything else has happened to me! I have been cut, stabbed, run over, hit by a car, and tromped by a horse!....."(By the Goitti's)

A week in how are we doing?

Do you need motivation? Or are the books you picked flying off that TBR?

I have started 2, hoping to finish the first today. Which does not feel like much yet but I think I am gaining momentum!

9 weeks to go. ⏰✔️🤞

Come covers quite a bit in this, mostly the history of women in medicine, what "They" thought of us, how the medical institutions reflected the morals of the time, no matter what the evidence showed.
I wish she would have included Trans women more, she mostly ignores them beyond using a quote from Dylan Mulvaney and a few off handed sentencing at the end of a long chapter on HRT.
But overall I thought this was good she makes interesting points?

Rumor is we are headed for a storm weekend. With possible power outages (unlikely) and 3 inches of rain. So I am getting my reading sorted!

#10BeforeTheEnd

"A young man with unruly black hair stood upon the summit of Calton Hill in the wee hours of a Thursday in early February."

#Firstlinefriday @ShyBookOwl

#10BeforeTheEnd

I bought this book years ago at the Edinburgh airport. It's past time to get it off the TBR shelf!

Goodness Jackson is so good. At about 50 pages in I was a bit disillusioned but I pushed myself knowing I could trust her and it paid off big time. I loved the melding of cult, thriller, romance (not like that). Her characters are richly drawn and the situations infuriating. I love a book that makes me want to reach in and shake someone.

Listening to this audiobook while walking the neighborhood.
Look at this tree!! So red, so gorgeous 😍

I know it isn't the book. It must be me. But this felt very overwritten and I quickly became bored. This might be because I like Boulder have zero desire to be a mother, only I would have left Samsa and not gotten myself into this position. I thought this would be a quick afternoon read but it ended up taking me 4 days because I could not care enough to pick it back up. I am sure I am missing something.

Not really my lucky day when I pulled this 480pg book off the library shelf because it and I didn't get along. At all. I even tried using one of my Ever& credits for the audio and that was worst than just reading it with the narrator speaking at the slowest pace to ever be spoken and not being able to pronounce local names correctly. Beyond that the book wasn't good (IMO) too many threads - the author kept throwing herself and her abusive 👇

I was going to listen to the audio of this because the physical has become a super drag, but the narrator is saying local names wrong and nothing is more nails on the chalkboard then people who don't know how to say Willamette.
(Wuh-la-muht not Will-a-met, it is a first nations word.)

Question for the Litsy wise - if someone blocks you what does it look like?

I think it is funny (I am not offended) and I am just curious if my hunch is accurate, is it possible that if you try to tag them (for a prompt they started) they will not pop up, that I can click through from someone else's post, and get to their page but it says they have hundreds of thousands of points but no posts yet?

Also did I block them? Ahah How would I know?

Tagged is my first #10BeforeTheEnd book, Murderland I have started, but feels like it will be a struggle. Behind is my next ups.

#WeeklyForecast

A little horror for the season
Tingle is back and just as bananas as always. This book centers luck, probability and a world gone mad. At the center is Vera who is a sympathetic and believable character. I like Tingle's writing and even as the story get crazier and crazier his writing stays firm.
Some scenes are a bit graphic he describes things well, I was especially creeped out by his descriptions of people eating.

"We're all guests out here in the wild, passing through like we own the place and quickly discovering that nature has other ideas."

Chuck Tingle is known for his wild "gay horror" but I think people should talk more about how he is actually a good writer too.

This one is super wild! I am enjoying it.

Technically the 10 weeks begin on Wednesday, but lets get a head start! What #10BeforeTheEnd are you starting with??

I am starting with Careless People which is very overdue to the library.

If you would like to join just pick 10 books you plan to read before 2025 ends and get to reading. Good Luck to all who join.

This is a difficult book to "rate" I went in a bit begrudgingly. An American White Woman teaching us about Indian slums? I am cautious of profiting off the poorest of the poor.
Her writing is fantastic. It is a difficult topic and I think she does well telling you the facts while also being sympathetic. It is a tightrope telling such sad stories with care, but I think she did that well.
I don't know if I can rec it, but I am glad I read it.

Keeping resistance weird.

Be safe out there this weekend!

Book sorting day.

Pulling up my #10BeforeTheEnd
Thinking about 2026 it's so soon, and there are so many books I haven't gotten to!

This was a struggle. I switched to audio, but overall I was just bored. I know this is a well loved book. The writing was great but I found all of the characters annoying. Many are very priggish more so than the couple who are called out as. I like Cecilia but we barely get to see her (calling her puritanical sister Dorothea Dodo cracked me up) I realized later it takes place over 2 yrs in these characters lives and I am shocked felt like 70 yrs.

After much hemmming and hawwwing I have my #10BeforeTheEnd

Many of them were on my original #25in25 that I just have not been able to get myself to pick up. I need to stop buying books I cannot seem to force myself to read!

I am actually excited for all of these so hopefully they are not a pain to get through.

At the beginning of the year I picked 25 books I wanted to definitely check off my bookshelves in 2025.
I am going okay(ish) some big chunkers waiting for me. But I ticked off Middlemarch last night, & I am now down to 7. I am going to add most of those to my #10beforetheend challenge and push through on them! I know everyone loves Anne of Green Gables, I do not know why it has been so hard for me to pick it up, it was even a bookspin 1 month.

I cannot believe it, but, next week kicks off the last 10 weeks of 2025. So here we go!

For those who would like to participate it is time for the annual #10BeforeTheEnd

Pick 10 books, dedicate yourself to finishing them before the end of the year. Super simple.

Tag me if you want to join, I love seeing people's lists!

#Weeklyforecast Making my way through Middlemarch a bit at a time. I thought this was going to be a banger for me I love Elizabeth Gaskell, and English country society storylines but I am having trouble paying attention while I read this. Still hoping to finish by end of week.

Also reading Chuck Tingle ? and hoping to get to this library book. I hate "Reality" dating shows but I have enjoyed a few books on the premise so going to try Compund!

"Portland is Portlanding" is the most Portland headline out there.

I have been distracted and personally overwhelmed, but I am so proud of my city. Emergency Naked Bike Ride was today so look forward to that in the news it was a cold and wet day for it.

"I have found it absolutely astounding, all the trouble living has turned out to be.'
What a lovely surprise book. I read this in less than a day. I loved the literary references, it has been a long time since I have read an epistolary novel but this one really worked for me even if I didn't always like the MC. I thought it was a well done contemplating look at life and aging.

So glad everyone was raving about this! Especially @BarbaraBB
I picked it up last night and am already 3/4 in. A book lovers dream of a book I love how many books have been mentioned are many my own favorites. It is increasing my TBR but I am so enjoying it.

This feels like a Woman's Prize book. I would not be surprised to see this on their list next year.
I think putting it on the Booker list was a mistake, but I personally really enjoyed it. I thought it gave a great overview of T&T from the 70-90s Though it was an incredibly White view that the author could have addressed better.
As someone who was left at a hospital in 1980, and who was adopted, I found this incredibly interesting on that front.

Taking my neighborhood walk many neighbors are all set up for the season!

Listen to this tagged on audio while also reading it, it is pretty chunky.

This might be one of the best known true crime books. A John Cusack movie was even made of it (I have heard it is not good so I am passing on it). I found the book itself to be a bit scattered. Lots of characters (in every sense of the word) most not really having anything to do with the story beyond giving the book a particular vibe. Savannah itself comes off as a very well drawn character, and for that I think the author did a good job. 👇

“I felt perfectly safe in my rolling metal fortress, rusted and dented as it was. Nothing and no one could get to me, and nothing and no one did—with one very notable exception. Her name was Chablis.”
Have to admit, the one thing I didn't expect in a Southern Murder book was a side character who is Trans and the author respecting them. Learning today about beloved Lady Chablis a Trans performer in Savannah who died in 2016 of pneumonia at age 59.

Nonfiction November is coming and looking through what I have on hand to read is making me a bit sad. I am reading Murderland and Midnight in the Garden (maybe Peepshow if I can squeeze it in)for Spooky Month. I would really love to hear fun NF you have read lately I could throw in? I have the new Mary Roach on audio, and thanks to @Hooked_on_books Cheese War is waiting for me at the library. I am really excited for the tagged.

Out this Tuesday! (Oct. 7)

This is a genre bending story, it starts very hard sci-fi with words my STEM background brain didn't really know, but then slowly morphs into something so much more. I think some people will struggle with the almost magical realism quality of the story. I loved the weaving in of Jim and Tawny, their story of finding each other again and them bringing in the past and the Indigenous folklore, well done!

I started and stopped this a few times before I turned to the audio which is excellent. The book is a bit too flowery of language for me, but it does fit the fairy tale theme. Once I got into the story I loved the tale of Esther and Ysabel Hawthorn, 2 beloved sisters. You can feel their bond through the pages and that point where they start to want different things. I can see this story as a classic fairy tale to read to children.

Grey October vibes.

A light pick. I loved the cat (Pumpkin - fitting for the season) but the book itself felt a bit too sentimental, and with too many storylines for such a short read. I would have preferred it if it was about the siblings and the bad guys only.
The writing was fine though and I enjoyed August's storytelling if they could tighten it up a bit so I will try their next that comes out next year.

Fresh Month, Fresh Season, Fresh board!

#BookspinBingo Board
#Bookspin - Flesh
#DoubleSpin - The River Has Roots

@thearomaofbooks

I read 17 books in September, and DNF'd 2. Some really stand out books this month! Tagging the 1 I keep thinking about.

4.5⭐
Sky Daddy
The Anthropocene Reviewed
Travels With My Aunt
The Hounding
Cry of the Owl
4.25⭐
Minor Feelings
Stone Yard Devotional
4⭐
Gold Coast Dilemma
Nearly All the Men in Lagos Are Mad
Is This A Cry For Help
Come Rain or Come Shine
3.75⭐
Our Evenings
Ignorance
Storm We Made
3.5⭐
Twilight of Empire
Dating Dr Dil
Mr Salary

#Bookspin - Cry Of The Owl ✔
I didn't get to my Double Spin, and I am not sure I ever will.

Bingos - 4

Goodbye September. I hardly knew ya!

#Bookspinbingo
@thearomaofbooks

A really great distraction book. All of these characters are wild! I am always surprised when I read a Highsmith that her books are not more popular, they are propulsive, it is often impossible to guess what the characters are going to do next, and a stark reminder of what we have gained as a society (911!?!) since the 60s. Also makes you feel like if you had committed a crime then it would have been so much easier to get away with it!

A friend to me to her new favorite bookstore in Camas Washington. It is gorgeous, and they have the funnest bookclubs, like a cookbook club where the members pick a recipe and they have a potluck at the end of the month! I don't cook but I think it is the best idea. The shop is super cute and they have a small cafe that serves coffee, wine, and beer. 😍

Bookish - Camas Washington

Screaming at these characters to stop talking to the police without a lawyer!