October 2020 Reading Wrap-Up

Hey hi hello friends, and welcome back to my blog!

So this is really weird for me because I'm actually using my mother's laptop, since I'm still not back home. I said it on twitter but basically my mom and I came out to California because her father was dying, and since she is a retired hospice nurse, she was the one assigned to take care of him at the end. We drove out from Arizona the 15th of October, and my grandpa passed away the 29th, two days after my birthday. We won't be leaving until after we lay him to rest, which won't be until the 10th of November, so I'll be in California for another week and a half. I'll make sure to post a reading update once I get home.

Okay, anyway. This month I read eleven books and completely caught up with all of the books I had on my currently reading page on Goodreads. Of those books, only two were rereads, so a lot of brand new content this month! Also, no manga. 

Let's get into it. 

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Novels

1. Love & Other Carnivorous Plants by Florence Gonsalves
Star rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 352 pages
Read: 10.05 - 10.06
Goodreads thoughts: N/A

2. The Tower of Nero by Rick Riordan (The Trials of Apollo #5)
Star rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 416 pages
Read: 10.06 - 10.07
Goodreads thoughts: Am I crying that my childhood is officially over? Yes, 100%

With that being said, this was truly a wonderful ending to my most favorite universe of all time. It ticked all the right boxes, gave us closure on all of our favorite characters, and just overall gave us a good, happy ending. I'm just really, really sad that it's over. 

Thank you, Uncle Rick. For everything.

3. Radio Silence by Alice Oseman (REREAD)
Star rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 403 pages
Read: 10.08 - 10.09
Goodreads thoughts: N/A

4. Dreams of Gods and Monsters by Laini Taylor (DOSAB #3) (REREAD)
Star rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 613 pages
Read: 9.28 - 10.13
Goodreads thoughts (PREVIOUS REVIEW): I could not ask for a better ending to a better trilogy. I'm angry at myself for not having read this series earlier but also I'm so happy I read it now when I could fully appreciate the beautiful creation of Laini Taylor. I am looking forward to owning the entire series myself so I can go and reread it whenever I want.

5. The Queens of Innis Lear by Tessa Gratton
Star rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 576 pages
Read: 6.11 - 10.15
Goodreads thoughts: FINALLYYYYYY FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY I HAVE FINALLY FINISHED THIS GODDAMN BOOK HALLELUJAH

Okay, anyway. Even though it took FOUR MONTHS to finish this, I still consider this book a masterpiece. I readily admit that King Lear is my favorite Shakespeare play (which is a really unpopular opinion for some reason?) so I knew that I was going to love this books to at least some degree, but I wasn't expecting to love it as much as I did. My favorite part about it is absolutely the representation of magic: connecting to earth, digging your hands into the dirt and feeling the roots of the trees and stones and the island as a whole. It's the most accurate comparison to green witchcraft that I have seen in literature. 

Catch me crying at that ending though! I mean I had an idea of how it would play out, and I was right, but it still hit me hard in some parts, especially since I read the last 100 pages all in one sitting, so it was just blow after blow. 

But really, I am so so glad that I read this, and I definitely plan on reading it again in the future. Hopefully it won't take me quite as long, lol.

6. Days of Distraction by Alexandra Chang
Star rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Page count: 320 pages
Read: 10.06 - 10.17
Goodreads thoughts: I enjoyed this maybe a little less that I thought that I would, but I still enjoyed it nonetheless. Alexandra Chang has a very unique way of writing that I really clicked with, and I hope that she comes out with other books in the future. 

(It was fun reading the parts about Davis, because my sister went to college there, so I recognized a lot of the places and people mentioned.)

7. This Coven Won't Break by Isabel Sterling (These Witches Don't Burn #2)
Star rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 330 pages
Read: 10.19 - 10.20
Goodreads thoughts: Trigger warning for kidnapping and torture; blood

This was ten times better than the first book. All of the problems I had with book one were either resolved or edited, so it just left all the best parts. Plus this was so much gayer and that's always a plus.

The stakes were SO MUCH HIGHER than the first one that I felt that constant thrum of anxiety while reading, and couldn't put it down. It did still suffer from the "I'm this person, but wait I'm actually this person, but REALLY I was this person all along" trope that the first book had a lot of, but again it was done much more tastefully in this one. You can really see the growth in Isabel Sterling's writing. 

8. Imaginary Friend by Stephen Chbosky
Star rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Page count: 705 pages
Read: 10.15 - 10.21
Goodreads thoughts: Trigger warnings - domestic abuse, child abuse, sexual assault (plus sexual assault of a minor/child), suicide, self-harm, psychological attacks, demonization of mental illness, bullying, torture, sickness, blood

Okay. Here's the thing.

This book was great for the first 250 pages. It gave me chills. It kept me up at night. It did exactly as I would expect a horror book should do. But then the rest of the book was just...there? This could've easily been 400 pages shorter than it really was. 

I still love Chbosky's writing. His prose is phenomenal. I hope we get a dozen more books by him. But this is definitely not his best work. It was over explained and just fell prey to the most common problem of writing: he didn't know where to stop. I didn't need all of the chapters just talking about how awful their chances were, how it would take a miracle to win, how they were all doomed beyond measure. It just became repetitive and boring. 

9. Shorefall by Robert Jackson Bennett (The Founders Trilogy #2)
Star rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Page count: 493 pages
Read: 8.15 - 10.25
Goodreads thoughts: Eh? I think the first book was much better than this one, which is a little sad to me because I loved the first book so much and I was hoping that this would be even better. I definitely think that it just tried to do too much. Everything was happening so fast that I didn't even get the chance to mourn any of the characters that we lost. I'm interested to see how book 3 will hold up. 

10. The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab
Star rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Page count: 448 pages
Read: 10.26 - 10.31
Goodreads thoughts: What else could I possibly give this but five stars?

I said this before, but I think it's the fact that this is so different from her usual writing style that I love it as much as I do. It's gritty and raw but also dreamy and poetic in a way that only Schwab can accomplish. I can see why this book took ten years to fully flesh out, because HOW do you possibly come up with a story like this?? Can you imagine having the brain and imagination it took for this story to unfold?? I could never. 

Graphic Novels

1. An Embarrassment of Witches by Sophie Goldstein and Jenny Jordan (ONE DAY READ)
Star rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Page count: 204 pages
Read: 10.29
Goodreads thoughts: Cute and quick. I liked the familiars the most, Rhonda and Archie were hilarious and it really made me want a hedgehog. 

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Total page count: 4,850 pages

Favorite book of October: The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab

Least favorite book of October: Imaginary Friend by Stephen Chbosky

DNF'd books this month: A Golden Fury by Samantha Cohoe

                                            The Mythic Dream by Dominik Parisien and Novah Wolfe (Editors)

Unfinished books this month: A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

                                                   A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

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Okay, that's it! Overall it was a pretty good reading month with some of my favorite books of the year, even if it wasn't a great month personally. A Deadly Education and A Little Life are also the last physical books I have with me, so I either have to find more books on Libby to tide me over until I get home, or I have to make them last. I'm leaning more toward the former, of course. 

I'll talk to you guys in a couple of weeks. In the meantime, what was your favorite read of October? Comment below or tweet at me!

Until next time!