Yesterday was a pretty successful round of Dewey’s readathon. I managed to stay up until 4:30am and while I didn’t get a massive amount of books read, I did read one of my top books of the year. I think I probably could have stayed up later but I disappointingly didn’t really enjoy my last read. It was the Stephen Graham Jones book I was looking forward to the most and I ended up dnf’ing at 37%.
I did do a few check in’s throughout the day so I’ll leave those linked below so you can check them out if you want to.
I read three (short) books and read a third of the last one. Right before I went to bed I read the last chapter of the Victober group book so I’m going to include that book in this wrap up just because I don’t have a lot to say about and I did read it during the 24 hours.
Dewey’s
The Last Final Girl is a story that I thought I would absolutely love. It’s about a slasher in a Michael Jackson mask and has a group of teenage characters (like Scream, one of my all time favorite movies). And while I always appreciate when authors play around with different narrative styles, this just didn’t work for me. It works better as an audio but I still wasn’t a big fan. Jones wrote this like a script which sounds like it would be fun but it was a bit confusing. Instead of having names and dialogue like a typical script there are just constant page breaks and no clear structure or distinction between scene setting and character’s speaking. But the main reason I DNF’d it was that it was so similar to My Heart is a Chainsaw that I decided I was ok with not finishing it. My Heart is a Chainsaw is one of the best books I’ve ever read and I am ok with just existing with that version of a similar story. However, I always immediately look up spoilers for books that I have DNF’d to see if I made a good choice or not and I haven’t done that with this book. Which makes me feel like I will probably get around to finishing this at some point.
I gushed enough about Halloween Party Murder in my check in’s but this was a fun and zany cozy mystery. My only critique is that the Halloween part of the story was over way to fast and I wanted more of the actual party.
The Women Could Fly is easily one of my favorite books of the year. I was planning on reviewing it in this post but it is so similar to The Year of the Witching that I thought it would be fun to talk about both of those books at the same time. They are both witchy reads that tackle a lot of the same themes and topics in beautifully poignant ways. I only have a few chapters left of The Year of the Witching, which I’m hoping to finish tonight and while I’m loving it, it’s just not hitting the same way as The Women Could Fly. Both are incredible reads though.
I feel like if I didn’t first hear about Moon of the Crusted Snow on a list of indigenous horror novellas I would have rated this higher. This should be classified as more of a post apocalyptic suspense novel. While I understand why some people view it as a horror I found it to be more creepy and insidious. I was completely mesmerized by Rice’s writing and the way the story was slowly unfolding. I do highly recommend it and I am looking forward to reading more from Rice in the future.
Victober
I was really enjoying the first half of The Mayor of Casterbridge and then it started dragging. By the end I was just looking forward to it being over. The only character that I liked was almost non existent throughout the middle which is probably why. I would describe this as a depressing tale about a short tempered man who sabotages himself at almost every opportunity. And I didn’t like the ending at all. It is a morality tale that gave a good peek into society and the way of life back then so I gave it three stars.
Books With Cassie 