After deciding what I missed on September I planned what feels like the perfect reads for Spooky season and here they are:
For AYearAthon:
It is hosted in a GoodReads group; the themes list can be found at https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/123987-ayearathon
Theme: Horror/Thriller
Mandibula by Monica Ojeda (Jawbone)
This has been translated to English by New Ruins in 2022 and is available on Kindle as well.
Blurb: “Was desire something like being possessed by a nightmare?”
Fernanda and Annelise are so close they are practically sisters: a double image, inseparable. So how does Fernanda end up bound on the floor of a deserted cabin, held hostage by one of her teachers and estranged from Annelise?
When Fernanda, Annelise, and their friends from the Delta Bilingual Academy convene after school, Annelise leads them in thrilling but increasingly dangerous rituals to a rhinestoned, Dior-scented, drag-queen god of her own invention. Even more perilous is the secret Annelise and Fernanda share, rooted in a dare in which violence meets love. Meanwhile, their literature teacher Miss Clara, who is obsessed with imitating her dead mother, struggles to preserve her deteriorating sanity. Each day she edges nearer to a total break with reality.
Historia de la leche by Monica Ojeda (The story of the milk)
This one does not have an English translation yet.
Blurb: In Historia de la leche Mónica Ojeda takes up a myth from the biblical tradition – Cain, Abel and their fratricidal dispute for the love of their father – and, in the vein of A Night with Hamlet by Vladimir Holan or Antígona González by Sara Uribe, she she rewrites from the present, investigating, as she did in her novel Mandíbula, the strange violence of female and family relationships. To house her in her own bones and recognize everything foreign that inhabits her, the poetic voice kills Mabel, her sister, establishing a dialogue with her, with her mother and with her father, while she faces, almost in a trance, what she remains: the guilt, the memory that hurts, the terrible maternal silence, the frighteningly open space between the mother and the surviving daughter.
The next installment in the Lousie Rick series by Sara Blaedel La chica queue Corrio or in English the Running girl.
Blurb: Louise gets a call from her son, Jonas. It's every parent's worst nightmare: A school party has ended in terrifying chaos after a group of violent teenagers forced their way into the building in search of alcohol and valuables. Dashing to the scene, Louise discovers one of the students gravely injured--struck by a car while attempting to run for help. Now the girl's distraught mother, pushed to her emotional breaking point, will do anything to make those who hurt her daughter pay.
So when someone targets the gang members with a vicious attack, the girl's mother is the obvious suspect. But Louise can't shake the feeling that the case might not be as cut-and-dried as it first appears. Someone is lying--but who?
Perfect Block by Blake Pierce
The second installment i the Jessie Hunt series.
Book Description: rookie criminal profiler Jessie Hunt, 29, picks up the pieces of her broken life and leaves suburbia to start a new life in downtown Los Angeles. But when a wealthy socialite is murdered, Jessie, assigned the case, finds herself back in the world of picture-perfect suburbia, hunting a deranged killer amidst the false facades of normalcy and sociopathic women.
So that takes care of the thriller aspect so now onto the horror stories.
Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice
This will be a reread for me. And I might even try to watch the movie afterward.
Book Description: Here are the confessions of a vampire. Hypnotic, shocking, and chillingly erotic, this is a novel of mesmerizing beauty and astonishing force—a story of danger and flight, of love and loss, of suspense and resolution, and of the extraordinary power of the senses.
Buzzwordathon created by Keyla from Books and Lala- the whole list can be found at https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/1111928-buzzwordathon or YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwmtVw9iJUg&t=596s
Theme: "Magic" or magic-related words.
Enchanted Life by Sharon Blackie
This is a nonfiction book
Book Description: Taking as her starting point the inspiration and wisdom that can be derived from myth, fairy tales, and folk culture, Dr. Sharon Blackie offers a set of practical and grounded tools for enchanting our lives and the places we live, so leading to a greater sense of meaning and of belonging to the world. Enchantment . By Dr. Blackie’s definition, a vivid sense of belongingness to a rich and many-layered world, a profound and whole-hearted participation in the adventure of life. Enchantment is a natural, spontaneous human tendency ― one we possess as children, but lose, through social and cultural pressures, as we grow older. It is an attitude of mind which can be the enchanted life is possible for anyone. It is intuitive, embraces wonder, and fully engages the mythic imagination ― but it is also deeply embodied in ecology, grounded in place and community. To live this way is to be challenged, to be awakened, to be gripped and shaken to the core by the extraordinary which lies at the heart of the ordinary.
The Magic Factory by Morgan Rice
Book Description: THE MAGIC FACTORY: OLIVER BLUE AND THE SCHOOL FOR SEERS (BOOK ONE) tells the story of 11 year old Oliver Blue, a boy unloved by his hateful family. Oliver knows he is different, and senses that he holds powers that others do not. Obsessed with inventions, Oliver is determined to escape his horrible life and make his mark on the world.
When Oliver is moved to yet another awful house he is put into in a new sixth grade, one even more terrifying than the last. He is bullied and excluded, and sees no way out. But when he stumbles across an abandoned invention factory, he wonders if his dreams might be about to come true.
Who is the mysterious old inventor hiding in the factory?
What is his secret invention?
And will Oliver end up transported back in time, to 1944, to a magical school for kids with powers to rival his own?
Literally Dead Book Club also created by Keyla from Books and lala, the group can be found at https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/1065386-literally-dead-book-club
The Family Game by Catherine Steadman
Book Description: Harry is a novelist on the brink of stardom; Edward, her husband-to-be, is seemingly perfect. In love and freshly engaged, their bliss is interrupted by the reemergence of the Holbecks, Edward's eminent family and the embodiment of American old money. For years, they've dominated headlines and pulled society's strings, and Edward left them all behind to forge his own path. But there are eyes and ears everywhere. It was only a matter of time before they were pulled back in . . .
After all, even though he's long severed ties with his family, Edward is set to inherit it all. Harriet is drawn to the glamour and sophistication of the Holbecks, who seem to welcome her with open arms, but everything changes when she meets Robert, the inescapably magnetic head of the family. At their first meeting, Robert slips Harry a cassette tape, revealing a shocking confession which sets the inevitable game in motion.
Classics
Beautiful and the Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Published 1922
Book Description: here is the story of Harvard-educated, aspiring aesthete Anthony Patch and his beautiful wife, Gloria. As they await the inheritance of his grandfather's fortune, their reckless marriage sways under the influence of alcohol and avarice. A devastating look at the nouveau riche, and the New York nightlife, as well as the ruinous effects of wild ambition.
John Grisham
The associate
Book description: Kyle McAvoy grew up in his father's small-town law office in York, Pennsylvania. He excelled in college, was elected editor-in-chief of The Yale Law Journal, and his future has limitless potential.
But Kyle has a secret, a dark one, an episode from college that he has tried to forget. The secret, though, falls into the hands of the wrong people, and Kyle is forced to take a job he doesn't want, even if it's a job most law students can only dream about.
Three months after leaving Yale, Kyle becomes an associate at the largest law firm in the world, where, in addition to practicing law, he is expected to lie, steal, and take part in a scheme that could send him to prison, if not get him killed.
Around the world:
The focus of this month will be South America and Europe.
Bolivia: Giovanna Rivero and the book is Tierra Fresca de su tumba it was published in English by Charco Press Fresh Dirt.
Book Description: Shipwrecks, origami, possession, and science―these short stories are where contemporary horrors and ancient terrors meet.
Six tales of a dark beauty that throb with disturbing themes: the legitimacy of revenge, incest as survival, indigenous witchcraft versus Japanese wisdom, the body as a corpse we inhabit. Rivero's stories pierce the reader like a wound, but in the end also offer possibilities of love, justice and hope. Told with a fierce and fragile lyricism that probes the abysses of the human soul, in _Fresh Dirt From the Grave _Giovanna Rivero reworks the boundaries of the gothic to engage with pre-Columbian ritual, folk tales, sci-fi and eroticism.
Ukraine: Andrei Kurkov the book is Muerte con pingüino, which is also available in English Death and the Penguin
Book Description: Viktor is an aspiring writer with only Misha, his pet penguin, for company. Although he would prefer to write short stories, he earns a living composing obituaries for a newspaper. He longs to see his work published, yet the subjects of his obituaries continue to cling to life. But when he opens the newspaper to see his work in print for the first time, his pride swiftly turns to terror. He and Misha have been drawn into a trap from which there appears to be no escape.
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