And sadly, I don’t have my Halloween decorations out and they probably won’t go up this year.

I have a very good reason though.

My house is in complete disarray because someone has mobility restrictions.

It’s been a tough couple of weeks. At the start of October here I took Beau in for a surgery to remove some masses. One was in a real bad spot in the joint of his front leg and was impinging on his movement… the other was just growing a bit fast and he was going to be unconscious anyway so the vet grabbed it while he was out. They both came back as benign, thankfully. Unfortunately, the one in the joint of his leg isn’t healing very well. His restrictions were supposed to end today, but he’s popped a few stitches. The sofa is still disassembled across two rooms to keep him from jumping on it. I’m still carrying him up and down the stairs. I’m doing laundry daily to keep his blankets clean. And obviously the Halloween decorations aren’t going up because the house is just not in a good shape for it this year.

Unfortunately that also means I haven’t gotten a whole lot done since my last newsletter. I wanted to talk books this newsletter, but I’m only about 80% through Off the Reservation by Stephen Graham Jones and haven’t touched the others. But I’ve really been enjoying Off the Reservation and look forward to finishing it this weekend.

I do have a bunch of books I’ve read in the months leading up to October I can talk about, though! We’ll start with the one that isn’t horror. I read We Hexed The Moon by Mollyhall Seeley and I’ll be perfectly honest - I read the first chapter and was concerned that I wasn’t going to like it. But a few more chapters in and I was hooked. It’s a great coming-of-age story, their friendship feels beautifully strong but also tragically fragile. Books like this are why I try to pick up things I normally wouldn’t gravitate to, because more often than not I’m surprised with how much I wind up loving the book.

Now, as far as books for spooky season… I’ve got just a couple horror books to talk about. I actually didn’t read a ton of it this year, I bounced around genres a bit and I think this year my top genres were fantasy and non-fiction. But I’ll mention The Hacienda which technically I read last year but it’s probably on my forever-recommend list because it’s one of the few horror books that frightened me.

I don’t scare very easily when reading things. Movies, however, will get me every time. I’m a giant coward. And video games are even worse. I only play multiplayer horror games, because that way my brother will play too and he’ll either carry the team or make a heroic last stand while I run away and leave him to die.

There’s two more horror books I want to recommend and I actually got to blurb both of these, which was a real treat. The House That Eats the Dead is a really fun haunted house story and while I’ve talked about it before, I’ll bring it up again because a) it’s spooky season and b) it wasn’t actually released yet when I last mentioned it. I find myself thinking about it whenever I walk past the front porch column that probably needs to be replaced in the next year or so….

The other book is Jenny Will Eat You Now, which is a fun blend of folklore, horror, and romance. It was unexpectedly charming, but also had a good bit of gore and people getting devoured, which I’m always here for as far as horror tropes go.

That’s about it for books at the moment. I really haven’t made much progress through my stack like I hoped I would.

There’s one more thing I want to mention here before I return to the world’s worst fitness routine of carrying my dog down a flight of stairs 💪

I’ve been dying to tell everyone the story of my dog and his relationship to a certain character in How to Survive Camping, but I’m trying to avoid putting spoilers in my newsletter. So later this month, I’ll send out a special edition newsletter that’ll be very clearly marked as containing The Lady in Chains spoilers and you’ll be able to read or delete as appropriate. It’ll also be email only, so folks won’t stumble on it if they’re reading back through my newsletter.

So I’ll see you later this month! Until then, have a great spooky season, and I hope you’re enjoying your Halloween decorations! (unlike me 😭 )

I said I was done at the end of September but just kidding, I added more to the calendar. It’s just super easy for me to go to places around Columbus.

October 18th - Storyline Bookshop Sci-fi/Fantasy Book Club - Upper Arlington, OH

October 31st - Reading and Signing at Dragonfly Bookshop - Hilliard, OH

November 19th - Books and Beverages at Birdie Books - Westerville, OH