October has been a good reading month for me to an extent. I started off the month strong but then I hit a road block that meant that I read less than I planned to read this month. All of these you've all ready seen in my Halloween Book Recommendations but I wanted to just wrap up this reading month and give a more indepth review of each of these books.
The first book I actually started at the end of September but finished very early on in October. House of Salt And Sorrows by Erin A Craig is a book that had been on my yearly TBR since I first read the synopsis at the beginning of the Summer. A creepy, spooky reimagining of Twelve Dancing Princesses, this book follows the eight remaining sisters of the Thamaus Dozen as they grieve and try to move on after the untimely and somewhat grotesque deaths of their four older sisters. With the youngest sister seeing her dead sisters in their family home and the townspeople claiming the family is cursed, this book follows the second eldest sister ---- as she tries to unravel what's happening to her family. This book was the perfect mix of creepy and spooky but with enough intrigue and mystery that it wasn't a stand alone horror novel. What I really enjoyed was the imagery Craig created through her writing and the twists and turns she placed at the climax of the story to throw you off the scent if you'd managed to work out what was happening to this poor family. Plus it has a beautiful love story as a side plot that will make you want those characters to survive to the end in a world where nobody is safe.
From there I read A Curse So Dark And Lonely by Brigid Kemmerer. I'd heard a lot about this book on BookTube but was a little wary of picking it up. A loose reimagining of Beauty and The Beast, this book follows street smart Harper who is transported from her home in Washington one night to the beautiful yet cursed world of Emberfall. There she meets Prince Rhen and his Royal Guard Commander Grey who have relived the Autumn of Rhen's eighteenth birthday for the last five years. And they're hoping that Harper can help them break the curse that holds Emberfall and all it's subjects to poverty, famine, murder as well as attacks from the mysterious beast that appears at the end of each season. Yet Harper isn't the type of girl who's going to fall for those beautiful royal looks and charm and going through every feeling she has about Rhen and her imprisonment in Emberfall is what had me hooked on this book. I just loved everything about this book and I'm dying to get my hands on the sequel when it comes out next year. Kemmerer has a way of writing everyday issues such as disabilities (Harper has Cerebal Palsey) and sexuality in a way that only strengthens everything her characters stand for. I read this book quickly considering it's size but I also dragged it out so it wouldn't end and I wouldn't end up waiting sadly for it's sequel.
This month has really be the month for reimaginings and retellings. The third book I devoured this month was The Deathless Girls by Kiran Hargrave Miller. And and as you can see this a hardback, something rarely seen in my book collection. I just couldn't wait any longer and when I saw one lone copy in Waterstones that happened to be a signed edition, I knew it was just meant to be. Following twin sisters Lil and Kizzy who are kidnapped from their settling after watching their entire family being murdered, this creepy tale follows them as they're thrown into a life of servivtude under the folk lore of the terrifying Dracul. This is an amazing retelling of Dracula and his brides and how they became his undead loves or what he would have you believe they are. I read this book so damn quickly and was even tempted to reread it once I'd finished it, I loved it that much. If you want something a little dark, a little creepy, I highly recommend giving it a read.
And the last book I read in October was one I intially picked up in August but put it down because it gave me way too many Salem/Halloween vibes. However with October being Spooky Season, it was the perfect time to pick it up once again. The Dreadful Tale Of Prosper Redding by Alexandra Bracken follows a young boy who believes himself to be the only unextraordinary member of his infamous family. Until he finds out he is inhabiting a malefactor who is behind his familys fame and fortune. And with that begins a countdown to remove this malefactor from his body before he's tricked into making a contract and living his life in servitude with said malefactor. But it's not going to be as easy as it seems and reading this book definitely wasn't as easy as one would think it would be. I lost interest pretty quickly in this book but continued to push through it in hopes that it would be get better. And I'm so glad I did, it got so much better and the twist at the end was phenomenal. I'm dying to read the sequel but it's going to have to wait a while as my TBR pile keeps growing by the day.
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