Halloween + What We Read in October

First up, Halloween! In true Minnesota fashion, we went from 75 degrees on Tuesday to this yesterday. 

At least the ground was warm so most of it melted. It was just depressing. But I nearly always trick or treated with a winter jacket, mittens and hat so they are just getting a true Midwestern trick or treating experience!

Pikachu and Chase, under warm winter jackets in our neighbor’s yard.

It wasn’t so bad once we were walking around, especially with heavy bags of candy. They went with me for an hour and then we emptied their bags and they went back out for 30 more minutes with dad. We do not need this much candy but it’s a good opportunity to see our neighbors. 

Now- onto the main topic! Here we are in the penultimate month of the year! I'm not going to say "where did the time go?" because while time has flown, I have been so busy with travel and such so it feels like 10 months have passed. But I digress. My book count for October is 10 which is very high, but I read 97% of one of the books (Wellness) in September and I slowly read another book over the course of 9 months with a Patreon group (Lonesome Dove) so I didn't actually read every word of these books in October. If I had to pick a word for my October reading, it would be "meh." There were a lot of solid 3 star reads which for me means "just ok to meh." 

Favorite Books:

Ina Garten's memoir "Be Ready When the Luck Comes" was a DELIGHT. I gave it an enthusiastic 5 stars. 

The Return of Ellie Black is a mystery about a missing girl that is found on a hiking trail in the Pacific NW. Something is not quite right with her (which, duh, she was missing for years) - where has she been and why isn't she talking much about her captors? 

Forgotten on Sunday has a truly horrible cover but it's a very sweet tale about a young woman that works in a retirement home in France and forges a relationship with one of her patients. 

Lonesome Dove was a re-read for me but I had read it so many years ago that I did not remember much. I read this with a Patreon group which really added to the experience. Now I want to track down the miniseries!

The rest (which is a mix of ok to meh):

I've liked other books by Rainbow Rowell but Slow Dance was solidy "just ok to meh" for me. It's a romance but the main protagonist is hard to root for and while I know she had a challenging family background, some of her behavior was just so juvenile. 

The Great Divide is historical fiction about the building of the Panana Canal. I had heard great things about this book but didn't connect with it. 

Expiration Dates was a fun romance and almost made my best of list for October. It's about a women who gets a slip of paper telling her how long a relationship will last when she meets someone new. 

I Hope This Finds You Well is about a woman who writes nasty things about/to her coworkers in white text in emails. HR finds out and she gets in trouble, but they accidentally give her access to the whole company's emails and instant messages. It was good in theory but was too unbelievable for me. 

It pains me to say that I didn't adore Shark Heart. I fear it was a bit over-hyped. This is my October book club selection which we'll be discussing next week since I was traveling when our club usually meets. The premise of the book is that a newlywed couple finds out that the husband is slowly turning into a great white shark. It's a bananas set-up but it somehow works. The writing felt choppy to me, though. 

Lastly Wellness is a book that had such mixed reviews but people kept telling me I should read it so I finally did. It did not work for me, though. It was just TOO DANG LONG. I thought the writer had some great things to say about marriage and parenting but, for me, it got lost is all the wandering side stories. I did not need to know about several generous of the husband and wife at the center of the novel. 

What the boys read:

Paul continues to mostly be interested in Dog Man books, but I am trying to expand his interest outside of that genre (Chelsea - I am going to check out Stick Dog!! Thank you for the rec!). We were told at his teacher's conferences that he is reading at a 4th grade level which kind of blew our minds! His teacher emphasized that we should still read to him so I'm trying to get him interested in a read-aloud. Currently he mostly reads to himself at bedtime. We started The Mouse and the Motorcycle but that didn't seem to interest him, so my search continues... 

Taco has been VERY into Halloween books. His favorite is Pumpkin Soup which is an adorable book that I heard about from The Mom Hour years ago. Besides that we've been reading a lot of Julia Donaldson, including Room on the Broom. I think it's time to get rid of our board book collection as he rarely picks out board books anymore! I like that board books are short but much prefer picture books!

Did you read anything great in October?