My October TBR 2024
My October TBR for 2024 is quite ambitious especially considering I’ve never based my reading on a TBR. I’ve read with fierce chaotic abandon allowing my mood and interest level to dictate what I read. However, I want to implement a structured approach to my reading and decided to give this a shot. So, let’s chat about the fourteen books I want to read this month.
Dracula by Bram Stoker
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It’s the original vampire story that started it all. What better way to celebrate the spooky season than to read this classic? As a lover of vampires who has read everything from The Vampire Lestat to Twilight, I consider it a mortal sin that I’ve never read this classic! So, I had to add it to my October TBR.
My Prediction 5 🌟
Synopsis
When Jonathan Harker visits Transylvania to help Count Dracula with the purchase of a London house, he makes a series of horrific discoveries about his client. Soon afterward, various bizarre incidents unfold in England: an apparently unmanned ship is wrecked off the coast of Whitby; a young woman discovers strange puncture marks on her neck; and the inmate of a lunatic asylum raves about the ‘Master’ and his imminent arrival.
Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Canas
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There’s something about this book cover that speaks to me. Plus it feels like it’s not your standard vampire story which intrigues me.
My Prediction 4 ⭐
Synopsis
As the daughter of a rancher in 1840s Mexico, Nena knows a thing or two about monsters—her home has long been threatened by tensions with Anglo settlers from the north. But something more sinister lurks near the ranch at night, something that drains men of their blood and leaves them for dead.
Something that once attacked Nena nine years ago.
Believing Nena dead, Néstor has been on the run from his grief ever since, moving from ranch to ranch working as a vaquero. But no amount of drink can dispel the night terrors of sharp teeth; no woman can erase his childhood sweetheart from his mind.
When the United States attacks Mexico in 1846, the two are brought abruptly together on the road to war: Nena as a curandera, a healer striving to prove her worth to her father so that he does not marry her off to a stranger, and Néstor as a member of the auxiliary cavalry of ranchers and vaqueros. But the shock of their reunion—and Nena’s rage at Néstor for seemingly abandoning her long ago—is quickly overshadowed by the appearance of a nightmare made flesh.
And unless Nena and Néstor work through their past and face the future together, neither will survive to see the dawn.
Life and Death: Twilight Reimagined by Stephanie Myer
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Every year during the spooky season I re-read a book or two from my Twilight collection and this year I chose this one because it’s a fresh spin on the original and I really like the ending in this one.
Synopsis
There are two sides to every story….
You know Bella and Edward, now get to know Beau and Edythe.
When Beaufort Swan moves to the gloomy town of Forks and meets the mysterious, alluring Edythe Cullen, his life takes a thrilling and terrifying turn. With her porcelain skin, golden eyes, mesmerizing voice, and supernatural gifts, Edythe is both irresistible and enigmatic.
What Beau doesn’t realize is the closer he gets to her, the more he is putting himself and those around him at risk. And, it might be too late to turn back….
The Hacienda by Isabel Canas
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Another book by Isabel Canas makes the list! I chose this book because I want to explore a story featuring a haunted house and this fits the bill. And again the cover is stellar. I’m jumping on the Isabel Canas wagon this month for sure.
My Prediction: 4 ⭐
Synopsis:
Mexican Gothic meets Rebecca in this debut supernatural suspense novel, set in the aftermath of the Mexican War of Independence, about a remote house, a sinister haunting, and the woman pulled into their clutches…
In the overthrow of the Mexican government, Beatriz’s father is executed and her home destroyed. When handsome Don Rodolfo Solórzano proposes, Beatriz ignores the rumors surrounding his first wife’s sudden demise, choosing instead to seize the security his estate in the countryside provides. She will have her own home again, no matter the cost.
But Hacienda San Isidro is not the sanctuary she imagined.
When Rodolfo returns to work in the capital, visions and voices invade Beatriz’s sleep. The weight of invisible eyes follows her every move. Rodolfo’s sister, Juana, scoffs at Beatriz’s fears—but why does she refuse to enter the house at night? Why does the cook burn copal incense at the edge of the kitchen and mark its doorway with strange symbols? What really happened to the first Doña Solórzano?
Beatriz only knows two things for certain: Something is wrong with the hacienda. And no one there will help her.
Desperate for help, she clings to the young priest, Padre Andrés, as an ally. No ordinary priest, Andrés will have to rely on his skills as a witch to fight off the malevolent presence haunting the hacienda and protect the woman for whom he feels a powerful, forbidden attraction. But even he might not be enough to battle the darkness.
Far from a refuge, San Isidro may be Beatriz’s doom.
The Only One Left by Riley Sager
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This book intrigues me because it features a character with a mysterious and deadly history. And that always makes for a suspicious, twisty, and spooky time. Plus I’ve heard so many good things about it I’m excited to give this a read and see how I like it.
My Prediction: 5 🌟
Synopsis
At seventeen, Lenora Hope
Hung her sister with a rope
Now reduced to a schoolyard chant, the Hope family murders shocked the Maine coast one bloody night in 1929. While most people assume seventeen-year-old Lenora was responsible, the police were never able to prove it. Other than her denial after the killings, she has never spoken publicly about that night, nor has she set foot outside Hope’s End, the cliffside mansion where the massacre occurred.
Stabbed her father with a knife
Took her mother’s happy life
It’s now 1983, and home-health aide Kit McDeere arrives at a decaying Hope’s End to care for Lenora after her previous nurse fled in the middle of the night. In her seventies and confined to a wheelchair, Lenora was rendered mute by a series of strokes and can only communicate with Kit by tapping out sentences on an old typewriter. One night, Lenora uses it to make a tantalizing offer—I want to tell you everything.
“It wasn’t me,” Lenora said
But she’s the only one not dead
As Kit helps Lenora write about the events leading to the Hope family massacre, it becomes clear there’s more to the tale than people know. But when new details about her predecessor’s departure come to light, Kit starts to suspect Lenora might not be telling the complete truth—and that the seemingly harmless woman in her care could be far more dangerous than she first thought.
Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
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I’ve recently developed a fascination with history and true crime stories which piqued my interest in this tale. I’m currently reading The Wager by this author and have found it unputdownable. I can only imagine how delicious this will be.
My Prediction: 5 🌟
Synopsis
In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, the Osage rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions, and sent their children to study in Europe.
Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, became a prime target. One of her relatives was shot. Another was poisoned. And it was just the beginning, as more and more Osage were dying under mysterious circumstances, and many of those who dared to investigate the killings were themselves murdered.
As the death toll rose, the newly created FBI took up the case, and the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, turned to a former Texas Ranger named Tom White to try to unravel the mystery. White put together an undercover team, including a Native American agent who infiltrated the region, and together with the Osage began to expose one of the most chilling conspiracies in American history.
The Guilt Trip by Sandie Jones
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I love a good domestic thriller! I live for the secrets and the drama they bring and I feel this book will be no different. And the cover is gorgeous!
My Prediction: 3.5 ⭐
Synopsis
Rachel and Noah have been friends since they met at university. While they once thought that they might be something more, now, twenty years later, they are each happily married to other people, Jack and Paige respectively. Jack’s brother Will is getting married, to the dazzling, impulsive Ali, and the group of six travel to Portugal for their destination weekend.
Three couples.
As they arrive at a gorgeous villa perched on a cliff-edge, overlooking towering waves that crash on the famous surfing beaches below at Nazaré, they try to settle into a weekend of fun. While Rachel is looking forward to getting to know her future sister-in-law Ali better, Ali can’t help but rub many of the group up the wrong way: Rachel’s best friend Paige thinks Ali is attention-seeking and childish, and while Jack is trying to support his brother Will’s choice of wife, he is also finding plenty to disagree with Noah about.
One fatal misunderstanding . . .
But when Rachel discovers something about Ali that she can hardly believe, everything changes. As the wedding weekend unfolds, the secrets each of them hold begin to spill, and friendships and marriages threaten to unravel. Soon, jumping to conclusions becomes the difference between life and death.
We Used to Live Here by Marcus Kliewer
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This book has been everywhere and everyone has said it’s such a creepy spooky time. And, it flows with my goal to read my haunted spooky house stories this month. Needless to say, I gave in to the peer pressure and picked up a copy to read this month.
My Prediction: 5 🌟
Synopsis
As a young, queer couple who flip houses, Charlie and Eve can’t believe the killer deal they’ve just gotten on an old house in a picturesque neighborhood. As they’re working in the house one day, there’s a knock on the door. A man stands there with his family, claiming to have lived there years before and asking if it would be alright if he showed his kids around. People pleaser to a fault, Eve lets them in.
As soon as the strangers enter their home, uncanny and inexplicable things start happening, including the family’s youngest child going missing and a ghostly presence materializing in the basement. Even more weird, the family can’t seem to take the hint that their visit should be over. And when Charlie suddenly vanishes, Eve slowly loses her grip on reality. Something is terribly wrong with the house and with the visiting family—or is Eve just imagining things?
Hidden Pictures by Jason Rekulak
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There’s something about kids being influenced by supernatural forces that guarantees a horrific and petrifying experience. This is another book that is highly acclaimed and has been making its rounds on bookish social media. Looking forward to seeing what the fuss is all about.
My Prediction: 4 ⭐
Synopsis
Fresh out of rehab, Mallory Quinn takes a job in the affluent suburb of Spring Brook, New Jersey as a babysitter for Ted and Caroline Maxwell. She is to look after their five-year-old son, Teddy.
Mallory immediately loves this new job. She lives in the Maxwell’s pool house, goes out for nightly runs, and has the stability she craves. And she sincerely bonds with Teddy, a sweet, shy boy who is never without his sketchbook and pencil. His drawings are the usual trees, rabbits, balloons. But one day, he draws something a man in a forest, dragging a woman’s lifeless body.
As the days pass, Teddy’s artwork becomes more and more sinister, and his stick figures steadily evolve into more detailed, complex, and lifelike sketches well beyond the ability of any five-year-old. Mallory begins to suspect these are glimpses of an unsolved murder from long ago, perhaps relayed by a supernatural force lingering in the forest behind the Maxwell’s house.
With help from a handsome landscaper and an eccentric neighbor, Mallory sets out to decipher the images and save Teddy—while coming to terms with a tragedy in her own past—before it’s too late.
Things We Do in the Dark by Jennifer Hillier
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I’ve heard about how sinister this thriller is and oh how I love a sinister thriller! I saw that this was available on Kindle Unlimited and didn’t hesitate to add to my library.
My Prediction: 4 ⭐
Synopsis
A brilliant new thriller from Jennifer Hillier, the award-winning author of the breakout novels Little Secrets and Jar of Hearts. Paris Peralta is suspected of killing her celebrity husband, and her long-hidden past now threatens to destroy her future.
When Paris Peralta is arrested in her own bathroom – covered in blood, holding a straight razor, her celebrity husband dead in the bathtub behind her – she knows she’ll be charged with murder. But as bad as this looks, it’s not what worries her the most. With the unwanted media attention now surrounding her, it’s only a matter of time before someone from her long hidden past recognizes her and destroys the new life she’s worked so hard to build, along with any chance of a future.
Twenty-five years earlier, Ruby Reyes, known as the Ice Queen, was convicted of a similar murder in a trial that riveted Canada in the early nineties. Reyes knows who Paris really is, and when she’s unexpectedly released from prison, she threatens to expose all of Paris’s secrets. Left with no other choice, Paris must finally confront the dark past she escaped, once and for all.
Because the only thing worse than a murder charge are two murder charges.
Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez
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I thought I’d add a fluffy, light romance to my TBR since I’ve gone heavy on the thrillers and horror. This will be my first Abby Jimenez and I’ve heard great things about her work and looking forward to experiencing a book by her for the first time.
My Prediction: 3.5 ⭐
Synopsis
Dr. Briana Ortiz’s life is seriously flatlining. Her divorce is just about finalized, her brother’s running out of time to find a kidney donor, and that promotion she wants? Oh, that’s probably going to the new man-doctor who’s already registering eighty-friggin’-seven on Briana’s “pain in my ass” scale. But just when all systems are set to hate, Dr. Jacob Maddox completely flips the game . . . by sending Briana a letter.
And it’s a really good letter. Like the kind that proves that Jacob isn’t actually Satan. Worse, he might be this fantastically funny and subversively likeable guy who’s terrible at first impressions. Because suddenly he and Bri are exchanging letters, sharing lunch dates in her “sob closet,” and discussing the merits of freakishly tiny horses. But when Jacob decides to give Briana the best gift imaginable—a kidney for her brother—she wonders just how she can resist this quietly sexy new doctor . . . especially when he calls in a favor she can’t refuse.
The House of Lost Secrets by Anstey Harris
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This is a contemporary mystery thriller about secrets between friends and the cataclysmic damage they can cause. I’ve had this in my Kindle library for a while it’s time I give it a read.
My Prediction: 4 ⭐
Synopsis
The weatherworn cottage Clachan has always been Jo Wilding’s sanctuary, a blissful escape from her tumultuous home life. From the first summer Rachel invited her to join the Willoughby family in the wilds of Scotland, she fell in love with the sea air, sandy beach and Tristan, Rachel’s older brother…
All these years later, Clachan is where their most important occasions and conversations take place, so when Rachel organises a weekend there, Jo never suspects that this weekend will change everything. Because it turns out Rachel has been keeping a secret, a betrayal that plunges Jo into a past she’s spent years trying to forget.
Left to untangle the pieces of their past alone, Jo has to decide if there is such a thing as forgiveness when there is no one left to forgive?
How To ADHD by Jessica McCabe
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October is ADHD Awareness month and to celebrate I wanted to read a couple of books about ADHD. This first book features YouTuber Jessica McCabe as she shares her tactics and strategies for managing ADHD in a neurotypical world. As a fellow ADHDer I’m sure I’ll takeaway a lot from this book to help me better manage my symptoms.
My Prediction 5 🌟
Synopsis
In this honest, friendly, and shame-free guide, the creator of the award-winning YouTube channel How to ADHD shares the hard-won insights and practical strategies that have helped her survive, even thrive, in a world not built for her brain.
Forget “try harder.” When your brain works differently, you need to try different .
Diagnosed with ADHD at age twelve, Jessica struggled with a brain that she didn’t understand. She lost things constantly, couldn’t finish projects, and felt like she was putting more effort in than everyone around her while falling further and further behind. At thirty-two years old—broke, divorced, and living with her mom—Jessica decided to look more deeply into her ADHD challenges. She reached out to experts, devoured articles, and shared her discoveries on YouTube.
In How to ADHD , Jessica reveals the tools that have changed her life while offering an unflinching look at the realities of living with ADHD. The key to navigating a world not built for the neurodivergent brain, she discovered, isn’t to fix or fight against its natural tendencies but to understand and work with them. She explains how ADHD affects everyday life, covering executive function impairments, rejection sensitivity, difficulties with attention regulation, and more. You’ll also find ADHD-specific strategies for adapting your environment, routines, and systems,
- Boost the signal and decrease the noise . Facilitate focus by putting your goals where you can see them and fighting distractions with distractions.
- Have less stuff to manage. Learn why you have trouble planning and prioritizing, and why doing more starts with doing less.
- Build your “time wisdom.” Work backward when you plan, and track how long it actually takes you to do something.
- Learn about your emotions. Understand how naming your emotions and letting yourself experience them can make them easier to regulate.
With quotes from Jessica’s online community, chapter summaries, and reading shortcuts designed for the neurodivergent reader, How to ADHD will help you recognize your strengths and challenges, tackle “bad brain days,” and be kinder to yourself in the process.
Scattered Minds by Gabor Mate
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This book explores the origins of ADD and how it can be properly treated so those living with the condition are able to lead fruitful productive lives. I can’t wait to explore his perspective on the origins of ADD since he doesn’t align with the belief that it’s not genetically inherited rather reversible impairment and developmental delay.
My Prediction 4.5 ⭐
Synopsis
Scattered Minds explodes the myth of attention deficit disorder as genetically based – and offers real hope and advice for children and adults who live with the condition.
Gabor Maté is a revered physician who specializes in neurology, psychiatry and psychology – and himself has ADD. With wisdom gained through years of medical practice and research, Scattered Minds is a must-read for parents – and for anyone interested how experiences in infancy shape the biology and psychology of the human brain.
Scattered Minds:
– Demonstrates that ADD is not an inherited illness, but a reversible impairment and developmental delay
– Explains that in ADD, circuits in the brain whose job is emotional self-regulation and attention control fail to develop in infancy – and why
– Shows how ‘distractibility’ is the psychological product of life experience
– Allows parents to understand what makes their ADD children tick, and adults with ADD to gain insights into their emotions and behaviours
– Expresses optimism about neurological development even in adulthood
– Presents a programme of how to promote this development in both children and adults
That wraps up all the books that I want to read in October and I sincerely hope I’m able to get to them all! What are your reading plans for this month? Were there any books you added to your TBR? And, if you’ve read any of the books I’m planning to read this month let me know how you liked them!