Skip to main content

September TBR Round Up

Ah the TBR or rather To Be Read Pile, the bane and reason for the avid readers existence. Like many avid readers I start out with grand plans at the beginning of a month to read a crazy number of books but plan to read and actually read are very different categories. As such, here's the round up of what my TBR pile has in it for the month of September.
The excellent reissues of American Supernatural and Hill House
Poor Penguin's American Supernatural Tales and Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson they have yet to be read by me. To be fair American Supernatural Tales was planned by me to read over at least 2 months since it chronologically covers America's supernatural short stories from the 1800's to the present. But unfortunately, I haven't found a spare moment to start it. I'm hoping to at least read the opening story before month's end but we'll see. As for Hill House I honestly, put it in the pile to read something classy. The last few books I have read have been part of what Grady Hendrix refers to as Paperbacks From Hell or the crazy genre and horror paperback originals of the horror boom. Which there is nothing wrong with them but for variety's sake I wanted to read something more people consider "classical." That's also the reason why I haven't read it yet. I'm scared I will be disappointed by it the way I was disappointed by Turn of the Screw by Henry James. Essentially, it was talked up to the nines as super scary and super influential so when I finally read it although I could see why it was influential, it just didn't scare me. I wasn't even creeped out by it. I was just left feeling meh and wanting to punch the governess character for being so obnoxious. So I will try to get to it and at least toss it in October's TBR if I don't.
Get ready for crazy with these paperback originals
I'm currently reading John Saul's Cry for the Strangers which is the classic story of unfriendly locals and a possibly, seriously cursed beach that hungers for the blood of outsiders. It's a great B movie of a book which I'm coming to expect from John Saul who wrote prolifically during the horror boom. A small warning for anyone wanting to read John Saul he has a serious vendetta against children and they die frequently in his books, most often violently. As for The Sendai by William Woolfolk it's a classic science gone amok scare tactic horror novel about test tube babies. I haven't read it yet but I found it completely by chance and was intrigued by how bonkers it sounded. It's fairly short so I'm hoping I can read it before the end of September. Well that's my TBR in a nutshell. It's not crazy big but I seem to be extra busy this month. Do any of these books look like something you'd want to add to your TBR or are some of you saving horror for October? The comment section is always open.



 
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Halloween Reading: Deciding What To Read Now and What To Halloween Read

As I wrote in my previous post I suggested a good way to get in the spooky spirit starting September, was to pick out a horror short story collection and something considered a classic in the genre. But like most avid readers I run into the problem of what do I read now and what do I save for Halloween month? There are no perfect answers to this question by any means, but the sub categories I try to fill in my Halloween reading list is a haunted house story, something wildly controversial, a killer animal narrative, and a loss of innocence/growing up novel. Two of the most infamous "real" horror novels The Amityville Horror is the supposedly "true" story of the Lutz family moving into a home where a family slaying occured and shortly after being beset by terrifying supernatural forces. Although the haunting aspect has been debunked from what I have heard it's still a chilling what if and I think it will be perfect mood reading. Michelle Remembers is extra ...
2 comments
Read more

Top 5 Best Reads of 2019

Unlike the worst list my best of was really hard to narrow down. I only completed 35 books but as I discussed in my previous post in general, I enjoyed most of what I read. To compromise with myself there is an honorable mentions section this time featuring books that didn't quite make the cut. With that out of the way these are my Top 5 Best Reads of 2019! 5) The Saturday Night Ghost Club by Craig Davidson Written by the same author as future genre classic The Troop, this slim but emotionally rich meditation on memory and loss made me cry like a baby. On the surface about a man's memories of his summer adventures with a quirky uncle it unfolds into so much more successfully combining the myths of childhood with the real spectres of growing up and untimely death. This would rank higher but I was expecting this to be actually horror instead of a coming of age story but it still deserves to be on this list. 4) Monster by Christopher Pike This YA Horror was insane in t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Summer of Night: More Than a King Copycat

Stop me if you've heard this one before. A gaggle of school children on the cusp of puberty in the 1960's try to find out what happened to a missing fellow kid during the summer only to become embroiled in supernaturally tinged horrors in their small town. No this is not Stephen King's 1986 doorstop It I'm instead describing Dan Simmons 1991 doorstop Summer of Night . Dan Simmons has recently re-entered humanity's consciousness with the AMC adaption of his novel The Terror  and if like me, you devoured the far superior source novel you would have found out about Summer of Night with a quick search for a list of Simmon's back catalogue. Although many people's initial response would be to punt this 600 page paperback into the cash grab King knock off bin if you stop and give it a chance you'll find a story although similar in some beats far more affecting and rich in presentation. Taking place in fictional Elm Haven, Illinois we follow a group of boys from...
Post a Comment
Read more