Dear Readers, September was a great month personally new job and a raise, but I had to sacrifice reading. I did not complete my goal of 7 books this month, I read only five. I read 1 horror, 2 mysteries and 1 new release thanks to netgalley. I Read 2 books from a book series Goosebumps The Night of the Living Dummy 2 and  The Poet from the Harry Bosch Universe. I read one 5 star book, two 4 star books, one 3 star books and one 2 star book.

Five Star Reviews:

The Poet by Michael Connelly is very dark atmospheric mystery. The killer from The Poet is the most terrifying because of the way they mask their kills, there’s a line from the movie The Usual Suspects written by Christopher McQuarrie “The Greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist”, that fits so well here. The Killer only goes after detectives and makes their kill look like suicide. The police department doesn’t want to talk about so are quick to dismiss it, until a reporter and a twin bother of one of the victims won’t let it rest and discovers his brother might not be the only one. This book is so great and what’s cool is it is a reporter solving the crime instead of a detective. I think this is Connelly most personal story since he used to be a crime reporter before becoming a full time novelist. The story could be called slow by some, but I found it so interesting how the crime is broken down and you the reader are there for all of it the discovery the crime and then the hunt. The twists in this story are jarring and there is plenty of them. The climax is good and some pretty unexpected things happen.

Four Star Reviews:

The Cartographers by Peng Shepard is a mesmerizing tale of map makers and the hidden treasures of maps. This book is an adventure/mystery that dips into science fiction and fantasy. The love of map making is explained really well and why some people dedicate their lives to it. This book has some great characters that I was drawn to. The book has a really cool twist midway through that changes what this book is about and makes it truly unique. The writing and the words are really powerful in this story. The pacing was a little slow at the beginning, I was losing interest right in the middle when, the book hits it’s twist which immediately interested me and the second half moved rapidly. The Climax was good I figured out one twist pretty early on of who a hidden figure was, which made the climax good but not great.

Dark Harvest by Norman Partridge is a horror fable about how one town has a crazy Halloween ritual that takes place in the 1960’s. This novella is a small story but with some really well thought out twist. The best thing about the novel is the writing, which reminded me of a hard crime novel the way harsh metaphors are used. “It’s as black as a licorice whip under and October sky ” is one of my favorite descriptions. The book takes place in one day and we get 5 characters perspectives. The pace moves really fast and the climax was enjoyable. The big thing that it is missing is the history of the night, so some part the book reminded me of Shirley Jackson’s short story The Lottery with elements of The Hunger Games by Collins and a sprinkled with a little of the Long Walk by King.

Three Star Reviews:

Goosebumps – Night of the Living Dummy 2 by R.L. Stine is filled with more dummy action than the first one and Slappy is now introduced. Night of the Living Dummy 2 is book 31 in the original Goosebumps series order, this is the half way point on my quest to read them all since there is 62 books in the original series. This novel is actually the one developed for the television episode called Night of the Living Dummy. Wooden dummies creep me out and this book has some good scares. The scariest moment is when Slappy grabs a little girls finger and will not stop squeezing and also find his head is full of worms. I liked that the curse is back. The final twist was good and doesn’t end with a joke, but ends with did what I think just happened, happen.

Two Star Reviews:

All Dressed Up by Jilly Gagnon is a murder mystery with a 1920s theme, where a real murder might have taken place but is it all part of the game? This novel was hard to get into, and that’s a problem because I love murder mysteries. I think this book has a good mystery in that is buried deep in mediocrity and a bad mystery. We only see glimpses of the real mystery at the end. The climax was not bad and the only highlight of this novel. The dialogue was bad in a lot of spots and hard to tell some characters apart since they sounded so similar. I thought about not finishing more that a few times but powered through this is easily the worst book I have read that was published this year. Thanks to Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine, Bantam for letting me read All Dressed Up by Jilly Gagnon. All Dressed Up is published on September 6 2022.