Reminder: #TBRChallenge Day is November 18

Hello November, the second to last month of the 2026 #TBRChallenge! I know, it's crazy right? 

This month's challenge is set for November 18 and the optional theme is Wrath. If you are a Harlequin Presents or Dark Romance fan, November is your time to shine! Revenge, vengeance, characters with anger issues, retribution, a villain who gets exactly what's coming to them - well, you get the idea.

That said, I can totally understand not having the bandwidth to deal with a theme right now. I seem to have lost the bandwidth to, quite frankly, read anything. Sometimes you just gotta go to the TBR and grab the first book that piques your interest. That's OK! Mojo is a mysterious and very fragile thing these days. The goal of the Challenge is to read something, anything, that has been languishing.

Now that we're barreling towards the 2026 off ramp, it's time to start planning for the 2027 #TBRChallenge. Once again I'm soliciting ideas from Romancelandia for monthly themes. If you're so inclined, be sure to check it out. The poll will close in early December.

2027 #TBRChallenge Theme Poll

My apologies for the blog being a bit of a dead zone the past few weeks, there's been quite a bit going on in the Bat Cave, most of it revolving around me still not reading and having a medical procedure that required an overnight hospital stay a week ago. This procedure was planned and not a medical emergency, but the issue was long-standing and starting to get worse, so it was time to get it dealt with. What I didn't plan on was that recovery would be so exhausting. Let's just say I'm happy Veteran's Day landed when it did and I got a day off in the middle of the week. I slept in and 'twas glorious!

Anyway, all this to say that I think I'm late talking about the 2027 #TBRChallenge. I know, right?! I can't believe we're staring down the first of the new year and it's time for me to start thinking about next year's challenge, but here we are.  And y'all know what that means?  Yep, it's time to open up the annual theme poll. As I always say, the monthly themes are optional for those who participate, but over the last several years y'all have come up with some fun ideas. So fun, in fact, that every monthly theme in 2026 sprang out of last year's poll.  

I won't set a hard deadline on when this poll will close, but let's say "early December." That's when more information and sign-ups will be announced for next year's challenge.  

Fill out the 2027 #TBRChallenge Theme Poll 

All Hallows: Unusual Historicals for October 2026

Limping to the finish line of 2026, the last couple of months have had a lot going on around the Bat Cave and hope springs eternal that I can turn the corner and walk into 2027 with some renewed purpose and mojo. I could be borderline delusional, but I find it more productive to try to maintain a positive outlook - albeit I'm not always successful. What I am positive about (for sure) is that we have a nice mix of offerings of Unusual Historicals for this month, including books from established favorites and relative newcomers. 

The Gilded Rose by Joanna Shupe

Love isn’t always a fairy tale.

Charming and popular, Orson Grey is the most sought-after bachelor in Manhattan. When Caroline pledges to spend her life with him, it feels like the beginning of a fairy tale.

The fairy tale quickly turns into a nightmare.

Behind closed doors, Orson is controlling and cruel. Trapped by laws that prevent women from leaving unhappy marriages, Caroline has no choice but to endure her husband’s behavior. Each day grows more intolerable, and her frustration and resentment mounts. Even her passion for rare books is stifled, leaving her isolated and lonely, a fading rose trapped under glass.

When Caroline is offered the opportunity to catalogue a private library, she seizes it like a lifeline. Exploring the literary treasures, she discovers a friend in the library’s owner, Zane Bishop—a brilliant, wealthy recluse who was disfigured in an explosion years ago.

Thoughtful and kind, Zane is everything Orson is not. As their trust builds, Zane realizes that Caroline’s pain runs much deeper than she lets on. He suffers with her, knowing precisely of Orson’s cruelty firsthand. Zane will stop at nothing to set Caroline free, even if it means risking everything.

Shupe is one of those authors I really want to like but whose books that I've tried have just not worked for me - but I seem to be in the minority. Lots of folks love her work and her latest (she's still with Avon) is a Beauty and the Beast story that leans in on the dark, so yes I am intrigued why do you ask? Heroine trapped in abusive marriage finds her salvation in the arms of a wounded man.

Abby's One and Only by Carla Kelly

Elsinore, Wyoming is ranching country, where people are scarce, cattle plentiful. World War II affects everyone, including a rancher's son dead in a B-17 over Germany. Pilot Fritz Harsch's younger brother Evan yearns to enlist and finish his brother's work, but he can't. A badly thrown baseball took out his eye in a high school game years ago. Draft boards don't want even capable men wearing an eyepatch.

Abby Nicholls waits tables in Elsinore's One & Only Café. An orphan, she is quiet, observant, and loves rancher Evan Harsch. On a whim, she makes a wish on a gravy boat she is polishing that looks like a magic lantern. It's a simple wish: Abby wants something good to happen to her and Elsinore. The town is far from war, but war came anyway, and people are hurting. Abby laughs off her impulsive gesture, but things start to happen...

A new Carla Kelly set in World War II era Wyoming with a touch of magic. Orphaned heroine who works in a diner, rancher's son unable to enlist due to childhood accident. Regular people with regular problems with, what sounds like, a light touch of whimsy. This sounds delightful!

Beau Scamp by CM Harris

England, 1794: What a time to be alive!

Charlotte Goddard has spent her life performing. First, as Charlie, the stable hand raised in breeches by her highwayman father, and then as Beau Scamp, the notorious road thief whose reputation does considerably more work than her actual skills.

When a botched robbery brings her face to face with Lady Catherina Pemberton—the childhood friend Charlotte has loved since she was twelve—she finds herself talked out of fleeing to America to avenge her father’s death and instead talked into the most ill-advised disguise of her career: maid to the woman she’s desperately in love with, in the house she’s been robbing, and under the noses of everyone who wants her hanged.

A Sapphic romp through Georgian England that sounds positively madcap! Instead of taking off to America, our highwaywoman heroine agrees to an ill-advised plan that has her pretending to be the maid of the woman she's loved since she was 12. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? 

Bargaining with the Devil by Lea Hollis

A bastard-born spy and assassin.

Ciarán Quinn is accustomed to doing the dirtiest work for the Crown. Sent to hunt down ruthless Scottish smugglers, his orders are clear: eliminate their leader by any means necessary and destroy the operation. Falling for the prickly, stubborn beauty he rescued from a fate worse than death two years earlier is not part of his mission.

A survivor haunted by the past.

Lucy Muir leads a reclusive existence along the rugged Solway Coast, closer every day to giving in to her demons. She neither wants nor needs interference in her life—particularly not from a devilishly compelling man who challenges her at every turn. Quinn’s dark good looks and rough-edged charm entice her, and his patience threatens to destroy every fragile wall she’s built.

Volatile attraction and irresistible desire.

White-hot passion blazes between them, but Lucy’s jagged edges reopen Quinn’s deepest wounds. As danger looms in every direction along the wild Scottish coast and old enemies close in, love may be the riskiest bargain of all—and the one most worth making.

The second in the Sirens & Spies series, he's a spy and assassin charged with ferreting out smugglers along the Scottish coast and she's the woman he rescued and has sworn to protect. The sample on this one got me hooked: Lucy learned, two years ago on the road out of Paris, that there was more honesty in the soul of a man whose profession was killing people than in the heart of the man who murmured pleasantries against her knuckles and bought her frocks and fripperies. That didn't mean she'd ever wanted to see Mr. Quinn again.

Strange Bedfellows by Emma Vail

Ashley Montagu, accomplished jewel thief and son of an earl, has a vengeful heist to plan and does not need a kind-hearted man with the arse of a Roman god falling into his life. Especially when that man is looking for a wife.

Henry Cavendish, country gentleman and Bow Street police informant, is up in Town for the Season to find a wife, not an exquisite man with sky gray eyes and a sober mouth that wants kissing. He struggles to reconcile his feelings with his duty, and then discovers Ashley’s identity: the jewel thief Henry has been tracking for years.

He's a well-born jewel thief with plans and no time or inclination to get his head turned by a pretty face, especially a pretty face that's looking to find a wife. Things get even more complicated with that pretty face turns out to be a police informant and he realizes that the thief he's been tracking is the very same man he desperately wants to kiss. 

Radio Silence by Chace Verity

At the height of his fame, Hollywood star Ike Irving abruptly abandoned his radio show, his home, and his loved ones. For five years, the English gentleman avoided the world, leaving the press and his friends with no answers for his disappearance. It's only in 1946, after the war has ended, that Ike returns to Hollywood. He plans to revive his radio program and recklessly hopes to reunite with the man he loves, his former radio partner.

Sidney Lewis is an American actor best known for his villainous gangster roles. What Hollywood doesn't know is that Sidney used to be a heavy in a previous life. He's the only person who knows why Ike Irving disappeared, and he's determined to keep Ike's secret safe at any cost—even if it means keeping their relationship strictly professional and leaving the romance in the past.

While Ike and Sidney work together to go back on the air and bring laughter to American audiences, their past keeps pursuing them. A gossip columnist with a grudge is particularly relentless in his quest to take down Ike Irving. When the press's claws reach for the other cast members on the radio show, it becomes clear Ike and Sidney will have to face their past and deal with their new problems together.

Two men reappear in post-World War II Hollywood looking to revive their radio careers, only for their past to come back and haunt them. The author appears to have not made this book available in the Amazon ecosystem, so links go to book's listing on the author's website which lists a variety of other buy links.

A Cinderella Christmas by Sabrina Jeffries, Mary Jo Putney and Anna Bradley

THE MISTLETOE MAIDEN * Sabrina Jeffries

Once arrogant and aloof, Lord Noel Davenport is determined to help childhood friend Eve Archer restore her family’s fortune. Queen Charlotte’s upcoming charity Christmas embroidery contest is the perfect place for Eve to display her skills and gain opportunities. But though Noel has chosen a wife, by midnight it’s clear that guarding his heart is impossible when desire proves an irresistible gift . . .

THE CINDERELLA CHALLENGE * Mary Jo Putney

Rejected by her bigoted family, gifted young Casey has survived by disguising herself as a young man and working in the offices of the Chatham Royal Navy Dockyard. But when she reports her suspicions of a plot against Britain's most brilliant engineer, she doesn't expect handsome investigator Cameron Tremayne to swoop in and decide to the solve the mystery of her as well. Can their unlikely partnership bring them a future of loving Christmases together?

A WINTER'S WISH * Anna Bradley

While she designs the stunning gowns that have made her wicked stepsisters the toast of London, Estella Harley also plans to escape her cruel stepmother. Posing as a lady's maid, she seizes her chance at a glittering Yuletide house party thrown by the mysterious Duke of Hawthorne. But when it comes to secrets—and longing for a real-life fairytale—the duke and Estella have more in common than meets the eye . . .

Would it even be October is we didn't have an appearance of a Christmas anthology? An embroidery contest, a chick in pants, and a seamstress heroine from three established historical romance writers playing with the Cinderella trope for the holiday season.

To all the Earls I've Loved Before by Emma Orchard

Bianca Constantine has no intention of surrendering her freedom to marriage. Newly wealthy and determined to make her name as an artist, she plans to avoid the dangers of Society altogether – until a chance encounter with a charming young lord draws her back into London’s glittering world.

Commissioned to paint the boy’s portrait, Bianca expects nothing more scandalous than long afternoons in an elegant townhouse. Instead, she comes face to face with the one man she hoped never to see again.

The summer Bianca spent in Venice with Xan Challender was filled with passion, freedom, and lies. She never told him she was an heiress. He never revealed that he was set to inherit an earldom.

Now Xan has returned to England to claim his title, and neither has forgotten the betrayal that tore them apart – or the desire that still burns between them.

What happened in Venice should stay in Venice - but some secrets are just too explosive to stay hidden...

She's an artist with no interest in marriage who takes a commission to paint a portrait, only to be reunited with the man she spent an unforgettable summer in Venice with. A man who has absolutely no clue that she's an heiress and who never told her he's the heir to an earldom. Whoops.

Spirits and Scandals by Ginny B. Moore

He doesn't believe in spirits. She doesn't believe in love. The ghosts are about to prove both of them wrong.

Phineas Cavendish, Earl of Valebrook, refuses to be fooled by another charlatan. Four years a widower with no patience for grief or grifters, he arrives at the haunted Ashveil Manor with one goal—expose the famous medium within as a fraud.

Bridget Murphy doesn't have her grandmother's otherworldly gift. What she has is a quick wit and an elaborate system of tricks—none of which she’s proud of, but all of which have kept the family business running while her celebrity grandmother tours the country.

Then a storm washes out the road, trapping her in the house with the most infuriatingly handsome skeptic she’s ever met.

Bridget is prepared to keep up the ruse, but when the candles begin to extinguish themselves and objects move without explanation, her parlor tricks become unnecessary. And whatever is haunting them seems far more interested in pushing Phineas and Bridget together—repeatedly, inconveniently, and in increasingly compromising positions.

The final book in the Society of Scandal multi-author series features a fake medium heroine and a widower hero determined to unmask her as a fraud. Then a storm blows in and they're both trapped in a haunted manor together.....

Fields of Briar by Mae Moore

Trusting her heart again could bring her ruin.

Orris Gray was dragged away from her beloved Texas last season, and she did not simply arrive in London, she crashed into it, breaking the veneer of serenity, demanding to be heard, as is Orris’s way. In a city where reality is based on societal rules and those who remain within those narrow confines, she is determined to not only live on her own terms, but to love by them, too.

Abram McQueen was somewhat satisfied with his position as the spare heir, with no responsibilities and the ability to flit around the world exploring his love of painting. That is, until he finds himself embroiled in scandal—the murder of his dearest friend and servant—while rapidly falling for one of the beautiful Gray sisters.

As Abram searches for his valet’s killer while making every effort to subdue Orris’s desire to help, he discovers she won’t be pushed aside and is impossible to forget.

Can he protect her and bring the killer to justice? Has Orris fallen for the wrong type of man once more? Only time will tell.

The second book in the Arias and Alibies series features a Texas born heroine who crashes into London like a lightning bolt and a spare to the heir hero who just wants to paint but ends up embroiled with the heroine AND a murder. 

Guilty as Charmed by J.M. Diedrich

When Charlie Lambert, Scotland Yard's decorated detective chief inspector, receives an anonymous letter detailing a crime scheduled to occur at a dinner party, he knows what he has to do. Infiltrate the party. Apprehend the criminal. Stop the crime before it happens. His prime suspect: the hostess. A lady who's already gotten away with murder once.

Lady Hannah Hilary can’t afford to have Detective Inspector Lambert sniffing around her weekly parties--not with so many secrets surrounding her husband’s death. But sniff around he does…until his investigation transforms into something far more intimate--and more dangerous--than either anticipated. Hannah can’t fall for a man who would see her shackled and imprisoned if he ever learned her secrets. And yet…

As Hannah’s past and Charlie’s investigation grow ever more entwined, they risk their livelihoods for a chance at a love that should be impossible. But when a deadly third player enters the game, there's more than just their hearts on the line—it's their lives.

He's a Scotland Yard detective determined to infiltrate a dinner party and stop a crime he's been tipped off about - only to run up against the hostess, whose own notorious reputation has people believing she was responsible for her husband's death. He's on the hunt for justice and she's determined to keep her secrets well and truly buried. 

To Save a Rebel's Heart by Madelyn Grey

A widow determined to never love again… A war veteran who believes himself unlovable.

After sustaining a debilitating injury in the War for Independence, down-on-his-luck cobbler, Sylas Tidwell, craves a sense of purpose. He joins a group of privateers and sets sail overseas, but all is not well. Along the English coast, a group of marauders attack their ship, and lay waste to almost everyone on board.

Melanie Calstock, a widowed undertaker’s daughter with OCD, is prone to late nights due to her ever-present grief and racing mind. She overhears the commotion from the shore, and rushes down to investigate; upon finding Sylas’s unconscious, bleeding body, she notes the similarities between Sylas and her late husband’s wounds, and her loss resurfaces with a breathless intensity.

When Sylas awakens, he is intrigued by the peculiar woman at his side, but bemused by how even with his lighthearted quips, she remains cold and guarded. To him, her dismissive nature and her father’s overprotectiveness prove what he feared all along: the war has left him inhuman, monstrous, and unworthy of finding love.

Melanie, meanwhile, feels guilt for enjoying Sylas’s colorful sense of humor and impish mannerisms, and tries to withhold her affections. She does not wish to find love again – not when she already had a pure, beautiful romance. But when Sylas prepares to return home, Melanie must face the question she fears most: is it better to have loved and lost twice, or to take a chance on the one man who pumped her heart back to life?

The. Hero. Is. A. COBBLER!!!!  Ahem. Anyway, he's a wounded veteran of the American Revolution who takes up a new life as a smuggler and she's an undertaker's daughter who finds his unconscious body on the shore. This is the third book in the Heart's Rebellion series.

A Recipe for Love by Sara Adrien

A duke.

A baker's daughter.

And a secret that could destroy them both — or finally make her whole.

Chester Stockton, Duke of Wyndale, controls the flour that feeds London. He sets the policies, signs the circulars, and keeps the docks running like clockwork. What he doesn't do is lose his head over a woman behind a pastry counter. Until he does.

Lady Barbara Beaumont is everything society expects — polished, careful, perfectly behaved. What society doesn't know is that she slips away every morning to knead dough in her father's Harley Street pâtisserie, wage war on the Flour Duke in anonymous letters, and live the only life that feels real. She has managed the secret beautifully.

Then he walks through her door. Twice.

They shouldn't want each other. He is strangling her father's livelihood with a stroke of his pen on his policies. She is the last woman a duke should notice — with a limp, uncertain prospects, and a French baker for a father she is not supposed to have. But Chester sees both halves of her and wants them equally. And Pepper — because that is who she really is — is running out of reasons to keep him at arm's length.

When a royal tasting at the Brighton Pavilion drags her double life into the light, she will have to choose: the safety of the secret she has always kept, or the man who would ruin her reputation and love her with his whole heart.

First book in a new series, she's a Lady working in her father's bakery and he's a Duke whose control of the flour market is strangling the life out of her father's business. And, of course, they fall for each other. 

Devil in Her Details by Tanya Wilde

Striking up a deal with Brighton’s most dangerous devil seemed sensible at the time . . .

Sharp-tongued Lady Lilly Trenton, fond of creating exotic clothing for exotic purposes, retired from the season with one goal: Shake off a marquess who tried to trap her into marriage using the very hobby she loved and who refuses to give up his suit. Opening a milliner’s shop in Brighton seemed the perfect choice, until a scarred, black-clad stranger walks through her door determined to procure her services. How did this handsome, scarred rogue even know her secret? But when that pesky marquess darkens her doorstep once more, the devil makes an offer she simply can’t refuse . . .

Ruthless Dagger Fury, one of the seven bastard sons of the Duke of Crane, doesn’t do distractions—he certainly doesn’t do ladies of the ton. He has an empire to protect, a traitorous brother to hunt, and a family under siege from an uncle who’d see them all destroyed. But everything changes when a possible lead sends him to a milliner’s shop on North Street to investigate. What he finds is a suspicious beauty of the upper class and the last complication he needs. But in an effort to gain information, he promises to help her deal with a pest, and once he gives his word, he never breaks it.

As Lilly’s tormentor grows bolder and tension mounts under Dagger’s own roof, two people from opposite worlds must decide if the walls they’ve spent a lifetime perfecting are worth tearing down—for each other.

She's on the run from a marquess who won't take no for an answer and creating a new life for herself as a seamstress in Brighton. He's the bastard son of a Duke who has problems of his own, and then he agrees to help her, adding additional complications. This is the third book in the Bastards of Brighton series. 

A Lady's Guide to Mystery and Mischief by Isabella Kamal

She’ll do anything for love—even track down a thief.

It is the summer of 1847, and love-obsessed herbalist Farah Rafiq has made a discovery: that taciturn solicitor Grey Montgomery is the only thing standing between her and blissful matrimony. It has been two years since she agreed to a marriage of convenience with Francis Beaumont in hopes of squeezing a life-altering romance out of him, and with three to go, she is determined to take matters into her own hands. Knowing they cannot marry unless Francis’s inheritance is released, she packs her bags and makes her way to London to convince Mr. Montgomery to hand Francis the key to the family coffers—a task that would be made all the easier if Francis were anyone other than the cousin that Mr. Montgomery seems to harbor an intense hatred for…

Refusal comes easy to Grey Montgomery, who has emerged from decades of misery at the hands of his grandfather and cousin a disciplined, withdrawn man. To him, Farah is nothing more than a stubborn whirlwind who threatens to upend the fragile peace he’s surrounded himself with. A stubborn whirlwind with a dazzling smile and an irritating, unflappable cheer—and one he soon believes deserves far, far more than Francis could ever offer.

When a portion of Francis’s inheritance is stolen, Farah convinces Mr. Montgomery to help her solve the case. But their newfound proximity brings with it unexpected surprises, and Farah begins to wonder if her lifelong fixation on romance has been leading her astray. With matters growing more complicated by the moment, she must re-examine friendships, challenge her own views on love and, finally, find the courage to face the truth of her own heart.

She's determined to finally marry the man she loves and all she has to do is convince his obstinate cousin to turn over the keys to her true love's inheritance. Of course there's more to the story than our pretty herbalist realizes, and naturally the cousin, who at first sees her an unwanted annoyance, quickly realizes she deserves far, far better than what she's chasing after. This is the second book in the Protocols of Gentility series.

Serendipity's Suitor by Maeve Greyson

In the glittering heart of Mayfair, where reputations are currency and marriages are brokered like business deals, Lady Serendipity, Seri to those closest to her, has become a scandal of a different sort: unwed at nine and twenty, fiercely independent, and utterly unwilling to surrender her future to anything less than true love.

She has already done her duty. One by one, she helped her six sisters find love matches, fulfilling their late mother’s deathbed wish. But the final condition of the will remains unmet. Until Seri marries for love, her brother, the Duke of Broadmere, will never receive the entirety of his vast inheritance.

Now the Season is underway, and her brother is desperate.

There is only one problem.

The man who holds her heart is the one she can never have.

Alexander Sutherland is no aristocrat, no suitable match for a duke’s sister—only a brilliant, steadfast solicitor with no title to recommend him. Yet with him, Seri is truly seen and loved.

When a determined viscount sets his sights on her and moves to eliminate his rival, what begins as a battle for her hand becomes a threat to Alexander’s very life.

Now she faces an impossible choice: marry for duty and save the man she loves, or defy Society, risk her family’s reputation, and fight for a love that could destroy her and Alexander both.

The final book (7!) of the Seven Unsuitable Sisters series features the very definition of a spinster heroine (29!) who has seen all her sisters suitable married to true love matches. She wants nothing less for herself, which is a problem since if she remains unwed, her Duke brother will not receive the entirety of his inheritance, and she's madly in love with a wholly unsuitable man, a mere solicitor! 

And there we have it, 16 new Unusual Historicals to pique your interest and whet your appetite for autumn evenings reading. What books are you looking forward to picking up?

#TBRChallenge 2026: Bad Date

The Book: Bad Date by Ellery Lloyd

The Particulars: Thriller short story (58 pages), Amazon Original Stories, 2025, Digital Only

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: I subscribe to Amazon Prime, which means I can take part in Amazon's monthly First Reads program. Sometimes a bonus short story is included, of which this was one back in August 2025. 

The Review: So, it finally happened. After six years, which included the height of the pandemic when I was regularly still reporting to the office, I finally caught COVID. I have no experience but from what I can gather it's largely been a mild case. Spiked a fever at one point, but things seem isolated to general fatigue and feeling like I have a very bad sinus cold / virus. But this development, on top of the fact that I'm in the reading slump from hell, has meant I was fully expecting to miss my own TBR Challenge deadline - which just looks bad for the hostess even though I always tell everyone that this Challenge is meant to be "low stress."  Well folks, that's why Baby Jesus invented short stories and novellas. So I went diving into my Kindle app and dug up this short story (58 pages!) that fit this month's The Hunt theme perfectly.  The official blurb is as follows:

Fay Roper is a divorced single mom and a globally famous actress. She’s also unlucky in love. Maybe because the last thing Fay wants in a man is yet another superfan. But somehow, every time she has a boyfriend who isn’t a stalker, he abruptly disappears from her life. With the help of her best friend and right-hand woman, Poppy, Fay decides to change the game and join an exclusive new dating app under a false identity. A subscriber named Oliver takes the bait. But Oliver likes to play games too. And only one of them can win.

What the blurb leaves out? Fay's acting career is well past skidding into a ravine. Looking to make over her former child-star image she took on more "serious" roles, which were not kindly received. Her first marriage, to an older and abusive fading action star, ended in divorce and she got sole custody of their son Wolf. Through it all is Poppy, her BFF and personal assistant who is helping her navigate the dating app waters which they are using for fodder for their podcast series (because, of course). But it soon becomes clear that there's more here than meets the eye. Fay and Poppy have ulterior motives, as does her latest "match" Oliver. The question is, which hunter will come out on top?

The way the authors (this is a husband and wife team) lay out the story is rather clever. As the reader you immediately know not to take anything at face value and the authors keep you on the line by dropping little juicy breadcrumbs to reveal more behind everyone's various motives. The problem? None of these people are terribly likeable. Poppy the personal assistant is probably as close as we get, but even she's sticking her head in the sand about a lot. Ultimately the character we're expecting to get their comeuppance gets it, but there's still a rather disconcerting realization that while that "bad person" is dealt with, another character who has committed MULTIPLE MURDERS is just allowed to have that all swept under the rug. It's the stuff horror movies are made of y'all - truly. 

So where does this leave me? Not terribly satisfied but there's enough juice in the writing of this short story that I wouldn't necessarily be opposed to trying a full-length suspense novel by these authors. That said, I'd walk into that experience likely a bit leery that the promise of a fully righted universe might not be forthcoming.

Final Grade = C-

Reminder: #TBRChallenge Day is October 21

I'm not sure how 2026 can feel like it's flown by but also feel like it's been the longest year in the history of the world, but here we are in OCTOBER! We're down to the final three months of the TBR Challenge folks, which means it's time for me to think about planning for 2027 - gah!

This month's challenge is set for October 21 and the optional theme is The Hunt. I think this theme is a lot of fun because on the surface it seems pretty straight-forward for October - The Hunt = romantic suspense. Serial killers, characters in danger, characters looking to solve a mystery of some sort etc. But wait, you could also choose a historical romance, say a hero or heroine who is desperately looking to get married for XYZ Romancelandia Reason or a heroine trying to dodge her matchmaking mama and "ruin herself" with a Romancelandia Duke of Slut (of which there seem to be plenty to choose from).  This is a theme that you can tinker around with a bit.

That said, I can totally understand not having the bandwidth to deal with a theme right now. Sometimes you just gotta go to the TBR and grab the first book that piques your interest. That's OK! The goal of the Challenge is to read something, anything, that has been languishing.

It's never too late to sign up for the Challenge.  You can learn more about it, and see a list of who is participating, over at the #TBRChallenge 2026 information page.

Library Loot Review: Girl Dinner

I don't think as readers that we talk enough about how the format in which we consume a story can effect our ultimate outcome with said story. Take Girl Dinner by Olivie Blake. I knew within the first 10% of this story that had I tried to eyeball read it I would end up DNF'ing it. But, strangely enough, it kept me engaged on audio, even though this ultimately ended up being a disappointing read. To explain the why, I'm going to do something I rarely do with my reviews - I'm posting the cover blurb verbatim:

Good girls deserve a treat.

Every member of The House, the most exclusive sorority on campus, and all its alumni, are beautiful, high-achieving, and universally respected.

After a freshman year she would rather forget, sophomore Nina Kaur knows being one of the chosen few accepted into The House is the first step in her path to the brightest possible future. Once she's taken into their fold, the House will surely ease her fears of failure and protect her from those who see a young woman on her own as easy prey.

Meanwhile, adjunct professor Dr. Sloane Hartley is struggling to return to work after accepting a demotion to support her partner's new position at the cutthroat University. After 18 months at home with her newborn daughter, Sloane's clothes don’t fit right, her girl-dad husband isn’t as present as he thinks he is, and even the few hours a day she's apart from her child fill her psyche with paralyzing ennui. When invited to be The House’s academic liaison, Sloane enviously drinks in the way the alumnae seem to have it all, achieving a level of collective perfection that Sloane so desperately craves.

As Nina and Sloane each get drawn deeper into the arcane rituals of the sisterhood, they learn that living well comes with bloody costs. And when they are finally invited to the table, they will have to decide just how much they can stomach in the name of solidarity and power.

If you read this and immediately thought "Dark Academia" and/or "Horror" - you would, sadly be mistaken. What it is is Contemporary Fiction masquerading as satire with one (yes, one) horror element. Blake backs into a delightfully compelling set up (sorority girls achieving it all thanks to cannibalism) but instead we get a litany of feminist current events (yes, it's depressing), girl bosses, trad wives, and the erosion of women's rights. Honestly I don't need a novel for this - I can just read the news and scroll social media, two things I probably need to be doing less of for my own mental health. 

We never really get much in the way of Nina's freshman year she would rather forget, and it's hard to sympathize with Sloane who won't tell her POS husband how much of a POS he is to his face. She instead just silently stews while she internally muses. She doesn't tell him she's drowning. She doesn't tell him she needs help. Instead of coming out and saying it, she tap-dances around it and he goes on being blithely clueless because...he's a man.

It's a lot of set-up. A LOT. The cannibalism revelation, which we all know is coming thanks to the back cover blurb, doesn't get revealed until 60%. And then it's largely hand-waved away by Nina and Sloane, while having a token moment of being horrified and disgusted, starts puzzling it out like the sociologist she is and we end up with a travesty of an ending - one that doesn't involve her gutting her husband whose sins eventually spill out into the open. 

Ultimately, here's the thing, I was invested enough to keep listening to this on audio but I was rewriting it in my head the whole time. What this could have been had the satire been biting and the author had leaned in hard on the horror the elements. A horror novel about cannibal sorority girls with a backdrop of biting satire about current events and the state of feminism?  Yes please. Instead we get a book that basically tells the reader that women can't have it all unless they become cannibals - and even then, do they really have it all? There's no righting of the universe here, it's just depressing.

Final Grade = C- 

Review: The Murder at World's End

Ever start a book and right from the jump you just know you're in for a delightful time? That was me with The Murder at World's End by Ross Montegomery, and I have AztecLady to thank for the experience. Well over a year ago now, she stumbled across the book on Netgalley and pointed it out to me thinking it sounded like something I might enjoy. She was right. 

The publisher marketed this as Knives Out meets Downton Abbey and that's a fairly apt description. It's 1910 in Cornwall and Stephen Pike is making his way to Tithe Hall (AKA World's End) with a letter from a do-gooder society promising him employment. Stephen is fresh out of prison and desperate for a second chance, but when he arrives he finds the butler wasn't expecting him and the house in an uproar. The house is in a state because Halley's Comet is approaching and the master of the house is convinced there will be catastrophic repercussions. Remember Y2K? That's kind of what we're talking about here. Every half-baked and ludicrous "scientific theory" is being touted by the Viscount who has ordered the house be sealed from top to bottom. Family, servants, everybody, will be locked in their rooms for the night, with every crevice sealed from the inside (candle wax in the key holes, cotton batting used under doors, windows and chimneys boarded up etc.). 

The butler is a Christian man, and frankly is desperate for the help, so Stephen squeaks into a job by the skin of his teeth. He's the new second footman (not the under butler as the blurb suggests!) and between preparing the house for the end of the world as they know it, he's tasked with keeping Miss Decima out of everybody's hair. Aunt Decima is an elderly maiden aunt who terrifies everyone in the household and is a trial for her family. What Aunt Decima really is is an intelligent, spinster woman who doesn't suffer fools - and frankly she's surrounded by nothing but fools. I mean, no wonder she's cranky.

Halley's Comet appears and naturally nothing happens. The rivers don't start running backwards, the gas from the comet doesn't permeate the Earth's atmosphere and asphyxiate people etc. This is also when Stephen learns how he came to be summoned to Tithe Hall, but I won't give it away. Anyway, it's the next morning when he's tasked to unseal the Viscount's study where he spent the night and gasp! There's the Viscount, sitting in his desk chair, with a crossbow bolt through one of his eyes. The man is dead - murdered in the locked study sometime during the night. And Stephen, having only been a member of staff for 24 hours, and with a prison record, he might as well have scapegoat tattooed on his forehead.

Stephen's alibi is Miss Decima, and while she loathed her idiot nephew, she also was incapable of committing the murder due to physical limitations. The local law isn't much help and the detective from Scotland Yard turns out to be an idiot, so there's nothing for it - she'll have to solve the murder herself, but she'll need help - which means Stephen.

I really enjoyed this unconventional crime solving duo, but I can see how they may not work for every reader. The nice way to describe Stephen is "he lacks confidence." The sort of bloke who embarrasses and blushes easily. How this guy survived prison is another mystery. Aunt Decima vacillates between Humorously Disagreeable and Just Plain Disagreeable. She also comes off as a know-it-all but will begrudgingly offer praise and admiration when warranted - it's just in her experience she's not use to it being warranted. I don't see any in-between here - readers are either going to love them or loathe them with no middle ground.

Is there anything better than a locked room mystery? Honestly, not much and Montegomery really sinks his teeth into it by also having the house be on an island that is inaccessible during high tide when the causeway floods. When looking up more information about this book, there was more than on instance of "Golden Age" being used as a descriptor and certainly the author plays up all the hallmarks of what makes a "Golden Age Mystery." That said, when something is described as such, there are certain expectations by some readers - namely, language. Y'all Miss Decima swears like a sailor on shore leave. Look, I admired the colorful use of expletives, but if you're a reader who wants a "Golden Age Mystery" but gets their nose out of joint over the use of the f-word, don't say I didn't warn you. I have a theory Montegomery included Miss Decima's frustrated expletives because it's his first adult book - having previously only published children's fiction. He likely had a stock pile of f-bombs just dying to get out before he exploded 😂.

There's plenty of red herrings and blind alleys to keep the reader guessing although I'll admit I'm a bit ashamed of myself for not puzzling the whole thing out sooner. I mean, I really should have - but I'm chalking this up to the author doing a good job in providing enough potential theories as distractions that I was a slow on the uptake. Including Halley's Comet as background was inspired (and very interesting!) and oh happy day, there's going to be a book two featuring our unconventional sleuthing duo. One of my better reads so far this year and a dynamite listen on audiobook.

Final Grade = B+