Bookish Travels—October 2022 Destinations

I saw this meme on It’s All About Books and thought, I like this!! So, I decided to do it once a month also. Many thanks to Yvonne for originally posting this!!

This post is what it says: Places I travel to in books each month. Books are wonderful and take you to places you would never get a chance to go. That includes places of fantasy too!!

So….enjoy!! Please let me know if you have read these books or traveled to these areas (other than the fantasy….lol).


Here’s where I traveled in October:

United Kingdom:

Various fictional areas of England

London

London


United States

Phoenix, Arizona
Pennsylvania and Connecticut
Texas, Arizona, Washington State (mountains/coast)
Woodlake, New Hampshire
North Boston, Massachusetts
Herber, Arizona
Denver, Colorado
Pennsylvania and Connecticut

Massachusetts (Boston), California (Los Angeles, San Diego), Oregon (Portland), North Carolina (Sugar Mountain, Asheville), New York (New York City, Atlantic West), Florida (Tampa area, Jacksonville, Nassau), Colorado (Montlake), Montana (Polson), New Jersey (Northside), Georgia (Fulton County), Ohio (Dayton), Texas (Fort Worth),


The Mirror Realm

Various locations in the Mirror Realm

France

Paris

Fantasy China

The Grass Sea and various cities

Fantasy Japan/Southeast Asia/maybe China


Outer Space

The Ark

Ellwyn

Country of Ellwyn


St. Thomas

Indigo Royal Resort


Australia

Peridot Island


Canada

Vancouver

October 2022 Wrap Up

October was a busy month for me reading/writing reviews. I finally feel that I am getting back to where I was preCovid!!

Here is what I read/posted in October.

As always, let me know if you have read any of these books and (if you did) what you thought of them.


Books I Read:


Books I got from NetGalley:


Books I got from Authors/Indie Publishers:


Books Reviewed

Nightmares & Daydreams by Dominic J. Anton (review here)

The Lost Son by Aidan Lucid (review here)

The Man without Shelter by Indrajit Gara (review here)

Fleshed Out by Rob Ulitski (review here)

Big Summer by Jennifer Weiner (review here)

Steel Fear by Brandon Webb and John David Mann (review here)

The Last Huntress by Lenore Borja (review coming November 1st)

Alias Emma by Ava Glass (review coming November 2nd)

Locklands by Robert Jackson Bennett (review here)

A Broken Clock Never Boils by C.J. Weiss (review coming November 3rd)

A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor (review coming November 8th)

WWW Wednesday: October 19th, 2022

WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Sam at Taking on a World of Words.

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?


Personal:

  • Thursday, I took Vinnie in to get neutered. The plan was to drop him off at 7:30 and pick him up between 4-5:30. Drop off went fine (except he cried the entire car ride down). Pick-up was a little different. I had Miss R with me (I came straight from school), and she was a freaking handful. She didn’t want to wait and freaked out because a bee was flying outside the car (but she wouldn’t roll up the window). We got Vinnie, and Miss R said, “Mom, he smells like pee.” I get him home, let him out of the carrier, and he is soaked in pee. His belly (including where they tattooed him), legs, neuter site, and tail were sopping wet, and there was a ton of pee in the bottom of the carrier (with two puppy pads in there). BK and I were furious. On top of that, when I looked over his paperwork, it looked like they had forgotten his microchip. So, I am not too thrilled with our local Humane Society. He was starving (he had had no food since 9 pm on Wednesday) and thirsty. I was also concerned where he got neutered would get infected at the worse and burned by the pee at the best. Thankfully, it has healed up nicely.
  • Friday was a chill day for me. Miss R didn’t have horseback riding (her instructor is on vacation). We went to Sams Club after Mr. Z and Miss B got home from school. I had one of their hot dogs for dinner, which was delicious!!!
  • Saturday, we drove up to Blowing Rock/Boone to drive on the Blue Ridge Parkway to leaf peep (which, I am told, is a northeastern thing to say). I haven’t been since we moved here, and I loved it. The colors were gorgeous.
  • Sunday, BK left for a business trip. The company owner was touring the different stores the product was in. I did feel bad for him. His flight was at 630, and he landed at 930 (he had a layover). He didn’t get to the hotel until 1030 and had to be up by 530 to drive to the store. When I talked to him that night, he was exhausted.
  • Monday, I talked to the Humane Society about Vinnie’s microchip. They apologized, and I was able to book an appointment to have it inserted in two weeks. The woman who booked the appointment did try to charge me for it, and I argued (because I already paid in August) that I did and had the paperwork to prove it. She finally looked up his records and agreed with me. But I am taking the paperwork they gave me (with the receipt stapled to it), just in case.
  • Miss R had an unmounted lesson Monday afternoon. She was supposed to have a regular lesson with a trainer she doesn’t like on Wednesday. I was able to cancel that, and the barn owner asked if she wanted an unmounted lesson. She learned about bits, the bridle, and how to control the horse.
  • Tuesday, I did nothing except laundry and Grub Hub Wendy’s to me. I also bought the newest DLC for my Planet Zoo game. They now have wombats, foxes, skunks, raccoons, and flying foxes. So, guess what I played after all my chores were done…lol.
  • I am super excited because NetGalley granted me a wish. I never wish for books, but when I saw this one and read the blurb, I knew I had to. What book was it? The Ferryman by Justin Cronin. I can’t wait to read this!!!
  • I also finished reading The Spear Cuts Through Water on Tuesday. I started it last Thursday. Good book but super long.

So that’s the essential things for this past week. How was your week?

As always, let me know if you have read or are planning to read any of these books!!


What I Recently Finished Reading:

Finley Reeves is the queen of bad mistakes. Fresh off a bad divorce, she decides to rebuild her life from the ground up – starting with a fixer-upper that’s got more leaks than the Titanic. Deciding to tackle this project alone might be her biggest mistake of all…. That is until Noah Thompson shows up at her front door like a knight in a shining tool belt and makes her an offer she’d be crazy to refuse.

Noah’s sexy, rugged, and good with his hands, but Finley swears she doesn’t need his help – in the basement, or in the bedroom. Can this unlikely couple build a future together? Or will this be one fixer-upper that is better off left alone?

(A fun and sexy Contemporary Romance, ages 17+.)


What I am currently reading:

Stefano Vanzetti.

You’d have to be living under a rock if you grew up in northern Boston and didn’t know who he is. He’s the heartthrob of every Italian girl in my neighborhood, the man who’s probably had your daughter roll through his sheets at least once, the devilishly handsome mysterious man with dark brown eyes that gave you nightmares, and yes, every horrible thing you’ve probably heard about him is very much true.

Did I also mention he destroyed my dreams and aspirations in life when he asked my father for my hand in marriage?

We will not be silent.
We will not stand down.
We are furious.
We are the storm.

More than forty of your favorite authors have gotten together to create an anthology where 100% of the proceeds go toward charities fighting for our reproductive rights.

Participating Authors
Alexandria Bishop :: :: Karina Halle:: Amelia Wilde :: Amie Knight :: Anna B. Doe :: Anna Edwards :: Anne Malcom :: Anne Mercier :: Bella Matthews :: BT Urruela :: Cali Melle :: Carly Phillips :: Cassandra Robbins :: Claire Hastings :: Clarissa Wild :: Sandy Alvarez and Crystal Daniels :: Danielle Pearl :: Darcy Rose :: Dee Palmer :: Dove Cavanaugh King :: Eden Summers :: Ella Fields :: Evie Mitchell :: Giana Darling :: Hannah McBride :: India R Adams :: Ivy Fox :: Jack Davenport :: Jenika Snow :: Jessica Gadziala :: Kat T. Masen :: KL Donn :: LP Lovell and Stevie J Cole :: Max Henry :: Nicole Blanchard :: Nikki Belaire :: Piper Davenport :: Sade Rena :: Saffron A. Kent :: Samantha Young :: Sarah Bale :: Serena Akeroyd :: Sierra Glass :: Skye Warren :: Susanne Valenti and Caroline Peckham :: Willow Winters


What books I think I’ll read next:

IS IT MADNESS OR THE SUPERNATURAL?

Psychiatrist Claire Rossi seeks cases nobody else can treat—cases like her mother’s, whose misdiagnosis of schizophrenia and subsequent death inspired Claire’s career. Initially infatuated with an influx of seemingly schizophrenic patients, interest turns to terror as their ailments infect her too. She sees and hears a man who grows more violent with every encounter. The analysis and training she’s relied on her whole career fail to explain his presence, leaving only one conclusion: that what haunts her isn’t in her head at all. But maybe that’s just what she wants to believe.

As her symptoms escalate, she’s left with two unsettling clues. Her mother speaks to her in twisted idioms, and a mysterious letter taunts her with a single line:

Enjoy your gifts.

Detective Wade’s search for her sister leads to an abandoned building and a man with two teens, a fierce battle where light poles bend like pipe cleaners, and twenty-six unmarked shallow graves.

A sibling addicted to extreme sports used to be her biggest challenge. Now fate has chosen to widen her horizons and test her unique psychic skill set. With her Bernese mountain dog by her side, they must fathom friend from foe while staying one step ahead of the organization responsible for kidnapping those with psychic abilities.

Parker Ratham’s goal of locating psychically talented teens and adults held prisoner takes him deep into the Connecticut forests. On a stormy night, he crosses paths not only with a serial killer, but also a young teen running from unknown assassins.

Each must learn to trust and work as a unit while staying ahead of those seeking to capture or kill. 

Bradley Pay is back with a jaw-dropping sequel to The Killings Begin! Travel across the world and dive into the complex hearts and minds of Tracey Lauch and a cast of unsuspecting new characters in Death in a Dark Alley. Boasting the Spectrum Series’ iconic fusion of contemporary romance and psychological suspense, Bradley Pay has created another tangled web of love, loss, and an insatiable desire to kill.

Tracey Lauch may be a murderer, but he is still a man. Although his childhood abandonment trauma began decades ago, now his compulsion to strangle women who resemble his mother has begun to evolve. Outrunning his past, embracing love in the present, and creating a future free of investigation proves increasingly complicated.

Isabelle’s life in Brazil is burdened with mistakes and abandonment, too – but not in the same way. She falls in love with all the wrong men at all the wrong times, and her best friend Frank shows his true colors when, over and over again, he is not there for her when she needs him most. Aside from the stark difference that Isabelle is not a murderer, she and Tracey both desire love, a life partner, and the warmth of a family. 

But what does Isabelle’s story have to do with Tracey? How can an innocent trip to Strasbourg, France, become a heart-stopping event that changes their lives forever?

Peek behind the curtains of this cold-case investigation and catch an intimate glimpse inside the characters’ lives.

When Marchioness Lamberico fails to conceive a child, she solicits the help of Imelda, the village witch. Nine months later, she gives birth to a baby girl. Biancabella. Though perfect in every other way, the infant is born with a snake wrapped around her neck. To the relief of the marchioness, the creature vanishes at once and, in the joy of motherhood, is soon forgotten. When Biancabella is a young girl, the snake reappears and explains their uncommon sisterhood. Samaritana helps Biancabella unlock her magical gifts and asserts that so long as they are together, all will be well. Their close, though secret, relationship unites them above all others. Years pass, the sisters contented, until the day King Ferrandino of Naples arrives, seeking Biancabella’s hand in marriage. What follows shatters the sisters’ bond, leading to misfortune and betrayal, which forces them to grapple with not only the loss of their connection, but leaves each fighting for her life. Loosely based on the Italian fairy tale Biancabella and the Snake, the story explores how the love can transform from a domineering and covetous power to authenticity and, ultimately, redemption.

WWW Wednesday: October 12th, 2022

WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Sam at Taking on a World of Words.

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?


Personal:

  • I got to see my friend, who I have known since 6th grade (so over 30 years). She was driving to Florida with her husband and stopped in my neck of North Carolina for 2 days. It was a super nice visit.
  • Friday, we went to our city’s Oktoberfest. This is the first time since Covid that the city has had it. I loved it. Our city has a social area, and people carried their drinks within those boundaries. There were a lot of stalls with various crafts. I got a cat mom sticker to put on my car…lol. The highlight of the night was the petting zoo. Everyone had a blast.
  • We didn’t do much over the weekend. We went grocery shopping (and went to the new Piggly Wiggly that opened up) and just hung out. I played Sims 4 all weekend (FYI: if you have Sims 4 and play on Origin, they were moving all accounts to EA).
  • I took Tony to the vet on Monday to get his second set of kitten shots. He was a whopping 4.75lbs and perfectly healthy. The vet did have some concerns with his paws (we do, too), but she advised us to keep an eye on them.
  • I didn’t get a lot of reading done last week. The book I just finished, The Art of Prophecy, is about 500 pages, and it took me forever to get through it. I liked it, but it was long.
  • I haven’t been updating older posts, either. But, after I publish this post, I plan on starting that back up again.

So that’s the essential things for this past week. How was your week?

As always, let me know if you have read or are planning to read any of these books!!


What I Recently Finished Reading:

An epic fantasy ode to martial arts and magic—the story of a spoiled hero, an exacting grandmaster, and an immortal god-king from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Lives of Tao.

It has been foretold: A child will rise to defeat the Eternal Khan, a cruel immortal god-king, and save the kingdom.

The hero: Jian, who has been raised since birth in luxury and splendor, celebrated before he has won a single battle.

But the prophecy was wrong.

Because when Taishi, the greatest war artist of her generation, arrives to evaluate the prophesied hero, she finds a spoiled brat unprepared to face his destiny.

But the only force more powerful than fate is Taishi herself. Possessed of an iron will, a sharp tongue—and an unexpectedly soft heart—Taishi will find a way to forge Jian into the weapon and leader he needs to be in order to fulfill his legend.

What follows is a journey more wondrous than any prophecy can foresee: a story of master and student, assassin and revolutionary, of fallen gods and broken prophecies, and of a war between kingdoms, and love and friendship between deadly rivals.


What I am currently reading:

It is 1889 in Philadelphia, and detective John Doyle is restless. Along with his miserable partner, Thomas Braham, Doyle pursues mysteries, strange sightings, and other obscurities tossed aside and disregarded by the police. For years, Doyle has taken on these cases in the hopes of discovering something supernatural – something that could upend and dispute his long-standing, debilitating fear that immortal souls do not exist.

Doyle’s search for the supernatural remains unsuccessful until he receives a strange letter from an old doctor friend regarding a young woman with a mysterious and rather disturbing illness. When the doctor goes missing in the same town that this young woman resides in, Doyle and Braham decide to take on the case and search for clues regarding their missing friend. In doing so, they discover that there is no longer any suffering young woman, but a dangerous abomination whose origin cannot be explained by science nor modern medicine.

Meanwhile, an unnamed victim has been kidnapped. Trapped in a cell with nothing but a journal to document their experiences, this mysterious Prisoner must undergo terrifying scientific experiments while trying not to lose all hope and sanity.

Inspired by the works of renowned horror and mystery writers like Stephen King, Edgar Allen Poe, and Arthur Conan Doyle, The Prisoner of Fear brilliantly weaves questions of mortality and the human propensity for evil into a truly intriguing, unique, and frightening narrative.

Ohioana Book Award finalist Ruth Emmie Lang returns with a new cast of ordinary characters with extraordinary abilities.

Five years ago, Nora Wilder disappeared. The older of her two daughters, Zadie, should have seen it coming, because she can literally see things coming. But not even her psychic abilities were able to prevent their mother from vanishing one morning.

Zadie’s estranged younger sister, Finn, can’t see into the future, but she has an uncannily good memory, so good that she remembers not only her own memories, but the echoes of memories other people have left behind. On the afternoon of her graduation party, Finn is seized by an “echo” more powerful than anything she’s experienced before: a woman singing a song she recognizes, a song about a bird…

When Finn wakes up alone in an aviary with no idea of how she got there, she realizes who the memory belongs to: Nora.

Now, it’s up to Finn to convince her sister that not only is their mom still out there, but that she wants to be found. Against Zadie’s better judgement, she and Finn hit the highway, using Finn’s echoes to retrace Nora’s footsteps and uncover the answer to the question that has been haunting them for years: Why did she leave?

But the more time Finn spends in their mother’s past, the harder it is for her to return to the present, to return to herself. As Zadie feels her sister start to slip away, she will have to decide what lengths she is willing to go to to find their mother, knowing that if she chooses wrong, she could lose them both for good.


What books I think I’ll read next:

Bradley Pay is back with a jaw-dropping sequel to The Killings Begin! Travel across the world and dive into the complex hearts and minds of Tracey Lauch and a cast of unsuspecting new characters in Death in a Dark Alley. Boasting the Spectrum Series’ iconic fusion of contemporary romance and psychological suspense, Bradley Pay has created another tangled web of love, loss, and an insatiable desire to kill.

Tracey Lauch may be a murderer, but he is still a man. Although his childhood abandonment trauma began decades ago, now his compulsion to strangle women who resemble his mother has begun to evolve. Outrunning his past, embracing love in the present, and creating a future free of investigation proves increasingly complicated.

Isabelle’s life in Brazil is burdened with mistakes and abandonment, too – but not in the same way. She falls in love with all the wrong men at all the wrong times, and her best friend Frank shows his true colors when, over and over again, he is not there for her when she needs him most. Aside from the stark difference that Isabelle is not a murderer, she and Tracey both desire love, a life partner, and the warmth of a family. 

But what does Isabelle’s story have to do with Tracey? How can an innocent trip to Strasbourg, France, become a heart-stopping event that changes their lives forever?

Peek behind the curtains of this cold-case investigation and catch an intimate glimpse inside the characters’ lives.

Two warriors shepherd an ancient god across a broken land to end the tyrannical reign of a royal family in this new epic fantasy from the author of The Vanished Birds.

The people suffer under the centuries-long rule of the Moon Throne. The royal family—the despotic emperor and his monstrous sons, the Three Terrors—hold the countryside in their choking grip. They bleed the land and oppress the citizens with the frightful powers they inherited from the god locked under their palace.

But that god cannot be contained forever.

With the aid of Jun, a guard broken by his guilt-stricken past, and Keema, an outcast fighting for his future, the god escapes from her royal captivity and flees from her own children, the triplet Terrors who would drag her back to her unholy prison. And so it is that she embarks with her young companions on a five-day pilgrimage in search of freedom—and a way to end the Moon Throne forever. The journey ahead will be more dangerous than any of them could have imagined.

Both a sweeping adventure story and an intimate exploration of identity, legacy, and belonging, The Spear Cuts Through Water is an ambitious and profound saga that will transport and transform you—and is like nothing you’ve ever read before.

Finley Reeves is the queen of bad mistakes. Fresh off a bad divorce, she decides to rebuild her life from the ground up – starting with a fixer-upper that’s got more leaks than the Titanic. Deciding to tackle this project alone might be her biggest mistake of all…. That is, until Noah Thompson shows up at her front door like a knight in a shining tool belt and makes her an offer she’d be crazy to refuse.

Noah’s sexy, rugged, and good with his hands, but Finley swears she doesn’t need his help – in the basement, or in the bedroom. Can this unlikely couple build a future together? Or will this be one fixer-upper that is better off left alone?

Stefano Vanzetti.

You’d have to be living under a rock if you grew up in northern Boston and didn’t know who he is. He’s the heartthrob of every Italian girl in my neighborhood, the man who’s probably had your daughter roll through his sheets at least once, the devilishly handsome mysterious man with dark brown eyes that gave you nightmares, and yes, every horrible thing you’ve probably heard about him is very much true.

Did I also mention he destroyed my dreams and aspirations in life when he asked my father for my hand in marriage?

When Seventeen year old Winter Merrill was compelled to make a bargain with the mysterious Secret Keeper, she knew there were rules. The most important one, the next time you have a secret, you will not be able to tell it….even if you try.
What she didn’t know is that her next secret if not told, would destroy her life and the life of Liam, the only boy she ever loved. Can Winter find a way out of the dark bargain that binds her tongue or will her deal with the Secret Keeper bring devastating consequences unimaginable even to her?

October 2022 TBR

September was a fast month, but it seemed to slow down with the kids being in school again. It was hot here, but the weather cooled down as September ended. It went from being in the ’90s to being in the ’60s within a week (or so it seems). I am enjoying it (not a fan of hot weather here).

This month’s list is rather short. I finished up September’s TBR early and got to work on October’s. Now, saying that I will have a bunch of requests….lol.

So, here’s this month’s TBR list. Let me know if you have read any of them!!


This was an author request. I figured that October would be a perfect month to read it. It certainly looks spooky!!
This was a pleasant surprise. I got it in the mail yesterday. I can’t wait to see where this book is going to take me (location-wise and other)
I have been waiting on this book for a little bit. The publisher prefers to mail paperbacks, and I should get mine next week.
A book from my TBR. I will not be reviewing.
Another from my TBR. Will not be reviewing.
From my TBR. I will not be reviewing.
From my TBR. Will not be reviewing.