Hello friends, happy Wednesday! I’m posting this a day later than I usually do because I really wanted to post my TV Tuesday post yesterday for Halloween. I hope you’re all doing well and had a good month; I can’t believe we’re wrapping up yet another month, but let’s get into it!

Currently Reading:

Pet Sematary by: Stephen King. I’m coming up to the end of this book and it’s been dark – darker than I thought this was going to get. This talks about death in ways you don’t normally think about and I’ve been enjoying the way this makes you think; it’s also really tense and suspenseful – I just want to know how this ends!

The Divine Comedy: Inferno by: Dante. This is my next classic read and I’ve been so fascinated by the depths of hell this goes to and the different stops we’ve been taking. This is volume 1 of 3 of the Divine Comedy and I can’t wait to keep exploring more.

Hotline by: Dimitri Nasrallah. This is my next Canada Reads book. This one was short-listed and I’ve been enjoying it. I like how fast-paced it is and reading along this woman’s life who immigrated from Lebanon to Quebec, Canada. It’s been such an interesting read. Just like recent past books, this one has me interested in Canada’s history and now I’m in the process of formulating a new project. 😅

What I’ve Read:

100/100 – I hit my Goodreads/StoryGraph goal, woohoo! 🎉

One of Us Is Back by: Karen M. McManus. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ This was an interesting way to end the trilogy. I enjoyed it for the most part, but I felt some parts didn’t feel very believable.

Little Broken Things by: Nicole Baart. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ I wanted to like this more than I did; it had a good story, but it got lost trying to be a mystery/thriller.

Swearing is Good For You by: Emma Byrne. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ This had interesting concepts and was a quick read but it didn’t really explain why swearing is good for us.

Wide Sargasso Sea by: Jean Rhys. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ I enjoyed this, but I wanted more. I also thought it got a little disjointed by the end. I look forward to reading Jane Eyre though.

Zara Hossain Is Here by: Sabina Khan. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This was an important, impactful read, with food descriptions that are SO good and comforting!

Finding Edward by: Sheila Murray. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This was such a moving story with a lot of Canadian history that is often times forgotten or ignored; highly enjoyed!

Deceptions by: Kelley Armstrong. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ This was the weakest novel in this series so far – I wanted to like it, but the love triangle that was trying to form was not it.

Rilla of Ingleside by: L.M. Montgomery. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ The final novel in the Anne of Green Gables series and this took me back to what I loved in the first few novels. I was happy the series ended the way it did.

Red Clocks by: Leni Zumas. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ This is a very politically charged novel about women’s reproductive rights. It made me feel a lot of different ways, and the way this was written was sorta strange; I don’t know how else to explain in such a small space. I didn’t hate this, and I could see what the author was trying to do, but I didn’t always like it.

Links to my my blog posts this past month:

Links to posts I enjoyed around the blogosphere:

The Orangutan Librarian talked about why Shakespeare still matters.

Stephanie @The Abundant Word posted 6 empowering books for World Black Mental Health Day.

Sofi @A Book. A Thought is back!! She posted her welcome back post.

This month has felt like a roller coaster. It started off so good, so many books, so much good times with my friends, then we hit mid-month and things started to take a turn; things at work got shaky, but they’re okay now, even if I’ve been asked to work a little less 😬, and now that we’re at the end, things are feeling calm again… just in time to roll into the best month ever, November! My birthday month!

Highlights:

✨Spent time downtown with a few friends going to indie bookstores in Toronto

✨Bought 10 new books to me 📚😊

✨Baked for the first time since January! 😱 I made pumpkin loaf and everyone loved it! ❤️

✨Spent Thanksgiving weekend with friends

✨Took a mini trip to Cambridge (Ontario)

✨Had Thanksgiving dinner with my group of friends

✨Went to a book sale at the library… and didn’t buy a book! 😄

✨Got my haircut!

✨Spent an afternoon with friends shopping and going out to dinner, yum!

✨Went to brunch with friends, also very yummy!

What I’ve watched:

Sex Education; season 4. I was so excited to watch the final season of this show… but I have to say I feel like I was a bit underwhelmed by it. There were so many things I just didn’t care about. Everything with Otis just bored me, I didn’t care about the whole sex therapist feud (O annoyed me so much because she couldn’t see how much she avoided everything, but she thought she was the best therapist) I didn’t care about Otis and Maeve because they were so will they/won’t they and the commitment was never there, I was glad to see the way they parted because it made sense. The new school came off real strong and it was very off-putting at first, plus Eric was just very in our faces that I couldn’t handle. But I will say, I like that things did tamper down. I enjoyed going on Eric’s journey with him because we all know he’s the star of the show, and it was really nice to see the school come together on social justice issues and be there for one another. Also, the plotline with Adam and his dad was probably my favourite plot. It was SO good; they made me cry so many times! So, in between all the mumbo-jumbo this season was, there were some really well and deeply developed plots, it just sucks we had to dig to get to them. I will miss this show because I loved these characters; they felt so real and raw.

Boy Meets World; season 2. This season started off a little off-putting and jarring because after spending all this time in innocence land in middle school, in season 1, then jumping right into high school and everyone making out, felt like there was no transition there. By the time I got to the end of the season though, it felt like we got the show we knew in season 1 back. The introduction to Mr. Turner was so good. There are some epiosdes I remember more than others from when I was a kid, like as a kid I don’t think I would have appreciated the dynamic between Mr. Turner and Mr. Feeney; they really play off each other a lot and it’s SO much fun to watch. I love how Mr. Turner can get to these kids and watching Shawn find a parental figure in Turner (which I didn’t remember). Also, I feel like this season had less Topanga this season, and when we saw her, her character changed a bit. It has left me intrigued to see where season 3 goes.

Star Trek: Voyager; season 2. The first 26-episode of the show and I’m still getting into it. I’m liking it and I’m getting used to the characters, but I’m still not invested in any of their stories really. The episode where Tuvok and Neelix became one person was probably the most memorable episode of the season because it took two characters who were the least alike and made them one. The character they became was such an interesting person. The doctor is probably my favourite character, for someone who is a hologram, he’s the person with the most character; you’d think he’d be more robotic or something, but he’s not. He manages to make me laugh every episode. This crew is on their 75-year journey to get back home, I wonder if it’ll really take them that long. As I continue through the seasons, I guess I’ll find out!

Clark; limited series. A friend of mine had mentioned that Bill Skarsgård was in a new series on Netflix, it was only 6 epiosdes so I took a chance on it. This was really interesting because it looked at where the term ‘Stockholm Syndrome’ comes from and is based on Clark Olofsson’s life and how he fooled everyone into loving him with the lies he told. It was definitely an entertaining watch and Skarsgård does a great job of playing a psychopath, like he’s a little too good at it. You could see the show blended clips from actual events into the story, so it gave it a more real feel. Overall, I enjoyed it and thought it was well done. I learned more about Stockholm Syndrome, and about some of Sweden’s history. This does have a lot of sex and drug use, among other violent plots. You can watch this on Netflix either dubbed in English or in the original Swedish, which is what I did.

The Simpsons; season 10. I’m just rocking my way through this… with only 25 more seasons to go 😂… but I’m in no rush to finish this. I think I enjoyed this season more than the previous one. I feel like they made fun of American life more this season, which I thought they did a good job of. I also noticed more religious jokes too. I thought it was interesting that we found out Ned Flanders is 60 years old?! Why don’t I buy this? I feel like this is going to come back again. I always enjoy when we get back story on either Homer or Marge’s family… now that I write this, you know we haven’t seen Selma and Patty basically the entire season. They just popped in for background, but they never had a plot… it’s been a while and I miss them. Hopefully we’ll see them again soon. But I did like learning about Homer’s mom and his upbringing – gave us more insight into Homer.

The Fall of the House of Usher; limited series. Another year, another show from Mike Flanagan. I’ve watched each of his mini series and this one was just as good as his past ones. I don’t know a lot about Edgar Allen Poe, which this was inspired by, but I still enjoyed watching this. It was so interesting to see all the Ushers fall one by one and in the most intricate ways. I like how we were kept guessing the entire time, especially with Verna’s character, she was such a mystery. There were some characters who I honestly didn’t feel invested in to feel sorry for their deaths, but that didn’t make it any less worthy of investment. If anything, I think if I had been invested in every single character, I wouldn’t have liked it as much just because there are a lot of characters in this. Some we don’t even get to see for that long, as it’s only 8 epiosdes. This was just enough creepy mixed with real life spooks; I was very invested. It was also nice to see actors come back to play new roles, in what has been called the Flanagan-verse. I like that every October(ish) we’ve had something new from him.

List of Movies:

• Disney Movies:
  • The Happiest Millionaire – woof, this was almost 3 hours long, full of plotless singing and dancing (not for me)
  • The Gnome-Mobile – this was a strange plot about saving gnomes, wasn’t my fave
  • The Jungle Book – I looked forward to this movie… and nope it disappointment me, not what I remembered
  • Charlie, the Lonesome Cougar – a man takes in a baby cougar, then when it gets older disaster ensues… it was not the most entertatining movie
  • Blackbeard’s Ghost – I actually enjoyed this movie, it was silly but not totally unbelievably so, plus it had a lot of heart
  • The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band – talk about a mouthful of a title… too bad the movie wasn’t great. This was probably the most political Disney movie I’ve seen; not great
  • Never a Dull Moment – this just asked for dull moments because of its title… unfortunately there were multiple; not the greatest heist movie ever made
  • The Horse in the Gray Flannel Suit – this surprised me with how much I liked it; it was heartwarming and sweet
  • The Love Bug – I wanted to like this… but I didn’t really care for it. I do look forward to seeing Herbie in further movies
  • Smith! – nope, not worth it. I was surprised that in 1969 we were still doing these Western plots – this felt like it belonged in the 1940s or 50s

Summertime Switch – the only reason I watched this was because the Pod Meets World Podcast watched Rider Strong’s movie from 1994… and it was not great, very cringy.

Munchie Strikes Back – another movie I watched because of Pod Meets World… and I didn’t hate this, I actually enjoyed it. It gave me like OG Goosebumps vibes. The plot was weird, but I expect that from low budget movies.

What I’m watching:

Star Trek: Voyager; season 3. I’m about half-way through this season and there have been some memorable moments, the crew are starting to gel together and I think I’m enjoying it more.

Boy Meets World; season 3. I’m also about half-way through this season, too and this wasn’t as jarring a jump from season 2 to 3, like 1 to 2 was. We’re in the same environment in the high school, but what I have noticed was how much older Cory has gotten, or well I should say the actor. He literally went from a little boy to a teenage boy right before our eyes. I’m not digging the Cory/Topanga relationship. It was like it was thrown together and we’re just supposed to accept that they’re a couple… yet we really didn’t get any lead up to it. It’s just yep, they’re in love with each other and are going to be together forever. Also we barely see Topanga, still!

The Simpsons; season 11. I’ve just started the next season and I’m enjoying it fine. I have to say, the first few epiosdes weren’t that great; the writing wasn’t really funny, it was more eye roll than anything else, but it is mellowing out. I still have many episodes left of the season.

Goosebumps; season 1. This is a new series on Disney+ that I happened to stumble upon. I’m really enjoying it. I like that the premise follows these teens who are paying for the repercussions of their parents mistakes and that each episode is the title of a classic Goosebumps book title. I don’t like that all the episodes aren’t out yet. Whoever set this up, didn’t think this through. The episodes come out every Friday, which is fine… but they’re still coming out after Halloween… they should have started it earlier so the show doesn’t end mid-way through November.

Sense8; season 1. I’m finally getting around to what is on my Netflix list… I’ve completely abandoned it, so time to resurrect it. So far I’m 2 episodes in and I’m just hella confused. There are so many characters all over the place and they sometimes see each other and they don’t know why. I want to like this, but so far I’m just not, but I will keep watching so that things can flesh out more, we’ll see how it goes.

Instagram & YouTube videos from the month:

How was your October? Read, watch, do anything interesting? Let me know!