October RandomKIT - Treats, not tricks

This month is a treat from me to you. Please pick a treat for yourself. A favorite author, a favorite series, a favorite genre, or a book you have been looking forward to.
Pull up your chosen book, a blanket, a furry cuddle buddy, and a cup of pumpkin spice latte and enjoy treat yourself, just don't forget the wiki

I personally am reading a Halloween cozy Death of a Neighborhood Witch and a childhood favorite Clifford's Halloween

My sister and her husband are coming over here for a 3-week visit. I know she's going to bring me some books with her, so they will be my treats.

What a lovely idea. I am going to pull The Other Half Lives by Sophie Hannah down from my shelf as I always enjoy her police procedurals and this will help me with my goal of reading series.

Easy enough! I may even "treat" myself to a new book!

Oh, thanks so much! I don't know yet what it will be but it will definately be enjoyable.

This is a delightful idea! Checking out my lists!

Ha! Having just opened the ScaredyKIT thread, I love the play you did with the theme! :-)

>7 LibraryCin: I second this!

I had planned to save Nettle and bone for this challenge, but I was stück on a train with nothing to read, so I finished today. It would have fit this challenge beautifully. Great story, a strong flavour of rRobin McKinley at her best.

I'm going to be entirely predictable (for me) and go for some extra nature/place writing. I've just picked up a used copy of Towards Re-enchantment: Place and its Meanings (edited by Gareth Evans & Di Robson, not Robin Robertson as it says in the touchstone, although he did write one of the chapters) and I already can't wait to read it!

I've chosen Zoobiquity: What Animals Can Teach Us About Health and the Science of Healing for this challenge. I've been looking forward to it for ages, but just not quite getting around to it because I so rarely pick up nonfiction. I'm confident I'll really enjoy it, though, so this feels like a good time to make room for it!

I see that one of my favorite authors is releasing another book in her wonderful Foreigner series in October, so I'm planning on reading the next one in the series, Tracker so I can catch up sooner!

>3 DeltaQueen50: I've changed my mind and decided to read Josephine Baker's Last Dance by Sherry Jones for my treat.

Rereading the Mercy Thompson series as my October treat. So far I’ve read Moon called and Blood bound. Very cosy.

I have completed my read of Josephine's Baker Last Dance by Sherry Jones and it was, indeed, a treat!

I read Kerry Winfrey's Faking Christmas, which was a "treat" in several ways: It's a new book from an author I reliably enjoy, it's a holiday romance, and it has one of my favorite romance tropes (fake dating). Overall, it was enjoyable read, but it ended up being a bit too lightweight and frothy for me.

I read New Beginnings at Christmas Tree Cottage: the perfect feel-good festive romance by Georgia Hill. It had a great small town Christmassy vibe.

Definitely a Treat: Marple: twelve new stories
Twelve writers have maintained their own unique style while capturing Christie's Miss Marple accurately, and without resorting to parody. These intriguing murderous puzzles are as delicious as Christie's own. Some even include Christie-like blinkered expression, suggesting prejudice. Just like any collection of short stories, including Dame Christie's own, some were better than others although I enjoyed all of them. My favourite was The Second Murder in the Vicarage by Val McDermid.

I've finished The Whole Town's Talking by Fannie Flagg, last in a series about Elmwood Springs, Missouri and with a feeling of neighborliness and how small towns used to be. A "comfort" read for sure.

I initially selected Clifford's Halloween by Norman Bridwell as one of my treats to read for RandomKIT, but since this was an original bagged set from the 1970s (6 Cliffords in a bag for $3.99), I decided to read all of them. While I enjoyed the books again, not all of them were as beloved as I remember.

I finished Towards Re-Enchantment: Place and Its Meanings, an anthology of essays on place, language and nature in the British Isles, and it was an absolute treat - this sort of book is definitely my literary happy place!

COMPLETED Pod by Laline Paull and A Death to Record by Rebecca Tope, two library books my sister brought out with her on her visit, so definitely treats.

My treat was The Last Chronicle of Barset, Anthony Trollope's wonderful wrapup of the Barsetshire series.

The November thread is up: https://www.librarything.com/topic/354379

Finished the last book in the Mercy Thompson series today. Incidently, I read the last one, Soul taken, as last years randomkit challenge for October.
A real treat, even though there are some recurring themes that become a bit annoying, and the exposition/scene setting is a bit much when you read 14 books in a row.

Missing You / Harlan Coben
4 stars

Kat is a police officer. 18 years earlier, not only was her (also police officer) father murdered, her fiance, Jeff, dumped her and she hasn’t seen him since. But she is still in love with him. Imagine her surprise when a friend insists on putting her on a dating site and there is Jeff! She is cryptic when she sends a message and the reply makes it seem like he has no idea who she is.

Meanwhile, a teenaged (?) boy comes to Kat; he thinks his mother is missing, and it’s suspicious. Even though his mother told him she was meeting a man she was dating. The other police Brandon had gone to didn’t believe him, so why is he coming to Kat and why does he think she’ll believe him?

There were a lot of different storylines happening in this book, but I found them all interesting. They did all come together at the end. There were times when we followed the POV of “bad guys” and I often find those parts in many books boring, or at least not nearly as interesting as the rest, but that wasn’t the case with this one. Not sure why that was. Maybe the dog helped! :-)

I just finished Cassiel's Servant, which felt like a treat because it revisited a beloved story from a different character's POV.

For customer service appreciation week, I received the gift of The Witches: The Graphic Novel. What an unexpected treat. The Witches is one of my favorite books. Reading this book was a double treat, as I enjoyed this rendition of the story. Stayed true to the story, but changed enough to make it new.

>27 susanna.fraser: I've been looking forward to this one, but have heard mixed reviews, so have been hesitating to pick it up.

I treated myself to The Accidental Alchemist by Gigi Pandian. I was drawn to the cover when I was browsing on Audible and when I saw it featured a gargoyle, decided I needed to give it a try. And I am glad that I did. This was a fun cozy mystery about an alchemist who moves to Portland, OR and finds a stow away gargoyle packed in amonst her things. Looking forward to more in the series.

>29 staci426: It definitely doesn't stand alone, but if you read and loved Kushiel's Dart I think it's well worth the read. With that said, I think it's good that it had been at least 10-12 years since I last looked at the original book--since I remembered the broad outlines but not all the details of the plot, it felt more like revisiting than repetition to me.

I read two memoirs, Turning Pages by John Sargent 4*, and James Patterson by James Patterson 3.5*. Both were interesting, and both had been executives in the publishing business.

>29 staci426: Taking a BB on the Accidental Alchemist and it was a 99 cent download today. Thanks!

>30 susanna.fraser: That's good to hear. The original Kushiel trilogy is an all-time favorite and it's been just as long for me since reading it. I was contemplating a reread before tackling this one, but I think I will hold off on that.

>32 LadyoftheLodge: Hope you like it! That's a great deal.

My favorite genre is fantasy and for October, I read The Magician's Daughter by H. G. Parry. This is my favorite type of fantasy that has magic, humans as the central characters, and a strong narrative that drives the story and doesn't get bogged down in world building or philosophy. It is set in the early 20th century on an island off Ireland. I love historical fiction as well and this one really delivers there.

>34 soelo: Ooh, sounds intriguing!

This may be an odd choice, but I treated myself to a book of obscure economic history from my library's stocks: Venedig und die Weltwirtschaft um 1200. It's a collection of papers presented at a conference about Venice and its trade relations with the rest of the known world at the time, and it offers some surprising facts.

I recently re-read Sarah Addison Allen's The Sugar Queen. With "sugar" in the title, it definitely counts as a sweet treat! Plus, I like the book a lot and treated myself by re-reading it.

Just an FYI that the 2024 group is live, and we are in the process of suggesting CATs for next year, so stop by if you'd like to join the discussion! https://www.librarything.com/ngroups/24125/2024-Category-Challenge

Hi everyone! I got back on LT after a long absence at the beginning of this year. I've been doing several of the LT challenges, but I hadn't joined the Category Challenge. Sometime in September I became aware of this particular challenge, though I don't remember how I found it. I thought this sounded like fun, and I decided that I would try to read something for it if I had time. Also, the group welcome message said it was fine for anyone to swing by and join one of the reads even if you're not an official member of the group, which encouraged me even more.

Fortunately, I did have some time after I finished my other group reads for this month, so I have picked up The Cubs Way for this challenge. It's a treat for me, because as a life-long Cubs fan, it was a thrill to finally see them win the World Series. I had bought the book back when it was published, but somehow never got around to reading it until now, so there's also the impetus to finish another ROOT. And it also fits because the baseball playoffs are under way this month. I'm currently about 3/4 of the way through the book, and if I don't finish it by the end of the day, I'll definitely finish it tomorrow morning.

I've been reading some books with difficult marriages and not much love, so I decided to treat myself to a viewing of my favorite novel adaptation: North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell. This is one of my favorite novels with a great love story, and the BBC mini-series stars Richard Armitage (swoon/sigh). I feel grounded again!

>40 kac522: Love that adaptation!

>39 atozgrl: However many years ago (longer than I want to think!), when I found this group, I believe I spent the last few months of the year just watching how things worked. Then, I really joined in the following year!

Welcome!

>39 atozgrl: welcome back!

>41 christina_reads: Isn't it great? Even though a few things are changed from the book (like the ending), I think this adaptation captures the essence and themes of the book really well. I've re-watched it _almost_ as many times as the 1995 P&P with Colin Firth. 😊

>42 LibraryCin: >43 fuzzi: Thank you both very much! I am happy to be here, and glad to have found this group also!

>39 atozgrl: Hi there and welcome back! Hope to see more of you in the challenge threads. The new discussions are going on for the 2024 challenges, so you might want to swing by.
https://www.librarything.com/ngroups/24125/2024-Category-Challenge

>46 LadyoftheLodge: Thank you, I will take a look!

Thank you everyone for participating. It looks like we all enjoyed our treats this month.

>44 kac522: Colin Firth... :sigh:

>44 kac522: I'm with you on the 1995 P&P! Great adaptation! And Colin Firth!

A Time for Mercy / John Grisham
4.5 stars

When Josee’s boyfriend comes home drunk – again – she is beaten unconscious. Her two teenage kids are locked in one of their bedrooms hiding, but when they hear Stuart (the boyfriend) clomp off to his bedroom and they can’t hear their mother, they are afraid she is dead. When they go down to check, 16-year old Drew turns around to find Stuart passed out on his bed… with his gun beside him. 14-year old Kiera, downstairs with her mother, hears the shot. When the police come, Drew is arrested. In Mississippi, murdering a cop guarantees a capital (death penalty) trial. Defense lawyer Jake Brigance is handed the case.

Another great book by Grisham. I really like Jake and the story was fantastic. Not a short book (are any of Grisham’s short?), but I wanted to keep reading to see what surprises might happen next. Black woman Portia is working for Jake and planning to head to law school; she’s another secondary character I really like. I do hope the series continues.