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Recent Reads

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Hello

I’m here to share a few books that I read recently First I will start with a few horror novels, and then a nonfiction book.

It was Vera’s idea to buy the Itza. The “world’s most advanced smart speaker!” didn’t interest Thiago, but Vera thought it would be a bit of fun for them amidst all the strange occurrences happening in the condo. It made things worse. The cold spots and scratching in the walls were weird enough, but peculiar packages started showing up at the house — who ordered industrial lye? Then there was the eerie music at odd hours, Thiago waking up to Itza projecting light shows in an empty room.

It was funny and strange right up until Vera was killed, and Thiago’s world became unbearable. Pundits and politicians all looking to turn his wife’s death into a symbol for their own agendas. A barrage of texts from her well-meaning friends about letting go and moving on. Waking to the sound of Itza talking softly to someone in the living room…

Book TW: there is animal death in this book (fairly upsetting as well) (note: I don’t usually include TW notes, but I plan to try to improve my book ‘review’ format later to include this better, but for now it’s fairly casual overall and more about my thoughts/impressions than formal reviews)

This book piqued my curiosity when I was browsing through the top recommended horror books of 2021. Haunted devices are fairly relatable and continue the theme of haunted “houses” without being too “house-like” or gothic house themes.

A fair number of reviews mentioned this was heart-wrenching, and… my gosh. I didn’t expect the story to turn as it did a few times and I had to take a bit of a break after finishing it (reading it straight through for all my free and awakened moments over a few days) because it was so… glum. That said… I think this definitely was a page-turner and though I don’t think I would consider it scary, it has a fair number of unsettling and eerie scenes. It does get a bit of cosmic horror. Overall, this has stuck around in my mind which is kind of rare since I have poor memory with books…

For Dr. Siena Dupont and her ambitious team, the Alpenglow glacier expedition is a career-defining opportunity. But thirty miles into the desolate Deadswitch Wilderness, they discover a missing hiker dangling from a tree, and their satellite phone fails to call out.

Then the body vanishes without a trace.

The disappearance isn’t the only chilling anomaly. Siena’s map no longer aligns with the trail. The glacier they were supposed to study has inexplicably melted. Strange foliage overruns the mountainside, and a tunnel within a tree hollow lures Siena to a hidden cabin, and a stranger with a sinister message…

This was one of my favourite horror reads recently - SUPER creepy! I don’t usually like “cryptid” type horror, but this book was marketed as appealing to fans of House of Leaves. At first, I felt like it was nothing like HoL (and it isn’t, in terms of story) but after getting more into it, I can see why they designed the marketing line like that. Apparently this is the first book of a series and I’m really looking forward to the next part.

What I really liked about this was that there’s a definite creepy mystery, scenes are tightly paced and horrifying, time/space weirdness, and there’s a totally ordinary IT guy (I like ordinary people who are just in situations). I really want to know what happens next!!!

When Louise finds out her parents have died, she dreads going home. She doesn’t want to leave her daughter with her ex and fly to Charleston. She doesn’t want to deal with her family home, stuffed to the rafters with the remnants of her father’s academic career and her mother’s lifelong obsession with puppets and dolls. She doesn’t want to learn how to live without the two people who knew and loved her best in the world.

Most of all, she doesn’t want to deal with her brother, Mark, who never left their hometown, gets fired from one job after another, and resents her success. Unfortunately, she’ll need his help to get the house ready for sale because it’ll take more than some new paint on the walls and clearing out a lifetime of memories to get this place on the market.

But some houses don’t want to be sold, and their home has other plans for both of them…

So, Grady Hendrix… has been fairly hit/miss for me - i LOVED Horrorstor (except one scene that was a bit too much for me haha), but i HATED The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires so much I feel disgusted even thinking about it (massive TW for book, totally out of nowhere violent SA. Uggggh). I was a bit torn on starting this one because I didn’t want to be hit by random SA in story again, but I’m really glad I ended up giving this a chance. The premise sounded fairly interesting and I figured I can just DNF if it didn’t work out.

The premise is fairly simple (haunted house, creepy dolls), but like how Stephen King really ran off with the common story of “you sure don’t want to go bringing things back to life” in Pet Sematary, I found this one unique enough and super creepy!! I think it still has an element of fun in the creepiness factor though it’s not a perfect novel (like Pet Sematary is basically perfect), I enjoyed reading it a lot and couldn’t put it down.

Once a year, scoutmaster Tim Riggs leads a troop of boys into the Canadian wilderness for a three-day camping trip; a tradition as comforting and reliable as a good ghost story and a roaring bonfire. But when an unexpected intruder — shockingly thin, disturbingly pale, and voraciously hungry — stumbles upon their campsite, Tim and the boys are exposed to something far more frightening than any tale of terror. The human carrier of a bioengineered nightmare. An inexplicable horror that spreads faster than fear. A harrowing struggle for survival that will pit the troop against the elements, the infected … and one another.

TW: extremely graphic and horrifying animal cruelty/death (I’m fairly sure a lot of people put down the book at this scene)

To be honest, I didn’t really pay attention to the synopsis or the premise after the first line and just jumped in to it with not much expectation. But, ooh… this book shows up a lot on people’s “most/top disturbing horror” and after starting into this, I was suddenly enlightened to why. This book moves fast and is incredibly… disturbing! Some visual images are still stuck in my mind.

Really gross and hopeless survival horror novel for those of you who like those - I don’t regret reading this, and “enjoyed” it in the sense that it’s definitely disturbing, but it’s certainly not a cosy horror to read!

Now we can move on to the non-horror book!

In Attached, Levine and Heller trace how these evolutionary influences continue to shape who we are in our relationships today. According to attachment theory, every person behaves in relationships in one of three distinct ways: ANXIOUS, AVOIDANT, SECURE.

Attached guides readers in determining what attachment style they and their mate (or potential mates) follow. It also offers readers a wealth of advice on how to navigate their relationships more wisely given their attachment style and that of their partner. An insightful look at the science behind love, Attached offers readers a road map for building stronger, more fulfilling connections.

Picked up this book since I needed a nonfiction refresher to break up the horror. This sounded interesting and I hear good things about it, so I decided to give it a read!

The three attachment styles presented in this book are:

• Anxious: consistently worrying about their relationships and whether their partner loves them back

• Avoidant: minimizing closeness and intimacy due to the feeling of loss of independence

• Secure: feeling comfortable in relationships and intimacy, supportive and caring

I feel like this book has a great premise, and shows plenty of easy to understand examples to showcase these styles as well as how people can reapproach these scenarios to become healthier and more secure. While reading, I kept having the feeling that some readers may take away how the author depicted anxious and avoidant styles as being able to fix a lot of their fears and issues by finding a secure attachment style partner. Though it’s true a healthy relationship contributes SO MUCH to healing, there’s also so much work anxious/avoidant individuals can do that shouldn’t be forgotten too, instead of relying entirely on a secure(r) partner to fix issues.

The book had a lot of interesting things to think about, and I like how there were frequent lists and checklists to reflect on, to easily reference when trying to think through scenarios. I feel like these often make me overthink since I’m trying to imagine all the different kinds of combinations of scenarios and attachment styles. Overall, I’m happy I read it, but I’m not sure how much I’ll remember to take away from it.