October Book Haul Part 1 #StackedShelves #BookMail #BookPost

Welcome to the first book haul in October! Lots of books, reviews and blog tours this month 😀 Busy! I have been surprisingly organised this month and have had the opportunity to showcase all of the book that arrived at my door in September/October. Orenda Books are one of those publishers that you can always rely on to provide you with a great read; The Man Who Died and House Of Spines were absolutely cracking reads. Allison and Busby are another generous publisher, thank you for all the brilliant proofs. Enough talk! Let us get to the books!

(P.S I am very behind on my book hauls so there are a several books on this list that I have read and reviewed already!)

October Book Haul Part 1

House Of Spines by Michael J. Malone

Published by: Orenda Books

MJM is quickly becoming one of my all time favourites. A lot of you will have already read this and I am sure you will agree that he is a tremendous talent. If you haven’t had the chance then make sure you read HOS!

Official Synopsis: Ran McGhie’s world has been turned upside down. A young, lonely and frustrated writer, and suffering from mental-health problems, he discovers that his long-dead mother was related to one of Glasgow’s oldest merchant families. Not only that, but Ran has inherited Newton Hall, a vast mansion that belonged to his great-uncle, who it seems has been watching from afar as his estranged great-nephew has grown up.  Entering his new-found home, it seems Great-Uncle Fitzpatrick has turned it into a temple to the written word – the perfect place for poet Ran. But everything is not as it seems. As he explores the Hall’s endless corridors, Ran’s grasp on reality appears to be loosening. And then he comes across an ancient lift; and in that lift a mirror. And in the mirror … the reflection of a woman…

A terrifying psychological thriller with more than a hint of the Gothic, House of Spines is a love letter to the power of books, and an exploration of how lust and betrayal can be deadly…

The Coffin Path by Katherine Clements

Published by: Headline

Sept/Oct definitely seems to be the time for the ghost story! I have been receiving some dark material recently. The Coffin Path isn’t out until Jan 2018 so it will be a while for my review but just look at that cover for now, superb!

Official Synopsis: Maybe you’ve heard tales about Scarcross Hall, the house on the old coffin path that winds from village to moor top. They say there’s something up here, something evil.

Mercy Booth isn’t afraid. The moors and Scarcross are her home and lifeblood. But, beneath her certainty, small things are beginning to trouble her. Three ancient coins missing from her father’s study, the shadowy figure out by the gatepost, an unshakeable sense that someone is watching.

When a stranger appears seeking work, Mercy reluctantly takes him in. As their stories entwine, this man will change everything. She just can’t see it yet.

I Am Behind You By John Ajvide Lindqvist

Published by: Quercus (riverrun)

There is A LOT of love for this novel on Twitter and Instagram. I am desperate to read it and find out what the hype is all about. Maybe once I (finally) read it I could arrange a giveaway? Who would enter?

Official Synopsis: Molly wakes her mother to go to the toilet. The campsite is strangely blank. The toilet block has gone. Everything else has gone too. This is a place with no sun. No god.

Just four families remain. Each has done something to bring them here – each denies they deserve it. Until they see what’s coming over the horizon, moving irrevocably towards them. Their worst mistake. Their darkest fear.

And for just one of them, their homecoming.

Bonfire by Krysten Ritter

Published by: Hutchinson

I have read and reviewed this already… I couldn’t wait. So good! Krysten has already taken TV by storm, now she has shown a dab hand at literary brilliance. I cannot wait for KR’s next novel!

Official Synopsis: It has been ten years since Abby Williams left home and scrubbed away all evidence of her small town roots. Now working as an environmental lawyer in Chicago, she has a thriving career, a modern apartment, and her pick of meaningless one-night stands.

But when a new case takes her back home to Barrens, Indiana, the life Abby painstakingly created begins to crack. Tasked with investigating Optimal Plastics, the town’s economic heart, she begins to find strange connections to a decade-old scandal involving the popular Kaycee Mitchell and her friends—just before Kaycee disappeared for good.

But as Abby tries desperately to find out what happened to Kaycee, troubling memories begin to resurface and she begins to doubt her own observations. And when she unearths an even more disturbing secret, her search threatens the reputations, and lives, of the community and risks exposing a darkness that may consume her.

Mr Dickens and His Carol by Samantha Silva

Published by: Allison & Busby

I have sadly never read A Christmas Carol. It is a huge novel! It is an indulgence that I cannot partake in atm. But reading a novel about the creation of A Christmas Carol? That sounds good!

Official Synopsis: For Charles Dickens, each Christmas is been better than the last. His novels are literary blockbusters, avid fans litter the streets and he and his wife have five happy children and a sixth on the way. But when Dickens’ latest book, Martin Chuzzlewit, is a flop, the glorious life threatens to collapse around him.His publishers offer an ultimatum: either he writes a Christmas book in a month, or they will call in his debts, and he could lose everything. Grudgingly, and increasingly plagued by self-doubt, Dickens meets the muse he needs in Eleanor Lovejoy and her young son, Timothy. With time running out, Dickens is propelled on a Scrooge-like journey through Christmases past and present.

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell

Published by: Bloomsbury

Another pre-reviewed title on the list. The Silent Companions is A grade chills and thrills. Check it out immediately and thank me later!

Official Synopsis: Newly married, newly widowed Elsie is sent to see out her pregnancy at her late husband’s crumbling country estate, The Bridge.

With her new servants resentful and the local villagers actively hostile, Elsie only has her husband’s awkward cousin for company. Or so she thinks. But inside her new home lies a locked room, and beyond that door lies a two-hundred-year-old diary and a deeply unsettling painted wooden figure – a Silent Companion – that bears a striking resemblance to Elsie herself…

The Relive Box and Other Stories by T C Boyle

Published by: Bloomsbury

I thought The Terranauts was a fantastic read. Fiction based on a huge real-life scientific adventure. I am eager to get back into T.C Boyle’s writing 😀 I adore short stories so this should be everything I like and more!

Official Synopsis: In these stories, T. C. Boyle focuses hisunerring eye on humanity’s relationship with nature, and the unintended consequences of our efforts to control it. The prize-winning ‘Are We Not Men?’ reflects on the impact of new gene-editing technologies while ‘The Relive Box’ parodies our obsession with electronic games.

In ‘She’s the Bomb’, a young woman waits on her graduation day, heart in mouth, for an explosive event. A burrito-seller has a killer business idea in ‘The Five-Pound Burrito’, but learns that success comes at a price. An Italian couple moves south for a fresh start in ‘The Argentine Ant’, but finds that paradise holds a nasty sting. And in the chilling ‘The Designee’, a lonely widower can’t believe his luck when he receives a mysterious letter from England.

We Shall Not All Sleep by Estep Nagy

Published by: Bloomsbury

This sounds incredibly intense! There is a lot going on in this novel and I am excited to get involved. It is a departure from my usual comfort zone for novels which is something I drastically need. Keep me challenged!

Official Synopsis: Seven Island has two houses. One for Hillsingers and one for Quicks.

1964. The Hillsingers and the Quicks have shared the small Maine island of Seven for generations. But though technically family–Jim Hillsinger and Billy Quick married Park Avenue sisters Lila and Hannah Blackwell–they do not mix. Now, on the anniversary of Hannah’s death, Lila feels grief pulling her toward Billy. And Jim, a spy recently ousted from the CIA on suspicion of treason, decides to carry out the threat his wife has explicitly forbidden: to banish their youngest son, the twelve-year-old Catta, to the neighboring island of Baffin for twenty-four hours in an attempt to make a man out of him.

With their elders preoccupied, the Hillsinger and Quick children run wild, playing violent games led by Catta’s sadistic older brother James. The island manager Cyrus and the servants tend to the families while preparing for the Migration, a yearly farming ritual that means one thing to their employers, and something very different to them.

Set during three summer days, Estep Nagy’s debut novel moves among the communities of Seven as longstanding tensions become tactical face-offs in which everything is fair game for ammunition. Vividly capturing the rift between the cold warriors of Jim’s generation and the rebellious seekers of Catta’s, We Shall Not All Sleep is a richly told story of American class, family, and manipulation–a compelling portrait of a unique and privileged WASP stronghold on the brink of dissolution.

The Man Who Died by Antti Tuomainen

Published by: Orenda Books

Another cracking read. I cannot recommend this enough. A story about a man investigating his own murder, attempting to catch the perpetrator before he passes away, was too good of a read to not jump straight in. This is a brilliant story and I am eager to read more of AT’s work. I am doing a Q&A with AT on the 12th of Oct so swing by to check that out!

Official Synopsis: A successful entrepreneur in the mushroom industry, Jaakko Kaunismaa is a man in his prime. At just 37 years of age, he is shocked when his doctor tells him that he’s dying. What is more, the cause is discovered to be prolonged exposure to toxins; in other words, someone has slowly but surely been poisoning him. Determined to find out who wants him dead, Jaakko embarks on a suspenseful rollercoaster journey full of unusual characters, bizarre situations and unexpected twists.

With a nod to Fargo and the best elements of the Scandinavian noir tradition, The Man Who Died is a page-turning thriller brimming with the blackest comedy surrounding life and death, and love and betrayal, marking a stunning new departure for the King of Helsinki Noir.

The Lustre of Lost Things by Sophie Chen Keller

Published by: Allison & Busby

Another departure from all the crime/fantasy that I am used to. This does sound fantastic though. One of those novels that allows you to reconnect with the magical side of life.

Official Synopsis: For the first time in my thirteen years, I have a story of my own to tell and I am the one who will tell it.

It is only at The Lavenders, his mother’s unusual bakery, that twelve-year-old Walter Lavender feels at home. There meringues scud through displays like clouds, marzipan dragons breathe actual fire, and the airy angel-food cake can make customers pounds lighter. But when the magical Book at the heart of the shop vanishes and the landlord threatens closure, it is up to Walter to find the Book and save the shop. Despite—or because of—a communication disorder that renders him speechless, Walter has a special ability to find lost things. Accompanied by Milton, his overweight golden retriever, Walter’s quest will take him around and under New York City, into the subway and soaring over Central Park. Along the way he will discover his voice and learn what it means to truly be found.

Three-Martini Lunch by Suzanne Rindell

Published by: Allison & Busby

I’m finding multi-layered and challenging novels everywhere in 2017. This (again!) is not my usual type of novel but it sounds like it could be  one hell of a read.

Official Synopsis: New York, 1958. Three people striving to make their mark on an unforgiving city. Can they navigate the passions, the pitfalls and the power games as they reach for success?

Cliff Nelson, a privileged New Yorker, is slumming it around Greenwich Village, enjoying the idea that he is the next Jack Kerouac.

Eden Katz arrives in the city with one burning ambition, but she is shocked at the stumbling blocks she encounters.

Miles Tillman is an aspiring writer who straddles various worlds and belongs to none.

Sleeping Beauties By Jo Spain

Published by: Quercus

I hear great things abut Jo Spain. I have never read one of her novels but I am keen to give one a go. Quercus have been extremely generous to me in 2017 and I am trying to show off their books as much as possible!

Official Synopsis: The inspector frowned and examined the earth under the trees. As he scanned the glade, his stomach lurched. One, two, three, four. Five, counting the mound of earth disturbed under the tent. Somebody had cleared the earth of its natural layer and sown their own flowers

In five places

Five graves

A young woman, Fiona Holland, has gone missing from a small Irish village. A search is mounted, but there are whispers. Fiona had a wild reputation. Was she abducted, or has she run away?

A week later, a gruesome discovery is made in the woods at Ireland’s most scenic beauty spot – the valley of Glendalough. The bodies are all young women who disappeared in recent years. D.I. Tom Reynolds and his team are faced with the toughest case of their careers – a serial killer, who hunts vulnerable women, and holds his victims captive before he ends their lives.

Cheers for popping in to check out the horde of book mail I have been sorting through towards the end of September/Start of October 2017. Publishers are gearing up for the festivities and bringing more amazing releases to us to share with each other over the Christmas period. That’s right! I used the C word! Forgive me, it’s just the books going straight to my head. Please let me know if you have read any of these books. I want to know what you thought :D.

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