October 2025 - Reviewed

I am so glad October is done! It has been a very busy month for me, starting off with a wedding in the UK and then flying back to Sydney and almost immediately jumping back into sitework. The one upside is the beautiful spring weather that has finally arrived in NSW - and the blooming of the jacaranda trees on every corner. I also announced my new book, Nightshade and Oak, and will be kicking off my preorder campaign and trailing some hints, quotes and covers very soon!

In between fieldwork and flights I managed to read ten books this month and this is what I thought of them.

Mere - Danielle Giles

what if we held hands in the cursed convent? The latest in my dark medieval obsession, Mere tells the story of an isolated convent in the fens of Anglo-Saxon Norfolk where the 'mere', the marsh, is starting to take back the reclaimed land. It took me a few attempts to make it past the first pages but once I did I really enjoyed myself, it was moody and atmospheric, touched on the darker realities of Anglo-Saxon life but didn't wander into caricature.

The Charioteer - Mary Renault

This is my second Renault, after reading her Alexander the Great story, The Persian Boy, earlier this year. I didn't like it quite as much as that, which had a much better pace and more engaging narrator. I felt The Charioteer, which is set in a convolescent ward in WW2, seemed to drag, especially the endless and boring party scenes, but the sweet and gentle romance between the protagonist and the orderly was pleasant enough to read. I can see why this felt like a breakthrough book of it's time, and part of that appeal endures but it just wasnt 'grabby' the way the Alexander book was. However, I will be returning to Renault's ancient historical fiction soon.

Isabella Nagg and the Pot of Basil - Oliver Darkshire

Another book that I initially bounced off and then forced myself to read by dint of taking it on a fourteen hour plane journey! Having taken a moment to properly dig in I did like this book, which is an irreverant fairy tale retelling. I struggled a little because it is so clearly inspired by Pratchett, footnotes and all, and while I did enjoy it, when you set yourself up as a direct comparison to one of the absolute pillars of fantasy you are going to come off a little bruised. Having said that, it's a debut in the genre and I did like it more than Pratchett's early Rincewind books so I will consider dipping back into his next works.

The Compound - Aisling Rawle

This book had me at Lord of the Flies meets Love Island! I love trashy reality tv, and I love fiction that skewers it (Ben Elton has some great takes on X-Factor and Big Brother), so yes, I really liked this book. It follows the beautiful but vacuous Lily as she navigates a dystopian desert Villa, packed with equally lovely single men and women. There is some great exploration of capitalism and consumption, as well as the particular toxic masculinity that damages all genders. Even though she is the narrator Lily is shallow, difficult to root for, but the author manages to show this without having her become too annoying. Overall I enjoyed a lot.

The Summer War - Naomi Novik

A rare four star review for one of my favourite authors! I've been consistently adoring everything Novik has put out since Uprooted, this one was good but not spectacular. It's a short novella following the daughter of a brilliant general, who curses her brother to live a life without love after he leaves their estate. I think the cause of the struggle for me was that the protagonist didn't feel particularly active in her own narrative, despite being a powerful and clever witch in her own right. I enjoyed the short stories from Novik's Buried Deep, more and would have preferred one of those be fleshed out into a novella. Obviously I will continue to read anything Novik wants to publish, and if my standards weren't so high for her I might have enjoyed it more!

Red Sky in the Morning - Elizabeth Laird

Reread of a childhood favourite. Reading this again for the first time in fifteen?twenty? years was a fascinating experience! I must have read this book half a dozen times between the ages of nine and twelve and it clearly had a much more formative impact on me than I realised. Every other page had a turn of phrase or an opinion that I had internalised without knowing, and it was almost shocking to find the source of things I felt were natural to me! Luckily I think it was a good text to be impressed by as even now I loved and cried at this book.

Red Sky in the Morning follows three formative years in the life of Anna, starting with the birth of her disabled brother Ben. Anna learns to love Ben, to feel pride for him, and this love fundamentally changes her as a person. At the same time she is still growing up and battling school, friendships, love. This book was published in 1988 and still feels fresh and relatable today.

I was suprised to see a lot of positive GR reviews in Arabic and I think this is because the author has also written books set in Palestine, Kurdish Iraq, and Lebanon, filling a gap before the Own Voices movement of the last few years. Given the delicacy and grace with which she handled Red Sky, as well as these reviews, I would recommend those books as well.

A Psalm for the Wild Built & A Prayer for the Crown Shy - Becky Chambers

I finally sat down and read the two Monk and Robot novellas from Becky Chambers, another favourite author, and I was... underwhelmed! It still has Chambers' wonderful, natural prose style, but I think teeter slightly too close to Utopian for me to find truly engaging. I also could not click with Dex, the protagonist, and that definitely dampened my enjoyment. If you liked the third Wayfarer book then you might like these novellas more than me, I prefer my cosy sci-fi with a little more salt in the caramel!

The Tragedy of True Crime - John J Lennon

A fascinating book! I tried out the audiobook becasue I thought the idea of an exploration of true crime narratives was so interesting and then once I got into the book I realised that the author is writing from prison, serving a sentence for murder. Lennon is a great writer, having built up a career as a journalist from behind bars, and as he says repeatedly, his edge is his access. This book tells the stories of four murderers, their lives before, during and after the crimes that sent them to prison. Lennon, as the fourth perpetrator, weaves his story into the others, highlighting similarities, differnces, and how the outside world has treated them.

It's an incredible look at who gets to tell these stories, victims, perpetrators, random podcast hosts, and Lennon has clearly done a lot of work on himself, calling out his previous biases, flaws and always taking accountability for his crime.

Down Under - Bill Bryson

Written after a spate of visits in the late 90s and early 00s, Bryson turns his famously whimsical pen to Australia. As a newly certified Australian I was pleased to see him pay appropriate homage to the stunning beauty of my country as well as the wonderful people that live in it. This was all great to read. And yet there is an underlying tension through this book, that Bryson only occasionally remarks on - Australia's relationship with it's Indigenous people.

Bryson calls out the achievements of the world's oldest culture, highlighting the brutal colonial history, and the current trauma that affects them. He goes out of his way to visit and research Myall Creek, and yet he never talks to an indigenous person, never gets anything other than the opinon of Australian whites. This book was written twenty-five years ago, and many of the attitudes of the people in the book are now considered barbaric by polite society (though I meet people with these views still). It is perhaps harsh to judge Bryson by a standard that we ourselves cannot meet, but as a beloved and established author I would have liked to see him leverage that into talking to indigenous elders, and getting some of their words into his very inflluential books.

Two months to go until the end of the year and hopefully lots more writing and reading ahead! I wish you all a happy November!