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Review: The Lost History of Dreams by Kris Waldherr
This book has been on my radar for months. I basically stalked the authors Twitter page waiting to see when there would be ARC’s available and hoping that I would get picked to be an early reader! To say that this book has my name written all over it is an understatement. I love all things Victorian and Gothic and this book couldn’t have been more intriguing to me if it tried. It had everything I was looking for in a great Gothic read. I was beyond thrilled to get picked as an early reader and patiently waited to start the book so that I could savor every single aspect…
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Review: The Winter People by Jennifer McMahon
This book was going around Bookstagram (aka Instagram), for most of December. There were a couple of IG users that were hosting read alongs and I saw quite a few posts for this book and admittedly became intrigued. This is an author that I have ever heard of before, which was actually surprising because she has written a number of ghost story thriller books so I am shocked that I haven’t come across her name before. What ultimately drew me in and made me want to read this one was all the buzz on ‘the gram’ but also the cover. It looked haunting and the stark white contrast and eerie…
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Review: Melmoth by Sarah Perry
She’s watching you. Melmoth the witness. Always watching and always lonely. This book was on my radar since I’m a huge fan of gothic literature. I have Perry’s novel, The Essex Serpent, to read and have heard rave reviews about it. With October in full swing and this book being released, I decided to start with this book before I read The Essex Serpent. I have never heard the tales of Melmoth the witness but I love Prague and with this novel being set there, I could barely get the box unwrapped before I started reading this one. It has been years since Helen Franklin left England. In Prague, working…
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Review: The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Right now, The Haunting of Hill House is everywhere thanks to the Netflix mini series. My sister and I do a buddy read for October/Halloween every year and each of us pick a book to read for the month and then we read it together. My pick was Frankenstein and The Haunting of Hill House was her pick. I wasn’t terribly excited about this book, but I’ve been looking for something similar to Crimson Peak (the movie) and this one sounded like it would be in the same vein—-though a more modern setting. I also picked up the Penguin Horror edition with an intro by Guillermo del Toro and I…
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Review: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Every year my sister and I pick two scary books to read. This year we went with two horror classics, The Haunting of Hill House and Frankenstein. Neither of us have read these two books so we thought it would be fun to do a buddy read all month and discuss them. So we started Frankenstein first. It’s been on my list to read for so long. It’s like the classic horror story and everyone says how amazing this book is. Mary Shelley began writing Frankenstein when she was only nineteen. At once a Gothic thriller, a passionate romance, and a cautionary tale about the dangers of science, Frankenstein tells…
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Review: Stalking Jack the Ripper (Stalking Jack the Ripper #1) by Kerri Maniscalco
Having a library card is the best thing in the world. After seeing this book on a few Instagram pages, I was lured in by the cover and title. I wasn’t really sure I wanted to buy it though so I put a hold on it at my local library. After waiting three weeks for it to be returned, I was finally able to pick it up! This is one of those times that I am so thankful for library cards. Seventeen-year-old Audrey Rose Wadsworth was born a lord’s daughter, with a life of wealth and privilege stretched out before her. But between the social teas and silk dress fittings,…
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Review: The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower #1) by Stephen King
Well it was bound to happen at some point in my literary review career…..the dreaded DNF (did not finish) tag. But little did I know that this would happen to one book that I was convinced I would love. When I finished the A Song of Ice and Fire AKA Game of Thrones series, I was longing for something similar and just as epic. I can’t tell you how many times The Dark Tower series was recommended…..countless times. I have it in paperback and on my iPad, that’s how much I wanted to read it. I even waited until the mood was perfect and I was ready to get into…
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Review: The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials #1) by Philip Pullman
After reading Up To This Pointe earlier this month, I was dying to read something else set in the ‘north’ or in the ‘cold’. The Golden Compass has been on my TBR shelf forever and now seemed like the perfect time to read it since it features the Northern Lights and the north pole as well as a host of other things! Lyra Belacqua has been raised at Oxford’s, Jordan College, most of her young life. It is here that two very important people come to visit. the first is her uncle, Lord Asriel, who is an explorer and who has just returned from the north with some dangerous findings. Lord Asriel…
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Review: The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
I am not really into horror literature or super scary stories….I haven’t read any Stephen King or V.C. Andrews because I would like to be able to sleep at night. However this Halloween season, I got inspired to pickup a ghost story. Maybe it’s because I went to watch Crimson Peak and was eager to read something similar…..but I decided to pick up The Woman in Black as I am a sucker for Gothic novels so this sounded right up my alley. Arthur Kipps is a young London solicitor who has been dispatched to the small windswept town of Crythin Gifford with its salt marshes and fog that rolls in and leaves the…
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Special Feature: The Spine Tingling Literary Canon List for Halloween
Halloween is just around the corner and this week on The Lit Bitch we are talking about the books that make you want to curl up and hide under the covers of your bed. You know those books that scare you so bad that every little noise in your house makes you jump and wonder….is there a monster under my bed??? The folks at Casper Mattresses have a great blog called Pillow Talk and they are doing a super fun ‘haunted’ feature on their blog for Halloween where they talk about spooky hotels (including the Heathman Hotel in Portland, a personal fav of mine being from Oregon and all). Casper is a great company full…