October 2025 Monthly Wrap Up -- BOOK THOUGHTS

BOOK THOUGHTS

October 2025 Monthly Wrap Up

I read a lot in October because of a lull in my work schedule. Then November blew up and I forgot to post my monthly wrap up. Here's the list of the 19 books I read last month. 

The Luck of the Bodkins by P.G. Wodehouse. Madcap fun on an ocean liner.

Sir Harry Hotspur of Humblewaite by Anthony Trollope. This is the only book I managed to read for Victober 2025 and I admit I was disappointed. I loved the both the Barchester and Palliser series. This is the first stand alone Trollope book I've read. The story was soppy and a real downer. Unlike most of Trollope's female characters, the heroine was a nitwit. 

The Light of Day by Graham Swift starts as hardboiled detective fiction and ends as a melancholy love story. It kept me entertained throughout and thinking about it after. 

Autumn by Ali Smith annoyed me until I loved it. It took me a while to get into the writing style and the story. 

Aiding and Abetting by Muriel Spark, a brilliant, imaginative tale inspired by the Lord Lucan disappearance. I thought it was excellent. 

The Fisher King by Anthony Powell. I’m glad I read it, but probably one for Powell completists like me. It's another shipboard story, so I had a theme going with the Wodehouse book. 

Indian Summer by William Dean Howells. I reviewed this one in an earlier post, here. Howells was an American, so technically not a Victorian author, but he wrote in the late 1800s so this was Victober-adjecent. 

Slightly Foxed, No. 87, the autumn issue of my favorite literary journal from Foxed Quarterly. I love these essays about backlist books, even though they lead to an ever-longer wishlist and tottering TBR stacks. 

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield. Definitely my fave of the month. I got this book years ago, when it first came out, but never read it. I am so glad I did! I don't like scary books, but I enjoy a story like this that is brimming with eery atmosphere and suspense. 

From Harvest to Home: Seasonal Activities, Inspired Decor, and Cozy Recipes for Fall by Alicia Tenise Chew put me in an autumnal mood. After reading it, I was so inspired, I made a hydrangea wreath. 

The Anti-Minimalist House by Massimo Listri. I’m on a quest to read all my coffee table books and I liked the title of this one. It is different than most of my home decor books because the author/photographer is Italian and most of the houses featured were Italian or French. Interesting, but a different look than the English and American house books I am used to. Lots of dark colors, especially dark red, and what I think of as baroque furnishings. Not literally from the Baroque period, but heavy and ornate. 

NOT PICTURED

The Lonely Girl by Edna O-Brien. This is the second book in O'Brien's Country Girls Trilogy. I liked this one a lot because the two main characters are adults in this one, not children and teen agers like in the first one. 

Some Lie and Some Die by Ruth Rendell, book 8 in her Inspector Wexford series. I love this series and plan to continue to plow through it. 

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore was my book club’s pick for October. Not my favorite, but I don’t like stories about teenagers. And I thought the ending was absurd. 

The Shortest Way to Hades by Sarah Caudwell, the second book in her Hilary Tamar series. I read the first book this summer and was excited to find audiobooks of the other three books. Lawyers who drink wine, travel around Europe, and solve mysteries -- and the books are very funny. I love this series and wish there were more than four of them.

The Sirens Sang of Murder, also by Sarah Caudwell, the third book in the series.

A Grave in the Woods by Martin Walker. His Bruno series is getting on my nerves. This is the 17th book and I am happy there is only one more to go (at least until he writes a new one). I loved this series at first, really loved it. Bruno is a viallage policeman in France who loves to cook. Wonderful! But Walker adds interesting and charming characters in every book then can't let any of them go. Trying to work two dozen or so recurring characters into every story limits the available plots. The books are getting repetitive but this one put me over the edge -- Walker forgot to include a murder mystery! The bodies in the grave in the woods were from WWII and there was no perpetrator to aprehend. 

Marble Hall Murders by Anthony Horowitz, book three in his Susan Ryeland series featuring a book editor turned amateur sleuth. Unlike the Bruno series, this one is still fresh and lively. I love it.

Falstaff by Robert Nye -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

Falstaff by Robert Nye

Thank you for joining me for Book Beginnings on Fridays. Please share the opening sentence (or so) of the book you are reading this week. You can also share from a book that caught your fancy, even if you are not reading it right now.

MY BOOK BEGINNING

I was begotten on the giant of Cerne Abbas.

-- from Falstaff by Robert Nye. Interesting first line. The story he goes on to tell is quite funny.

Robert Nye's 1975 novel, Falstaff, is the ficitonal memoir of Shakespeare's beloved comic character. It's rollicking, bawdy historical fiction at its best. The book has been on my TBR shelf for a long time, ever since I read about it in Anthony Burgess's book, 99 Novels: The Best in English Since 1939, a Personal Choice. I've loved many books that I read because they are on Burgess's list and, only a few chapters into this one, I can tell it will be another favorite. 

YOUR BOOK BEGINNINGS

Please add the link to your Book Beginnings post in the box below. If you share on social media, please use the #bookbeginnings hashtag.

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THE FRIDAY 56

The Friday 56 is a natural tie-in with Book Beginnings. The idea is to share a two-sentence teaser from page 56 of your featured book. If you are reading an ebook or audiobook, find your teaser from the 56% mark.

Freda at Freda's Voice started and hosted The Friday 56 for a long, long time. She is taking a break and Anne at My Head is Full of Books has taken on hosting duties in her absence. Please visit Anne's blog and link to your Friday 56 post.

MY FRIDAY 56

-- from Falstaff:

Being made page in a great household was supposed to prepare you for entry to court circles later on. I dare say the preparation lay in listening to the conversation of 1's betters, and in learning what to lick and where to crawl.

FROM THE PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION

The most beloved comic figure in English literature decides that history hasn’t done him justice—it’s time for him to tell the whole unbuttoned story, his way. Irascible and still lecherous at eighty-one, Falstaff spins out these outrageously bawdy memoirs as an antidote to legend, and in the process manages to recreate his own. This splendidly written novel is a feast, opening wide the look and feel of another age and bringing Shakespeare’s Falstaff to life in a totally new way. Like Jack Falstaff himself, it’s sprawling, vivid, oversized—big as life. We return in an instant to an England that was ribald, violent, superstitious, coursing with high spirits and a fresh sense of national purpose. We see what history and the Bard of Avon overlooked or avoided: what really happened that celebrated night at the windmill when Falstaff and Justice Shallow heard the chimes at midnight; who really killed Hotspur; how many men fell at the Battle of Agincourt; what actually transpired at the coronation of Henry V ("Harry the Prig"); and just what it was that made the wives of Windsor so very merry.

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

 

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield

Thank you for joining me this week for Book Beginnings on Fridays where participants share the opening sentence (or two) from the book they are reading. You can also share from a book you want to feature, even if you are not reading it at the moment. 

MY BOOK BEGINNING

It was November. Although it was not yet late, the sky was dark when I turned into Laundress Passage.

-- from The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield.

Are you reading anything special for Halloween week? I do NOT like scary, so no horror, ghosts, vampires, or gruesome crimes for me. That limits my choices!

The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield seems like a good pick. It’s been sitting on my TBR shelf for years, long after it ceased to be super popular. I’m about a quarter of the way into it and it’s perfect for me. It has just the level of eerie atmosphere, suspense, and melodrama that I enjoy. There may be ghosts, but not so far! 

Have you read this one?

YOUR BOOK BEGINNING

Please add the link to your book beginning post in the linky box below. If you participate or share on social media, please use the hashtag #bookbeginnings so other people can find your post.

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THE FRIDAY 56

The Friday 56 asks participants to share a two-sentence teaser from their book of the week. If your book is an ebook or audiobook, pick a teaser from the 56% point. 

Anna at My Head is Full of Books hosts The Friday 56, a natural tie-in with Book Beginnings on Fridays. Please visit My Head is Full of Books to leave the link to your post. 

MY FRIDAY 56

-- from The Thirteenth Tale:

In the shop my father was sitting at the desk with his head in his hands. He heard me come down the stairs and looked up, white-faced.

FROM THE PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION

Reclusive author Vida Winter, famous for her collection of twelve enchanting stories, has spent the past six decades penning a series of alternate lives for herself. Now old and ailing, she is ready to reveal the truth about her extraordinary existence and the violent and tragic past she has kept secret for so long. Calling on Margaret Lea, a young biographer troubled by her own painful history, Vida disinters the life she meant to bury for good. Margaret is mesmerized by the author's tale of gothic strangeness—featuring the beautiful and willful Isabelle, the feral twins Adeline and Emmeline, a ghost, a governess, a topiary garden and a devastating fire. Together, Margaret and Vida confront the ghosts that have haunted them while becoming, finally, transformed by the truth themselves.

The Luck of the Bodkins by P. G. Wodehouse -- BOOK REVIEW

BOOK REVIEW

The Luck of the Bodkins by P. G. Wodehouse

The Luck of the Bodkins is typical P. G. Wodehouse, which makes it typically delightful. I have a Penguin edition, the kind with my favorite Ionicus covers, but I read this one with my ears. I prefer Wodehouse as audiobooks because the humor works better for me when I hear it than when I see it.

The story takes place on an ocean liner sailing from England to New York. There's a usual Wodehouse crowd of characters, led by Monty Bodkin, a rich young man pretending to have a job in order to win the hand of Gertrude Butterwick, star field hockey player travelling to a tournament in America. Other travelers include Gertrude's stodgy cousin Ambrose Tennyson who gave up his steady job in the British Navy to become a Hollywood screenwriter, and Ambrose's younger brother Reggie Tennyson who wants to work in Hollywood but his family is forcing him to take an office job in Canada. Lottie Blossom, a film ingénue who carries a pet baby alligator in a basket for publicity, and movie mogul Ivor Llewellyn provide the Hollywood connection. The well-intentioned ship's steward Albert Peasemarch is along to stir the pot.

It is a plot similar to most Wodehouse novels. There are farcical misunderstandings, room switches, a musical revue, and the need to steal back a precious item (in this case, a toy Micky Mouse). Romantic parters fall out, reunite, fall out again. Ambrose's job offer to become a film writer comes down to a monstrous misunderstanding. Someone is determined to smuggle a string of pearls through customs, but her accomplice is convinced Monty is a detective on their trail. Everything is topsy turvy, chaos reigns, and all comes good in the end.

It’s impossible to describe the humor of P. G. Woodhouse. People either love it, like me, or it leaves them cold, like my husband. Lots of laughs come from using ordinary words in unexpected situations, so just repeating the words to someone doesn’t make them laugh unless they can understand the entire context. Mostly the word play is just silly but jumps out at you when you don't expect it. For example, after several instances of the pet alligator nipping people, Ambrose (or Reggie, I don't remember) asks Lottie Blossom if her alligator is safe. She answers, "Why, is someone trying to hurt him?" I barked with laughter, but that kind of thing is not for everyone. 

Sometimes, of course, the lines are just funny, like the opening sentence:

Into the face of the young man who sat on the terrace of the Hotel Magnifique at Cannes there had crept a look of furtive shame, the shifty, hangdog look which announces that an Englishman is about to talk French.

I think my husband is just wrong.

Are you a Wodehouse fan? What’s your favorite?

If We Still Lived Where I was Born by Maria Giura -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

If We Still Lived Where I was Born by Maria Giura

Thank you for joining me for Book Beginnings on Fridays. Please share the opening sentence (or so) of the book you are reading this week. You can also share from a book that caught your fancy, even if you are not reading it right now.

MY BOOK BEGINNING

we'd be in the apartment above the pastry shoppe
where downstairs my father made cannoli and eclairs and rum baba

and my mother made trays of butter cookies and rang up customers
and balanced the books.

-- from the first, title poem in If We Still Lived Where I was Born by Maria Giura.

Maria Giura's new book of poetry, If We Still Lived Where I was Born, launches on November 4. Maria was kind enough to send me a review copy and I am greatly enjoying these engaging poems. 

I first "met" Maria in 2019 when she published Celibate, a memoir about falling in love with a Catholic priest. Read my review of Celibate here and my 2019 interview with Maria here. 

YOUR BOOK BEGINNINGS

Please add the link to your Book Beginnings post in the box below. If you share on social media, please use the #bookbeginnings hashtag.

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This preview will disappear when the widget is displayed on your site.
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THE FRIDAY 56

The Friday 56 is a natural tie-in with Book Beginnings. The idea is to share a two-sentence teaser from page 56 of your featured book. If you are reading an ebook or audiobook, find your teaser from the 56% mark.

Freda at Freda's Voice started and hosted The Friday 56 for a long, long time. She is taking a break and Anne at My Head is Full of Books has taken on hosting duties in her absence. Please visit Anne's blog and link to your Friday 56 post.

MY FRIDAY 56

-- from "In Praise of Silence" in If We Still Lived Where I was Born:

It used to terrify me
especially on three-day weekends.
Afraid God would speak,
that I would hear,
I'd drown Him out with plans, activity,
motion.

FROM THE PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION

In Maria Giura's If We Still Lived Where I was Born, the narrator unlocks the meaning she's made of her childhood and heritage, spirituality and lost loves and draws the reader in to retrieve their own. The collection begins in the apartment above her parents' Brooklyn pastry shoppe where she imagines them still fighting, still making us, still together, then shifts to adulthood where she learns to stay still long enough to listen for the story, and then returns to childhood where her mother and aunts teach their kids to spread out their blankets and live. Moving between New York and Italy, between family and "stranger," these poems show longing and vulnerability, but also the thrill of being young and part of something larger than oneself, of making peace, and pursuing the path you were meant to. They brim with the people and places that have taught her the most and ring with pathos and celebration, from her immigrant father waiting for her on the corner . . . bread in his hand to the sister who pulled the music out of her, helped her make her own song. Beginning with a journey to a literal birth place and extending outward to many figurative places of self-discovery, this collection explores what lasts when all else passes away.