In My Opinion!!
Currently reading:
My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing
’Salem’s Lot by Stephen King
Loving My Lovely Wife——I hope to have more time to read in the coming week. Only a few pages into ’Salem’s Lot so far, but excited to dig back into King.
Books finished this week: 1
★★★☆☆
Where this book came from: A quick search of my email tells me I ordered this from B&N back in January 2020.
Why this book: I love horror movies. Also, I read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies when it first came out and didn’t mind it, so I figured I’d give Seth Grahame-Smith another try. (I think he also maybe went to Emerson . . . ?)
Thoughts: I picked this up because it was sitting on top of a pile of books on the bottom of one of my bookshelves, and I thought, Hey, that’s seasonally appropriate and probably a fast read! I read it in a couple hours yesterday (Saturday) night and chuckled at some of the observations. It’s a cute read for people familiar with horror and all its many tropes, but some of the humor feels like the author trying too hard, and also makes it clear this was first written in 2007 and only slightly updated for re-release in 2019.
Library updates:
October is usually when I spend my evenings watching horror movies—old favorites, recent releases, whatever I find on Shudder. I love settling in with a grandma craft and something that’s going to make it hard for me to sleep when the weather gets cold.
I haven’t watched very many scary movies this spooky season. I haven’t even put out my two pieces of Halloween decor, though not for lack of trying. Somehow, I genuinely cannot find my Halloween decorations in my one-bedroom apartment; that’s a problem for another time. I’ve been busy and tired, and I spend a lot of time after work doing grad school homework or watching YouTube (I’m in my YouTube Era, in case that hasn’t been made abundantly clear already, and it’s an era that began many years ago and shows no signs of ending anytime soon).
But I was able to get a bit of a horror fix from the Brooklyn Horror Festival, which I mentioned a bit last week. Britt (hi, Britt!) and I went to see Torso, which was insane, and Ringu, which thankfully was not as scary as I was worried it would be, over last weekend, and I had a few more tickets this week. I had to skip Wilder Than Her on Monday evening, because I was just . . . going through it, to be honest. But I went to see Monolith on Wednesday——which was mostly fine!——and then Britt and I reunited on Thursday night to see Where the Devil Roams——which was not at all what I expected it to be and, in fact, was very bad!! In my opinion!!
Anyhow, I’m thankful the festival exists and I’m glad I got to see some good stuff this year. I feel like I live at the Nitehawk Williamsburg now, and I’m excited to dig into a bunch of the other movies from the lineup that sold out before I could snag tickets (looking at you especially, The Sacrifice Game). Horror movie season can be anytime you like, and I say it will continue into November and maybe even December this year.
To make up for my lack of horror viewing, I’m doing some horror reading, thanks to my Literature of the Gothic class. Obviously, we’ve read Frankenstein and Dracula so far. The last book for the semester is ’Salem’s Lot, but I’ve started reading it now because 1) it felt seasonally appropriate and 2) it’s Stephen King, so I know I’m going to need some extra time to get through it. Bring on the vamps!
Closing thoughts:
More of a question of the week: If you had the opportunity to become a vampire, would you? Be honest.
