Welcome to Litsy!

#21DaysofHorror Day 19. This is one of the best haunted house novels I‘ve ever read. The story is told from different perspectives and one of them happens to be the house itself. We follow Miranda and her twin Eliot and their dad, Luc, as they grieve their mother and wife. They live in a very sinister house that at one point describes its killing of one of the family‘s relatives. It is one of the scariest things I have ever read.

Unpopular opinion here. This one didn‘t work for me😬, at least not at this moment. It was boring in some parts and confusing in others. But I will try it again in the near future to see how it goes. Sometimes a re-read helps me to change my perspective, or opinion about a book. 2.9/3 ⭐️

Really atmospheric and poetic. The narrative flows out in a dreamlike state. It feels like things aren‘t happening while they are kind of happening? I‘m not entirely sure, but I do know it still somehow kept me captivated. I really liked it. This is also my official submission for this week‘s #Screamathon prompt! @4thhouseontheleft

Cream will do though.

Thank you so so much Diane @Crazeedi for such a lovely #LittleChristmasSwap! It was a joy to open! The book choices are perfect. I‘ve badly wanted to read both for awhile. And the treat choices are also perfect! A lovely way to wrap up the holiday season. And an extra thank you to @bookish_wookish for hosting!

Slippery, chilling, and worth obsessing over.

I racked up points for #TeamHarkness this weekend for #Scarathlon2020!

110 points for hours in @DeweysReadathon (I read all 4 books pictured above!)
95 points for books read (mostly non-Halloweeny but a few spooky ones incl. picture books!)
5 points for watching the Buffy season 2 episode Halloween
TOTAL: 210 points

The most points I've got in the #Scarathlon so far. I know it doesn't compare to others but I'm proud! @StayCurious

#dogsoflitsy This is our little (big) weirdo, Zora. She‘s majestic only when she needs to be (don‘t tell her I didn‘t pick a majestic shot for this). The rest of the time she‘s flopping backwards on beds for naps and sideways onto people for full body cuddles. She is the best reading buddy!

I want to meet your fur babies 🖤 Tell me about them in the comments, or tag me in a post! :)

Finished my first #Readathon book! Melancholy and spooky. I felt like the whole reading experience had me teetering on the edge of discomfort. The house in this book isn't so much haunted as it is alive. It's a monstrous character who keeps the Silver women for itself. It also *is* the women. There's also a delightful amount of queerness and interrogation of the UK's racist and anti-immigrant/refugee ideologies, plus Oyeyemi's beautiful writing.

Full sunshine streaming in through the window while I'm almost done #Readathon @DeweysReadathon hour 2 ☀️

I was starting to wonder if the reports of queer content in this book were wrong, but ...

"The first kiss with Cat might have been in a public place -- at the cinema, I think. It's hard to say because I was so scared that it felt as if we were kissing in front of everyone every time." ?

#Readathon time! Technically it started at 5am on the west coast but I can't get up that early, even for my beloved reading. But 7am is still pretty good! It's just starting to get a teensy bit light here. I'm starting with White is For Witching, my current read. Then I've got a stack of shorter books to choose from for the rest of the day. Happy reading fellow readathoners! @DeweysReadathon

"Suryaz and Deme would each need a talisman, an object that smelt lovely, or that felt kind to the hand; such things are little suitcases to put sad feelings in so that they can go away by themselves."

⭐️⭐️⭐️ So I liked this book better than this author‘s latest book Gingerbread. It was way sadder than I expected but the ending was pretty spooky. I think the eating disorder problem was the scariest part for me. If you‘re looking for sad scary then I recommend. If you‘re looking for Halloween scary this one doesn‘t hit that note. This was my #bookspinbingo No. 6 and it was on my #screamathon list.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

2020 Reading Challenge
14. A Book with a Color in the Title

It‘s not so much that the house is haunted as much as it is alive...

•An altogether eerie and unsettling atmosphere (Hello, Poe).
•Prose so poetic it borders on lyrical.
•Bewitched from page one.

Helen Oyeyemi knows that ghost stories aren‘t just for kids.

Based on this book and Gingerbread, I think Helen Oyoyemi would be very interesting to talk to about food. There's a lot here about nurturing someone vs consuming them and how fear can turn a place of protection and safety into a prison. It's also possible there's an allegory for systemic racism and/or isolationism, but I'll have to mull it over some more.

+16 #scarathlon2020 #teamharkness #screamathon @StayCurious @4thhouseontheleft

Mid-morning snack. I've discovered that, either because I'm in my 40s now or because of the anxiety caused by 2020, my body needs a little more attention than I usually give it. So this morning was a 12-mile bike ride with my spouse followed by stretching, meditation, and now a little reading and a snack that is not inspired by the main character's preferences.

"Miranda Silver is in Dover, in the ground beneath her mother's house."

#FirstLineFridays @ShyBookOwl

Pros: the writing is gorgeous and unsettling
Cons: each character‘s POV has them living a different version of the same story but none ever seem to come together at the end. It feels unfinished on every account.

I really did enjoy it but I just wanted it to go deeper than it did.

Trying to digest this book. Finished it last night and stayed up thinking about it. I‘m not positive how I feel.
My main wish right now is that it had been more of a story of Ore finding her Soucouyant. I think for me, that was the most interesting part of this story.

This disturbing tale of a haunted house and a twin suffering an eating disorder stutters and jumps between 3 POVs - the twin brother, the college girlfriend and the house itself. The effect is to leave you unsure of what is real, much like the people in the house. It can be confusing - I had to reread sections to be sure of who was speaking - but Oyeyemi writes like a poet, with more emphasis on sound and imagery than on creating clear lines. ⬇️

At first I thought, what does all this racism and xenophobia have to do with this book about a haunted house. But after watching Francina Simone‘s video on Being Black. I have to say this is a book about racism dressed as a haunted house story. This is also Oyeyemi‘s rejection of the white princess “everything has to turn out ok for her” myth. This is about how hate will sour your house and will ruin futures. The oppression in here! Pick!!!👇🏼

Barely on page 10 and I have no idea what‘s going on except that I love the writing. The personification of words- like “please” is a kid in someone‘s mouth acting like a petulant child saying,”I don‘t wanna!!” Which for the word please itself is hilarious. And the impatient words on the bottom are a group of people who had been trapped in an elevator. Lol @Centique #WIFWBuddyRead

Today I got my WIFW book and was gonna start it but then I noticed a strong smell of cinnamon and/or mint and thought how funny that someone might be trying to bewitching me into this book. Turns out there was liquid damage. So getting a replacement. Side note- watched my favorite Twilight Zone this week. Jess Belle who is so sick for the love of Billy Ben she bargains with a witch but doesn‘t realize the cost. Happy Friday night, Littens!

Generations of a family are subject to the whims of a malevolent house. It‘s not that it‘s haunted as much as alive. When Miranda is in trouble, her brother Eliot tries to help but is not affected by the house the same way the women in the family are.

Last week's #bookreport and my upcoming #WeeklyForecast

The only book I actually started from last week is tagged. At least I kept to one on the list, right? 🤷‍♀️ #moodreader

@Cinfhen

A little late night reading

About half way through this one and still not too sure about it. It's interesting but a strange and confusing read so far....

#WIHM

Tentative #FebTBR

It's Women in Horror Month and I've decided to participate in the #lohfreadathon over on IG so I'm filling my month with some great authors of the genre. Ok, so I already started The Other People, but I'm not done so it counts 😂

I'm also doing a #MistbornBuddyRead starting this month and I'm thrilled to finally get to this one!

Not sure what else I'll read but I'm hoping to finish all these at least 😊

I'm not feeling in the mood for my current library book, so I thought I'd try one of the books I already own. Any votes for which one I should try? From L to R:
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey

Yes, yes, yes. I loved this. I didn't always have my bearings, a bit like standing on the deck of a ship, something always shifting beneath my feet. Don't expect clear answers or a tidy resolution. Do expect eeriness and atmosphere, unsettling imagery and intriguing characters, and a commentary on racism and xenophobia skillfully woven through it all. 5 ⭐ (Now I'm off to read everything else Oyeyemi has written 👋🏼)

Thank you so much @BethM for this amazing #basicwitchswap package! I am so excited about these books and for a very cool looking new tarot deck! Very excited for some witchy fall reading (and eating) 🧙‍♀️🖤

@sprainedbrain @Meaw_catlady

So excited to open my #basicwitchswap box from @PatriciaU today 🥰

I LOVE everything!! That card is so pretty, the mug is funtastic, fab book choices, and all the rest is just so great! Thank you so much, Patricia! 😘

(The cats also love their treats, I appreciate you thinking of them 😻)

Also thanks to @sprainedbrain & @Meaw_catlady for organizing all the witchy goodness

#libraryhaul because I just couldn't help myself

Beware if you enter Oyeyemi's world. Not all who choose to stay at this eerie bed and breakfast with the Silver's will be scared. If you've read this author before, you'll already know this isn't really a horror novel all the time- she's got about 5 pots of thematic stews boiling at any point. But if you're like me and ideas and images are what scare you, then come in, make yourself comfortable. Don't worry about the whispers. And have an apple 🍎

A lot of horror freaks me out, so I'm not much for #screamathon - but tor.com published a piece called 'Horror Recommendations for All Tolerance Levels' so I thought I might dip my toe into the spooky atmospheric end of the pool just a bit in honor of the Halloween season!

https://www.tor.com/2019/10/01/horror-recommendations-for-all-tolerance-levels/c...

#7covers7days Day 1

Thanks @merelybookish for the tag!

@tournevis not sure if you've already been tagged, but if you want to play, it's 7 covers in 7 days, no explanations needed, & tag someone new each day.

Another quiet morning brought to you by a tiny sleeping in 😁

I‘m not sure what I‘ll be reading over the holiday weekend but it‘ll be dark and creepy for sure!

This one has been in my plans for a very long time. Haunted house books are a favorite of mine and this one gets across the board great reviews!

Why do people go to these places, these places that are not for them? It must be that they believe in their night vision. They believe themselves able to draw images up out of the dark. But black wells only yield black water.

I‘ve never read a more interesting book structurally. My mind was given a workout.

This book is difficult. Oyeyemi is a very subtle writer, almost falling into obtuse sometimes and her books don't follow standard literary flows. So Squidapus is unsure if he got everything that this book was doing. As usual her language is absolutely incredible and the atmosphere in the book is unnerving and stressful. Be careful; if you read this book and think it's about a haunted house and not racism/trauma/mental health/family, read closer

#BewitchedBotheredandBewildered #MayMovieMagic
I'm about to post a gushing review of my first Oyeyemi and after I finished it I immediately added more of hers to my TBR.
You could say I was *bewitched* by her magical style, *bothered* that I don't have more of her books on my shelf, and *bewildered* that I haven't read her before now.
@rohit-sawant @Cinfhen

In this novel we meet the twins Miranda (Miri) and Eliot, and their dad and grandmother. The story is told in first person, and since that would switch through the novel I had problems with knowing who was telling the story when. This made it hard for me to connect with the characters and the writing style.

I guess we all know this feeling.

A reference to Buffy. Buffy 💜💜💜

I most confess that I haven‘t been given this much thought, but I love literary references in books

It‘s been too long since I read “Wuthering Heights” and I‘ve only watched the TV series of “Vanity Fair”, so I don‘t know if I agree with the conclusion here.

Decided to put “Swan Song” on hold for now and try this one instead.

I‘m in love with this book. Oyeyemi has an almost poetical way with words that‘s enchanting and I was riveted.

This one wasn't for me, but I definitely want to read more of Oyeyemi. Her writing is lyrical and there are some lines that really stand out. But this book was too ambiguous for me, the kind that makes me feel like, am I too dumb to understand this abstract symbolism? Or is it just maddeningly vague? Read it if you like: fractured narratives, lyrical writing, creepy settings, and feeling adrift in hints.

My first book by Helen Oyeyemi. A challenging read so far, but I'm into it.

My heart is in my throat and I don‘t know what to do. All I know is that I love Helen Oyeyemi! Full stop. 💀