in literature, october 2024
anne rice's vampires, mycology, and a dose of good old-fashioned female hysteria
i hope everybody had a lovely halloween!!! as i am writing this it is october 30th, but even so october has been rather nice leading up to tomorrow. i’m really struggling with work/life balance recently— i find the pleasure i derive from writing sometimes eats away at everything else until it falls into my peripheral and strays far from my mind. still, a productive month is hardly a bad thing.
i didn’t actually read much at all though, given the anne rice books are very lengthy and have taken up most of the time i dedicate to leisure. it’s been nice to accommodate the season and read something for genuine pleasure, though that isn’t to say i don’t have take-aways from it. even though it isn’t polished poetry, vampire fiction also has its merits! if we’ve spoken or you’ve been subscribed to this substack since before i did housekeeping this year, you know i have many thoughts about the merits of vampire fiction.
anyways— in lit, october edition:
*yes, i am aware i am posting this in february of 2025. this is custom for my substack, keep up <3
10/9 anne rice’s the vampire armand + the vampire lestat
i read interview with the vampire initially when i was 16, caged in by pandemic and looking for a reprieve. i found it! a brilliantly dark book imbued with queer sexuality and trauma— just the thing i needed, actually, as shoved in the closet as i was then. though, i really wasn’t compelled to read more at the time, the tv series (2022—) has motivated me to go back and read more anne rice, which i have actually fallen in love with! it’s especially fun to jump in from the show, given that s3 will be an adaptation of the vampire lestat. fingers crossed we’ll get the vampire armand further down the line as well. both books were fabulously entertaining but i have a special love for armand in particular. if you know me personally, you know this is at least 45% to do with assad zaman’s portrayal, but i digress. this is one of the essential cornerstones of the modern vampire. taking apt time to read rice’s literature was a joy.
queen of the damned is next on my list, but i told myself i’d make a dent in my tbr before pursuing this one. in due time!
for anyone else who has read or watched the show;
10/14 m. l. rio’s graveyard shift
m. l. rio’s writing has thoroughly captivated me since i initially picked up if we were villains in 2021. because of its theatrical, dark academic, and murder mystery-esque nature as well as its standout cast of distinct characters, it became a favorite of mine. my friends have collected instances of me attempting to get them to read it. one actually did, and i have an annotated copy from him on my bookshelf next to my very own. i’ve read both in full multiple times.
so naturally when i heard we were getting another work by rio, i was quick to get my hands on it. graveyard shift enamoured me— as an academic with insomnia, i saw myself fitting right in with this band of characters. tuck and hannah were my favorites from the get-go and remained such until the end.
i was very surprised to see a disproportionate amount of negative reviews. everyone who i spoke to was comparing this work to if we were villains. one is a novel, one a novella, and they’re years apart. i guess that’s the issue with being (rightfully) raised onto a pedestal for one work— you’re defined by it, so everything you produce after exists in its shadow without you getting a say.
comparing them didn’t occur to me. the consistencies were because rio has a very enchanting way of writing her dialogue so it jumps off the page, and inconsistencies were because it was a different work with a different reading experience.
all and all, i love it. the allusions to mycology got me very curious as to that area of study and though quick, i appreciate the ability to tell a story both efficiently and concisely. i am of the belief it’s harder to write a novella than a novel (i say this having done both). really, i enjoyed this story— it’s pleasantly short, please check it out as well as if we were villains!
+ m. l. rio has a substack as well, go find her at
:)10/25 jessica gross’ hysteria
i picked this up because it struck me as odd in just the way i like— female sexuality, obsession, self-destructive narrator. and sigmund freud is there!
here’s the blurb: In HYSTERIA, we meet a young woman an hour into yet another alcohol-fueled, masochistic, sexual bender at her local bar. There is a new bartender working this time, one she hasn't seen before, and who can properly make a drink. He looks familiar, and as she is consumed by shame from her behavior the previous week— hooking up with her parents' colleague and her roommate's brother— she also becomes convinced that her Brooklyn bartender is actually Sigmund Freud. They embark on a relationship, and she is forced to confront her past through the prism of their complex, revealing, and sometimes shocking meetings. With the help of Freud—or whoever he is—she begins to untangle her Oedipal leanings, her upbringing, and her desires. Jessica Gross's debut is unflinchingly perceptive and honest, darkly funny, and unafraid of mining the deepest fears of contemporary lives.
and really it should have checked all my boxes being this way, but i just couldn’t get through it. so many times i wanted to stop, but i had to know where the story was going. to elaborate, there were a number of unapologetically graphic, sexual, and upsetting scenes that were just so vivid and relatable that it kept me invested, but without these at times, jarring accounts by our protagonist, i’d have been driven away by the too-on-the-nose writing style. i like ‘in your face’ narration— it’s enjoyable and unforgettable, but i can’t say for sure that this hit me the same way as other writers i like such as elle nash and and eliza clark.
i encourage those curious about the blurb to check it out (pay mind to the topics of sexuality and questionable consent) and let me know how they found it. i’m seeing a trend of extremely odd short fiction works about weird unhinged (often white) women1 and though i enjoy reading a lot of them, i can’t really figure out where this is leading us and how it’ll appear down the line. if you want to speculate with me, you’re welcome to.
though i read many other works this month, these stuck out to me to write about. for those reading this february, i am sending my best to you and thank you for your interest in my rambles :)
the next installment is TBD as my reading has been very selective and scattered. i had a pretty rough tail-end of 2024 and am admittedly finding my footing in the new year, so it’ll come out when it comes out. i will say i’m making my way through cleopatra and frankenstein by coco mellors and absolutely loving it.
del
my novella falls under this category. i’m guilty of it, too.
yummy mycology