October was a very busy and exciting month for me, as I flew out to Japan, where I’m spending the next three months.

I’m staying in Osaka, which is a huge city in the Kansai region, and have been doing lots of exploring and adventuring because there is just so much to see. As a result, I haven’t had as much time to read this last month because I’ve been making new friends and going to castles/temples/shrines/parks/festivals. So my wrap up this month will be relatively short, but let’s get into it nonetheless!

I only read one novel last month (I STILL HAVEN’T FINISHED EMPIRE OF STORMS, WHO AM I?!) and seven volumes of manga.

The novel I read was Shadow Fall, which will be released on 22nd November (my sister’s birthday). I received a copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, and you can read my full review here if you’d like.

The short version is that this novel involved a lot of over-used dystopian tropes and an annoying love triangle, but managed to drag itself out of the abyss somewhat in the last hundred pages.

The manga volumes I read were:

Bleach Volume 40

Love Attack volumes 1-5

Platinum End volume 1 (although it’s weirdly listed as chapters rather than volumes on Goodreads).

Bleach was easily my favourite volume of the month, although I started the other two on recommendations from friends and am enjoying them both.

Love Attack is great if you want light-hearted humour, romance and a kick-ass female lead (seriously, she jumps out of windows just to kick people), and Platinum End is by the creators of Death Note, so if you enjoyed the darkness and twists of that plot then you’ll likely enjoy this too.

TTT Posts

Top Ten Tuesday: Villains

Top Ten Tuesday: Books I read because of a recommendation

Top Ten Tuesday: Characters I’d name a pet after

Top Ten Tuesday: Halloween special

(Obligatory copyright free pumpkin photo.)

Other Features

I didn’t do any tags this month (although I know I’ve definitely been tagged by a few people, so shame on me), but here are some things I wrote about:

Help me decide which books to take to Japan!

Arriving in Japan

NaNoWriMo Plans

Other Highlights

Anime

I started watching a new anime called Norn9 (or Norn + Nonet), which is based off a video game of the same name. While the plot seems a little all over the place, the animation and colours are beautiful (I’m a sucker for beautiful animation) and the characters have different magical powers, which is right up my street. The only annoying thing is the male characters far outnumber the female characters (where are my powerful ladies at?), but hopefully the series will make up for this in other ways.

Music

I discovered an artist called Eurielle this month, who wrote songs for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings soundtracks, and her voice is so soulful it gives me shivers. It’d recommend Carry Me and You Said if you fancy giving her a listen.

Youtube

The lovely Ashleigh over at A Frolic Through Fiction started up her own Booktube account this month, so you should definitely go follow her if you don’t already!

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That’s pretty much it for October. I’m going to be uploading some separate posts about Japan, so that’s why I haven’t included much about it here.

Let me know what you guys have been reading this month and if you’ve been up to anything exciting!