February actually turned out to be a sincerely low-key month as far as getting new books was concerned. I still spent some time wracking my brain about what I did or didn’t get this month, as usual, but it seems the blanks I’m drawing are real. I suppose this is good, it’s not as if my shelf space is growing, but I think I should visit one of the local shops soon.

Enough rambling, on to the books!

New Books

The DC Universe by Mike Mignola was a completely surprise find that I was more than happy to take home with me. I was vaguely aware that books like these get made, collecting various DC stories written by a certain author, but I had no idea one existed for Mignola. What sealed the deal for me, however, was the fact that I found it still in its shrink wrap for $4 at a dollar store, which is one hell of a value. I’m not sure I’ve heard much about what he’s written for mainline DC characters, so I’m curious to see what it has in store for me too.

Hop! by Joshua Barkman is a very short graphic novel that the author independently printed copies of. Originally, each page was published on Barkman’s Instagram account (False Knees) as part of Inktober in 2021, one for every day of October. He was so happy with how it turned out that he decided to get it printed in a little book, and I was more than happy to place an order for one.

Novel Discoveries

I’ve been spending some of my idle time on TikTok more and more lately, and as a result a lot of the new books that are catching my interest I’m hearing about from there.

Gutshot by Amelia Gray was the first of these this past month, which is a collection of horror stories I’m really interested in checking out. In my mind they have something of a Western edge to them, but I don’t know if I’ve fabricated a memory I heard about the book based on the cover and title. I’m always on the lookout for new great horror to read though, so this is a book I’ll probably be more actively seeking out in the near future.

Star Wars: Stories of Jedi and Sith is an outlier because I feel like I don’t normally bother with putting Star Wars book here, since I consider my interest to be a given. However, I don’t normally go for the Middle Grade books connected to this franchise, so I took care to make sure I remembered this one. This book caught my attention due in no small part to the fact that it will include a story about Rey, and part of me is hoping it involves her training with Leia, which we sadly didn’t get to see a lot of on screen due to Carrie Fisher’s unfortunate passing. I want them to continue to do more with Rey in the expanded media too, so hopefully this will satisfy some of that desire.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt is another recommendation I got from a video, and it is about a group of college students forming their own secret society, which takes a dark turn. The video spoke highly of Tartt, and considering how many ratings this book has on Goodreads, it’s apparently high time that I made myself familiar with her work.

Marabou Stork Nightmares by Irvine Welsh is a book I shelved after hearing about it purely because of how weird and evocative the title is and how much of a literal head trip the story is supposed to be. The author is a name I recognize too, which helps, though I’ve yet to read any of his work.

Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlmann and Kerascoët is a graphic novel that blends traditional fairy tale motifs and visuals with some really dark elements, or so I’ve heard. The combination of such elements is something that really appeals to me, so I particularly want to check this one out sooner rather than later.

An honourable mention goes to The Liminal Zone by Junji Ito, which I very recently learned is the next book of his coming out in North America. I have no idea what it’s about, however, nor does it even have a cover publicly available yet, so I can’t feature it like I normally do.

Closing Thoughts

This year’s winter has done a great job of being an absolute nuisance, and I cannot wait for it to be over, so I don’t really mind the passage of the months feeling so fast right now.

Has anybody else gotten into the bookish corner of TikTok at all? It’s interesting, but I’m also starting to see certain books turn up a lot in a way that’s getting repetitive. I’ve heard that Tender is the Flesh is “such a disturbing book” so many times now that I might actually read it out of a weird sense of (benign) spite. I love hearing about disturbing books (within reason), but it’s no fun if you just keep telling me about the same book!

Until next time, thank you for reading!