{"id":1571,"date":"2018-10-25T12:58:01","date_gmt":"2018-10-25T16:58:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/?p=1571"},"modified":"2018-10-08T19:59:32","modified_gmt":"2018-10-08T23:59:32","slug":"book-review-october-by-michael-rowe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/?p=1571","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: October by Michael Rowe"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/October-Michael-Rowe-ebook\/dp\/B076ZMWGPN\/ref=as_li_ss_il?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1526051165&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=october+michael+rowe&amp;linkCode=li3&amp;tag=monstlibra0f1-20&amp;linkId=06cc6a475f748150b64d0c57febf6a6e\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/widgets\/q?_encoding=UTF8&amp;ASIN=B076ZMWGPN&amp;Format=_SL250_&amp;ID=AsinImage&amp;MarketPlace=US&amp;ServiceVersion=20070822&amp;WS=1&amp;tag=monstlibra0f1-20\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/e\/ir?t=monstlibra0f1-20&amp;l=li3&amp;o=1&amp;a=B076ZMWGPN\" alt=\"\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" border=\"0\" \/><\/p>\n<p><i>October\u00a0<\/i>by Michael Rowe<\/p>\n<p>ChiZine, 2017<\/p>\n<p>ASIN:\u00a0B076ZMWGPN<\/p>\n<p>Available: Kindle edition, audiobook, MP3 CD<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Michael Rowe is one of those writers who can swing from the eloquent prose of a Peter Straub to the brutality of a Richard Laymon. His novels\u00a0<em>Enter, Night<\/em>, and\u00a0<em>Wild Fell\u00a0<\/em>were excellent examples of pushing the envelope while holding onto what makes the genre so good.\u00a0<em>October\u00a0<\/em>is the best of Rowe\u2019s writing yet: a\u00a0traditionally-styled tale, with some surprise twists. At only 151 pages, it can, and should, be read in one sitting, for the reader to feel the full impact.<\/p>\n<p>Mikey Childress is a bully\u2019s dream. He\u2019s not exactly the most popular kid in town; he\u2019s undersized, and a bit odd. His one friend, Wroxy, isn\u2019t much different from him, but she is much more comfortable with who she is. Mikey wants more out of life; he wants to be accepted, to be loved for who he is, and to not have the crap kicked out of him on a daily basis.<\/p>\n<p>When Mikey stumbles upon a black mass in the woods of his town, he\u2019s terrified.\u00a0 When the bullies\u2019 beatings of him intensify, though, becoming more dangerous, Mikey investigates what happened during the summoning he witnessed.\u00a0<em>October\u00a0<\/em>truly takes off then; a new friend shows up at school, someone who Mikey has always wanted and needed in his life, who may be just a little too good to be true. The novel could have become cliched at that point, but instead, Rowe takes a hard left into the unexpected, forcing the characters to examine what they truly want and need in their lives, and has a surprise ending.\u00a0While a twisty novel like this one can only truly surprise the reader on a first read,\u00a0<em>October\u00a0<\/em>is\u00a0worth reading a second time. Highly recommended.<\/p>\n<p>Reviewed by Dave Simms<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>October\u00a0by Michael Rowe ChiZine, 2017 ASIN:\u00a0B076ZMWGPN Available: Kindle edition, audiobook, MP3 CD &nbsp; Michael Rowe is one of those writers who can swing from the eloquent prose of a Peter Straub to the brutality of a Richard Laymon. His novels\u00a0Enter, Night, and\u00a0Wild Fell\u00a0were excellent examples of pushing the envelope while holding onto what makes the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[18,119,171],"tags":[290],"class_list":["post-1571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-reviews","category-horror","category-paranormalsupernatural","tag-michael-rowe"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3Eu9f-pl","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1571"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1571\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1572,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1571\/revisions\/1572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/ReadingBites\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}