16 Books Scary Mommy Editors Read & Raved About This Month

*Releases Oct. 6

If you read Mixed Feelings and fell in love with Sara, this sequel is everything! Seventh grade just got even messier — Sara is now officially a teenager juggling drama club, volleyball, a growing crush, and a mom who thinks that means more responsibility, and the balancing act is equal parts hilarious and painfully relatable. The dual timeline of trying to be both a kid and a young adult at the same time is so perfectly captured that anyone who survived middle school will be reading this through their fingers. It’s the perfect fall graphic novel for the tween in your life! — Katie Garrity, Senior Editor, News & Social

*Releases Oct. 20

As someone who devoured Bethany Joy Lenz’s Dinner for Vampires memoir, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on whatever she wrote next. If you also read Dinner, you know that Lenz is someone who can expertly write about being slowly stripped of yourself by a person who says they love you... and here she does it in fiction. In 1880s London, an American expat who makes her living painting the dead meets a charming new man. With the Whitechapel murders (aka Jack the Ripper) unfolding in the background, we see a different kind of dismantling taking place in Cora’s life. There’s a lot to love here: the feminist bones, Victorian London, the build-up to a truly shocking twist. Lenz built a world I didn’t want to leave, and I would happily take a second book in it. — Julie Sprankles, Deputy Editor, Lifestyle & Entertainment

If you like a main character who you wish made better choices but you can kind of relate to them because they don't, this book's for you. TV writer Caroline mistakenly sees some notes about a patient in her therapist husband's desk. When she sort of accidentally pitches a show based on the content of those notes, things quickly spiral out of control. You will cringe and say, "No, she wouldn't..." more than once. — Katie McPherson, Associate Editor, Lifestyle & Entertainment

Just wow. This book of five short stories absolutely blew me away. If you are looking for a spooky season book that is a little more subtly gothic and horrific, let this be your pick! These stories remind me of The Twilight Zone, but super feminist. They are filled with creepy rural settings in the Northwest, powerful, complex women, and the sense that you don't quite know what's going on around you. I devoured every one of these! — Sarah Aswell, Deputy Editor, News & Social

Ellen O'Clover simply does not miss! If Not You is already a Book of the Month pick and a Kirkus-starred novel, and I cannot wait for everyone to get their hands on it — it is a rivals-to-lovers romance about two Chicago advertising copywriters with five years of contentious history who get forced together on a month-long work trip and have absolutely no choice but to actually see each other. The slow-burn tension is genuinely scorching, the banter is sharp, and early readers are comparing it to The Hating Game, which tells you everything you need to know. — Katie Garrity

Here's another ghost story as we enter fall. Junie is an enslaved girl working in the home of a plantation owner and navigating her life absent of freedom the best she can. But after her sister dies tragically and reappears as a ghost only Junie can see, her life begins to change. What is Junie's sister's ghost trying to tell her, and if she listens, what will happen next? This is a gripping story and a lovely piece of historical fiction from a debut writer that shows slavery in all its horror and complexity. — Sarah Aswell

From the NYT bestselling author of The Last Bookshop in London comes a dual-timeline witchy historical fiction that follows a modern woman in Savannah whose strange gifts after her mother's death lead her to a decaying English manor, and a 17th-century widow in Suffolk accused of witchcraft for the crime of being educated and independent. It is atmospheric, spellbinding, and the kind of book that was made to be read under a blanket while the weather turns. Exactly what the season ordered! — Katie Garrity

I know I'm way late to this book, but I saw it was available at the library and snapped it up finally. This book is batshit in all the best ways. We meet a nameless protagonist who feels like she can't be her most authentic self in her marriage, but has been able to get by expressing herself through her creative endeavors. She hopes a road trip to New York for work will help her get clarity, but then she pulls over at a motel 30 minutes from home and spends two weeks hiding out, indulging her every whim, and just doing whatever the f*ck she feels like. July's prose is masterful and will remind you exactly why you love to read: It's painfully accurate and hilarious and just so good. The book explores midlife, motherhood, perimenopause, and monogamy, and I couldn't put it down even when I wanted to (AUDRA?!). — Katie McPherson

Maggie O'Farrell is one of my must-read authors, and this book might be her best yet. Set in Ireland after the Great Hunger, the story follows a family struggling to survive whose lives are changed when they discover a strange spring in the woods. This is historical fiction at its best, with gorgeous writing and unforgettable characters. By the end, you will be so moved about what O'Farrell has to say about colonialism, family, nature, and the land we all live on. — Sarah Aswell

*Releases Nov. 3

I didn't set out to read this at the same time as All Fours, but I highly recommend it. Mattoo's accessible and honest memoir was like the sensible counterweight to July's novel. As a wife and mom who didn't want to blow up her life or escape it, Mattoo chronicled her personal experiment to stop optimizing her life and instead find, nurture, and devote herself to joy. — Katie McPherson

This is the best science fiction novel I have read all year, and wait until you hear the premise. One day, every white person wakes up and walks into the nearest body of water and drowns. Those left behind are faced with an uncertain future, for what will they do when all of the power systems around them suddenly collapse? This story follows one man, Charlie, who is freed from prison (as all prisons shut down) after years behind bars, and his daughter, Sidney, whom he's never met until now. The entire book is amazing and so well written! — Sarah Aswell

I was determined to work my way through Alice Hoffman’s Practical Magic series before seeing Practical Magic 2 in the theater, and The Book of Magic buttoned it up for me. And what a way to end my quest! This book pulls every generation of the Owens family into the present day for a final reckoning with the curse. In other words, the perfect primer before you go see PM2, which I highly recommend. I would say this isn’t the book to jump into first if you’re starting the series. It’s the payoff book since all the threads from the other three land here. Read it last, right before you head to the movies! — Julie Sprankles

I love Rainbow Rowell's romances because they feel so real and messy compared to some of the others out there. This one is about a woman in the midst of a divorce who reconnects with an old friend who she's always been a little in love with — but things are very, very complicated. Some people didn't like this book because the main character deals with body issues A LOT throughout the story, but I found it really refreshing, as a fat person, to have a fat person talking about being a fat person! Other people didn't like the ending... but I actually thought it was great. — Sarah Aswell

This is going to be in my top five books of the year, no doubt. It's a super dark comedy about a grumpy old man who kind of accidentally adopts a couple of kids and brings them on a road trip to meet his future wife (who... does not know he's her future husband). There's also a cat who can predict death in the car. If you like quirky characters, gallows humor, and learning about the human condition, you will like this book. I can't wait to go back and read Hartnett's other books! — Sarah Aswell

This is a classic that doesn't feel like a classic. This short, powerful book is about a young woman who is coming of age and falling in love for the first time — but is it with the right person? Charity is adopted, repressed, and bored in her small New England town, but does she know what's best for her or what love even feels like? Written in 1917, I love how modern this story felt and how ahead of her time Edith Wharton was to write this at all! — Sarah Aswell

For the little theater kid in your life, this book is going to send them completely over the edge — Welcome to Broadway is an interactive sound button picture book with 12 buttons that play iconic Broadway show tunes, including "For Good" from Wicked, "Tomorrow" from Annie, and "Belle" from Beauty and the Beast, all performed by Tony Award-winning Broadway stars. Three New York City pigeons guide readers through the theater district, the history of musicals, and everything that makes a Broadway show magical, for ages 4 and up. It is genuinely one of the most exciting kids' books of the fall! — Katie Garrity