Reviews of the 8 Books I Read in October 2026

1. Brain Damage by Freida McFadden

Dr. Charly McKenna had the perfect life: a thriving dermatology practice, a luxury apartment overlooking Central Park, and a handsome husband who adored her. Until the night a bullet tore through her skull… and stole everything.

Now Charly wakes in a rehabilitation hospital unable to walk, speak, or remember her own name. All she knows is that someone tried to kill her―and they may still be out there. As fragments of memory surface, so do unsettling questions about the people around her, including the attentive man who keeps appearing at her bedside.

My Rating: ★★★★

This is my 23rd Freida McFadden book and I’m still not finished. With Freida releasing four books in 2026 alone, it’s so hard to keep up! But I think I only have seven more of her books to read before her next release comes out in March 2027.

Brain Damage was first self-published by Freida in 2016, but has been re-released in 2026 with a new cover and has made its way into the New York Times Bestsellers list. We follow a woman who is shot in the head at the beginning of the book, but survives and has lost her memory, so doesn’t remember who shot her. The book goes between the past and present as we figure out if it was the boyfriend (isn’t it always the boyfriend?) or someone else in the main character’s life.

Like all of Freida’s book, it keeps you guessing right until the end and then throws a huge curveball.

2. I See Buildings Fall Light Lightning by Keiran Goddard

Only Rian has made it out of the estate and moved away to another city, but his money doesn’t stop him from clinging to a vision of the past that is quickly slipping away. Oli is fading by the day, drinking and snorting his way through the endless boredom. Things are looking up for Conor, but he is never too far away from chaos. Patrick and Shiv are as in love as ever, always the calm in the eye of the storm, but even they are rocked when old secrets begin to open new wounds.

My Rating: ★★

This was a very slow read. Too slow for a book with 200 pages.

I saw online that it’s been adapted for TV (I’m not sure why or how) and that it stars Anthony Boyle and Lola Petticrew, two Northern Irish actors. Starting the book, I thought it would be set in Northern Ireland, but it’s actually set in Birmingham. I would watch the first ten minutes of the movie just to see how the two NI actors deliver a Brummie accent.

For me, there were too many characters, especially since we were given the point of view from each. It was hard to keep up with who was who, who had what job and who was more depressed. A comparison I would make would be to Close to Home by Michael Magee. That book hit the mark more for me, focusing on two brothers who felt like they had no hope for the future. The title of this book gave me hope for what was inside, but the title might have been the best part of the book.

3. Soul Searching (1) by Lyla Sage

Collins Cartwright does not want to go home. Sweetwater Peak, Wyoming, was supposed to be in her rearview mirror, but when she finds out a developer is trying to buy her parents’ antiques shop out from under them, she doesn’t have a choice—at least, that’s what she tells her family. They don’t need to know she’s lost her job and is out of money. Or that the ghosts who have always been her companions have recently gone silent.

But just because she’s returned home doesn’t mean she has to stay with her parents or crash on her twin sister’s couch. Lucky for her, the new-to-town upholsterer has a room for rent above his store. Unluckily, it is absolutely crawling with more ghosts who are freezing her out. And Collins hates being ignored.

My Rating: ★★★

I devoured the Rebel Blue Ranch series by Lyla Sage last year. After reading book one, I ran to the bookshop to pick up book two and then a few weeks later picked up book three and four. Reading a full series isn’t like me at all, as I’m currently in the middle of 23 different book series if you can believe that.

Lyla Sage was actually on tour in Australia promoting book two of this series (Free Falling) – I got to meet her! – so I thought it was a good time to read book one, Soul Searching. Instead of cowboys, we’re dealing with ghosts in this new series. We also have mentions of the town Rebel Blue Ranch is set in and characters that overlap which I liked as a hidden nod. However, I didn’t sense any chemistry between our two main characters whatsoever and I felt the female main character was a little annoying and unlikeable. I won’t be running to pick up book two but I will be running to re-read the Rebel Blue Ranch series.

4. The Names by Florence Knapp

In the wake of a catastrophic storm, Cora sets off with her nine-year-old daughter, Maia, to register her son’s birth. Her husband, Gordon, respected in the community but a controlling presence at home, intends for her to follow a long-standing family tradition and name the baby after him. But when faced with the decision, Cora hesitates…

Spanning thirty-five years, what follows are three alternate and alternating versions of their lives, shaped by Cora’s last-minute choice of name. In richly layered prose, The Names explores the painful ripple effects of domestic abuse, the messy ties of family, and the possibilities of autonomy and healing.

My Rating: ★★★★★

Have you ever read a book and wished you had come up with the concept? That you wish you could be that clever? Not that I’m a writer myself, but that’s how I felt reading The Names by Florence Knapp.

In a world with more books and stories than one could ever read in one hundred lifetimes, almost every storyline you can think of has probably been done before. In saying that, there could already be a story with this same idea that I just haven’t come across yet. But fortunately for me, I was recommended to read The Names.

The story follows three different timelines with the same family, but we see three different paths a life can take all because of one decision – what a mother chooses as the name for her son. The underlying theme is of domestic violence and alcoholism from the father, because no matter what name the son was to have, the father’s character doesn’t change. So beautifully told and I know this is a book I’ll remember for years to come. 

5. The Score (3) by Elle Kennedy

Allie Hayes is in crisis mode. With graduation looming, she still doesn’t have the first clue about what she’s going to do after college. To make matters worse, she’s nursing a broken heart thanks to the end of her longtime relationship. Wild rebound sex is definitely not the solution to her problems, but gorgeous hockey star Dean Di Laurentis is impossible to resist. Just once, though, because even if her future is uncertain, it sure as heck won’t include the king of one-night stands.

Dean always gets what he wants. Girls, grades, girls, recognition, girls…he’s a ladies man, all right, and he’s yet to meet a woman who’s immune to his charms. Until Allie. For one night, the feisty blonde rocked his entire world―and now she wants to be friends? Nope. It’s not over until he says it’s over. Dean is in full-on pursuit, but when life-rocking changes strike, he starts to wonder if maybe it’s time to stop focusing on scoring…and shoot for love.

My Rating: ★★★★

More than a year since I read book two in this series (The Mistake), it was finally time to dive back in to the Off Campus world. Helped a lot by the recent TV series adaptation on Prime Video, season two is actually going to focus on book three of the book series, so it was time to pick it up.

The main characters we follow are Dean and Allie, and having watched the TV series, I could picture Mika Abdalla and Stephen Kalyn so clearly as these two characters which I really enjoyed. I love Elle Kennedy’s writing and I was so happy to be back in this world again, especially after reading Love Song by Elle Kennedy last month. My library currently doesn’t have book 4 or 5 in the Off Campus series so I’m not sure when I’ll be picking up the rest of the series, but I hope it’s soon!

6. Crazy Spooky Love (1) by Josie Silver

In the charming town of Chapelwick, the Bittersweet family has been a fixture on High Street for as long as anyone can remember. Their black-and-white building houses all three generations of ghost-sensitive Bittersweet women and their business, Blithe Spirits.

On her twenty-seventh birthday, Melody Bittersweet converts the back storeroom into her office and opens her own business. Unlike the rest of her family, she’s not taking down messages from ghosts—she’s taking them out.

The Girls’ Ghostbusting Agency takes on its first case: a grand old house that won’t sell because a trio of incumbent ghost brothers raise merry hell whenever prospective owners arrive to view it. It soon becomes clear that there’s a whole heap of unfinished business between the Scarborough brothers—including murder—and Melody isn’t the only one trying to unravel the mystery.

My Rating: ★★

I had a few Halloween-themed books on my Kindle, so since it is that time of year, I had to pick up one. As expected, it’s a silly, cheesy ghost story with some romance. What baffled me most was the quote on the cover, a review from Kirsty Greenwood saying that this is “One of my favourite books of all time!”. Is she crazy? We’re really putting this in the ‘best books of all time’ category?! That’s a baffling statement to make for a cheesy Halloween-themed rom-com.

I don’t even know if it was cheesy enough to be a highly-enjoyable rom-com. Perhaps if I was really in the spooky, cosy, Autumnal mood, then perhaps it could have been. But it was confusing enough to follow which brother (ghost) was which, and throwing in a random side-story of enemies-to-lovers romance for a few pages didn’t really spice things up as there was no real back story as to where the enemies part came from.

I do unfortunately own book two and three in the series – yes, it’s a series – and because I’m not a quitter, I will also unfortunately, have to read the full series at some point.

7. Famesick by Lena Dunham

For the last decade, as she’s spent countless hours in doctor’s waiting rooms searching for diagnoses, treatments, and relief, being the owner and operator of Lena Dunham’s body has felt, as she puts it, “like towing a wrecked car across town at midnight.” It’s not easy dragging a wrecked car anywhere, much less to the Met Gala while sewn into a gold lamé corset. Or to the set of the hit show that you—as a twenty-five-year-old—are writing, directing, producing, and starring in. Or to the White House, the Golden Globes, or your publicist’s office to discuss the latest internet disaster.

But Dunham does it—even if it means interminable hospital stays, vomiting in the bathroom when she’s meant to be meeting Oprah, or terrifying those closest to her—because she can no longer tell the difference between fighting to do what she loves and being a servant to her own ambition. All the while, she is holding out for a love that can withstand her personal and public challenges and, more than anything, yearning to feel like herself again—if only she could remember who that self was.

My Rating: ★★★★

About 10 years ago, I read Lena Dunham’s first book, Not That Kind of Girl. I have always heard the name Lena Dunham (being chronically online in my teens), but not really known her for her work. I’ve never watched the TV series Girls and yet I keep picking up her books and wanting to know more about her.

This second book, Famesick comes 12 years later and after a tumultuous (to say the least) time for Lena between the two releases, it was highly anticipated to see what she had to say and who she was going to mention I the book.

As I recently visited Los Angeles for the first time in 2025 (YouTube vlog here if you’d like to watch), I fell in love with the place and the air of celebrity and thirst to be known that was so clearly prominent. Reading Famesick transported me back here with her mentioning some of the places I had even visited myself.

The overarching story to take away for me, was Lena’s battle with endometriosis. An invisible disease for women that’s often written off as ‘bad menstrual cramps’. There are also a lot of mentions in the book that I’d love to know more about. Her relationship with her mentor Jenni that she no longer speaks to, her relationship with Adam Driver, her relationship with her brother, with her costars on Girls – although they’ve just announced a new return to the series – and I’d also love to know what Hollywood thinks of Lena Dunham too, before and after the book was released.

I don’t often read memoirs but these are the kind that I enjoy. I love name-dropping and a glimpse into celebrity lifestyle and drama. Is that shallow of me? I’m not sure. I grew up on gossip magazines in a small town and that world was my make-believe fantasy that I would never have access to. Or so I thought, before moving to London in 2016 and working in luxury PR. Now? I would move to Los Angeles in a heartbeat because that world still intrigues me and I have no shame admitting that.

8. Hollywood Ending by John Green

For rising talents Kai Laramie and Juniper Castillo, being cast in the buzzy biopic Andy Warhol Never Gets Old is the opportunity they’ve both been waiting for. They’re on the verge of breaking out, and maybe even falling in love. Soon, the movie is blowing up, and so are their lives—in exciting, but also terrifying, ways.

John Green artfully blends a behind-the-scenes Hollywood love story with an unflinching examination of the insatiable attention economy. Told through dual points of view, the novel brilliantly juxtaposes the on-screen study of Warhol’s life at the dawn of celebrity culture with the intimate struggles of two young people figuring out who they are, both together and alone.

My Rating: ★★★★

It’s been years since I read a book by John Green. As a teenager, I was a huge fan of his work and I remember re-reading Looking for Alaska a number of times. John did release a non-fiction project more recently about the history of tuberculosis which I heard good things about, but the subject matter hasn’t piqued my interest just yet.

Hollywood Ending, however, brings us back to John Green’s fiction writing but instead of teenagers, we’re focusing on two characters in their early twenties. Personally, I think I enjoyed this a lot because I had just finished Famesick by Lena Dunham which centres around Hollywood and the negative impacts that come with fame – quite similar to the main theme of this book. Another reason I think I liked it more than I expected is because I could so easily picture the two main characters as the current stars of the new Hunger Games movie. Both young, Hollywood starlets with the main female character having a lot more experience than her male counterpart. They fit so naturally into these characters that I can easily see this being adapted for screen and Mckenna Grace and Joseph Zada cast as the lead roles.

I read this so quick and was enjoying it so much that it was lingering on 5-star territory. The only reason I threw the book down at the end was because on the very last page they mentioned Covid. I hate reading about Covid in books, and especially because this went up until the last page without mentioning it, I felt like John Green really didn’t need to. Annoying.