*** BLACKOUT ***

Many thanks to Moonlight Murder for my lovely card for this year's Halloween Bingo.

As with previous years, I will update this post as we go along - with Harriet & Peter covering squares I have read, and The Gang popping up on squares that have been called.

I am also listing the books I plan to read / have read for each square - with () being planned reads, Italics being books in progress, and bold being books I have read:

Row # 1:

Southern Gothic: Sanctuary - William Faulkner

Cozy Mystery: She Died a Lady - John Dickson Carr

Dark Academia: The Incredible Crime by Lois Austen-Leigh

Diverse Voices Genre: Suspense (Transfiguration Card #2): The Taste of Murder - Joanna Cannan

Full Moon:  The Sittaford Mystery - Agatha Christie 

Row # 2:

Genre: Horror: Dracul - J.D. Barker & Dacre Stoker

Amateur Sleuth: The Mystery of the Skeleton Key - Bernard Capes

Halloween: Hallowe'en Party - Agatha Christie

Darkest London: Two for Sorrow - Nicola Upson

Black Cat:  Katzengeschichten - Patricia Highsmith

Row # 3:

Cryptozoologist Dystopian Hellscape (Transfiguration Card #1):  The Kraken Wakes - John Wyndham 

Locked Room Mystery: The Singing Sands - Josephine Tey

Free Space:  Rule Britannia - Daphne Du Maurier 

Gothic: The Monk - Matthew Lewis

Film at 11 Deadlands (Transfiguration Card #2): Pyramids - Terry Pratchett

Row # 4:

Ghost Stories: The Little Stranger - Sarah Waters

International Woman of Mystery: People Who Knock on the Door - Patricia Highsmith

Relics and Curiosities: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - J.K. Rowling

13: Busman's Honeymoon - Dorothy L. Sayers

Truly Terrifying: The Remedy - Thomas Goetz

Row # 5:

Spellbound: Circe - Madeline Miller

Sleepy Hollow: Blood Rubies - Michael McDowell

Creepy Carnivals: Watson's Choice - Gladys Mitchell

Fear The Drowning Deep: Danger! - Arthur Conan Doyle

Monsters: Frankenstein - Mary Shelley

Unallocated but in progress:  n/a

Transfiguration Cards available: 0 of 3

Another Bingo! I'm on fire now - two, count 'em two bingos.  I should probably report them soon ...

I still have my two squares left for blackout - I can only plead Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke as my excuse, and it doesn't even qualify for either square.  My recent acquisition of Cozy Crime Stories has "Gothic Fantasy" in big embossed letters on the cover, so I might try reading a few of those short stories for my Gothic read.  Suspense ... I have no inspiration, but I still have all three Transfiguration spells so something will present itself.

For my BookLikes tracking post, I'm going to rely on what I did last year, building an overall image as boxes are called.

Squares are greyed out until they're called.  

Called squares will be full-strength.

Read but not called squares will be greyed out below.

Once a square has been called and read, I'll move that piece from below to cover the square. 

My markers this year are pieces of a full image, seen here:

My tentative plan for what I'm reading.  I think there's going to be a lot of re-reads in the mix, given my current mood.  After I've read for a square, I'll hyperlink to the review.

I'll update my card and book list shortly but all the books are read and now I am just waiting for calls to come in to complete the card and, of course, I will continue to watch everyone else's HW Bingo posts closely. I've picked up so many great book suggestions from all of the HW Bingo posts already.

It's been a blast.  Thanks to everyone for making it so. 

What can I say?

I loved the book.

And I loved finishing this year's Halloween Bingo reads on such a high note. 

And now I shall go wallow in the inevitable book & series hangover...

Right, so the latest revelations make me suspect that there will be quite a serious conclusion to this. Not that I mind. If anything, I absolutely adore how Sayers manages to balance serious discourse with ... piffle.