Hey bookworm friends, since tomorrow is the autumnal equinox (for the Northern Hemisphere), I feel like I can now say Happy Autumn!🍂 I know many of us have been not-so-patiently waiting for this day, some have even been pre-emptively celebrating since August. I’ve planned a lovely way to help you bask in the vibes. Below you’ll find 2 intertwined lists: One is of books that I think are perfect for the fall season (To Read) & the other is quintessential autumn songs (To Play)! If you love pumpkin spice, sweater weather, and turning leaves, you’ll enjoy my bountiful harvest of Crisp Autumn Vibes!
This list will contain 10 books (a mix of Read and TBR) and 10 songs that I love! For some extra fun, I tried to match up each book with the song that I felt matched it best. I hope you find something you like 😜!
Crisp Autumn Vibes 🍂
📚 A Murder Is Announced– Agatha Christie
Classic Crime Fiction; #4 in the Miss Marple series. “A Murder is announced and it will take place on October 29th”
🎵 There is only one song for this book and it’s October 29 by Lord of the Lost. This is the ‘Swan Songs’ version—with a full ensemble and arranged in a classical style.
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📚 The Pumpkin Spice Cafe – Laurie Gilmore
Spicy Contemporary Romance; Getting a fresh start running a cafe in a small town. Grumpy X Sunshine with all the autumn vibes.
🎵 I don’t think any Gilmore Girls fans will argue that Where You Lead I Will Follow by Carole King is not ✨THE✨ autumn song! Just picture sitting at Luke’s listening to this song (with your headphones on so Luke doesn’t yell at you😉)
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📚Morbidly Yours – Ivy Fairbanks
Contemporary Romance; Set in Ireland. A mortician has to marry to inherit his family’s undertaking business. He befriends a cute cartoon creator who wants nothing to do with cemeteries. Let the romance…begin?
🎵The Last Day of Summer by gothic rock band The Cure is just broody enough to listen to while strolling along a cemetery and thinking about the passage of time.
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📚The Twilight Garden – Sara Nisha Adams
Literary Fiction; A heartwarming story that centers on friendships and a neglected community garden that will soon come to life again! But does the community save the garden or does the garden save them?
🎵 Shine On, Harvest Moon as performed by Ruth Etting literally sounds like crisp autumn vibes. I’m sure half of it is because it is the type of vintage music that’s at home in the TV show “Over the Garden Wall”.
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📚One Dark Window – Rachel Gillig
YA Gothic Romantasy; An atmospheric read set in a kingdom beset by perpetual mist. There’s a forest road, magic, a mysterious highwayman, and a monster.
🎵Darkness by neo-medieval folk band Blackmore’s Night is pulled from their ‘Autumn Sky’ album. And it begins with “Once upon a dark autumn night” so it couldn’t be more perfect.
More Autumnal Books & Songs
📚 Don’t Let The Forest In – C. G. Drews
YA Queer Horror; A tale about obsession at a boarding school near a creepy forest and monsters from artwork come alive.
🎵 we fell in love in october by girl in red is a certifiable indie pop bop! The lyrics “We fell in love in October that’s why I love fall” tell you everything you need to know!
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📚An Enchantment of Ravens – Margaret Rogerson
YA Fantasy Romance; Isobel, a talented painter, creates a portrait of Rook, the autumn prince, but includes a forbidden human emotion on his face. Stories about the fair folk are always fitting for this season but a large part of this one is set in the autumnlands!
🎵 Falling Slowly from the movie Once, written and performed by Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová screams fall to me. I can’t even put my finger on why but I can’t make an autumn playlist without it!
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📚The Bellwoods Game – Celia Krampien
Middle Grade Horror & Mystery; Children play a game in the haunted woods on Halloween night and soon find out some legends should not be played with.
🎵 Autumn Town Leaves by folk artist Iron & Wine has such gorgeous autumnal imagery in its lyrics. Some of it is playful and some of it is somber.
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📚 Mouse Guard: Fall 1152 – David Petersen
Fantasy Graphic Novel; Anthropomorphized mice with swords. Redwall vibes but with more violence. The art is stunning.
🎵Harvest by Finnish Symphonic Metal band Nightwish celebrates harvest season and life.
“Join the harvest of hundred fields
Hearty and tame
All going back to one single grain”
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📚Over the Garden Wall: Tome of the Unknown – Pat McHale, Jim Campbell
Middle Grade Graphic Novel; collects the additional original stories that take place between the episodes of the tv show! Follow Wirt and Greg as they try to find their way out of the Unknown forest.
🎵 Into the Unknown by The Blasting Company feat. Jack Jones is from the stunningly gorgeous Original TV Soundtrack. I know autumn is in the air when this album comes on and this song represents it flawlessly.
That’s it for my books and songs to celebrate autumn and I hope you step on many crunchy leaves today!🖤🍂
Let’s chat in the comments!
What is your favourite werewolf character? Or Can you think of any other werewolf songs to add to the list?
I don’t feel that I’m ready for Autumn yet as we never really had a Summer. I love this list though and really enjoyed the Twilight Garden.
I don’t feel that I’m ready for Autumn yet as we never really had a Summer. I love this list though and really enjoyed the Twilight Garden.
Ahaha oh well that’s too bad you didn’t have a summer, is the weather for you just not warm enough? & Thank you 🥰 I’m glad you enjoyed the Twilight Garden it’s on my tbr and I’ve heard such lovely things about it!
Ooh this is such a fun idea for a post and I love how you set it out. I’m not sure if I’ve heard one or two of the songs before or if they sound similar to something else 🤔 the one I definitely know is Where You Lead although I’ve only seen a few episodes of Gilmore Girls before. I need to try and watch it properly one day, especially as it’s on Netflix and easy enough to find (I think I gave up before as it was on TV and I knew I was going to end up missing some).
Book wise I’ve read one of these – An Enchantment Of Ravens and I adored it. The authors writing was so beautiful. And it was the fae too so perhaps my fondness isn’t surprising 😂
I added The Twilight Garden to my TBR a few days ago after seeing it mentioned in another post. And I really need to check out One Dark Window one day, given all the praise I’ve seen for it. Plus you called it a gothic romantasy which sounds heavenly 😍
Thank you!! 🥰 I’m glad you like the way it’s laid out It took me a while to come up with a template for it and I have a lot more themed book and +song lists planned for October so if there is something you think that can be improved upon in terms of the layout I’d love to know ♥
Ah yes, Where You Lead is so good, whenever I watch Gilmore Girls I never want to skip the theme song 😂 Oh yeah that makes sense it’s a lot easier to find now though I was in the middle of rewatching it with my husband (it was his first time) when we no longer had access to Netflix and I’m still kind of annoyed at that hahah. Anyways yeah If you can watch it all it’s great.
I adored An Enchantment of Ravens too and need to read other books by that author but I still have not! hahah yeah that tracks for you honestly, Charlotte = fae stories, it is known😜 I agree that the writing was gorgeous.
yeah I’ve seen a few friends say they loved it so I added it to my tbr and then I heard it begins in autumn so it sounded perfect for this list haha. Yes I highly recommend One Dark Window (sorry to talk about it in so many of our convos today 😂)
Ooh I look forward to discovering what those lists are. I’ll watch out for them.
Do you know any other Carol King songs? I’ve seen the musical & it was fantastic, it surprised me how many other songs she’d worked on too. I think there’s a movie adaptation of it out next year actually (I’m sure I saw that 🤔) oh that’s so frustrating. Was he enjoying it? I hope you manage to find a way to watch the rest soon. Maybe I’ll try to watch it over the fall as it seems like the perfect time to.
I’m happy being associated with fae books 😂 and same here. I actually own both of her other books and seriously need to get on and pick them up 🙈
Ooh it’s good to hear that others enjoyed it as I just spotted it on another Fall TBR. And I really will have to check that duology out sometime 😅
heheh okay thanks 🥰
I actually don’t know any other Carol King songs, I only know this one because of Gilmore Girls theme song but I could see myself liking other songs by her, maybe I should try to listen to more 🙂 & ohh Wait what musical?
Yeah he was enjoying it! The only thing is that he hates Jess and I’m a Jess girl through and through 😭Lol. Thanks! At some point I’ll look for it again.
haha yes, I definitely meant it as a compliment so I’m glad 🙂 & yes I hope you can pick up more Margaret Rogerson books soon.🖤
You may recognise a few and not really know they’re by her, like Natural Woman or I Feel The Earth Move. I didn’t until I saw the show. And it’s called Beautiful, it’s her story. I did see Daisy Edgar Jones listed as starring in it but that information seems to have vanished 🤔 its a shame if it’s changed as I think she’d suit the role perfectly.
Is that Lukes nephew or something? From what I remember I liked him too. But my memories are pretty vague and based on not many episodes 😂 it’s a shame you had such differing opinions on him though.
Thank you 😊 you too
wow you’re right, I had no clue those songs were by her too but I have heard them! huh, cool! Well that musical sounds interesting for sure 🙂 That’s weird about the actor not being listed anymore, I don’t know what that’s about :S
Yes Luke’s nephew! Well at least you remembered enough to know who I mean 😛 hehe, and yes I know right!? but also I guess it’s kind of fun to have a silly little rivalry while we watch the show. lol.
She wrote/contributed to a lot of songs by other singers in the past too. I didn’t realise This Woman’s Work was by Kate Bush until I saw a tribute act of hers 🙈 I guess I’ll have to wait and see what happens.
From what I remember he was probably my favourite but as I said I don’t have much to go on 😂 and yes that’s true, sometimes it’s fun to disagree.
That’s awesome! Sounds like she’s quite prolific!
haha yeah that’s fair. & yes only about little things that don’t really matter 🙂
The song I mentioned wasn’t by her, just another that I hadn’t realised was by a certain artists 😂 but there were definitely some by other artists that I was truly surprised to learn she’d worked on. Yes only on those sorts, definitely not big issues.
Ohh my bad okay I see ! 😅 but yes it’s fun when you discover stuff like that 🙂
Ah, what a nice theme for a post! I don’t do a lot of themed reading, but sometimes it is really nice to pick something seasonal.
Thank you🥰!! 🙂 I actually have a ton of themed posts similar to this planned for October so I figured why not do a broad one just celebrating Autumn? Yeah for sure, I agree 🖤
I love this post, it looks so pretty ✨🍂 I haven’t read any of the books or heard the songs, so thank you for the recommendations.
The Twilight Garden and Don’t Let The Forest In sounds interesting. I hadn’t heard of The first. They sound like the perfect autumnal reads!
Thanks, Sophie! You actually helped me with this post with your tip of using columns, absolute game changer so thank you again 🖤.
I’m glad the recs sound good to you, I’ve read some but the rest are on my tbr too 🙂
Hopefully you like them if you pick them up!
Aw… I’m so happy it helped 🥰
Thank you, I hope you enjoy the ones you haven’t yet picked up as well!
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Thanks so much!!
Perfection! The music in those books matches perfectly. I have some of those in my tbr and others are my favorites
Thank you, Vero! I’m glad you think the music and the books go well together, I did my best 🙂 & Nice, I hope you love the ones on your tbr when you get to them ♥
I’ve never tried the Miss Marple series, but loved Poirot. Seeing this post has given me the urge to get a bit of Christie in my reading life
Aha I’m the same, I’ve read multiple Poirots but no Miss Marples! This one is absolutely on my tbr and I’m hoping to try it soon! (I took a Christie break for a few years after reading a ton back to back haha)
What a lovely post! 🥰 I just finished The Pumpkin Spice Café and it was so cozy and autumnal 🍂 I also love Over the Garden Wall, it’s got such aesthetic fall vibes!!
Thanks, Caro 🥰 I’m currently listening to the Pumpkin Spice Café and I agree, it’s so cozy and it’s cheesy in just the way I like in holiday movies. 🧡Yess OTGW is basically Autumn incarnate at this point haha 🙂
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