What’s On My Fall TBR (2022)

We’re well into the fall season, which means warm drinks, cosy knit sweaters, edification and murder mysteries. Although summer reigns all year round where I live, it’s been rather rainy recently so I’ve decided to put together my very own fall TBR to get into the spirit of autumn. Without further ado, here are five books I’m hoping to finish by the end of the fall season! 

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Vita Nostra by Maryna and Serhiy Dyachenko

I’ve read most “classic” dark academia reads that people always recommend on social media except for Vita Nostra, which I don’t see around as much as other books. I’m a huge fan of the dark academia aesthetic, so I had to add this to my fall TBR. This is also probably the first dark academia novel I’m reading that’s translated from another language (Russian). We follow Sasha, whose life is upended the moment she meets a strange man who gives her the oddest tasks to complete in exchange for mysterious gold coins. When she has accumulated sufficient gold, he instructs her to enrol in the Institute of Special Technologies, where she receives an education unlike any other. This book sounds peculiar and exciting all at once, so I definitely have high hopes for this!

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The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams

I chanced upon this book during a trip to the bookstore and immediately added it to my TBR. The Dictionary of Lost Words follows Esme, whose father, along with a team of lexicographers, are compiling words for the first ever Oxford English Dictionary. Esme soon realises that certain words are held in higher regard than others, and words relating to women’s experiences tend to go overlooked and therefore unrecorded by the team of (male) lexicographers. With this in mind, she begins to compile a dictionary specially for all these forgotten words. I’m a sociolinguistics enthusiast, so you can probably see why this book really appealed to me. This has been sitting on my TBR for a while now, and though it’s definitely not dark academia by any means, it really gives off fall vibes to me (perhaps due to the quasi-academic setting) so I’m looking forward to reading it soon. 

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These Violent Delights by Micah Nemerever

Yet another dark academia classic, I’ve been putting off reading this one because the blurb analogises this to The Secret History (which I’m not a fan of). But I do want to give it a try this fall because I’m really in the mood for more dark academia! These Violent Delights is set in 1970s Pittsburgh and it explores the relationship between Paul and Julian, two troubled university freshmen who are instantly drawn to each other. This book contains obsession, violence and an academic setting, which are all hallmarks of the dark academia genre. It seems really intense, perhaps even dark and disturbing, and I can’t wait to finally check this off my dark academia TBR list. 

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Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind

I came across this book years ago after watching VIXX’s “(향) Scientist” music video and learning that it was inspired by this story, which I thought was really cool. I didn’t think much of it back then because I was in my decade-long reading slump, but I recently came across this book again and decided it was finally time to sit down and read it. After all, the season of fall, especially the month of October, is reserved for elegantly murderous stories like this one. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer is a work of historical literary fiction (first published in 1985) that is set in eighteenth-century France and follows Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, a boy with an unparalleled sense of smell who aspires to be a perfumer. Consumed whole by all sorts of scents, he embarks on a quest to create the “ultimate perfume”—the scent of a beautiful young virgin (which, not gonna lie, is hella creepy, and you can probably guess how murder plays into this). This story sounds terribly dark and disturbing, but also with a really intriguing twist—the interplay between odours and obsession seems incredibly fascinating and I can’t wait to dive into this. 

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These Vengeful Hearts by Katherine Laurin

I have Drizzle & Hurricane Books to thank for this last book on the list—I came across These Vengeful Hearts in her post recommending 10 underrated YA mystery books and immediately added it to my fall TBR. The premise of the story seems really interesting; it’s about a not-so-secret society at a high school called the Red Court, known for simultaneously granting favours and wrecking social havoc. Driven by the desire for revenge for what the Red Court did to her sister, protagonist Ember Williams is determined to destroy the Red Court from the inside. This seems like an engrossing tale of vengeance and retribution, so I really hope I’ll enjoy this!

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And that’s a wrap! I’d love to hear your thoughts on these books if you’ve read them, and I’d also love to know what’s on your fall TBR. I hope you guys have enjoyed this post, and I’ll see you in my next one!