Autumn 2022 TBR: 10 Books I Hope to Read

Happy Tuesday y’all! It’s that time again. What time is it? Time to share our seasonal TBR. Every quarter Jana over at That Artsy Reader Girl asks us to share a seasonal TBR. For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, that means our Autumn 2022 TBR. For my Autumn TBR 2002, I will list books I hope to read from October-December 2022.

How did my Summer TBR go? It was a bit hit-and-miss for me. I ended up reading only five of the ten books I listed, and I may complete a sixth before September is over. I had so many ARCs to read, and I hit a bit of a slump in August that didn’t help matters at all.

For my Autumn 2022 TBR, I followed a similar pattern to my previous seasonal TBR. This quarter, I have some ARCs to read and three books for the Buzzwords reading challenge from Books & Lala. So, I decided to highlight five of the ARCs. Then, I used Goodreads’s random search function to help fill the rest of my TBR. I am participating in the Read Christie 2022 Challenge, but they don’t list suggested books until the beginning of each month.

All titles are linked to Goodreads, and all synopsis are from Goodreads.

Without further ado, here is my Autumn 2022 TBR!

Sweet Land of Liberty: A History of America in 11 Pies by Rossi Anastopoulo

From the pumpkin pie gracing the Thanksgiving table to the apple pie at the Fourth of July picnic, nearly every American shares a certain nostalgia for a simple circle of crust and filling. But America’s history with pie has not always been so sweet. After all, it was a slice of cherry pie at the Woolworth’s lunch counter on a cool February afternoon that helped to spark the Greensboro sit-ins and ignited a wave of anti-segregation protests across the South during the civil rights movement. Molasses pie, meanwhile, captures the legacies of racial trauma and oppression passed down from America’s history of slavery, and Jell-O pie exemplifies the pressures and contradictions of gender roles in an evolving modern society. We all know the warm comfort of the so-called “All-American” apple pie . . . but just how did pie become the symbol of a nation?

Marlowe Banks, Redesigned by Jacqueline Firkins

Marlowe Banks’s life has come apart at the seams. Her engagement ended abruptly, and critics shredded her latest costume design. Her student loans are overdue, and her parents have never been more disappointed. Desperate to hide from her failures, Marlowe flees New York City to embrace invisibility in Los Angeles as a menial Production Assistant on a popular TV show. While sorting socks and taking care of her boss’ spoiled Weimaraner, no one can confront her poor artistic choices or the end of her engagement, the end her ex refuses to accept.

When a costume mix-up requires Marlowe to step into a scene, the camera catches a heated look between her and Angus Gordon, the show’s arrogant bad boy, thrusting Marlowe into the spotlight. As the pair are forced together on set, Marlowe learns she’s not the only one hiding. Walls come down for both of them, revealing a life Marlowe isn’t sure she’s ready for, and when her past comes calling, she has to decide if she’s going to stay invisible or if it’s time for a redesign.

None of This Would Have Happened If Prince Were Alive by Carolyn Prusa

Ramona’s got a bratty boss, a toddler teetering through toilet training, a critical mom who doesn’t mind sharing, and oops—a cheating husband. That’s how a Category Four hurricane bearing down on her life in Savannah becomes just another item on her to-do list. In the next forty-eight hours, she’ll add a neighborhood child and the class guinea pig named Clarence Thomas to her entourage as she struggles to evacuate the town.

Ignoring the persistent glow of her minivan’s check engine light, Ramona navigates police checkpoints, bathroom emergencies, demands from her boss, and torrential downpours while fielding calls and apology texts from her cheating husband and longing for the days when her life was like a Prince song, full of sexy creativity and joy.

The Lindbergh Nanny by Mariah Fredricks

When the most famous toddler in America, Charles Lindbergh, Jr., is kidnapped from his family home in New Jersey in 1932, the case makes international headlines. Already celebrated for his flight across the Atlantic, his father, Charles Sr., is the country’s golden boy, with his wealthy, lovely wife, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, by his side. But there’s someone else in their household—Betty Gow, a formerly obscure young woman, now known around the world by another name: the Lindbergh Nanny.

A Scottish immigrant deciphering the rules of her new homeland and its East Coast elite, Betty finds Colonel Lindbergh eccentric and often odd, Mrs. Lindbergh kind yet nervous, and Charlie simply a darling. Far from home and bruised from a love affair gone horribly wrong, Betty finds comfort in caring for the child and warms to the attentions of handsome sailor Henrik, sometimes known as Red. Then, Charlie disappears.

Suddenly a suspect in the eyes of both the media and the public, Betty must find the truth about what really happened that night in order to clear her own name—and to find justice for the child she loves.

Animal Life by Audur Ava Ólafsdóttir

In the days leading up to Christmas, Dómhildur delivers her 1,922nd baby. Beginnings and endings are her family trade; she comes from a long line of midwives on her mother’s side and a long line of undertakers on her father’s.’ She even lives in the apartment she inherited from her grandaunt, a midwife with a unique reputation for her unconventional methods.

As a terrible storm races towards Reykjavik, Dómhildur discovers decades’ worth of letters and manuscripts hidden amongst her grandaunt’s clutter. Fielding calls from her anxious meteorologist sister and visits from her curious new neighbor, Dómhildur escapes into her grandaunt’s archive and discovers strange and beautiful reflections on birth, death, and human nature.

At the Wolf’s Table by Rosella Postorino

Germany, 1943: Twenty-six-year-old Rosa Sauer’s parents are gone, and her husband Gregor is far away, fighting on the front lines of WWII. Impoverished and alone, she makes the fateful decision to leave war-torn Berlin to live with her in-laws in the countryside, thinking she’ll find refuge there. But one morning, the SS come to tell her she has been conscripted to be one of Hitler’s tasters: three times a day, she and nine other women go to his secret headquarters, the Wolf’s Lair, to eat his meals before he does. Forced to eat what might kill them, the tasters begin to divide into The Fanatics, those loyal to Hitler, and the women like Rosa who insist they aren’t Nazis, even as they risk their lives every day for Hitler’s.

As secrets and resentments grow, this unlikely sisterhood reaches its own dramatic climax. What’s more, one of Rosa’s SS guards has become dangerously familiar, and the war is worsening outside. As the months pass, it becomes increasingly clear that Rosa and everyone she knows are on the wrong side of history. 

The Trouble with Hating You by Sajni Patel

Liya Thakkar is a successful biochemical engineer, takeout enthusiast, and happily single woman. The moment she realizes her parents’ latest dinner party is a setup with the man they want her to marry, she’s out the back door in a flash. Imagine her surprise when the same guy shows up at her office a week later — the new lawyer hired to save her struggling company. What’s not surprising: is that he’s not too thrilled to see her after that humiliating fiasco.

Jay Shah looks good on paper…and off. Especially if you like that whole gorgeous, charming lawyer-in-a-good-suit thing. He’s also arrogant and infuriating. As their witty office banter turns into late-night chats, Liya starts to think he might be the one man who truly accepts her. But falling for each other means exposing their painful pasts. Will Liya keep running, or will she finally give love a real chance?

25 Days’ Til Christmas by Poppy Alexander

Kate Potter used to love Christmas. A few years ago, she would have been wrapping her presents in September and baking mince pies on Halloween, counting down the days and hours to Christmas. But that was before Kate’s husband left for the army and never came home. Now she can hardly stand December at all.

Kate can’t deny she’s lonely, yet she doesn’t think she’s ready for romance. She knows that her son, Jack, needs a Christmas to remember—just like Kate needs a miracle to help her finally move forward with her life. So she’s decided if there isn’t a miracle on its way, she’ll just have to make her own.

As Kate’s advent countdown to the best Christmas ever begins, she soon realizes that even with the best-laid plans, you can’t plan for the unexpected. For when the path of the loneliest woman in town crosses with that of the loneliest man, these two destined hearts might find a way to save the holiday for both of them. 

An Assassin’s Guide to Love and Treason by Virginia Becker

When Lady Katherine’s father is killed for being an illegally practicing Catholic, she discovers treason wasn’t the only secret he’s been hiding: he was also involved in a murder plot against the reigning Queen Elizabeth I. With nothing left to lose, Katherine disguises herself as a boy and travels to London to fulfill her father’s mission and to take it one step further — kill the queen herself.

Katherine’s opportunity comes in the form of William Shakespeare’s newest play, which is to be performed in front of Her Majesty. But what she doesn’t know is that the play is not just a play. It’s a plot to root out insurrectionists and destroy the rebellion once and for all.

The mastermind behind this ruse is Toby Ellis, a young spy for the queen with secrets of his own. When Toby and Katherine are cast opposite each other as the play’s leads, they find themselves inexplicably drawn to one another. But the closer they grow, the more precarious their positions become. And soon, they learn that star-crossed love, mistaken identity, and betrayal are far more dangerous off the stage than on. 

A Winter’s Wish by Tracy Corbett

Can they put aside their differences to work together?

Sam Tipping always shunned the wealth into which she was born. Instead, she’s worked hard to set up The Crash Pad, a shelter for homeless young Londoners – but she’ll need a Christmas miracle to keep it running.

Having grown up in foster care, Jamie Lawson has no time for heiresses. Until his job as a journalist requires him to befriend Sam in order to expose her city banker brother for financial irregularities.

As he spends more time with Sam, Jamie realizes she’s not the spoiled brat he assumed she’d be – in fact, she’s starting to melt the ice around his heart. But he’ll need to betray Sam’s trust if he’s ever to get his big career break.

That concludes my Autumn 2022 TBR! If my reading keeps up as it has recently, I’ll be reading more books than these. Why do I say that? A perk of my job and the shift I work is that we’re slow, so I can read! Yay! Another great thing is that I currently have access to these books. And that means I can read them when I’m ready!

How did your Summer 2022 TBR go? What books are on your Autumn 2022 TBR? I would love to know!

Looking for some more ideas to read? Check out my monthly reading wrap-ups.