Offbeat Offline: September 2026 (Plus Announcing the Last Hiatus of the Year…Hopefully)

Welcome to Offbeat Offline, where I bring you up-to-date with what went on in my life during the month just gone, give you a sneak peek of my next shenanigans, and share my favourite posts of late!

What happened last month to yours truly? The heat packed its bags, and I reckoned with all the health problems it left behind. Also, apparently, the month flew...and I have very little to show for it. Not like I'm not tired regardless...mentally, too. That's why I'm heading towards another hiatus... 

📚 WAIT, THAT'S IT? I only read two ARCs and reread three books this month. Probably because I left the house a tad more than I did during the neverending heatwave, and at the end of the day I was too tired to absorb new words. Probably because I spent too much time playing solitaires on the net (oops) and combing through a site for the '90s TV show Sliders, which I only discovered and started watching this month (anybody remember it? the one with the parallel universes?). Anyhow, here's the rundown of my (scarce) bookish activity...

Approvals (2):

• The Big Bad Book of Kaiju by Jonathan Maberry et al. (Adult, urban fantasy - anthology)

An explosive collection of monster terror, featuring 25 original tales of creatures the size of skyscrapers. See cities shattered and worlds ended, as great beasts rise from the deep.

• The Last Star in the Void (The Echo Archives #3) by Melissa Caruso (Adult, multiverse/supernatural/mystery)

Kembral Thorne is back on the job and everything is going great - she hasn't been in mortal peril for months and things are getting serious with her girlfriend, Rika Nonesuch. But then a simple mission goes wrong, and a mysterious Echo hires Kem for her most dangerous case yet - solving her own murder.

But there's more at stake than Kem's survival. Rips in the very fabric of reality are spreading through the Echoes, and her blood is the only thing that can close them. To save all the worlds, Kem must figure out who she can trust. And Rika must decide how much of her humanity she'll sacrifice for the power to protect the woman she loves.

Reads (5):

• The Big Bad Book of Kaiju by Jonathan Maberry et al. (see above)

When I saw Seanan McGuire's name in this anthology's line-up, I couldn't help putting in a request, hoping that I would enjoy a good portion of the other stories as much as I usually do hers. Unfortunately, the ones that stood out for me were few. Anyway, I have to give credit to most of these authors for putting a series of (often wild) spins on the subject material.

• The Last Star in the Void (The Echo Archives #3) by Melissa Caruso (see above)

No review excerpt because I haven't finished this one yet (I told you, September was weird), but so far, it has all the telltale signs of a fun ending to a series I've really enjoyed.

• The Haunting of Velkwood by Gwendolyn Kiste (Adult, supernatural/mystery - reread [pub. 2024])

After a mysterious incident, a whole street vanished in plain sight (or, it didn't exactly vanish, but since then it has existed inside a blurred bubble that nothing and no one can access...with a few exceptions)...and its resident became ghosts themselves - or did they? The Haunting of Velkwood will satisfy your craving for atmospheric and time-bending (or more like, time-looping) horror, all while weaving together threads of queer awakening (and women's awakening), dysfunctional parenting, sisterly love, child abuse, small-town bigotry/apathy and lingering trauma. Here's my old ARC review.

• Imaginary Girls by Nova Ren Suma (YA, magical realism/mystery - reread [pub. 2011])

A creative, heartbreaking spin on the mean girl/toxic sisterly relationship trope that uses magical realism to its best advantage, with characters who nevertheless feel deeply real. Also, on a purely stylistic level, Suma is one hell of a writer. Here's my old review.

• 17 & Gone by Nova Ren Suma (YA, contemporary/paranormal/mystery - reread [pub. 2013])

This one makes an impassioned plea for all the lost, or "simply" troubled, teen girls that the world leaves behind, looking at them through the eyes of one of their peers who is lost herself - only not in the same way as they are. Here's my old review.

Reviews (2):

• The Witch of Benbar's Cross by Tanya Meeson (Adult, supernatural/mystery)

Mini review on GR for now.

• The Big Bad Book of Kaiju by Jonathan Maberry et al. (see above)

Mini review to be posted after my hiatus.

Normally at this point I would list the reviews I plan on posting and the TMST prompts I plan on answering in October, but as I said above, I'm taking the month off. In the meantime, here's the TMST prompt list for the month of October, in case you want to join in:

• October 6th: If you had to teach a class or give a TED Talk, what would it be about?
• October 13th: What animal do you think best represents your personality? (a question I submitted)
• October 20th: If you could have any office supply in unlimited quantities, what would it be?
• October 27th: Who do you want on your team during the zombie apocalypse and why?

😬 THANK YOU, SUMMER. The temps have finally been abating since September 10th (we're having 25-25.5°C/77-77.7°F at home at the moment), but three months of holing up and eating poorly have taken a toll on me. You see, I've been sitting up in front of a computer with a fan by my side all summer, and don't get me started on my "I don't care what I eat as long as it doesn't involve real cooking" attitude, also courtesy of the intolerable heat. Which resulted in my usual bloating getting even more out of control, and a nice couple of fat rolls settling on my sides for good measure. The problem is, walking is hard - my legs tire easily - and I don't have the foggiest idea of what to eat to ease up the bloating, since IBS doesn't come with a neat instruction manual...apart from the things that you have to avoid at all costs (which, apparently, include most fruit and a lot of vegetables, not to mention legumes), there are a number of others that may or may not cause distress, depending on the individual and the intake...For goodness' sake, I have no time or patience for this - but the situation must be addressed somehow...

It doesn't look like he's saying that, but whatever.

🖥️ BLOGGER MALFUNCTION. Those of you who still use Blogger's reading list for the blogs they follow will have noticed that it acted up a lot this last month. It all started (even earlier) with reading lists not displaying the updates timely - I noticed it because of the Sunday Posts some of you do, that didn't appear on my timeline until late Sunday or even Monday, but that I would find to have been regularly posted on your blogs if I checked. Then the updates stopped completely for a week. The problem was raised multiple times on the Blogger message board, until someone finally managed to listen (or found the fix). I was trying to do the rounds regularly during that week, but I'm sure I missed some of your posts (sorry! though if you're very active, I can't seem to keep up with all your posts regardless 😩 😢). The fact is, I hate feed aggregators - I want to visit the actual blog, not to read post snippets (or whole posts) on a different platform...

PUBLISHING NEWS/TIPS

• Kit lists 10 queer SFF books she's excited for in 2026 .

THINK-PIECES, DISCUSSIONS, ORIGINAL FICTION

• Briana reflects upon the difficulties of bookish influencers becoming authors.

REVIEWS/RECOMMENDATIONS

• Barb reviews The Dogwalkers' Detective Agency by Michael Hogan.
• Blodeuedd reviews Girl, Goddess, Queen by Bea Fitzgerald.
• ElunedHermitCrab lists her all-time favourites in 6 years of blogging.
• Ethan reviews Fruit Fly by Josh Silver.
• Hannah reviews Boring Asian Female by Canwen Xu.
• Mary reviews Mantras and Minotaurs by Ashley Bennet.
• Sam lists her favourite indie novels.
• Tammy reviews The Burn Line by Jonathan Sims.

OTHER

• Jen spotlights authors Sarah Wallace & S.O. Callahan, who will participate in the Coastal Magic Convention 2027.
• Lissa presents the new look for her blog.
• Quinley shares her drawings.
• Rachel hosts a cozy paranormal reads giveaway.

(You will have noticed that there aren't repeats of your names in my lists this time. I picked up a single post for every one of you, so if you're featured, say, in the Think Pieces list, you won't appear in the Reviews one. I realised that these posts were getting too long if I featured the same bloggers twice, and I don't even know how many of you read these lists anyway or find new-to-you posts in them...Also, I have a question for those of you who blog under a pseudonym - Blodeuedd, ElunedHermitCrab: should I keep using your pen name for these post, or would you rather I used your real one?).

That's it for now. My next post will be up on November 1st, and it will be another Offbeat Offline installment. In the meantime, I'm going dormant for a while! but you can still find me on the usual SM, if sporadically (I usually check in once a day).

So, what were your highs/lows in the past month?