Dear Readers,
Welcome to October!
Book Beat Journal includes upcoming author events, local news, small press reviews by Tom Bowden, and several articles and reviews by the staff at Book Beat. We hope you find something here to enjoy.
Banned Books Week — October 4–10
Our Banned Books shelf is still under CAUTION tape at the front of the store. It’s a collection of books that someone, somewhere with authority decided you shouldn’t read either in a school curriculum or taken out of a public library. We think you should take a look. Discover something unexpected, challenging, and choose your own trouble. Be a rebel! Support your local libraries and bookstores.
The Detroit Art Book Fair Oct. 10-11
The Detroit Art Book Fair takes place on Saturday, October 10-11, 2026, starting at 10:00 a.m. at Vander located at 626 Harper Avenue (Suite B) in Detroit, Michigan. The DABF is a curated exhibition and fair dedicated to artists’ books, independent publishing, zines, art monographs, and exhibition catalogues. The Book Beat will have a booth this year. Stop by and visit. The show is free and open 10 AM- 4 PM Saturday and Sunday to the public.
Children’s Book Buzz
As Colleen scours publisher catalogs and prepares her annual talk for the Storytellers Guild and educational groups, we’ve been seeing the new fall books arrive in a steady stream and wanted to share a few highlights.
Sid Sharp’s latest Midnight Manor offers spooky, visually inventive storytelling with an irresistible atmosphere. Her artwork is an organic heap of wild creatures that seem to shake and tremble, wanting to leap off the page. Sharp’s world is a combination of weird and funny, with inside puns, jokes, and a clever parody of Goodnight Moon that is a jazzy Goreyesque mistreatment of the original. Midnight Manor is a pure delight of fun Halloween madness that will keep the steady attention of adult readers too.
Erin Bow’s Witchward Bound reminds us that fantasy for younger readers can be every bit as imaginative and emotionally rich as anything written for adults.
Tiffany D. Jackson’s Ghost in the Night combines suspense, heart, and unforgettable storytelling in a way few writers can manage.The book has lots of buzz and great reviews.
Rebecca Green’s Henri and Miko: Autumn in Bosk Olivette feels like a fall treasure, full of warmth, friendship, and seasonal magic.
“The artwork’s intricacy brightens these slow–paced friendship tales.” —Publishers Weekly
Hungry for Books
Katherine Rundell’s Why You Should Read Children’s Books: Even Though You Are So Old and Wise, is a spirited and delightful defense on adult reading of children’s literature and the enduring value of wonder.
Rundell takes aim at the common notion that readers “graduate” from children’s literature as they mature. She writes, “The human heart is not a linear train ride.” Reading, she argues, is not a march from one shelf to another, leaving earlier delights behind. She describes becoming a reader and then devouring books with “the same omnivorous unscrupulosity” she showed at mealtimes. It is a wonderful image because it reminds us that great readers are not always disciplined readers. They are hungry readers.
Rundell makes the case that children’s literature contains some of our most powerful and enduring stories. Writing about fairy tales is something we need to put into our reading habit—she observes that “hope in fairytales is sharper than teeth.” Their heroic optimism, she argues, is “the life principle writ large.” These stories are not merely training grounds for adult literature. They are foundational works that continue to shape us throughout our lives. Rundell instructs us to keep reading and writing them, “repossessing them as they possess us.”
Rundell includes a wonderful story about Maurice Sendak receiving a fan letter from a young boy. Sendak was so moved that he mailed the child a card adorned with a drawing of a Wild Thing. He calls the boy’s mother to see if he got the artwork. The mother tells him her son loved it so much that he ate it. Sendak considered this the highest possible praise: “He saw it, he loved it, he ate it.”
Children’s lit engages the imagination with a directness and intensity that adults often spend their lives trying to recover. Sometimes we might need a way to kickstart the imagination and here is the method.
Many of Rundell’s favorites are discussed and her enthusiasm is infectious. Her advice is to “go to children’s fiction to see the world with double eyes: your own, and those of your childhood self.“
Whether you’re revisiting a beloved classic or discovering one of this season’s outstanding new releases, children’s lit offers something many adult readers secretly crave: the chance to encounter the world again with curiosity, courage, delight, and hope.
Amanda with author/designer Young Huh at Kingswood School
Cranbrook alumna Young Huh had a sell-out signing of her new interior design book: A Mood, A Thought, A Feeling. This lush new Rizolli book shows off her AD100 techniques and ideas for creating cozy and open interior spaces. Her color choices amaze. Copies are now in stock and Huh may be returning in November for a quick in store signing, fingers crossed.
Below you’ll find a list of author events followed by essays, reviews, and ways to keep in touch. Thank you for reading and sharing books with others.
And thank you for supporting our author events, buying books online or in person. Your support is appreciated!
Happy October! Happy reading!
~Cary, Colleen and the Book Beat staff
Author Events, October
October 6: An Evening with Arthur Myron Horwitz and Dual Identities
October Reading Groups
Our reading selections for October offer a couple ways to explore the spooky season. The international lit group is reading The Twenty Days of Turin, by Giorgo De Maria, a cult Italian horror story from the mid-1970s that predicted social media, taking us into new dimensions. And the Sub Rosa group is reading Hurricane Season, a difficult but rewarding gothic read by the Mexican author Fernanda Melchor. See more details below. Reading group books are discounted 15% in store. All reading groups are free and open to the public.
Book Beat Journal: Reviews, etc.
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“There should be a place where only the things you want to happen, happen.”
— Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are
