Fall-Friendly Books

It’s been a minute since I’ve had fresh hummus, which I think is worlds apart from store-bought. It’s surprisingly simple to make for it to be so good, and I love the aesthetics of this YouTuber (though I’m using a food processor rather than a mortar and pestle).

What you’ll need:

-2 cups chickpeas

-1/4 cup lemon juice

-1/2 cup tahini

-1/2 tsp cumin

-salt

-iced water

-2 tbsp olive oil

Mix everything together.

-Optional if you want meat: ground beef, garlic, pepper paste, tomato paste, black pepper, paprika. Instructions are within the video description.

You can make the tortilla chips from scratch or just get them store-bought like me!

Witches are few and far between in the UK, which is why Mika Moon and her group of witches meet only so often — safety is priority, and too many witches in one place tend to draw attention. Even though Mika is used to the loneliness, a big part of her rejects it, and she posts videos on a YouTube-like site where she shares magic tips, pretending to be a witch. But someone sees her for what she really is and invites her to a house out in the middle of nowhere to tutor three young witches into their magic. Somehow, she agrees and finds with the inhabitants of the house — especially a grumpy librarian — a family like none she’s ever experienced. But the transition from being a loner orphan witch to a loved one isn’t easy, and she’ll have to make some changes to adjust.

If I’m being honest with y’all, a big part of the reason I chose to include this one is the cover. It’s gorgeous! So fall. But also, since this is a romance, it’ll have that happily ever after, which I associate with coziness. Here, Ari and Josh meet and instantly dislike each other. They’re also both sleeping with the same woman. After some years pass, and they fully expect to never see each other again, a chance meeting sends them back into each other’s lives, this time a little worse for wear. They’re both recovering from breakups and find comfort in each other. This leads to a friends-with-benefits situationship, which eventually leads to you-know-what.

I like a cozy, foodie mystery any season, but I feel like they really lend themselves to fall. In this fourth entry into the Tita Rosie’s Kitchen Mystery series, Lila Macapagal’s godmothers open a new laundromat. But when the body of one of their nieces visiting from the Philippines is found in the building next to a message painted on the floor, Lila will have to air out their dirty laundry (ha) to find out who did it. This is another book with the same endearing characters and delectable food descriptions that fans of the series have come to love.

So I actually first picked this one up in the summer and felt it really fit the season. And now I feel like I can say the same about it for fall. This is probably because it follows a young woman — who is modeled somewhat after the author — as she grapples with all her feelings through the seasons. While it handles some potentially heavy topics like mental health, I feel it has a quietly contemplative quality to it that lends itself to autumn. Also, the artwork and color palette are so pretty.

*Book Club Discussion: If you feel comfortable, you can discuss how the artwork made you feel and if it accurately represented the feelings mentioned. Also, what emotions did reading the book evoke overall?