I got a *little bit* carried away this year...
Are you doing any of these challenges? What are your goals for the year?
How It Works:
You can select, read and review a book from the categories listed below during the year for a total of up to 12 books; OR select, read and review any nonfiction book. A book may be in print, electronic or audio format.
Goal:
Nonfiction Nosher: Read & review 12 books, one for each category
Books I Might Read:
History: The Sleepwalkers
A Night to Remember
A Distant Mirror
Memoir/Biography: Born a Crime
Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
Remarkable Diaries
Waiting for Snow in Havana
Crime & Punishment: Killer of the Flower Moon
Wicked Plants
Science: Field Notes from an Unintentional Birder
Sentient: How Animals Illuminate the Wonder of Our Human Senses by Jackie Higgins
The Lost Art of Reading Nature's Signs
Health: Diagnosis
Travel: A Paris All Your Own
Food: Omelette and a Glass of Wine
Food Americana
In Search of the Perfect Loaf
Social Media: Find Your People
Sport: Steep Trails by John Muir
Relationships: Humankind by Brad Aronson
The Arts: Great Short Books
Literary Places
Thunder and Lightning
Writing Down the Bones
Published in 2023: A Brief History of Paris by Cecil Jenkins
1/12
2023 Back to the Classics Challenge
2. A 20th century classic. Any book first published from 1900 to 1972. All books must have been published at least 50 years ago; the only exceptions are books which were written by 1972 and posthumously published.
3. A classic by a woman author.
4. A classic in translation. Any book first published in a language that is not your primary language. You may read it in translation or in its original language, if you prefer.
5. A classic by BIPOC author. Any book published by a non-white author.
6. Mystery/Detective/Crime classic. It can be fiction or non-fiction (true crime). Examples include Murder on the Orient Express, Crime and Punishment, In Cold Blood.
7. A classic short story collection. Any single volume that contains at least six short stories. The book can have a single author or can be an anthology of multiple authors.
Complete Stories by Franz Kafka
8. Pre-1800 classic. Anything written before 1800. Plays and epic poems, such as the Odyssey, are acceptable in this category.
Dangerous Liaisons by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
9. A nonfiction classic. Travel, memoirs, and biographies are great choices for this category.
Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes by Robert Louis Stevenson
10. Classic that's been on your TBR list the longest. Find the classic book that's been hanging around unread the longest, and finally cross it off your list!
Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse
11. Classic set in a place you'd like to visit. Can be real or imaginary -- Paris, Tokyo, the moon, Middle Earth, etc. It can be someplace you've never been, or someplace you'd like to visit again.
Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser
12. Wild card classic. Any classic book you like, any category, as long as it's at least 50 years old!
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
2023 Chapter-a-Day Challenge
How It Works:
Get a copy of each of the six books.
- If you have your own blog, write a welcome post explaining why you are joining the read-along and what you hope to gain from it. Leave a link to your post in the comments section at the end of this post.
- Download the daily schedule: Nick’s 2023 George Eliot Chapter-a-Day Reading Schedule
- Commit to reading a chapter a day. If you get behind or race ahead, no worries. Life happens.
- Join Nick in posting a quote each day on Facebook or Twitter. using the hashtag #eliotreadalong. No spoilers, please!
- You will find official 2023 read-along graphic next to this list. Feel free to use it on your website if you wish.
- Subscribe to One Catholic Life so you don’t miss any read-along posts throughout the year. You can get updates via email by using the form in the right-hand sidebar.
Reading Schedule
We’ll be reading six of George Eliot’s major works. Here is a broad outline of the reading schedule, along with links to the Kindle editions, the online Gutenberg editions, and the Librivox audiobook editions (Kindle links are affiliate links):
- Adam Bede: January 1 to February 24 – Kindle – Gutenberg – Librivox
- The Mill on the Floss: February 25 to April 23 – Kindle – Gutenberg – Librivox
- Silas Marner: April 24 to May 14 – Kindle – Gutenberg – Librivox
- Romola: May 15 to July 26 – Kindle – Gutenberg – Librivox
- Middlemarch: July 27 to October 22 – Kindle – Gutenberg – Librivox
- Daniel Deronda: October 23 to December 31 – Kindle – Gutenberg – Librivox
2023 Gaia/Nature Reading Challenge
2023 Gaia/Nature Reading Challenge
There are no strict rules to the challenge. Pledge to read as many or as few nature-themed books as you would like. Just one qualifies for the challenge. The titles you choose can be either fiction or non-fiction; they just have to have nature, climate or environment as an issue or theme. Share your reading via comments on Gumtrees and Galaxies. Links are welcome and encouraged.
Super Past Due Reviews Challenge
In 2022, I first took on this project with a list of ten books. Happily, I managed to read and review five:
- Runs January 1 to December 31, 2023.
- Read as many books as you want.
- Books may be nonfiction, memoir, how-to, self help, coffee table books, instructional, picture books, and even fictional books if they are about people who are creative.
- You may include books of any format including traditional books, ebooks or audiobooks
- You may reread books.
- Books may count towards other reading challenges in which you are participating.
- Sign up here.
Please join Gilion at Rose City Reader for the eleventh edition of our Grand Tour of Europe through books! The European Reading Challenge has been going strong since 2012. Choose your own level of commitment to complete the challenge. There is a Jet Setter Prize for the person who visits the most countries between the covers.
THE GIST: The idea is to read books set in European countries or books by European authors. The books can be of any genre – fiction, nonfiction, novels, short stories, memoirs, travel guides, cookbooks, biography, poetry, whatever. You can participate at different levels, but each book must represent a different country -- either written by an author from a different country or set in a different country, no two books from the same country.
To participate in the challenge, sign up at the levels below. If you want to go on to compete for the Prize, keep reading!
- FIVE STAR (DELUXE ENTOURAGE): Read at least five books by different European authors or books set in different European countries.
- FOUR STAR (HONEYMOONER): Read four qualifying books.
- THREE STAR (BUSINESS TRAVELER): Read three qualifying books.
- TWO STAR (ADVENTURER): Read two qualifying books.
- ONE STAR (PENSIONE WEEKENDER): Read just one qualifying book.
1. Each of these 12 books must have been on your bookshelf or “To Be Read” list for AT LEAST one full year. This means the book cannot have a publication date of 1/1/2022 or later (any book published in the year 2021 or earlier qualifies, as long as it has been on your TBR pile). Caveat: Two (2) alternates are allowed, just in case one or two of the books ends up in the “did not finish (DNF)” pile.
2. To be eligible, you must sign-up with the Mr. Linky below. Link to your list (so create it ahead of time!) and add updated links to each book’s review. Books must be read and must be reviewed (doesn’t have to be too fancy) in order to count as completed.
3. The link you post in the Mr. Linky below must be to your “master list” (see mine below). This is where you will keep track of your books completed, crossing them out and/or dating them as you go along, and updating the list with the links to each review (so there’s one easy, convenient way to find your list and all your reviews for the challenge). See THIS LINK for an idea of what I mean. Your complete and final list must be posted by January 15, 2023.
4. Leave comments on the monthly posts as you go along, to update us on your status. Come back here if/when you complete this challenge and leave a comment indicating that you CONQUERED YOUR 2023 TBR LIST! Every person who successfully reads their 12 books and/or alternates (and who provides a working link to their list, which has links to the review locations) will be entered to win up to $100 of books from The Book Depository!(That’s right! To celebrate TEN YEARS of this awesome challenge, I’ve doubled the final giveaway prize from $50 to $100!)
5. Crossovers from other challenges are totally acceptable, as long as you have never read the book before, and it was published in 2021 or earlier!
*Note: You can read the books on your list in any order; they do not need to be read in the order you have them listed. Audiobooks count. Graphic novels count. Poetry collections? Essay collections? All good! As you complete a book – review it, go to your original list and turn that title into a link to the review. This will keep the comments section here from getting ridiculously cluttered. For an example of what I mean, Click Here.
Where Can I Post My Reviews? Anywhere! Tik Tok, Instagram, Mastodon, Hive, Facebook, Goodreads, a blog, YouTube, Twitter (if you haven’t abandoned it). It’s really up to you to choose the format that works for you, as long as your posts are public so that you can link them up on our Mister Linky and we can see them.
Monthly Check-Ins: On the 15th of each month, I’m going to post a “TBR Pile Check-In.” This will allow participants to link-up their reviews from the past month and get some recognition for their progress. There will also be small mini-challenges and giveaways to go along with these posts (Such As: Read 6 books by the June Check-in and be entered to win a book of your choice!) I’m hoping this will help to keep us all on track and make the challenge a bit more engaging/interactive. I started these mini-challenges in 2014, and I think they were a great success, so I am continuing them this year!
Chat: On Social Media, please use #TBRYear10
My 2023 TBR Challenge List: 101 Books
Why not go big and set an enormous goal? Let me see how many of the 101 books in my Kindle and physical TBRs I can read this year!
2/101 Read and reviewed
My Kindle TBR (40 books)
The Book of the Dun Cow by Walter Wagerin Jr. The Sterkarm Handshake by Susan Price
The Very Best of the Best: 35 Years of the Year's Best Science Fiction. Bel Ami by Guy de Maupassant
Adam Bede by George Eliot. The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry. Short Stories in French
Rhododendron Pie by Margery Sharp. Tess of the Road by Rachel Hartman
Miss Carter and the Ilfrit by Susan Alice Kerby. A Country Year: Living the Questions by Sue Hubbell
The Snow Leopard by Peter Mattiessen Map: Collected and New Poems by Wislawa Szymborska
Lives of the Stoics by Ryan Holiday. The Queen's Gambit by Walter Tevis
MacGregor Tells the World by Elizabeth Mckenzie. A Night to Remember and The Night Lives On by Walter Lord
Spirals in Time by Helen Scales. An Omelette and a Glass of Wine by Elizabeth David
A Distant Mirror by Barbara Tuchman. Mockingbird by Walter Tevis
Paris Adrift by E. J. Swift. Cold Sassy Tree by Olive Ann Burns
Diagnosis by Lisa Sanders. The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton
The Sleepwalkers by Christopher Clark. Lost Horizon by James Hilton
Mistress Masham's Repose by T. H. White. Cue for Treason by Geoffrey Trease
Jock of the Bushveld by James Percy Fitzpatrick. So Long, See You Tomorrow by William Maxwell
The Black Corsair by Emilio Salgari. Heart by Edmondo De Amicis
The Wonderful Adventures of Nils by Selma Langerloef. Bevis: The Story of a Boy by Richard Jefferies
Old Filth by Jane Gardam. Stoner by John Williams
A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley. The Tin Drum by Gunter Grass
My Physical TBR (61 books)
The Time It Never Rained by Elmer Kelton. Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis
All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque. Perdido Street Station by China Mieville
The Yellow Wall-Paper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Jack by Marilynne Robinson
W. B. Yeats: Selected Poems. The Queen of the Tambourine by Jane Gardam
Village School by Miss Read. A Sense of Direction: Pilgrimage for the Restless and the Hopeful by Geideon Lewis-Kravs
The Thurber Carnival by James Thurber. A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains by Isabella L. Bird
The Outermost House by Henry Beston. Pictures from Italy by Charles Dickens
Vroom with a View by Peter Moore. Battle Magic by Tamora Pierce
Courage for Beginners by Karen Harrington. The Bobbsey Twins: Merry Days Indoors and Out by Laura Lee Hope
Westward, Ha! Around the World in 80 Cliches by S. J. Perelman. A Winter Book by Tove Jansson
Literary Places by Sarah Baxter. The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson
Love Overdue by Pamela Morsi. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
The World on a Plate: 40 Cuisines, 100 Recipes and the Stories Behind Them. Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
The Heat of the Day by Elizabeth Bowen. Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann
Long Ago in France by M. F. K. Fisher. Vango: Between Sky and Earth by Timothee de Fombelle
Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. All Our Worldly Goods by Irene Nemirovsky
The Master of Go by Yasunari Kawabata. The Sound of the Mountain by Yasunari Kawabata
Auntie Poldi and the Sicilian Lions by Mario Giordano. Miss Pickerell Goes to Mars by Ellen McGregor
Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter. Into the Beautiful North by Luis Alberto Urrea
Refugee by Alan Gratz. A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World by C. A. Fletcher
In Search of the Far Side by Gary Larson. A View of the Harbour by Elizabeth Taylor
Haiku in English: The First Hundred Years. Collected Poems by Robert Graves
The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare. Percy Jackson's Greek Gods by Rick Riordan
Story's End by Marissa Burt. The City of Dreaming Books
Trixie Belden #10: The Marshland Mystery. Books: A Memoir by Larry McMurtry
D-Day: The World War II Invasion that Changed History by Deborah Hopkinson. The Eight by Katherine Neville
A Paris All Your Own edited by Eleanor Brown. Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlansky
The Secret Life of Salvador Dali by Dali. The Country Girls by Edna O'Brien
Arcadia by Tom Stoppard. The Novel Cure by Ella Berthoud
Books that Saved My Life by Michael McGirr. Remarkable Diaries
Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.
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