2017 Reading Challenges

2017 Reading Challenges:

  1. #LitsyAtoZ Challenge
  2. Pulitzer 7s Challenge
  3. Read Harder Challenge
  4. What’s in a Name? 2017

#LitsyAtoZ Challenge:

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Challenge Status: COMPLETED 12/19/17

I’ve done A to Z challenges ever since I started book blogging, but these past few years, I’ve just done it solo. This year, I’m jumping back into an “official” challenge and doing #LitsyAtoZ (you can find me on Litsy as @feministtexican).

The rules: Read a book from every letter of the alphabet, going by either title, author, or a mix of both. I’m going with author. Titles in gray are tentative.

  • A – The Impossible Knife of Memory by Laurie Halse Anderson
  • B – The Versions of Us by Laura Barnett
  • C – Whatever Happened to Interracial Love? by Kathleen Collins
  • D – The Unspeakable: And Other Subjects of Discussion by Meghan Daum
  • E – Things We Lost in the Fire: Stories by Mariana Enríquez
  • F – The Turner House by Angela Flournoy
  • G – Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body by Roxane Gay
  • H – The Wanderers by Meg Howrey
  • I – We Are Never Meeting in Real Life. by Samantha Irby
  • J – Him, Me, Muhammad Ali by Randa Jarrar
  • K – Licking Flames: Tales of a Half-Assed Hussy by Diana Kirk
  • L – March: Book One by John Lewis & Andrew Aydin; illustrated by Nate Powell
  • M – Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery
  • N – The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
  • O – Norma by Sofi Oksanen
  • P – True Grit by Charles Portis
  • Q – Trust No Aunty by Maria Qamar
  • R – Earth and Ashes by Atiq Rahimi
  • S – Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly
  • T – Smile by Raina Telgemeier
  • U – We’re Going to Need More Wine: Stories by Gabrielle Union
  • V – Smoke by Dan Vyleta
  • W – A Really Good Day by Ayelet Waldman
  • X – Pat the Zombie: A Cruel (Adult) Spoof by Aaron Ximm
  • Y – The Book of Joan by Lidia Yuknavitch
  • Z – We by Yevgeny Zamyatin

Pulitzer 7s Challenge

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Challenge Status: 2/8

This is a personal challenge that helps me break down my much larger Pulitzer Project.

The goal: read all of the Pulitzer fiction winners for the years ending in 7. No winners were chosen in 1957 and 1977.

1927 – Early Autumn by Louis Bromfield
1937 – Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
1947 – All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren
1957 – N/A
1967 – The Fixer by Bernard Malamud
1977 – N/A
1987 – A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor
1997 – Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer by Steven Millhauser
2007 – The Road by Cormac McCarthy
2017 – The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

Book Riot’s Read Harder 2017 Challenge

Read Harder Challenge logo 2017

Challenge Status: COMPLETED 12/31/17

The rules: There are 24 tasks in the Read Harder Challenge (or roughly two per month). You can tackle them in any order, make any changes, do them all in a month or spread them out over the year. Make the challenge yours! The Goodreads group for the challenge is here.

  1. A book about sports: Unsportsmanlike Conduct: College Football and the Politics of Rape by Jessica Luther
  2. A debut novel: The Turner House by Angela Flournoy
  3. A book about books: Tolstoy and the Purple Chair by Nina Sankovitch
  4. A book set in and by author from Central/South America: Things We Lost in the Fire: Stories by Mariana Enríquez
  5. A book by or about an immigrant: In the Country We Love by Diane Guerrero with Michelle Burford
  6. An all-ages comic: Smile by Raina Telgemeier
  7. A book published between 1900 & 1950: Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery (1908)
  8. A travel memoir: Kinky Gazpacho by Lori L. Tharps
  9. A book I’ve read before: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
  10. A book set within 100 miles of my location: Caballero by Jovita González Mireles and Eve Raleigh
  11. A book set 5000+ miles from my location: Year of the Elephant by Leila Abouzeid
  12. A fantasy novel: The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
  13. A nonfiction book about technology: Lean Out: The Struggle for Gender Equality in Tech and Start-Up Culture ed. by Elissa Shevinsky
  14. A book about war: The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II by Svetlana Alexievich
  15. A YA or middle grade novel by LGBTQ+ author: Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
  16. A banned/frequently challenged book: Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden
  17. A classic by an author of color: How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez
  18. A superhero comic with a female lead: Ms. Marvel Vol. 2 by G. Willow Wilson
  19. A book in which a POC goes on spiritual journey: Life’s Work: A Moral Argument for Choice by Dr. Willie Parker
  20. A LGBTQ+ romance: Tell Me Again How a Crush Should Feel by Sara Farizan
  21. A book published by a micropress: Licking Flames: Tales of a Half-Assed Hussy by Diana Kirk
  22. A collection of stories by a woman: Whatever Happened to Interracial Love? by Kathleen Collins
  23. A collection of poetry in translation on a theme other than love: Selected Poems by Marina Tsvetaeva
  24. A book wherein all point-of-view characters are POC: Him, Me, Muhammad Ali by Randa Jarrar

What’s in a Name? 2017

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Challenge Status: COMPLETED 12/26/17

The rules: Between January 1 and December 31, 2017, read one book in each of the following categories. These are my tentative titles:

  1. A title containing a number in numbers: 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl by Mona Awad
  2. A title containing a building: The Turner House by Angela Flournoy
  3. A title which has an ‘X’ somewhere in it: The Fixer by Bernard Malamud
  4. A title containing a compass direction: Exit West by Mohsin Hamid
  5. A title containing an item of cutlery: The Impossible Knife of Memory by Laurie Halse Anderson
  6. A title in which at least two words are alliterative: Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden