Wednesday, February 3, 2021

Back to the Classics Challenge 2021

Click HERE for guidelines and sign-ups.

Host: Karen K @ Books and Chocolate
Dates: January 1 - December 31, 2021

How the challenge works:
  • Complete six categories, and you'll get one entry in the drawing; 
  • Complete nine categories, and you'll get two entries in the drawing; 
  • Complete all twelve categories, and you'll get three entries in the drawing
The Categories:
  1. A 19th century classic: any book first published from 1800 to 1899.
  2. A 20th century classic: any book first published from 1900 to 1971. All books must have been published at least 50 years ago; the only exceptions are books which were written by 1971 and posthumously published.
  3. A classic by a woman author.
  4. A classic in translation, meaning 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; that is, a non-white author.
  6. A classic by a new-to-you author, i.e., an author whose work you have never read.
  7. New-to-you classic by a favorite author — a new book by an author whose works you have already read. 
  8. A classic about an animal, or with an animal in the title. The animal can be real or metaphorical. (i.e., To Kill a Mockingbird).
  9. A children's classic
  10. A humorous or satirical classic.
  11. A travel or adventure classic (fiction or non-fiction). It can be a travelogue or a classic in which the main character travels or has an adventure. 
  12. A classic play. Plays will only count in this category.

The Rules (quoted from the challenge announcement post):
  • All books must have been written at least 50 years ago to qualify; therefore, books must have been published no later than 1971 for this challenge. The only exceptions to this rule are books which were published posthumously but written before 1971. Recent translations of classic novels are acceptable. 
  • All books must be read from January 1 through December 31, 2021. Books started before January 1 do not qualify. All reviews must be linked to this challenge by 11:59 p.m. on January 1, 2022. Links for each category will be posted during the first week of January, and will be featured on a sidebar of the host blog for convenience through the entire year. (The link for the final wrap-up will be posted towards the end of the year, to avoid confusion). 
  • The deadline to sign up for the challenge is March 31, 2021. After that, the link will be closed and you'll have to wait until next year's challenge. 
  • Books may NOT cross over within this challenge — that is, you may not count the same book multiple times within this challenge. You MUST read a different book for each category in this challenge, or it doesn't count. 
  • Participants must post a wrap-up and link it to the challenge, and it must include links to all the books they've read for this challenge, specifying which books for each challenge. . . . It is fine to rearrange books for the challenge, since many books can fit multiple categories.
  • The wrap-up post MUST include contact information so the winner can be contacted privately before being announced on the blog. If your blog doesn't have a link, or if you have a Goodreads account, indicate that in the comments of wrap-up post.
  • The winner will be announced on the blog the first week of January, 2021. All qualifying participants will receive one or more entries, depending upon the number of categories they complete as stated above. One winner will be randomly selected from all qualifying entries. Winner will be contacted privately before being announced on the blog. 
  • The winner will receive a gift certificate in the amount of $30 (US) from Amazon.com (US) OR $30 in books from The Book Depository. Winners must live in a country that receives shipment from one of these online retailers. 
See the challenge announcement page for more details and FAQs. 

I'll probably be trying for six categories, at least to start. But I would love to read something for all twelve.

● See my original post about the challenge HERE.
● See the challenge announcement/sign-up post HERE.
● Link up reviews HERE.
● Link up challenge wrap-ups HERE.


MY READING LIST (books I've read, with links to reviews):
  • Category 1: Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë (pub. 1846) 
  • Category 2:
  • Category 3: Summer, by Edith Wharton (pub. 1917) 
  • Category 4:
  • Category 5:
  • Category 6:
  • Category 7: 
  • Category 8: 
  • Category 9:
  • Category 10: 1066 And All That: A Memorable History of England, by W.C. Sellar & R.J. Yeatman, illus. by John Reynolds (pub. 1931)
  • Category 11:
  • Category 12:

POSSIBLE  READS:

This is my list of TBR classics that match up with one or more of the categories in the challenge.

The 101 Dalmatians. Dodie Smith (1956) 
All Passion Spent. Vita Sackville-West  (1931)
The Ambassadors. Henry James  (1903)
The American. Henry James  (1877)
Animal Farm. George Orwell  (1945) 
Anna Karenina. Leo Tolstoy  (1877)
Appointment in Samarra. John O'Hara (1934)
Barchester Towers (Barsetshire #2). Anthony Trollope (1857)
Barry Lyndon. William Makepeace Thackeray (1844)
The Beckoning Fair One. Oliver Onions (1911)
The Bell Jar. Sylvia Plath (1963)
The Bostonians. Henry James (1886)
The Code of the Woosters. P.G. Wodehouse (1938)
Cranford. Elizabeth Gaskell (1853)
Cry, the Beloved Country. Alan Paton (1948)
The Custom of the Country. Edith Wharton (1913)
Delta Wedding. Eudora Welty (1946)
Demian. Hermann Hesse (1919)
The Edwardians. Vita Sackville-West (1930)
Eight Cousins. Louisa May Alcott (1874)
The Enchanted April. Elizabeth von Arnim (1922)
The Europeans. Henry James (1878)
Far from the Madding Crowd. Thomas Hardy (1874)
Fathers and Sons. Ivan Turgenev (1862)
The 42nd Parallel (USA Trilogy #1). John Dos Passos (1930)
Foundation. Isaac Asimov (1951)
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Anita Loos (1924)
The Go-Between. L.P. Hartley (1953)
The Golden Bowl. Henry James (1904)
Grand Hotel. Vicki Baum (1929)
The Heart of the Matter. Graham Greene (1948)
High Rising (Barsetshire #1). Angela Thirkell (1933)
Horseman, Pass By. Larry McMurtry (1961)
The House of Mirth. Edith Wharton (1905)
In Chancery (Forsyte Sage #2). John Galsworthy (1920)
The Invention of Morel. Adolfo Bioy Casares (1940)
Invitation to the Waltz. Rosamond Lehmann (1932)
Jane Eyre. Charlotte Brontë (1847)
King, Queen, Knave. Vladimir Nabokov (1928)
Lady Windermere's Fan. Oscar Wilde (1893)
The Magnificent Ambersons. Booth Tarkington (1918)
The Man in the Queue. Josephine Tey (1929)
The Marble Faun. Nathaniel Hawthorne (1860)
Medea. Euripides (431 BC)
The Metamorphosis. Franz Kafka (1915)
Misty of Chincoteague. Marguerite Henry (1947)
The Moonstone. Wilkie Collins (1868)
The Mousetrap. Agatha Christie (1952)
The Old Wives' Tale. Arnold Bennett (1908)
One Hundred Years of Solitude. Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1967)
Our Man in Havana. Graham Greene (1959)
Persuasion. Jane Austen (1818)
Pinocchio. Carlo Collodi (1883)
The Ponder Heart. Eudora Welty (1954)
Rabbit, Run. John Updike (1960) 
A Raisin in the Sun. Lorraine Hansberry (1959) 
The Red Pony. John Steinbeck (1937) 
Sense and Sensibility. Jane Austen (1811)
The Sheltering Sky. Paul Bowles (1949)
She Stoops to Conquer. Oliver Goldsmith (1773)
Sister Carrie. Theodore Dreiser (1900)
Six Characters in Search of an Author. Luigi Pirandello (1921)
Something Fresh (Blandings Castle #1). P.G. Wodehouse (1915) 
Stuart Little. E.B. White (1945) 
The Spoils of Poynton. Henry James (1896)
Things Fall Apart. Chinua Achebe (1958)
Where Angels Fear to Tread. E.M. Forster (1905)
Wide Sargasso Sea. Jean Rhys (1966) 
The Wind in the Willows. Kenneth Grahame (1908) 
Winesburg, Ohio. Sherwood Anderson (1919)
The Wings of the Dove. Henry James (1902)
A Wreath of Roses. Elizabeth Taylor (1949)


Monday, January 11, 2021

2021 What's in a Name Challenge

 


Hosted by: Andrea @ Carolina Book Nook
Dates: January 1 - December 31, 2021

● See my original post about the challenge HERE.
● See the challenge announcement/sign-up post HERE


Guidelines (from announcement post):
  • The challenge runs from January 1, 2021 to December 31, 2021. You can sign up any time, but only count books that you read between those dates.
  • Read a book in any format (hard copy, ebook, audio) with a title that fits into each category.
  • Don’t use the same book for more than one category.
  • Creativity for matching the categories is not only allowed, it’s encouraged!
  • You can choose your books as you go or make a list ahead of time.

Categories for 2021 (with links to review pages):
  1. One/1 (example: One Second After; The 100)
  2. Doubled word (ex: In a Dark, Dark Wood; Wolf by Wolf)
  3. Reference to outer space (ex: The Fault in Our Stars)
  4. Possessive noun (ex: The Zookeeper’s Wife)
  5. Botanical word (ex: The Language of Flowers; The Sandalwood Tree)
  6. Article of clothing (ex: Bossypants)


MY  READING  LIST (books read, with links to reviews):
  • Category 1: 1066 And All That, by W.C. Sellar & R.J. Yeatman, illus. by John Reynolds (1930)
  • Category 2: Dead Dead Girls, by Nekesa Afia (2021) 
  • Category 3: Tom Swift and the Visitor From Planet X (Tom Swift Jr. #17), by Victor Appleton II (1961; audiobook 2007)
  • Category 4: Smilla's Sense of Snow, by Peter Høeg; trans. by Tiina Nunnally (1992) 
  • Category 5: Oranges and Lemons (Bryant & May: Peculiar Crimes Unit #17), by Christopher Fowler (2020)
  • Category 6: 

POSSIBILITIES:

● Category 1 (One/1 - word or numeral):


● Category 2 (Doubled word):
  • Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter. Tom Franklin
  • Dead Dead Girls. Nekesa Afia 
  • Three Times Time. Jack Matthews
 
● Category 3 (Reference to outer space):
  • Full Wolf Moon (Jeremy Logan #5). Lincoln Child
  • The Moonstone. Wilkie Collins 
  • Number the Stars. Lois Lowry 
  • Star Trap (Charles Paris #3). Simon Brett 

● Category 4 (Possessive noun):
  • Monk's Hood (Chronicles of Brother Cadfael #3). Ellis Peters
  • Saint Peter's Fair (Chronicles of Brother Cadfael #4). Ellis Peters 

● Category 5 (Botanical word):


● Category 6 (Article of Clothing):
  • The Bluebonnet Betrayal (Potting Shed Mystery #5). Marty Wingate 
  • The Case of the Moth-Eaten Mink (Perry Mason #39). Erle Stanley Gardner 
  • The Case of the Singing Skirt (Perry Mason #60). Erle Stanley Gardner 
  • Death in a White Tie (Inspector Roderick Alleyn #7). Ngaio Marsh 
  • Devil in a Blue Dress (Easy Rawlins #1). Walter Mosley 
  • The Monkey's Raincoat (Elvis Cole #1). Robert Crais 
  • Monk's Hood (Chronicles of Brother Cadfael #3). Ellis Peters 
  • The Quaint and Curious Quest of Johnny Longfoot, the Shoe King's Son. Catherine Besterman
  • Red Mandarin Dress (Inspector Chen Cao #5). Qiu Xiaolong 
  • The Scarlet Slipper Mystery (Nancy Drew #32). Carolyn Keene 


........

2021 World War II Challenge

 

J. Howard Miller 1918-2004,
artwork details on wikimedia commons

HOST: Becky @ Becky's Book Reviews
DATES: January - December 2021

● See my original post about the Challenge HERE
● See the Challenge announcement/sign-up page HERE

GOALS: Read, Watch, Listen, Share WWII related stuff

Books
  • Fiction published during 1939-1945
  • Fiction set during 1939-1945
  • Fiction that is about the leading up to the war
  • Fiction that is about the direct aftermath of the war
  • Nonfiction books about the War
  • Biographies or Autobiographies with sections about the war
  • Poetry or verse novels with a WWII setting OR publication date
  • Essays, Articles, Op-Ed pieces
  • historical-historical (straight up historical with no sub-genres)
  • historical romance
  • historical mysteries
  • historical coming-of-age
  • historical thrillers/suspense/spy novels

Music
  • See YouTube Pop Hits Chronologies for the years 1938-1946

Films and documentaries
  • any film made/released during 1939-1945
  • any film set during the war 
  • any documentary about the war


MY  READING  LIST (stuff I've read, with links to reviews):

  1. The Clue of the Tapping Heels (Nancy Drew #16). Carolyn Keene (1939)
  2. The Clue in the Crumbling Wall (Nancy Drew #22). Carolyn Keene (1945) 
  3. The Hollywood Spy (Maggie Hope #10). Susan Elia MacNeal (2021; set in 1943) 

MY  WATCH  LIST (films/docs I've watched, with links to any reviews):
1. 
2. 
3. 


STUFF  I'VE  LISTENED  TO:


........


POSSIBLE  READS
  • Colour Scheme (Roderick Alleyn #12). Ngaio Marsh (1943)
  • Died in the Wool (Roderick Alleyn #13). Ngaio Marsh (1945)
  • The Hollywood Spy (Maggie Hope #10). Susan Elia MacNeal (2021; set in 1943) 
  • Los Alamos. Joseph Kanon (1997; set in 1945) 

........

Books in Translation Reading Challenge 2021



HOST: Jen @ IntrovertedReader.com 
DATES: 1 January - 31 December 2021

● See the Challenge announcement/sign-up page HERE
● See my original post about the Challenge HERE
● See the link for reviews HERE


Guidelines (quoted from announcement page):
  • You can read a book that’s been translated from any language into the language of your choosing. The challenge is not limited to translations to or from English.
  • You can read any genre
  • You can read books meant for any age group
  • Crossovers with other challenges are fine
  • Any format that you choose is also acceptable
  • The challenge will run from January 1 through December 31, 2021
  • A blog is not required for participation; you can also link to reviews on other sites such as GoodReads or LibraryThing
  • Sign up anytime throughout the year 

Levels:
  1. Beginner: Read 1-3 books in translation (my choice)
  2. Conversationalist: 4-6 books
  3. Bilingual: 7-9 books
  4. Linguist: 10+ books

MY  READING  LIST (books I've read, with links to reviews):
  1. The Lost Village. Camilla Sten; trans. by Alexandra Fleming (Swedish) 
  2. Smilla's Sense of Snow. Peter Høeg; trans. by Tiina Nunnally (Danish) 




......