Overly-Elaborate Self-Imposed

2019 Reading Challenge

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Because life is meaningless without rules and spreadsheets, I've set myself a challenge to fulfill the following 50 prompts with my reading this year! Books can count for as many prompts as they fit (so I might not need to read 50 books, though that's also my target number for the year).

My goal with this challenge is partly to read things that I wouldn't otherwise have picked up, but mostly to push myself to think frequently about reading.

Prompts

A little bit of variety

1. A volume of poetry
   • 16, Stag's Leap, by Sharon Olds.
2. A book that won a Hugo or Nebula
   • 18, Three Body Problem (Hugo)
   • 31, Paladin of Souls (Hugo and Nebula); also 30, 31, and 34 because the whole Chalion series won best series (Hugo)
3. A book I love re-reading
   • 11, Pride and Prejudice
   • 30, The Curse of Chalion
4. A Gothic novel NOT from the 18thC
5. A book that I hear people talk about a lot
   • 22, The Essex Serpent
6. A work of non-fiction (not a literary monograph)
   • 7, Wrong About Japan, a travelogue
   • 10, Japan Lonely Planet guide
   • 13, Daughters of the Samurai
   • 20, Augustus: First Emperor of Rome
   • 26, Post-Capitalist Survival Guide
   • 39, Marcus Agrippa: Right-hand Man of Caesar Augustus
7. A random book from my Goodreads to-read shelf
   • 15, Privilege of the Sword, previously book #49 on the list, added on July 2, 2016.
   • (If I want to do another, the next one my random number generator picked was, bizarrely, also 49, now referring to The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, added July 24, 2016)
8. A book I meant to read in 2018
   • 22, The Essex Serpent
9. A book mentioned in another book
10. A book with a nun
    • 3, Katherine, whose title character sometimes remembers having grown up in a convent
11. A comic book
12. A book set in a country where I have never been
    • 7, Wrong About Japan, read before I went to Japan
13. A book involving a non-Christian holiday
14. A book that revolves around a bet or game

Judging a book by its bibliographic metadata

15. A book by an author whose first and last names start with the same letter:
    • 12, Rainbow Rowell
    • 29, Naomi Novik
16. A book published in 2019:
    • 21, This Is How You Lose the Time War
    • 26, Post-Capitalist Survival Guide
17. A book with a question in the title
18. A book that’s been the title of my newsletter
19. A "birthday book": released during my birth month, or by an author who shares my birthday
    • 24, a lecture given on my birth date (February 19) in 1795
20. A copy of a book printed before 1830
21. A work published at one point as an incunabulum
22. A book by an author whose name is also an animal

Making things complicated

23. Three books by authors of three different ethnicities (1)
    • 1, by Paul Krueger, Filipino
24. Three books by authors of three different ethnicities (2)
    • 18, by Cixin Liu, Chinese
25. Three books by authors of three different ethnicities (3)
26. Three books recommended by friends from different friend circles (1)
    • 20, from an Ohio IRL friend
27. Three books recommended by friends from different friend circles (2)
    • 22, from a tumblr friend
28. Three books recommended by friends from different friend circles (3)
29. An author’s first and last books (first)
30. An author’s first and last books (last)
31. A five-book "title chain" (each book's title must share a word with the preceding book)
    • 1, Last Call at the Nightshade Lounge
32. A five-book "title chain"(2)
    • 33, Mira's Last Dance
33. A five-book "title chain" (3)
34. A five-book "title chain" (4)
35. A five-book "title chain" (5)

Can't take a guy out of the 18th century

36. Something published in the 1770s
37. Something published in the 1780s
    • 4, Cecilia (1782)
38. Something published in 1789
39. Something published in 1790
40. Something published in 1791
    • 45, The Comical Fellow
41. Something published in 1792
42. Something published in 1793
43. Something published in 1794
44. Something published in 1795
45. Something published in 1796
46. Something published in 1797
47. Something published in 1798
48. Something published in 1799
49. Something published in the 1800s
50. Something published in the 1810s
    • 11, Pride and Prejudice (1813)

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Books Read

1. Last Call at the Nightshade Lounge, by Paul Krueger (2016).
   • 23, three books by authors of different ethnicities
   • 31, first book in the title chain
2. The Inimitable Jeeves, by P.G. Wodehouse (1923).
3. Katherine, by Anya Seton (1954).
   • 10, a book with a nun
4. Cecilia: Memoirs of an Heiress, by Frances Burney (1782).
   • 37, something published in the 1780s
5. Lord Peter Views the Body, by Dorothy Sayers (1928).
6. Carry On, Jeeves, by P.G. Wodehose (1925).
7. Wrong About Japan, by Peter Carey (2004).
   • 6, a work of non-fiction
   • 12, a book set in on a continent where I have never been
8. The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, by Dorothy Sayers (1928).
9. Strong Poison, by Dorothy Sayers (1930).
10. Japan, by Lonely Planet (2017).
    • 6, a work of non-fiction. It no longer qualifies for 12, a book set in on a continent where I have never been, because I have now been in Japan, and read this book while there!
11. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen (1813).
    • 3, a book I love re-reading
    • 50, a work published in the 1810s
12. Carry On, by Rainbow Rowell (2015).
    • 15, an author whose first and last names start with the same letter.
13. Daughters of the Samurai: A Journey from East to West and Back, by Janice P. Nimura (2015).
    • 6, a work of non-fiction
14. The Five Red Herrings, by Dorothy Sayers (1931).
15. The Privilege of the Sword, by Ellen Kushner (2006).
    • 15, a random book from my to-read shelf
16. Stag's Leap: Poems, by Sharon Olds (2012).
    • 1, a volume of poetry
17. Very Good, Jeeves!, by P.G. Wodehouse (1930).
18. The Three-Body Problem, by Cixin Liu (2008).
    • 2, won a Hugo
    • 24, three books by authors of different ethnicities
19. Charlotte Smith in British Romanticism, ed. Jacqueline Labbe (2008).
20. Augustus: First Emperor of Rome, by Adrian Goldsworthy (2015).
    • 6, a work of non-fiction
    • 26, first book recommended by friends from different friend circles
21. This Is How You Lose the Time War, by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone;(2019). (I super recommend this novella for anyone who is "sci-fi curious".)
    • 16, a book published in 2019
22. The Essex Serpent, by Sarah Perry (2016). Prompts filled: 5, a book that I hear people talk about a lot; 8, a book I meant to read in 2018; 27, second book recommended by friends from different friend circles
23. Thank You, Jeeves, by P.G. Wodehouse (1933).
24. Mr. Denne's observations on a triple stone seat at Upchurch in Kent, by Samuel Denne (1795).
    • 19, a "birthday book" (the original lecture was given on my birth date, February 19, in 1795)
    • 44, something published in 1795
25. Thank You, Jeeves, by P.G. Wodehouse (1933).
26. The Worst Is Yet to Come: A Post-Capitalist Survival Guide, by Peter Fleming (2019). (I don't really recommend this book.)
    • 6, a work of non-fiction
    • 16, a book published in 2019
27. Maisie Dobbs, by Jacqueline Winspear (2003).
28. Howl's Moving Castle, by Diana Wynne Jones (1986).
29. Uprooted, by Naomi Novik (2015).
    • 15, first and last names start with the same letter
30. The Curse of Chalion, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2000).
    • 3, a book I love re-reading
    • 2, part of the Chalion series, which won the best series Hugo.
31. Paladin of Souls, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2003).
    • 2, won a Hugo and a Nebula. Also part of the Chalion series, which won the best series Hugo.
32. Penric's Mission, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2016).
33. Mira's Last Dance, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2017).
    • 32, second book in the title chain.
34. The Hallowed Hunt, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2005).
    • 2, part of the Chalion series, which won the best series Hugo.
35. The Cambridge History of Eighteenth-Century Political Thought, ed. Mark Goldie (2006).
36. The Code of the Woosters, by P.G. Wodehouse (1938).
37. Joy in the Morning, by P.G. Wodehouse (1947).
38. Cultural Capital: The Problem of Literary Canon Formation, by John Guillory (1993).
39. Marcus Agrippa: Right-hand Man of Caesar Augustus, by Lindsay Powell (2014).
    • 6, a work of non-fiction
40. Penric's Demon, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2015).
41. Penric's Fox, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2018).
42. Penric and the Shaman, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2016).
43. The Prisoner of Limnos, by Lois McMaster Bujold (2017).
44. The Goblin Emperor, by Katherine Addison (2014).
45. The Comical Fellow; Or Wit and Humour for Town and Country, by Tim Gape (1791).
    • 40, something published in 1791.

Background image modified from Freepik, using Richard Westen's repeater to edit. Lace border modified from pngtree.