Around the Year in 52 Books discussion

Welcome!

It's best if you create your own plan (using "create a new topic" and choosing "2019 Plans" for the folder) so you can keep track of your progress and share your choices with the other members. If you need help finding ideas, you can have a look at the weekly topics (posted closer to 2019)

You can read in order or jump around, but keep this order in your plan, since this makes it easier for others to find a prompt.

If you can't complete the challenge, it's not a problem. If one topic is too far out of your comfort zone or too difficult to fulfill, you can use a "Wild Card" and read something else for this week (reader's choice or past suggestions).

The 2019 List (Printable)

1. A book that was nominated for or won an award in a genre you enjoy
2. A book with one of the 5 W's in the title (Who, What, Where, When, Why)
3. A book where the author’s name contains A, T, and Y
4. A book with a criminal character (i.e. assassin, pirate, thief, robber, scoundrel etc)

5. A book by Shakespeare or inspired by Shakespeare
6. A book with a dual timeline
7. 2 books related to the same topic, genre, or theme: Book #1
8. 2 books related to the same topic, genre, or theme: Book #2

9. A book from one of the top 5 money making genres (romance/erotica, crime/mystery, religious/inspirational, science fiction/fantasy or horror)
10. A book featuring an historical figure
11. A book related to one of the 12 Zodiac Chinese Animals (title, cover, subject)
12. A book about reading, books or an author/writer

13. A book that is included on a New York Public Library Staff Picks list
14. A book with a title, subtitle or cover relating to an astronomical term
15. A book by an author from a Mediterranean country or set in a Mediterranean country
16. A book told from multiple perspectives
17. A speculative fiction (i.e. fantasy, scifi, horror, dystopia)

18. A book related to one of the elements on the periodic table of elements
19. A book by an author who has more than one book on your TBR
20. A book featuring indigenous people of a country
21. A book from one of the polarizing or close call votes

22. A book with a number in the title or on the cover
23. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #1 Something Old
24. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #2 Something New
25. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #3 Something Borrowed

26. 4 books inspired by the wedding rhyme: Book #4 Something Blue
27. A book off of the 1001 books to read before you die list
28. A book related to something cold (i.e. theme, title, author, cover, etc.)
29. A book published before 1950
30. A book featuring an elderly character

31. A children’s classic you’ve never read
32. A book with more than 500 pages
33. A book you have owned for at least a year, but have not read yet
34. A book with a person's name in the title

35. A psychological thriller
36. A book featured on an NPR Best Books of the Year list
37. A book set in a school or university
38. A book not written in traditional novel format (poetry, essay, epistolary, graphic novel, etc)

39. A book with a strong sense of place or where the author brings the location/setting to life
40. A book you stumbled upon
41. A book from the 2018 GR Choice Awards
42. A book with a monster or "monstrous" character
43. A book related to STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) [fiction or nonfiction]

44. A book related in some way to a tv show/series or movie you enjoyed (same topic, same era, book appeared in the show/movie, etc.)
45. A multi-generational saga
46. A book with a (mostly) black cover
47. A book related to food (i.e. title, cover, plot, etc.)

48. A book that was a finalist or winner for the National Book Award for any year
49. A book written by a Far East Asian author or set in a Far East Asian country
50. A book that includes a journey (physical, health, or spiritual)
51. A book published in 2019
52. A book with a weird or intriguing title

List created by the group members, after suggestions and votes. Thanks to all!

* Prompts have been grouped (roughly) by month. Some months have 5 prompts, when a new week starts within the same month. This is just a general guide and members can read at whatever speed works for them.

Super excited!!

YAY! I have updated the 2019 Plans list on the community spreadsheet to reflect the order of the prompts!

Yay!! I’m so excited! Thank you, mods!

Emily, you’re so on top of things!

Liz wrote: "Emily, you’re so on top of things!"

Procrastination at work haha!

Thank you mods! And Emily for being so diligent in keeping the spreadsheet updated!

I am off work tomorrow so I expect I will spend much of the day working on my list.

Ahh thank you mods! Time to really start planning.

Laura (and other mods), is there a time frame for when weekly topic threads might be posted? While I was looking at my planning, I was thinking about how I'd like to see those threads so I can look at lists that others suggest. I know there are a lot in the suggestions and voting threads, but those are obviously all over the place.

Steve wrote: "Laura (and other mods), is there a time frame for when weekly topic threads might be posted? While I was looking at my planning, I was thinking about how I'd like to see those threads so I can look..."

If you use the community spreadsheet, on the 2019 Plans list, I have a link to each suggestion, voting, and results thread for each prompt. I've been using that to find info about each prompt.. just Command+F to find the prompt within those threads!

(At least, that could help you pass the time until the weekly topic threads are released!)

After looking at the list some more I must say that I LOVE that the multi-week prompts are back to back.. it gives me a mad urge to connect books for the wedding theme prompts

I also love that we are ending with the intriguing title! Since I'm reading in order this year, I have a feeling I won't get as ahead on the prompts as I did this year (at one point, I was 10 books ahead!), so I'm glad to end with some whimsy.

Yay!

I want to research books! But I have extra work for tonight, I have non-negotiable deadlines for tomorrow. (it's almost dinnertime where I am at, so after that. kids and husband not getting much attention tonight either way).

I'd Like to say a BIG Thank You to Emily for the spreadsheets. I am useless at computers, and have found Emily's spreadsheets so helpful!

Emily wrote: "Steve wrote: "Laura (and other mods), is there a time frame for when weekly topic threads might be posted? While I was looking at my planning, I was thinking about how I'd like to see those threads..."

I know... it's just overwhelming to pick through the threads to find that particular prompt sometimes! And some of the prompts won while flying under the radar without much discussion sometimes.

I'll probably hold off some of the prompt planning until we get into more centralized discussions.

I am with you Steve. My plan is to start planning the prompts I don't need much help with, adding as much from my TBR as possible and then delving into the more challenging prompts once the threads are up.

If you are doing a rejects challenge, there are already threads popping up in the section while we wait for the official list threads.

Rachelnyc wrote: "I am with you Steve. My plan is to start planning the prompts I don't need much help with, adding as much from my TBR as possible and then delving into the more challenging prompts once the threads..."

I applaud everyone who also fits in rejects. I can't guarantee I'll get 52 let alone >52!

My goal is to read every book I own, and I'm doing a 40 Before 40 list, so most of my plans are just slotting in those books.

I'm looking forward to the lists for some of the prompts though!

I don't know how you guys can hold off on planning! I started planning after each poll, I can't control myself - I now have a complete list of books plus backup ideas for each category (except for the Goodreads Choice Award), I even found a "stumbled upon" book

I try to put it off because I won't follow the list I will make anyway. But I like the idea generating process (I already have loose ideas for some of the prompts).

Nadine wrote: "I don't know how you guys can hold off on planning! I started planning after each poll, I can't control myself - I now have a complete list of books plus backup ideas for each category ..."

I couldn't hold off, lol. I've been planning on the spreadsheet all along, so my entire (tentative, subject to change as always) plan is up!

Johanne wrote: "I try to put it off because I won't follow the list I will make anyway. But I like the idea generating process (I already have loose ideas for some of the prompts)."

yes I go right off my plan! Maybe 50% of my reads will be what I originally planned. Or not hahahaha I kept track of it this year and 66% of my challenge reads were planned for Popsugar and only 35% of my AtY reads were what I originally planned. So ... the plan is "tentative." :-)

It's only October and all my planning and listing and spreadsheeting is finished. How many minutes 'til January 1st? :lol:

We plan to open up the topic discussion threads at the beginning of November.

dalex wrote: "It's only October and all my planning and listing and spreadsheeting is finished. How many minutes 'til January 1st? :lol:"

https://days.to/until/1-january

Not exactly in minutes, but close lol

dalex wrote: "It's only October and all my planning and listing and spreadsheeting is finished. How many minutes 'til January 1st? :lol:"


hahahaha!!! right there with you!! now that my spreadsheet is ready to go, I'm just deciding which book I will read first! (I don't read in order.)

Yeah - I love planning but won’t follow a plan. So I like to stretch it out by separating the plan from the voting.

Nadine wrote: "Johanne wrote: "I try to put it off because I won't follow the list I will make anyway. But I like the idea generating process (I already have loose ideas for some of the prompts)."

yes I go right..."

I have three lists of "choices" on my spreadsheet. The third has all the choices that I have right now from my TBR. That will be copied over to the second column which will have books deleted as I read them. The single planned choice goes into the first column. There were a couple prompts late this year that no longer had anything in the second column by the time I got to them. Whoops.

This fulfills my compulsive need to plan while acknowledging that the plan is more of a guideline. I may have issues.

I've got about thirty of the prompts planned. A couple have two or three possible titles listed and a couple have question marks after a title, but for half the prompts I know exactly what I'll be reading. And some I'm geekily pleased about. Discovered a graphic novel titled Something New by Lucy Knisley which obviously must be read for the something new prompt ; -) My one problem is trying not to get into a reading slump for the remainder of the year. I've effectively finished all my reading challenges for this year (except for one pesky prompt where I'm considering reading something else to replace the first book I read for it) and I have to hold off on all the good books from my TBR until next year. Guess that's a downside of trying to maintain a short TBR !

Shelley wrote: "Nadine wrote: "Johanne wrote: "I try to put it off because I won't follow the list I will make anyway. But I like the idea generating process (I already have loose ideas for some of the prompts)."
..."

I wish I could limit myself to just three choices! For some prompts, I have over 10 books just from my bookshelf.

Emily wrote: "Shelley wrote: "Nadine wrote: "Johanne wrote: "I try to put it off because I won't follow the list I will make anyway. But I like the idea generating process (I already have loose ideas for some of..."

No, I'm saying I put EVERY choice in a cell under column three. I have about 10 books in the pre-1950 one. Then when I read my single choice, I already have my shortened selection ready to pick from.

I'm with you Emily, I try to limit myself to 10 choices. Sometimes even that doesn't work!

Peter wrote: "https://days.to/until/1-january Not exactly in minutes, but close lol "

Hahahaha!

Emily wrote: "My goal is to read every book I own, and I'm doing a 40 Before 40 list, so most of my plans are just slotting in those books.

I'm looking forward to the lists for some of the prompts though!"

Yes! Most of my planning so far has been looking at my TBR list and seeing what fits where.

It is driving me crazy to sit here at work when all I want to do is work on my lists! Good thing I don't have to work late tonight and there is no baseball game so I can spend the evening concentrating and dreaming about all the books I want to read in 2019!
Oh and one more thing, GO DODGERS!!

Shelley wrote: "Emily wrote: "Shelley wrote: "Nadine wrote: "Johanne wrote: "I try to put it off because I won't follow the list I will make anyway. But I like the idea generating process (I already have loose ide..."

Oh I like that idea! I may use it with my bookshelf reads, since I know I want to get through all of them and I don't want to end up with a few at the end that fit no where because I didn't plan it out well!

I copied all of my plans over from the spreadsheet and linked up their titles and.... I've gotten zero work accomplished since this list was posted hahahaha.

I am dying to have time to work on this!! I don’t even want to read for the next while, so I can get the planning & spreadsheets going.

Serendipity, I wish I had your problem. Haha! If I had finished my challenges already, I’d probably create a mini rejects challenge for the remainder of the year.

For the spreadsheet challenged among us (it can’t just be me, right?!), would anyone mind sharing their planning template? I started one this year but it’s really not very good and I know some of you *cough* Emily *cough* are really good at them!

I planned after every mini-poll! My problem is that I usually find a lot of books that fit, and then end up reading something else entirely. But the planning is so much fun! I love seeing what others have chosen, and of course many of those end up on my TBR.

Haha Rachelnyc, I will post my spreadsheet as soon as I'm done with it! Should be tonight!

EDIT: (Not that my planning will be done, but the spreadsheet formatting should be haha!)

Rachelnyc wrote: "For the spreadsheet challenged among us (it can’t just be me, right?!), would anyone mind sharing their planning template? I started one this year but it’s really not very good and I know some of y..."

No Rachel, not just you ;)
Thanks Emily

Thanks for asking, Rachel! I am pretty inept when it come to making spreadsheets, so I’ll take all the help I can get! 😂 Thanks in advance, Emily!

I knew I couldn't be the only one!

Thanks Emily! I plan to spend a lot of time over the next couple of days planning so having that would be a huge help!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...

Ok here's what I put together. It's a blank copy of what I'm using (with all of my 2019 sheets and stats, in case you're interested!)

Go to the 2019 Challenges tab. What I plan on doing is adding all of my books under Possible Books and as I read a book, I'll delete it from the rest of the prompts I had assigned it as a maybe to. (Thanks Shelley, for that idea!)

I'm reading in order and I always have like 10 books as possible reads (to cater to my moodiness), so just add and remove rows as you need. Let me know if you run into any issues, and I can try to troubleshoot!

This is seriously AMAZING! Thanks so much for sharing! I am now even more excited to plan!

Amazing. I’m anxious to look at it on my computer. 😍

Emily wrote: "https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...

Ok here's what I put together. It's a blank copy of what I'm using (with all of my 2019 sheets ..."

omg im totally using this it's so organized

The spreadsheet I’m using this year is pretty close to Emily’s, you can have a look on the link below (and copy if you want!). I don’t think I’ll be making any changes for next year. Don’t hesitate if you have questions!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...