Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge discussion

Share and discuss book ideas for
Task 8: Read literary fiction by a BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and/or disabled author.

I would recommend checking out The Confessions of Frannie Langton by Sara Collins.

I honestly never read as much literary fiction as I mean to, so I hope this helps give me a push. I'm definitely going to be paying attention for any recommendations that are by a disabled author in particular, ideally with disabled characters/themes. I'm also hoping to check at least a couple things of my TBR for this one.

Anyway, stuff that's on my TBR pile and would fit includes The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali, White Mulberry by Rosa Kwon Easton, Butter Honey Pig Bread by Francesca Ekwuyasi, There There by Tommy Orange, The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead, Blue by Emmelie Prophète, Little Fish by Casey Plett, Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi, and Last Night in Nuuk by Niviaq Korneliussen.

A book friend has recommended The Book of Night Women by Marlon James and I hope to complete this in 2025.

Wandering Stars

I'm considering Chain-Gang All-Stars.

I'm reading Set on You.

I've chosen "Little Fires Everywhere" by Celeste Ng

I'm gonna go for The Bee Sting

Cannot recommend Freshwater by Akwaeke Emezi enough, although trigger warnings abound!

My favourite book of all time would fit here too: The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

I started a Listopia for this: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/2...

Please feel free to add to it. :)

I'm trying to make a list for every prompt in the 2025 Book Riot Challenge.

I'll be reading Quichotte by Salman Rushdie.

I received James for Christmas so I'm happy to read it for this challenge.

I feel like this question has come up in past years challenges, but what qualities make a book "literary fiction"?

Planning on Joan Is Okay for this one

Erin wrote: "I feel like this question has come up in past years challenges, but what qualities make a book "literary fiction"?"
It focuses on style, themes, or character, rather than plot. So nothing genre fiction - nothing that's better classed as sci-fi for example, or a western. The lines can get kind of blurry, but it's usually fiction that has a point to make, like some sort of social commentary, outside of just telling a story.

Edit: https://bookriot.com/what-is-literary...
Here's how someone at bookriot defines it - and admits that it's a vague term at best. "After the undefinable “literary merit,” I most often hear that literary fiction has “beautiful writing,” that it is character-focused, and that it is not genre. Hmmm. I can think of books in every genre with beautiful writing, so that can’t possibly be a serious definition. As for character-focused, I suppose it might be true in broad strokes that genre books are plot-forward and literary books are character-forward, but there is simply no way that’s true across the board, or even close to it. Which leaves the idea that literary fiction is not genre fiction."

I think of literary fiction as character driven, rather than plot/style driven.

Natalie Piccotti wrote: "I received James for Christmas so I'm happy to read it for this challenge."

I'm reading this as well!

A few options on my TBR:

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, There There by Tommy Orange, The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki, The Idiot by Elif Batuman, Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson, Women's Hotel by Danny Lavery.

Oh, and I've read it, but Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu - now a tv show!

Lauraellen wrote: "A few options on my TBR:

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, There There by Tommy Orange, The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki, [book:The Idiot|30962..."
There there was one of my favorite books I read last year

I'm going to read Tangleroot, a YA and/or Nobody's Magic, about three women. They're both written by black women.

I read The House of Eve by Sedeqa Johnson. Great book that I would recommend.

I read James. 5 stars

Finally reading Never Let Me Go after sobbing watching the movie adaptation 15 years ago

I’m going to read SUCH A FUN AGE by Kiley Reid.

I just read Dream Count for this one

I read the wonderful James

I just finished Hula by Jasmin 'Iolani Hakes - highly recommended!

I read The Thirty Names of Night by Zeyn Joukhadar. What a lovely book!

Rebecca wrote: "I'm considering Chain-Gang All-Stars."

I read Chain-Gang All-Stars. The author did an amazing job blurring the lines between truth and fiction. A cautionary tale.

I read Wandering Stars Tommy Orange

I read Hunchback by Saou Ichikawa

I read Inside the Park by Andrea Williams - 5/30/25.

I was thinking of reading The Dark Maestro by Brendan Slocumb for this one, but I wasn't sure it fit. It does have great writing and I'm really enjoying it so far.

I read Convenience Store Woman for this one :)

Firekeeper's Daughter, Angeline Boulley

Elizabeth wrote: "I would recommend checking out The Confessions of Frannie Langton by Sara Collins.

I honestly never read as much literary fiction as I mean to, so I hope this helps give me a push...."

I'm still hoping to get to more of these, I really don't read enough literary fiction, but I ended up reading Breast Stories by Mahasweta Devi. Translated from Bengali, it's a collection of three literary fiction stories by an Indian author that are tied together by the theme of breasts. I don't know that I can truly say I "enjoyed" it, but it was thought provoking and had a lot to offer considering it's fairly short. The middle story, Breast-Giver, was the most compelling for me personally.