The 52 Book Club: 2025 Challenge discussion

29. Sends you down a rabbit hole

For this prompt we’re looking for books with a subject or topic that is so fascinating, you can’t help but want to learn more about it. For example: After reading Michelle McNamara’s book, I'll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman's Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer Liz spent hours researching and Googling the Golden State Killer.

It might be the subject of the entire book that “sends you down a rabbit hole” or it may be a fact that’s briefly mentioned but is so fascinating that you can’t stop thinking about it.

Other interpretations: You may have heard this phrase in reference to the Lewis Carroll’s book, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland / Through the Looking-Glass As a creative interpretation, you could choose to read this classic, or a novel inspired by this book. You might also decide to read a book that features a rabbit burrow on the cover, or rabbits as characters within the story.


Click here for our Goodreads List of suggestions

Leopold & Loeb's murder of Bobby Franks IS my rabbit hole, so I'm going to read Nothing but the Night: Leopold & Loeb and the Truth Behind the Murder That Rocked 1920s America by Greg King.

29. Sends you down a rabbit hole

The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek sent me down a rabbit hole. I was so intrigued by the fact that blue people actually existed! I found that more interesting than the story itself. I spent a decent amount of time reading up on blue people.

I'm definitely reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. That's the first thing that popped in mind when reading the prompt

winterland by Rae Meadows just sent me down a rabbit hole watching you tube videos of 1970 gymnasts!

Lights out in Wonderland by DBC Pierre.

A Billion Years:My Escape From a Life in the Highest Ranks of Scientology

oh, the Olympics become my rabbit hole every 4 years! I am going to read Winterland now, too. thanks!

Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood

reaching down the rabbit hole by A Ropper and R Burrell

City of Villains (City of Villains #1) by Estelle Laure or Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman or Heartless by Marissa Meyer

For this prompt I have chosen The Storm is Upon Us by Mark Rothschild.

For anyone interested in conspiracy theories (that is studying, not believing) it talks about the origin of the Q Anon phenomenon.

Prior to being banned from facebook in 2020 many anons (followers) invoked the imagery of the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland when speaking in coded language to avoid saying 'Q' publicly so it came to mind when I read this prompt, having picked up the ebook last week.

Last January I read The Island of Sea Women by Lisa See. The book is based on the actual all-female divers of the island of Jeju, Korea.
This book sent me down a deep rabbit hole. YouTube has videos of the divers.

I am choosing Mirror,Mirror: A Twisted Tale. I am obsessed with fractured fairy tales and I love the idea of wondering about the “what ifs” of the stories we know and love.

I read Women Talking not long ago and ended up researching the court case (horrible) and more about the Mennonite communities in Bolivia.

Bunny by Mona Awad

This short novel introduced me to a culture about which I knew nothing, sending me many times to Google to learn more about the country (Mongolia) and this minority group within that country (Tuvans). I will be looking for the second volume in this autobiographical trilogy, and hope that the third will also be translated into English eventually. The Blue Sky

I read The Passenger by Cormac McCarthy. This is his newest one and now I will have to read the second one Stella Maris to see if any of the questions are answered.

I loved The Aleph and Other Stories and Fictions, by Jorge Luis Borges.

Missing by Tom Hauser has sent me down a rabbit hole about the Allende government in 1970s Chile and the subsequent military coup. I am fascinated by the complex history.

I used My Heart Is a Chainsaw for this prompt. I have been in a slasher rabbit hole all month watching most of the movies mentioned in the book.

I stretched the meaning of the "rabbit hole" a bit to encompass the amount of time and the number of locations I had to research where I could actually get my hands on this book. A Ballad for Georg Henig written by Viktor Paskov and translated from Bulgarian.

The painted wall, by Otto Kraus

Could this prompt be met by discovery of a new author and subsequently reading everything they have written?

Tanya wrote: "Could this prompt be met by discovery of a new author and subsequently reading everything they have written?"

Absolutely!

I used After I Do by Taylor Jenkins Reid as the words "down a rabbit hole" are actually part if the text in the story.

Currently reading 'In The Land Of Pain' by Alphonse Daudet. I'm almost half of the way through and already I have multiple scribbles and notes reminding myself to follow up on Guy De Maupassant, Edmond De Goncourt and Daudet's previous works. I'm also reminded to return to the essays of Montaigne (which in turn recall the 'Meditations' of Marcus Aurelius), to get around to reading Flaubert's 'Madam Bovary', and to finish 'Human Traces' by Sebastian Faulks which features a lot of Charcot and the history of mental illness.

Then there's the quick asides that mention Dickens and how he referred to Daudet as his "little French brother"...that feels like the other reminder I needed to get a least one of Charlie boy's books under my belt this year...and then the anecdote from Turgenev regarding his feeling of having his flesh sliced open whilst under ether rather than chloroform, which provoked Goncourt to refer to Turgenev as "a true man of letters" - that just reminds me of the stack of Russian authors that are on my TBR and just the weirdly, vast, interconnectedness of things...especially when Baudelaire is then brought up and all I can think of is that last book I read (the autobiography of John Cooper Clarke) wherein the punk poet refers to himself as 'The Bargain Basement Baudelaire' and all I can think about is...just how everything seems to be pulling me down one rabbit hole after another...but also how they all connect up in a vast warren of interconnectedness that I cannot seem to escape, lol.

Sorry...that was probably a bit awkward to read but my mind is racing right now. Not that it isn't all the time anyway.

Ejaculate Responsibly: A Whole New Way to Think About Abortion

Unwinding Anxiety: New Science Shows How to Break the Cycles of Worry and Fear to Heal Your Mind by Judson Brewer
Since books can easily lead me down a rabbit hole I figured I would not plan this prompt, just wait for the first good rabbit hole and here it is.

I read Siddhartha

Act of Oblivion by Robert Harris

For this prompt I read They Called Us Enemy by George Takei, an astonishing graphic memoir which definitely sent me down a rabbit hole! 🌟️🌟️🌟️🌟️🌟️

I am reading Babel by R.F. Kuang and this historical fantasy epic is sending me down a rabbit hole. The book is 80% about the history of 1820s - 1830s colonialism, imperial expansion, racism and worldwide language translations. I can't stop reading further on the internet about these topics, especially on the art of translation. The other 20% is similar to Harry Potter.

Angela Y (yangelareads) wrote: "Bunny by Mona Awad" This is a great read for this prompt!!! haha - love it. I read Bunny - SO quirky but fun.

Petty: The Biography by Warren Zanes. This one caught me by surprise and I practically donned scuba gear I went so far down into YouTube, Google, Amazon Music, Pandora, you name it to round out the experience of reading this book.

Alice in Wonderland was one of my favourite books as a child and to read to my children so it will be nice to revisit it.

Bottle of Lies by Katherine Eban.

This book is about the corruption of the companies that make generic drugs and the corruption of the drugs themselves. Even corruption within the FDA. It's got me looking because I take a couple of the drugs mentioned in the book. It's well written but I turned up the speed to 1.25 because she read so clearly and slowly. Cut the time from 14 hours to 12. Excellent. 4.5 stars.

I read The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements
I kept looking up facts and even spent some time researching the physical periodic table that Theodore Gray made. Totally fascinating

I'm a quarter of the way through The Wind Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. It's my third Murakami. 1Q84 was my first a few years ago and I loved the first two volumes in that book but not the third so I'm hoping this one amazes throughout.

For this prompt, I read Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez. That wasn't my intention, but after reading about Puerto Rico and the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, I did a deep dive.

Switching my read of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to this prompt - I haven't felt this sucked into a book series since I was in grade school, and I'm having a great time!

Finished it on the finaly day of February. It was a ride!

I liked The Wind Up Bird Chronicle better than 1Q84 (the ending was much more satisfying). As soon as I saw this prompt, Murakami was the first author I thought of.

Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

I listened to Platonic:How Science Can Help You Make and Keep Friends. While listening to this I spent time looking into joining groups that can help me meet new friends. I am going to attend a knitting group and found a book club that I will attend next week. It has definitely helped me to change some of my behaviors.

As it is the Year of the Rabbit, I've been aiming to read a book each month that has something to do with rabbits/bunnies. I just made a list of possibles for me to choose from for the rest of the year, so I thought I'd share them here, in case anyone needs a suggestion.

So far I've read The Constant Rabbit (love Fforde, but this book wasn't my favorite) and Rabbits (talk about down a rabbit hole! LOVED this book).

Here are my options I've gathered for the rest of the year--I make no respresentations for these as I haven't read them yet:

1. The Chocolate Bunny Brouhaha by JoAnna Carl
2. White Rabbit, Red Wolf (This book is a lie) by Tom Pollock
3. The Rabbit Factory by Marshall Karp
4. Attack of the Fluffy Bunnies by Andrea Beaty
5. Alice by Christina Henry
6. Red Queen by Christina Henry
7. Looking Glass by Christina Henry
8. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo
9. Down the Rabbit Hole by J.D. Robb
10. The Quiet Room: A Rabbits novel by Terry Miles

I read We Spread by Iain Reid

I actually started looking up the mathematical proof of impossibility lol

After reading, and/or during, The Girl in His Shadow by Audrey Blake, I've spent a lot of time reading about the history of anaesthesia. And the history of surgery.....

I read The Marsh King's Daughter by Karen Dionne, 4 Stars

Lindsey wrote: "Tanya wrote: "Could this prompt be met by discovery of a new author and subsequently reading everything they have written?"

Absolutely!"

In that case my rabbithole was the splendid The Hands of the Emperor by Victoria Goddard: I loved it so much that I have since read about 10 of her other works!