Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

I always love these challenges and here's my list for 2025!

Challenge #1 – Old & New TBR Challenge

1914 and Earlier
1. “Hamlet” by William Shakespeare
2. “The Jungle Book” by Rudyard Kipling – completed 1/10 4*
3. “The Invisible Man” by H.G. Wells – completed 5/27 3*

1915-2005/New School
4. “The Killer Angels” by Michael Shaara - completed 7/3 5*
5. “Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell – completed 5/25 5*
6. “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck - completed 7/31 5*

Six Bookshelf Dust Collectors
7. “Artemis” by Andy Weir– completed 3/1 5*
8. “Ordinary Grace” by William Kent Krueger
9. “The Paris Wife: A Novel” by Paula McLain - completed 2/14 5*
10. “The Sound and the Fury” by William Faulkner
11. “A Man for all Seasons” by Robert Bolt - completed 8/5 3*
12. “Pigs in Heaven” by Barbara Kingsolver - completed 7/11 5*

Alternates
1. “Year of Wonders” by Geraldine Brooks
2. “The House in the Cerulean Sea” by TJ Kline – completed 4/25 5*
3. “Lady Susan” by Jane Austen – completed 10/9 4*


Challenge #2 - Members Choice Challenge - COMPLETED

1. 19th Century or Older - “The King in Yellow” by Robert W. Chambers – completed 9/7 3*
2. 20th Century – “Wind, Sand and Stars” by Antoine de Saint-Exupery – completed 5/30 4*
3. 21st Century – “The Last Murder at the End of the World” by Stuart Turton – completed 7/14 5*
4. Nonfiction – “The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World” by Michael Pollan - completed 6/29 5*
5. An Author never read before – “A Canticle for Leibowitz” by Walter M. Miller, Jr. –
completed 6/26 3*
6. Diversity – “Twelve Years a Slave” by Solomon Northup – completed 11/6 4*
7. Members Choice Mystery – “A Study in Scarlet” by Arthur Conan Doyle –
completed 8/13 4*
8. Members Choice Science Fiction – “All Systems Red” by Martha Wells –
completed 5/18 5*
9. Members Choice Fantasy – “Storm Front” by Jim Butcher - completed 8/7 4*


Challenge #3 - Expand Your Horizon With New Authors - COMPLETED

Seek out at least six (6) authors that you have never previously read, male or female, from any genre or era you want.

1. Thorton Wilder – “The Bridge of San Luis Rey – completed 1/20 3*
2. Graham Greene – “The Quiet American” – completed 3/14 4*
3. T.J. Klune – “The House in the Cerulean Sea” – completed 4/25 5*
4. Steve Turner – ““Amazing Grace: The Study of America’s Most Beloved Song” –
completed 4/22 4*
5. Kim M. Watt – “Baking Bad” – completed 5/8 5*
6. Robert Graves – “I, Claudius” – completed 5/13 4*
7. Doug Wright – “Quills” - completed 5/15 3*
8. Martha Wells - “All Systems Red” – completed 5/18 5*
9. Margaret Mitchell – “Gone With the Wind” – completed 5/25 5*
10. Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings - “The Yearling” - completed 6/11 5*
11. Walter M Miller Jr. – “A Canticle for Leibowitz” – completed 6/26 3*
12. Michael Pollan - “The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World” –
completed 6/29 5*
13. Michael Shaara – “The Killer Angels” - completed 7/3 5*
14. Stuart Turton – “The Last Murder at the End of the World” – completed 7/14 5*
15. Robert w. Chambers – “The King in Yellow” – completed 9/7 3*


Challenge #4 - Short Story Challenge - COMPLETED

Read 18 short stories. This equates to only two per month for the year. Read them all at once or spread them out, it's up to you.

1. “The Conjurer’s Wife” by Sarah Penner – completed 1/3
2. “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe – completed 1/18
3. “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Bierce – completed 2/1
4. “Prey” by Richard Matheson – completed 2/1
5. “Reunion” by Arthur C. Clarke – completed 2/1
6. “Key Item” by Isaac Asimov – completed 2/1
7. “The Lady with the Dog” by Anton Chekov – completed 2/3
8. “Babette’s Feast” by Isak Dinesen – completed 4/11
9. “Dog Star” by Arthur C. Clarke – completed 4/11
10. “Usher II” by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25
11. “The Body Snatcher” by Robert Louis Stevenson – completed 5/16
12. “Sorrow-Acre” by Isak Dinesen – completed 5/16
13. “The Thing on the Doorstep” by H. P. Lovecraft – completed 5/16
14. “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner – completed 5/16
15. “The Ransom of Red Chief” by O. Henry – completed 5/16
16. “The Voice in the Night” by William Hop Hodgson – completed 7/1
17. “Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes – completed 7/4
18. “A Rose for Ecclesiastes” by Roger Zelazny – completed 7/4




Challenge #6 - Group Reads Challenge - COMPLETED
The challenge is to read 12 of this years group selections. Between New School, Old School, Short Story/Novella, Revisit the Shelf, and Quarterly Long read our group selects 40 new and 12 reread books per year, giving us plenty of choices.

1. “The Merchant of Venice” by William Shakespeare – completed 1/3 5*
2. “Never Let Me Go” by Kazuo Ishiguro – completed 4/19 5*
3. “The Illustrated Man” by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25 4*
4. “The Queen of Spades” by Alexander Pushkin – completed 4/26 3*
5. “The Machine Stops” by E.M. Forster – completed 4/26 3*
6. “Zero Hour” by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25 4*
7. “Mimsy Were The Borogroves” by Lewis Padgett – completed 7/4 5*
8. “The Magician” by W. Somerset Maughn – completed 8/7 3*
9. “Death in Venice” by Thomas Mann – completed 8/21 2*
10. “Regret” by Kate Chopin – completed 8/22 4*
11. “Lois the Witch” by Elizabeth Gaskell – completed 8/26 4*
12. “The Stepford Wives” by Ira Levin – completed 9/4 4*
13. “The Invisible Girl” by Mary Shelley – completed 10/9 4*

Challenge #7 - Series Books – Start, Continue, Complete

Many if not most of us read series books. Sometimes these books are neglected in favor of other reading. As much as I like reading several of the series I have on my shelf. I have at times left them untouched for as much as a year. This year’s series challenge is to break the neglect and bring series books back into our current annual reading.

The Winternight Trilogy by Katherine Arden
The Bear and Nightingale – completed 7/26 5*
The Girl in the Tower
The Winter of the Witch


Challenge #8 - Travel the World One Continent at a Time - COMPLETED

Select a book or an author from each of the seven world continents, *Antarctica is optional, I understand that most around the world challenges are much longer in both time and number of books required. Our challenges only run from January 1-December 31. So, this seems more doable.

Africa – “The Stranger” by Albert Camus – completed 9/16 3*
Asia – “The Quiet American” by Graham Greene - completed 3/14 4*
Australia – “In a Sunburned Country” by Bill Bryson – completed 10/21 5*
Europe – “Brideshead Revisited” by Evelyn Waugh – completed 9/11 5*
North America – "Twelve Years a Slave” by Solomon Northup – completed 11/6 4*
South America – “The Bridge of San Luis Rey” by Thorton Wilder - completed 1/10 3*
*Antarctica - “The Narrative of Arthur Gordan Pym” by Edgar Allan Poe – completed 9/30 3*


Challenge #9 - Rereading - Some do. Some don't - COMPLETED

Some of us reread regularly, others reread rarely if ever. We have all read books that we found fantastic. We finish the last page, set it aside and think someday I would like to reread this again. Let us know the titles of five books you found worthy of rereading. This year’s challenge is, reread two of your selections.

1. “The Hobbit” by J.R.R. Tolkien
2. “The Little Prince” by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
3. “Emma” by Jane Austen - completed 1/4 5*
4. “The Handmaid's Tale” by Margaret Atwood – completed 8/22 5*
5. “The Name of the Rose” by Umberto Eco
6. "The Illustrated Man" by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25 4*
7. “Night” by Elie Wiesel – completed 5/15 5*
8. “Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes – completed 7/4 5*
9. “The Secret Garden” by Frances Hodgson Burnett – completed 8/14 5*
10. “The Stepford Wives” by Ira Levin – completed 9/4 4*


Challenge #12 – Fiction/Non-Fiction

Select three different subjects of interest to you and read a fiction book and a non-fiction book about that subject. Total number of books for this challenge is six.
Civil War
Fiction – “Killer Angels” by Michael Shaara – completed 7/3 5*
Nonfiction - “The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and
Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War” by Erik Larson – completed 10/8 4*

Marquis de Sade
Fiction: “Quills” by Doug Wright – completed 5/15 3*
Nonfiction - “The Curse of the Marquis de Sade: A Notorious Scoundrel,
A Mythical Manuscript, and the Biggest Scandal in Literary History”
by Joel Warner – completed 9/1 3*

Agatha Christie
Fiction – “A Murder is Announced” by Agatha Christie - – completed 1/15 4*
Nonfiction – “A is for Arsenic: The Poisons of Agatha Christie” by Kathryn
Harkup


Challenge #15 – Award Winners - COMPLETED
From the below book prize lists, or a prize from your country or local region, seek out and read two award winning books. Please let the group know what prize list or lists you use, as well as the book information.
Books Chosen

1. "Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell – Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1937 –
completed 5/25 5*
2. “The Yearling” by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings – Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1939 –
completed 6/11 5*
3. “The Killer Angels” by Michael Shaara – Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1975 –
completed 7/3 5*
4. “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck – Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1940 –
completed 7/31 5




Challenge #16 - A-Z Title Challenge

I find this to be a very difficult challenge, many others consider it one of their favorites. For those who really enjoy this challenge in its pure form use all 26 letters. For those of us who struggle, with this challenge consider it successful by using only 23 letters. There are 4 optional letters marked with an (*), you only need to use one.

A – “A Murder is Announced” by Agatha Christie – completed 1/15 4*
B – “Bartleby, the Scrivener” by Herman Melville – completed 1/22 4*
C - “Christmas at Thompson Hall” by Anthony Trollope – completed 8/19 5*
D – "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” by Philip K. Dick – completed 2/2 4*
E – “Emma” by Jane Austen – completed 1/4 5*
F – “Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes – completed 7/4 5*
G - “Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell – completed 5/25 5*
H – “Hamlet” by William Shakespeare
I – “I, Claudius” by Robert Graves completed 5/13 4*
J – “Joan of Arc” by Mark Twain – completed 3/27 5*
K – “Kon-Tiki” by Thor Heyerdahl – completed 1/31 5*
L - “Lady Susan” by Jane Austen – completed 10/9 4*
M –“The Magician” by W. Somerset Maughn – completed 8/7 3*
N – “Night” by Elie Wiesel – completed 5/15 5*
O – “Ordinary Grace” by William Kent Krueger
P – “Pigs in Heaven” by Barbara Kingsolver – completed 7/11 5*
*Q – “Quills” by Doug Wright – completed 5/15 3*
R – “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead” by Tom Stoppard
S – “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” by Unknown - completed 2/20 5*
T - “To the Lighthouse” by Virginia Woolf – completed 3/6 3*
U – “Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith” by Jon Krakauer
V – “A Vindication of the Rights of Woman” by Mary Wollstonecraft
W - “The Woman in Black” by Susan Hill – completed 1/7 4*
*X –
*Y – “The Yearling” by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings – completed 6/11 5*
*Z - “Zero Hour” by Ray Bradbury– completed 4/25 4*

Wow, you're really far along in your planning already! I love your rereading choices. The only one of those I haven't read is The Name of the Rose, and I hope to read that in January with the group. Happy reading!

The plans look great. Happy reading, Karen.

Lots of fun book selections here! Have fun!

An update to my reading year. It's going well so far!

Challenge #1 – Old & New TBR Challenge

2. “The Jungle Book” by Rudyard Kipling – completed 1/10 4*
3. “The Invisible Man” by H.G. Wells – completed 5/27 3*
5. “Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell – completed 5/25 5*
7. “Artemis” by Andy Weir – completed 3/1 5*
9. “The Paris Wife: A Novel” by Paula McLain - completed 2/14 5*
2A. “The House in the Cerulean Sea” by TJ Kline – completed 4/25 5*


Challenge #2 - Members Choice Challenge

2. 20th Century – “Wind, Sand and Stars” by Antoine de Saint-Exupery –
completed 5/30 4*
8. Members Choice Science Fiction – “All Systems Red” by Martha Wells -
completed 5/18 5*

Challenge #3 - Expand Your Horizon With New Authors

1. Thorton Wilder – “The Bridge of San Luis Rey – completed 1/20 3*
2. Graham Greene – “The Quiet American” – completed 3/14 4*
3. T.J. Klune – “The House in the Cerulean Sea” – completed 4/25 5*
4. Steve Turner – ““Amazing Grace: The Study of America’s Most Beloved Song” –
completed 4/22 4*
5. Kim M. Watt – “Baking Bad” – completed 5/8 5*
6. Robert Graves – “I, Claudius” – completed 5/13 4*
7. Doug Wright – “Quills” - completed 5/15 3*
8. Martha Wells - “All Systems Red” – completed 5/18 5*
9. Margaret Mitchell – “Gone With the Wind” – completed 5/25 5*


Challenge #4 - Short Story Challenge

1. “The Conjurer’s Wife” by Sarah Penner – completed 1/3
2. “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe – completed 1/18
3. “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Bierce – completed 2/1
4. “Prey” by Richard Matheson – completed 2/1
5. “Reunion” by Arthur C. Clarke – completed 2/1
6. “Key Item” by Isaac Asimov – completed 2/1
7. “The Lady with the Dog” by Anton Chekov – completed 2/3
8. “Babette’s Feast” by Isak Dinesen – completed 4/11
9. “Dog Star” by Arthur C. Clarke – completed 4/11
10. “Usher II” by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25
11. “The Body Snatcher” by Robert Louis Stevenson – completed 5/16
12. “Sorrow-Acre” by Isak Dinesen – completed 5/16
13. “The Thing on the Doorstep” by H. P. Lovecraft – completed 5/16
14. “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner – completed 5/16
15. “The Ransom of Red Chief” by O. Henry – completed 5/16


Challenge #6 - Group Reads Challenge

1. “The Merchant of Venice” by William Shakespeare – completed 1/3 5*
2. “Never Let Me Go” by Kazuo Ishiguro – completed 4/19 5*
3. “The Illustrated Man” by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25 4*
4. “The Queen of Spades” by Alexander Pushkin – completed 4/26 3*
5. “The Machine Stops” by E.M. Forster – completed 4/26 3*
6. “Zero Hour” by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25 4*

Update - Part 2

Challenge #8 - Travel the World One Continent at a Time

Asia – “The Quiet American” by Graham Greene – completed 3/14 4*
South America – “The Bridge of San Luis Rey” by Thorton Wilder – completed 1/20 3*


Challenge #9 - Rereading

3. “Emma” by Jane Austen – completed 1/4 5*
6. “The Illustrated Man” by Ray Bradbury – completed 4/25 4*
7. “Night” by Elie Wiesel – completed 5/15 5*


Challenge #12 – Fiction/Non-Fiction

Fiction: “Quills” by Doug Wright – completed 5/15 3*
Fiction – “A Murder is Announced” by Agatha Christie – completed 1/15 4*


Challenge #15 – Award Winners

1. “Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell – Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 1937 –
completed 5/25 5*


Challenge #16 - A-Z Title Challenge

A – “A Murder is Announced” by Agatha Christie – completed 1/15 4*
B – “Bartleby, the Scrivener” by Herman Melville – completed 1/22 4*
D – “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” by Philip K. Dick – completed 2/2 4*
E – “Emma” by Jane Austen – completed 1/4 5*
G – “Gone with the Wind” by Margaret Mitchell – completed 5/25 5*
I – “I, Claudius” by Robert Graves – completed 5/13 4*
J – “Joan of Arc” by Mark Twain – completed 3/27 5*
K – “Kon-Tiki” by Thor Heyerdahl – completed 1/31 5*
N – “Night” by Elie Wiesel – completed 5/15 5*
*Q – “Quills” by Doug Wright – completed 5/15 3*
S – “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” by Unknown - completed 2/20 5*
T – “To the Lighthouse” by Virginia Woolf – completed 3/6 3*
W - “The Woman in Black” by Susan Hill – completed 1/7 4*

Wow, so much progress, and so many 5* books! You must be really happy.

You have some excellent books in there! Great to see how much you have done on the challenges, but also how many of the books were winners so far.