The 52 Book Club: 2025 / 2026 Challenge discussion

October Mini - Prompt 1: Pick your costume — mythological, princess, or first responder

For this prompt, you’ll first need to choose between the three options: mythological, princess, or first responder. Once you decide on one of the options, pick a book that somehow fits that word. It may relate to the characters, theme, plot, title, cover design, etc.

Mythological:
Mythological books draw from ancient myths, legends, and folklore across various cultures. These narratives often feature gods, goddesses, heroes, mythical creatures, and epic quests, exploring themes of creation, morality, destiny, and the human condition. While this may be an opportunity to explore a classic epic like “The Odyssey” there are also a lot of popular modern interpretations and retellings. For this prompt, you could choose any mythologically based story or retelling (Greek, Norse, Roman, etc.) It could also feature any mythological creature, non-fiction about mythology, a character who studies mythology, etc.

Princess:
For this prompt, choose any book that somehow relates to the word “Princess.” This may be fiction or non-fiction about royalty, a character who is a princess or who “acts like a princess,” the word “princess” in the title, etc. As a creative interpretation, you might choose a character named Sara (name means Princess), etc.

First Responder: A first responder is a person with specialized training who is among the first to arrive and provide assistance at the scene of an emergency, such as an accident, natural disaster, or terrorist attack. Common first responders include paramedics, emergency medical technicians (EMTs), police officers, and firefighters. For this prompt, choose a book that features one of these professions. This may be fiction or non-fiction, and may feature first responders as main characters, secondary characters, or simply within a specific key scene within the book. “First responder” could also relate to the title, cover design, author’s previous career, etc.


Here are the links for our Goodreads Lists, please add your suggestions to them: Princess, Mythological, First Responder

I have just started reading Nattmennesket by André Bjerke that ticks two of the options, werewolf for the mythological and police officer for first responder.

Werewolves were not mentioned in the book, only in the synopsis, but I am currently reading Historier fra dypet – havets skapninger i all verdens myter, sagn og eventyr by Tor Åge Bringsværd about creatures from the sea in myths, legends and fairytales.

I will pich the princess costume and for this I will read A Treachery of Swans by A.B. Poranek

Extreme Medical Services by Jamie Davis is about paramedics for the paranormal.

LOL Didn't even know about this challenge, but my first book of October was Princess Posey and the Pink Present by Stephanie Green.

Read the memoir, The Beauty of Breaking by Michelle Harper, about an ER MD who of course deals with first responders as a routine part of her job.

And I finished Homer's Iliad for mythology last week, to complete the trifecta.

I had a hold on Gods of Jade and Shadow that just came available and works great for mythological.

I finished Daughter of the Moon Goddess this weekend, which is Chinese Mythology.

I just finished Graceling, by Kristin Cashore.

I overachieved and read Julia's House for Lost Creatures by Ben Hatke for Mythological, Mercy Watson: Princess in Disguise by Kate DiCamillo for Princess, and Police Officers on Patrol by Kersten Hamilton for First Responders.

I read The Impossible Fortune (Thursday Murder Club, #5) by Richard Osman, which includes at least 2 police detectives by name (Chris and Donna).

Planning on this one. I may have picked it for the cover alone

*Sempre Susan: A Memoir of Susan Sontag by Sigrid Nunez
I suppose to us "normal" everyday people who are not famous in any way, a person such as Susan Sontag may appear to be a 'princess' with a storybook life, but that is not necessarily so...
October 25 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I read A Thousand Naked Strangers-a non-fiction behind the scenes look at the life of an EMT/medic. 5 stars