Around the Year in 52 Books discussion

THE 52 TOPICS OF THE 2025 ATY READING CHALLENGE 0/90

1. A book from a genre that starts with A, T, or Y
A
T
Y
2. A book with a primarily red, green or blue cover
Red
Green
Blue
3. A book that fits a prompt suggestion for this year that did not make the list: A book with a desert setting. Jim Henson's Tale of Sand
4. A book by a new-to-you author
5. A book you want to read because of something you read in 2025 Oh, I Do Like to Be

6. A book related to blood, sweat, or tears
Blood The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper
Sweat Daughter of Daring: The Trick-Riding, Train-Leaping, Road-Racing Life of Helen Gibson, Hollywood’s First Stuntwoman
Tears It Ended Badly: Thirteen of the Worst Breakups in History
7. A book with a character who appears in more than one book
8. A book set in Africa, Asia, or Australia
Africa
Asia
Australia Into the Woods: the Battle for Tasmania's Forests
9. A book with a number, ordinal, or iterative numeral in the title
Number All in One Basket
Numeral
Iterative The Once and Future Me

10. An award winning book
11. A history or historical fiction book
History
Historical fiction
12. A book with cover text that is NOT black or white
13. An author's second/sophomore book
14. A book related to a painting by Vincent Van Gogh Sacré Bleu

15. A book you've wanted to read for a long time
16. A book featuring a character with a similar occupation to one of the Clue/Cluedo characters
Colonel Mustard: military officer Flashman
Mr. Green: clergyman (UK), businessman (US) War in Heaven
Professor Plum: academic, professor The Professor's House
Mrs. White: domestic servant (maid, housekeeper, cook, etc) The Mystery Guest
Mrs. Peacock: widow, socialite Aunty Lee's Delights
Miss Scarlett: a femme fatale Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Three Stories
17. A book set in the wellness or beauty industries
Wellness Who Is Wellness For?: An Examination of Wellness Culture and Who It Leaves Behind
Beauty Permanent Waves: The Making of the American Beauty Shop
18. A book with a location in the title

19. A book related to yesterday
20. A book related to today
21. A book related to tomorrow
22. A book by a Korean or Korean-diaspora author
Korean The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly
Diaspora Folklorn

23. A book with a road trip or long journey
Road trip
Long journey
24. A book that is either frothy or gothy
Frothy A Witch's Guide to Magical Innkeeping
Gothy The Woman in White
25. A book from the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die list
26. A book with a Z in the title and/or author name
Title
Author's name
27. A nonfiction book

28. A book related to a resistance, rebellion, or revolution
Resistance
Rebellion
Revolution
29. A vacation book
30. The most recently published book by an author and a book from that same author's backlist: Frontlist Book
31. The most recently published book by an author and a book from that same author's backlist: Backlist Book

32. A novella of 100-250 pages
33. A book with an Indigenous character or author
Character Two Old Women: An Alaskan Legend of Betrayal, Courage and Survival
Author Heat and Light
34. A book with a window on the cover
35. A book where all or part of the action takes place in a library, a museum, a school, or another public building
The Case of the Terrified Typist
36. A book with a primary character who is a woman over 40

37. A book that includes a science topic
38. A book that's part of a series
39. A book connected in some way to the "Queen of Crime", Agatha Christie Orient Express
40. A book that has a punctuation mark in the title Who Sent Clement?

41. A mystery or true crime book
Mystery
True crime Newton and the Counterfeiter: The Unknown Detective Career of the World's Greatest Scientist
42. A book set in an isolated location
43. A book involving survival
44. A book with a symbol of death on the cover

45. A book connected to "Bohemian Rhapsody" by Queen
46. A book that is not a novel
47. A book with "this", "that", "these", or "those" in the title
This
That All That We See or Seem
These These Memories Do Not Belong to Us
Those Those Beyond the Wall
48. A book with something edible in the title Automatic Noodle
49. A second book for your favorite prompt

50. A book with a bird on its cover
51. A book published in 2026 Daggerbound
52. A book related to the name of one of Santa's reindeer
Dasher Runaway Ralph
Dancer Dancing Barefoot
Prancer The Perfect Horse: the Daring U.S. Mission to Rescue the Priceless Stallions Kidnapped by the Nazis
Vixen Dark Star: A Biography of Vivien Leigh
Comet Lucifer's Hammer
Cupid The Austen Affair
Donder Thunder on the Right
Blitzen Picnic Comma Lightning: The Experience of Reality in the Twenty-First Century
Rudolph The Empress of Salt and Fortune

2026 Rejects Challenge: Science, Social Issues, and A Sense of Place
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

1. A book that includes a “forbidden” topic in polite conversation, such as sex, money, religion, politics, or personal issues. (Poll 13)
Predisposed: Liberals, Conservatives, and the Biology of Political Differences
Madame Restell: The Life, Death, and Resurrection of Old New York's Most Fabulous, Fearless, and Infamous Abortionist
It Can't Happen Here
The Plot Against America

2. A book featuring a feat of engineering (Poll 15)
The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World and
How the New Seven Wonders of the World Were Built

3. A book that takes place in a country/place along the path of totality for the 2026 solar eclipse: Spain, Portugal, Greenland, Iceland, the Arctic, and the Atlantic Ocean (Poll 14)
The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder
Independent People
No One Thinks of Greenland
Out in the Cold. Travels North: Adventures in Svalbard, the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Greenland and Canada
An African in Greenland
Towing Jehovah

4. A book related to observation, experimentation, or inquiry (Poll 13)
Observer
My Life with the Chimpanzees
Quantum Man: Richard Feynman's Life in Science
Measuring the World
The Tainted Cup

5. A book that relates to a river (Poll 12)
The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi
Walking The Wharfe: An Ode to a Yorkshire River
Elegy For a River: Whiskers, Claws and Conservation’s Last, Wild Hope

6. A book about wildlife or nature conservation (Poll 9)
Elegy For a River: Whiskers, Claws and Conservation’s Last, Wild Hope
Wild Life: Finding My Purpose in an Untamed World
Wild Souls: Freedom and Flourishing in the Non-Human World
Eye of the Albatross: Visions of Hope and Survival

7. A book related to medical science or health, or a medical memoir (Polls 8 and 11)
Zoobiquity: The Astonishing Connection Between Human and Animal Health
Everything Is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection
The Lady's Handbook for Her Mysterious Illness
Scurvy: How a Surgeon, a Mariner, and a Gentleman Solved the Greatest Medical Mystery of the Age of Sail

8. A fiction or non-fiction book that could be considered a microhistory (Poll 10)
The Book of Eels: Our Enduring Fascination with the Most Mysterious Creature in the Natural World
A Fish Caught in Time: The Search for the Coelacanth
Newton and the Counterfeiter: The Unknown Detective Career of the World's Greatest Scientist
Soundings: The Story of the Remarkable Woman Who Mapped the Ocean Floor

9. A book about women crossing borders, boundaries, or barriers (Poll 10)
Soundings: The Story of the Remarkable Woman Who Mapped the Ocean Floor
Walking with the Great Apes: Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, Birute Galdikas
All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis
Who Cooked the Last Supper: The Women's History of the World

10. A book related to psychology, mental health, or neuroscience (Poll 10)
Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain
The Case Against Reality: Why Evolution Hid the Truth from Our Eyes
Nineteen Ways of Looking at Consciousness
Metazoa: Animal Life and the Birth of the Mind
Adventures in Memory: Exploring the Science and Secrets of Human Memory
Time Warped: Unlocking the Mysteries of Time Perception

11. A book set in a country bordering the Indian Ocean (Poll 7)
In an Antique Land
A Fish Caught in Time: The Search for the Coelacanth
The Cat's Table
The Malay Archipelago

12. A book with a “green” topic or character (Poll 2)
When the Earth Was Green: Plants, Animals, and Evolution's Greatest Romance

13. A book connected to the Middle East in some way (Poll 2)
Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes
In an Antique Land

14. A book nominated for an award that values peace, cultural understanding, and related social issues (Poll 6)
Gods of the Upper Air: How a Circle of Renegade Anthropologists Reinvented Race, Sex, and Gender in the Twentieth Century (Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards),
Every Living Thing: The Great and Deadly Race to Know All Life (Pulitzer Prize)

15 A book related to a planet other than earth (Poll 7)
A City on Mars: Can We Settle Space, Should We Settle Space, and Have We Really Thought This Through?

16. A book about perceptions of reality or alternate realities (Poll 12)
Island in the Sea of Time
Our Tragic Universe
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
Nineteen Ways of Looking at Consciousness
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing
The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself
Ubik

Note: NancyJ added three more prompts to this list that I think are particularly relevant to the title topic(s). So I have added them here. Feel free to include them, skip them, or add your own prompt choices.

17. A book about nature, climate or the environment
Eye of the Albatross: Visions of Hope and Survival
All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis
Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid: The Fraught and Fascinating Biology of Climate Change
Playground

18. A book that deals with the 'fish out of water' trope (migrants and refugees)
Goodbye Sarajevo
Storming the Wall: Climate Change, Migration, and Homeland Security
On the Move: The Overheating Earth and the Uprooting of America

19. A book about a social, political or environmental issue you care about
Elegy For a River: Whiskers, Claws and Conservation’s Last, Wild Hope
Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?
The Insect Crisis: The Fall of the Tiny Empires That Run the World
Abundance
The Small and the Mighty: Twelve Unsung Americans Who Changed the Course of History, from the Founding to the Civil Rights Movement

2026 Rejects Challenge: Awards and Lists 0/10
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

1. A book nominated for an award that values peace, cultural understanding, and related social issues (Poll 6)
Every Living Thing: The Great and Deadly Race to Know All Life(Pulitzer)
The Burning Earth: An Environmental History of the Last 500 Years (Dayton)
The Cat's Table (Dayton)

2. A book shortlisted for a Dublin Literary Award (Poll 8)
https://dublinliteraryaward.ie/the-li...
All the Lives We Never Lived
Americanah
Exit West
Lincoln in the Bardo

3. A book that won an international literary award (Poll 15)
The Warwick Prize for Women in Translation
Three Summers

4. A book that was nominated for a Goodreads Choice Award in any year (Poll 13)
Six Wakes
The Test
Crosstalk

5. A book posted in one of the ATY Best Book of the Month threads in 2025 or 2026 (Polls 15, 17, plus more)
A Gentleman in Moscow
Wild Dark Shore
Endling

6. A book from the NPR “Books We Love” lists (Poll 14)
Women's Hotel
The Stardust Grail
There Are Rivers in the Sky

7. A book on one of Obama’s reading lists (Poll 12)
Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future
The Glass Hotel
Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive
The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History

8. A book listed in any ‘Best Books’ list of 2024 or 2025
NYPL
Hum
NYT
Godwin
Reboot
The Bluestockings: A History of the First Women's Movement

9. A book that has been long-listed for the Tournament of Books in any year
The City and Its Uncertain Walls
The Extinction of Irena Rey
Playground
Help Wanted

10. A book from any widely recognized list of your choice
Hugos
The Tainted Cup
Double Star
The Sirens of Titan
This Immortal

A few for fun!

1. A book with a title that contains the name of a professional sports team (Poll 5)
Baseball:
Seattle Mariners
Footie:
Arsenal: The Gunners
Aston Villa: The Villains
AFC Bournemouth: The Cherries
Brentford: The Bees
Brighton & Hove Albion: The Seagulls
Chelsea: The Blues
Crystal Palace: The Eagles
Everton: The Toffees
Fulham: The Cottagers
Liverpool: The Reds
Manchester City: The Citizens, The Sky Blues
Manchester United: The Red Devils
Newcastle United: The Magpies
Nottingham Forest: Forest
Southampton: The Saints
Tottenham Hotspur: Spurs, The Lilywhites
West Ham United: The Hammers
Wolverhampton Wanderers: Wolves
plus one I particularly love from the Championship League:
Ipswich Town: The Tractor Boys

2. Two books, where the second book's title provides a response to or continuation of the first book's title (Poll 4)

3. A book that fits 3 other prompts

4.. The mods! (Poll 3)
Jackie:
Lives in Wisconsin, USA. I'm a scientist, a mom, and a dog lover. My favorite genres are mystery, history, and nature books. Other hobbies include baking, DIY projects, and video games.

Robin:
I can speak and read French.
I grew up on a sheep farm but always lived in cities as an adult.
I am retired but I have a paying gig where I speak about lesser-known women from history.
I like cats, chocolate, and tea.
Robin’s lesser-known women from history books:
Leaving Coy's Hill - fictional but highly accurate about Lucy Stone, American suffragist
Born Criminal: Matilda Joslyn Gage, Radical Suffragist - popular nonfiction about someone who should be better known
Diva Julia: The Public Romance and Private Agony of Julia Ward Howe - the woman who wrote The Battle Hymn of the Republic did much more
Romantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and Her Daughter Mary Shelley - dual biography of 2 amazing women
Margaret Fuller: A New American Life - America's first feminist
Maria Mitchell and the Sexing of Science: An Astronomer Among the American Romantics biography but also talks about how men took over the field of science
Madame Restell: The Life, Death, and Resurrection of Old New York's Most Fabulous, Fearless, and Infamous Abortionist- the author ties it to recent events on abortion
Notorious Victoria: The Life of Victoria Woodhull, Uncensored - a 19th-century woman who was a fortune teller, stockbroker, journalist, and candidate for president
Free Thinker: Sex, Suffrage, and the Extraordinary Life of Helen Hamilton Gardener - a woman from the later era of suffrage who refused to accept society's double standards

Pamela:
I live in Salem, Massachusetts. I've worked my whole career in museums-- I started as a military/aviation curator but currently work at the House of the Seven Gables-- so here's your excuse to read Hawthorne. I wish I was a fashion curator though. I also knit and travel extensively. I read a lot of paranormal romance and try to balance it out with non-fiction, classics, and literary fiction. I've just started Moby Dick again- if anyone wants to use this prompt to shame me into actually finishing it, feel free.
I do love the beach!

Trish:
I live in London. I work as a financial editor and proofreader. I have cats. I'm the wrong side of 60. I enjoy reading, photography and like to cook.

Emily:
I'm a "retired" high school teacher of English, economics, personal finance, and journalism who now works with her husband at our CPA firm. I was also a college counselor and academic advisor, cheerleading sponsor, and yearbook sponsor. I have a toddler and another baby on the way. I started a book club 12 years ago and we vacation together every summer I also enjoy running and eating sweets haha!
Emily: (here's a link to all of the books we've read in our book club: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1c...)

Rocky Horror Picture Show challenge 2026

1. Dr. Frank-N-Furter - a book with a scientist or doctor The Mad Scientist's Guide to World Domination: Original Short Fiction for the Modern Evil Genius, Horse Destroys the Universe, Perdido Street Station, The Windup Girl
2. Brad and Janet - a book with an engaged couple
Engaged to the Earl, Ayesha at Last
3. Riff Raff and Magenta - a book with domestic servants or a brother and a sister Jeeves? Robin Kane?
4. Columbia - a book with a groupie/musician or a redhaired character Devil in Winter
5. Rocky Horror - a book with a creature The Island of Dr. Moreau
6. Eddie - a book with a murder High-rise Mystery, How to Solve Your Own Murder
7. A book set in New York City (for the midnight showings) Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Three Stories, Open City, Dash & Lily's Book of Dares, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, M Train
8. A book where characters dress up in costumes Girl in Disguise
9. A book connected to the lyrics of Science Fiction/Double Feature When Worlds Collide (Bison Frontiers of Imagination) by Edwin Balmer (1-Oct-1999) Paperback
10. A book connected to the lyrics of Time Warp The Day Tripper, The Summer of Impossible Things
11. A book connected to the plot of the movie The Invention of Morel, The Invisible Man
12. A book with an LGBT character The Watchmaker of Filigree Street, How to Repair a Mechanical Heart