Hooked on Books discussion

The Anomaly Alliance — 2026: Time Traveler's Challenge ⏳
Duration: January 2026 to December 2026

Welcome, temporal navigators! This thread is your crew's headquarters for the year-long journey through history. Use this space to coordinate reading plans, share era-specific book recommendations, discuss your adventures through time, and celebrate your progress on both your Personal Timeline and our Shared Timeline!

🚀 Crew Manifest
• Teddie
• Heather
• Trisha
• Anna
• Vicki

🧭 Our Mission
- Personal Timeline: Advance your crew from Prehistoric Times (Year 1) to Timeless Classics (Year 6000) by earning years through reading!
- Shared Timeline: Contribute to our community's collective journey. Every year you earn helps move everyone forward through history.

📜 Earning Years
- Base Years: every 100 pages = ~1 year
- Bonus Years: 2 years per completed bonus
- Monthly Era Champion: Winning crew earns a +30 year boost!

Example: A 280-page book with 4 bonuses earns: ROUND(280*0.01)=3 base years + (4*2)=8 bonus years = 11 Total Years

📊 Crew Log (Spreadsheet)
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...

🎯 Check-Ins
We'll post monthly reminders and tasks here! And please, post in your team thread at least weekly — Let's support each other to keep our timeline advancing!

Let the temporal adventure begin! May your books be compelling and your timeline be ever-forward! ⏱️✨

🪙 Time Traveler's Challenge - Bonus System Explained

Earn bonus years to accelerate your team's progress through the timeline! There are 8 possible bonuses per book (max), across several categories.

📅 Monthly Theme Bonuses (2 per month)
• Each month will have 2 Main Page Genre (MPG).
• Complete a task with a book from the monthly bonus genres to earn the bonus.
• These change monthly — check the HOMEBASE thread or your Team SS!

🗺️ Geographic & Temporal Collection Bonuses
• Unique Country Bonus: Earn a bonus for each new country (book setting ONLY) your TEAM reads from.
• Unique Publication Year Bonus: Earn a bonus for each new publication year your TEAM reads.
• Important: Uniqueness is tracked per team, not individually. Coordinate with your crew to maximize collection!

🌍 Diversity Reading Bonus
• Earn a bonus for reading a book by an author from an underrepresented group. (Updated from Book Quest: this is now author-related only, not based on genre or content.)

Underrepresented groups include: BIPOC authors, LGBTQ+ authors, authors with disabilities, neurodivergent authors, authors from marginalized religious groups, authors from developing nations, and indigenous authors.

⭐ Personal Badges
• Each month features unique personal badge challenges.
• These will be revealed when monthly tasks are posted.

🏺 Team Artifacts (Collective Bonuses)
These require entire team participation!

Team Read 📚
All team members read the same book and participate in an approved Buddy Read discussion thread.
Thematic Treasure Hunt 🔍
Your team finds books from your individual reading that share a common theme, motif, or symbol (like "fire," "moon," "rebirth," "keys," "mirrors"). Submit a combined "catalog" with quotes/examples showing the connection in your thread.

📝 Bonus Submission Notes:
• Claim bonuses on your team spreadsheet.
• For Diversity Bonus: Select the author's identity from the dropdown when claiming.
• For Unique Country/Year: Your team tracker will show your growing collection via a map.
• Team Artifacts require special submission in the thread!

Remember: Each bonus earned = +2 years on your timeline! Strategic bonus hunting can accelerate your journey dramatically. ⏱️✨


🌀 TEMPORAL ANOMALIES (Special Limited-Time Bonus)
• Watch for surprise bonus tasks with specific time-limited windows.
• A fun way to earn a quick burst of years — stay alert!

So excited for our next adventure (even as I work my way through my December books! lol)

Whee! Another challenge with that Ashley sparkle :)

Woo hoo! Here we are again, team! Ready or not, here comes 2026 and The Anomaly Alliance in all our splendor and glory!

Hey team! Such a shiny new home. :)

I love the new home. We need some decorations and snacks!

and a warm blankie. I'm scared. . . 🫣😭😭

these last 2 or 3 months of tasks have been so tough to read for. . .I hope I don't let you guys down at all this next year!!

We all do what we can do - it will be fun! :)

We will make it work! I do agree these have been some hard months but we rallied. A warm blanket definitely and maybe some bourbon. I'll bring the good stuff.

I would like to include a cozy fire 🔥 too. Teddie made a good point. As long as we each do our best, continue to try finding books we can buddy up on, and give each other grace we will be fine. We will have fun no doubt!

I think we've all struggled with the past few months. For me it's been the tricky prompts along with RL.

But I love the sound of our new cozy home. I will definitely bring my knitting as well (eh, Teddy?).

In the main thread, Ashley is asking us to fill out a google sheet so she has our info

here: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Thanks, Trisha.

okay, posting the whole task post because THERE ARE TONS OF NEW BONUSES IN HERE!!!

🪨 Time Traveler’s Challenge — January 2026
Era: Prehistoric Times

Welcome, adventurers. Dust off your cave tools, shake the mammoth hair off your reading chair, and let’s kick off this challenge properly.

We’re starting at the very beginning — before calendars, before written stories, before Goodreads existed to judge our choices.

January drops us straight into Prehistoric Times, where your priorities are simple: don’t die, find fire, and read good books.

Grab a chair and lock in — this first one will be a long one (just like the era itself).


🦣 Main Tasks
(view spoiler)[
Here’s what you’ll be tackling this January — each task ties directly to the raw, dangerous, no-internet reality of early humanity.

1. Read a book with a BROWN cover.
Brown = earth tones, hide, dirt, stone… basically the entire prehistoric aesthetic.

2. Read a book with the word "Prehistoric" or "Times" (no variation) in the Title or Text.
A direct line to the era — we’re anchoring the month with something explicitly referencing it.

3. Read a book that features a large, awe-inspiring animal or creature central to the story.
Mammoths, saber-toothed cats, giant birds — the world back then was full of creatures that could kill you or feed you, sometimes both.

4. Read a book featuring a natural disaster.
Before modern tech or infrastructure, nature was the ultimate threat. Storms, quakes, floods, eruptions — take your pick.

5. Read a book where survival against nature drives the entire story.
This era was literally one long "man vs. nature" arc. No cushions, no conveniences, just grit.

6. Read a book that uses vivid imagery to bring a harsh, natural environment to life.
Prehistoric landscapes were extreme — burning sun, frozen plains, dense forests. This task dives straight into that atmosphere.

7. Read a book that involves caves, underground worlds, or hidden places.
Caves = shelter, mystery, art, danger. They’re one of the most iconic parts of prehistoric living and storytelling.

8. Read a book where fire is featured heavily.
Fire was the game-changing technology of the era: warmth, safety, cooking, community. If fire matters in the story, it fits here.

9. Read a book related to "animism" or reverence for natural elements.
Early spiritual belief systems were rooted in the sun, moon, animals, rivers — nature itself as sacred. This taps directly into that worldview.

10. Read a book where a character invents, discovers, or learns something that changes their way of life.
Prehistoric times were one long innovation runway: tools, hunting strategies, language, fire, art. A discovery that transforms life is right on theme.
(hide spoiler)]

📅 Monthly Theme Bonuses (MPG)

For January, the two MPG bonus genres are:

🏕️ Adventure
🧭 Survival

Read any January task in one of these genres for an extra bonus.

🏅 Personal Era Badges
To earn these bonuses, you'll need to personally accomplish one of the following "tasks". This means that whatever book you are trying to gain the bonus for, should not only fit a regular monthly task, but also be related to the badge.

🔥 Firestarter
A book that sparks a group discussion — controversial, emotional, divisive, or just plain chaotic.

🎨 Cave Painter
Create or share something visual inspired by your book: moodboard, sketch, collage, digital art, cave scratchings… whatever your medium, show it off.

🪶 Hunter-Gatherer
A book someone on your team has already finished. Yes, you’re “gathering” from others’ finds. Yes, that’s the point.

******* 📜 Recommendation List Pick: will be an ongoing badge for the entire challenge, so here's a little info to start you off.
Every participant may submit up to 12 recommended books by the end of January. After that, the list locks for the rest of the challenge. You can read anyone else’s rec (not your own!) for a bonus.
How to submit your list: Post your list in your team thread and tag/link here. I’ll add it to the Index. *******

🏺 Team Artifacts (Permanent Collective Bonuses)
These require team-wide participation every time you attempt them:

📚 Team Read
Everyone reads the same book + joins the buddy-read discussion thread.

🔍 Thematic Treasure Hunt
As a team, compile a mini-catalog of shared themes/motifs found across your individual reads: fire, moons, wings, mirrors, rebirth, keys — whatever pops up. Include quotes or receipts.
How to submit your list: Post your "catalog" in your team thread and tag/link here.

🌍 Geographic & Temporal Collection Bonuses
New this year! Your team earns bonuses for:

• Unique Country Settings
• Unique Publication Years

These are team-level, not individual — coordinate, so you’re not all reading 2022 USA books and screaming later because you can only claim one bonus.

🌈 Diversity Author Bonus
Back from last year! Earn a bonus for reading a book by an author from an underrepresented group. This is author identity only (not content-based), and includes:
BIPOC, LGBTQ+, disabled, neurodivergent, marginalized religious groups, developing nations, Indigenous authors.

**** 🌀 Temporal Anomaly Bonus (Jan 1–31 Only!)
Start the year easy:

Read a book with a BLACK cover.

Bonus Genres (unchanging all year):
• Speculative
• Epistolary
(Tag 5+ counts — doesn’t need to be MPG.)


🏅 Personal Temporal Anomalties Badges (unchanging all year):
Perspective Shift 🔄 – Highlight a moment in your book where the narrator or POV tricks you, surprises you, or changes your understanding.
Causal Loop 🔁 – A book you discovered because of another member's post or discussion in the challenge.
Time Dilatation ⌛ – Get completely lost in a book, reading for so long you lose track of time.
Recommendation List Pick 📜 – See above!


If you have questions, put them in the Q&A thread (to keep this thread semi-tidy for New Sign Ups and Challenge Updates!

So sharpen your flint, gather your kindling, and let’s light this challenge on fire. Happy January, Travelers!

Temporal Anomaly Spreadsheet page: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...

11th book?

Oh man, I'm going to have to sit down and really focus on all these bonuses. Those are two tough MPG's for January also!

definitely having "Speculative" as a bonus is tough when we're reading for that this month!

I'm prepping for my recommendation list:

📜 Recommendation List Pick:
Every participant may submit up to 12 recommended books

1. Coffin Moon
2. A Short Walk Through a Wide World
3. The Appeal
4. Too Old for This
5. Heartwood
6. Exiles
7. The Lost Man
8. Dungeon Crawler Carl
9. How High We Go in the Dark
10. The Sun Down Motel
11. The Only Good Indians
12. Blacktop Wasteland

Heather's recommendation list:

1. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
2. The Guncle, Steven Rowley
3. Charm City Rocks, Matthew Norman
4. The Wee Free Men, Terry Pratchett (Tiffany Aching series)
5. Kills Well with Others, Deanna Raybourn
6. Rocky Start, Jennifer Crusie & Bob Mayer (Rocky Start trilogy)
7. One Death at a Time, Abbi Waxman
8. Key Lime Sky, Al Hess
9. A Witch's Guide to Magical Innkeeping, Sangu Mandanna
10. The Whyte Python World Tour, Travis Kennedy
11. I See You've Called in Dead, John Kenney
12. Mrs. Nash's Ashes, Sarah Adler

Any thoughts about team/buddy reads?

The 12 books that we recommend for the list: Should we each do a mixture of books or do our favorite genre of books? Trying to think through what books to list. I'm always up for team/buddy reads. I know that I'm going to reread Rules of Civility for one of the tasks because it covers that black cover. I read it last January so I think that's good for this challenge to reread. I also went and looked at Trisha's books that she already listed and The Wrong Daughter looks good. I am still trying to figure out what all the bonuses are! Like I see the team read but what is treasure hunt?

Ohhhhh: 🔍 Thematic Treasure Hunt
As a team, compile a mini-catalog of shared themes/motifs found across your individual reads: fire, moons, wings, mirrors, rebirth, keys — whatever pops up. Include quotes or receipts.
How to submit your list: Post your "catalog" in your team thread and tag/link here.


So we need a theme for the month!

I might try to fit this book in a task if anyone else wants to read it. I haven't researched where it would fit yet. The second book just came out and it looks like it might be a fun series.

The Recovery Agent

Heather wrote: "Any thoughts about team/buddy reads?"

I'm completely open! I'd love to get more team and buddy reads!
I know Vicki and I plan to buddy Isola but otherwise I was waiting to see other books everyone picks to see if I could copy them lol

bamaace83 wrote: "The 12 books that we recommend for the list: Should we each do a mixture of books or do our favorite genre of books? Trying to think through what books to list.. ..."

I know!! This is tough, I was waiting to see if others post their lists first and try to put books on there so I don't do repeats/duplicates.
it's tough to just do 12!

bamaace83 wrote: "Ohhhhh: 🔍 Thematic Treasure Hunt
As a team, compile a mini-catalog of shared themes/motifs found across your individual reads: fire, moons, wings, mirrors, rebirth, keys — whatever pops up. Include..."

I'm so up for this! I can change any of my reads - I was just trying to find books with that MPG

I'm sorry if I missed this somewhere, but are we supposed to basically list our 12 all-time favorite books? And yeah, we'll want to keep from duplicating.

Both The Recovery Agent & Isola look good to me.

Oh, and I'm reading Rebecca for my book with a black cover. It has 5x Speculative Fiction tags.

Okay. I'm starting my recommendation list and will be happy to change anything as needed. I've decided to list some of my very favorite books, and ones that I'm happy to read over and over.

Oh, also I'm currently looking for books with TIMES in the title that are also MPG Adventure or Survival. I'm listing them in the Archive Log on the SS.

I'm digging into this today!

My Recommendations:

1. The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon
2. Resistance Women by Jennifer Chiaverini
3. Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese
4. Tears of Amber by Sofía Segovia
5. The Reformatory by Tananarive Due
6. The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women by Kate Moore
7. A Different Kind of Angel by Paulette Mahurin
8. Sister Where Are You by A.M. Strong
9. Teardrop Shot by Tijan
10. The Silent Corner by Dean Koontz
11. The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss
12. Hazelthorn by C.G. Drews

Okay, I can also read Isola and The Wrong Daughter. I know that I'm going to read The Recovery Agent. Now, do those three books all have a theme lol! I think if we try to get a theme that covers maybe 5-6 if not all of our books that would give us good points.

Okay, I learned that I don't think we can use the unique country twice. I went to mark Canada and it turned red. I did mark Peru for The Recovery Agent though.

My Recommendations:

1. The Duke and I by Julia Quinn
2. The Street by Ann Petry
3. City of Bones by Cassandra Clare
4. Vision in White by Nora Roberts
5. Love Me to Death by Allison Brennan
6. Dear Martin by Nic Stone
7. The Cove by Catherine Coulter
8. The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins
9. Something So Right by Natasha Madison
10. All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker
11. Kulti by Mariana Zapata
12. Mine Till Midnight by Lisa Kleypas

I started a list but can rearrange if needed. I just went and found books that I've given 5 stars for and tried to do first in series to give people a starting point. I bounced genres around just in case.

bamaace83 wrote: "Okay, I learned that I don't think we can use the unique country twice. I went to mark Canada and it turned red. I did mark Peru for The Recovery Agent though."

Yeah, I tweaked the sheet so we can see whether a country or pub date year has been used. You can check the Temporal Anomalies tab on the far right to see the list of used countries and years.

Nice! Thanks, Teddie.

Thanks, Teddie!

I'm back! I'm over here updating things. Anybody have thoughts on a theme for next month? I have Isola ready to go for Boston. We are going to be on the train to Salem on the 2nd so I figured I could get it started that day. I'm tidying up challenges for this month this weekend so when I'll be ready to start the new year fresh.

I've been doing some research aka reading the QA tab. It looks like we can have two team themes and up to 5 of our books fit each theme. So, I was thinking maybe one of our themes should be water. If we read Isola, there is water on the cover. In the Wrong Daughter, there is a water scene. I think water would be a good one to add and can be easily found in books. I haven't really picked books for the month other than like 3 so not sure what would be another good theme.

Water sounds good to me for one of the themes.

Great idea, Anna!

It's me again! Okay, I've been stalking. I'm actually confused about the themes. It possibly might be we each read one book for a theme which would total five books? I have Isola ready to take on vacation and a couple other random books that I need to read. I have just pure romance fluff for the rest of the month. I needed a break, lol.

Love it Anna! I'll pick some books accordingly.

MOD ALERT
Has everyone on your team checked into the team thread?

As far as I know we have unless there is a different thread.

I'm updating our AA tab with our book recommendations so far - doing mine now!