2026 Reading Challenge discussion

This thread is to discuss Rakesfall by Vajra Chandrasekera.

Pages: 289 pages

Length: 1 month (June)

Participants: SarahKat, LinaVer, Whitney

Everyone reads at their own pace during a Buddy Read. Because participants can be at different parts of the book at different times, it is extremely important to mark spoilers so that the book is not ruined for someone who is not as far along as others!!!

Mark spoilers by placing {spoiler} before the text and {/spoiler} after the text but use the < and > instead of the { and }.

Here are some questions to help get the conversation started! Feel free to look up discussion questions specific to this book or come up with your own. Just make sure any questions that contain spoilers are under spoiler tags.
Discussion questions are not required but may be a fun way to talk about the book and get to know each other!

Prior to starting:
What prompted you to join this buddy read?
Have you read this author before? What do you think of their other books?

Mid-read:
What character or ideas do you relate to the most and why?
Do you have any favorite quotes or scenes?

After reading:
What was enjoyable or not-so-enjoyable about this book?
Did this book change your perception about anything, either within the book (character development) or in real life?

Hi y'all! I'm planning to start reading the book next week once I finish up my current reads!

I keep having holds come through so I may not get to this until later in the month.

I'll be starting this one somewhere toward the end of the month:)

So, I finished the book yesterday.

(view spoiler)[I'm not entirely sure I understood what I read. Lol. It felt to me like I was reading a short story collection more than a novel. Which apparently that's how this started was a few previously published short stories put together to make the novel. Every time I would start to understand and get into the story, that particular story would be over and a new one would begin with all different details. There were a couple of stories that I feel would have made great novels by themselves if the plotline continued. The first one where different worlds are watching each other through the TV and the last one where the character is trying to convince the kids to play the game. To be honest, between yesterday and today, I don't remember much about the other stories. I guess that says how much I actually absorbed from the book. I looked at the reviews. It has mixed reviews. People either really love it or hate it. Reviews are also saying his other book is better, so I may give it a chance later on. (hide spoiler)]

Curious to know what y'all thought about it.

Starting today as I've finished my other reads earlier. :)
quite excited about it, as I've been wanting to read something from scifi.

I'm starting today, though probably slowly until I finish a few other books.

I'm sorry for bailing out but I'm dnf'ing this book at 1/5th of it. It's what they call a "soft-dnf" for me, one I might come back to later as I am still curious about it. It has so many good reviews among my goodreads friends, everyone's talking about how it bends genre and how the narrative is so dream-like etc etc. But I've honestly just been feeling kind of stupid reading it, I don't understand much of what I read. And right now I'm in no mood for this kind of read. Sometimes I am, but not right now. I will follow this thread still though as I'm curious to read about your experiences with it.

I felt the same way, LinaVer. I didn't feel like I was comprehending what the author was trying to convey. I kept re-reading passages, and it still was not connecting for me. I truly don't remember most of the book now. I probably would have DNF'ed it, too. But, I'm never purposely DNF'ed a book. I just don't have it in me. Lol.

I feel the same. I clicked Whitney's spoilers just because I did not care if I spoil the book for myself and thought maybe you'd have some amazing insight that would make enjoy it more but I see we're all having the same experience. I'm still going to finish it because I want to use it for so many prompts on different challenges, but it's a struggle.

It is good to know it's more of a book of short stories than a cohesive novel. Maybe some of the stories will stick with me?

I was never a dnf'er before either Whitney! But I'm learning. I used to struggle through books and hate them and still finish but I just don't have it in me to finish them anymore :D I feel like my attention span has been worse with age or something. SarahKat, I hope you find that one story that you can enjoy.

I read the book from Feb 18 to March 1. It was a struggle to get through at first and sadly finished shortly after midnight so it didn’t count toward Feb. (view spoiler)[The different timelines were a bit confusing but the book got slightly easier to read after the halfway point if you guys attempt it again. I didn’t enjoy it enough to recommend but things get explained. (hide spoiler)]

SarahKat wrote: "I feel the same. I clicked Whitney's spoilers just because I did not care if I spoil the book for myself and thought maybe you'd have some amazing insight that would make enjoy it more but I see we..."

The stories are all connected. It gives Fifth Season vibes (view spoiler)[same characters connected over timelines (hide spoiler)]

Finally finished. Wish I hadn't. Oh well. At least I get to cross off a bunch of prompts across challenges.

SarahKat wrote: "Finally finished. Wish I hadn't. Oh well. At least I get to cross off a bunch of prompts across challenges."

You're a trooper for finishing it SarahKat!