The Eclectic Reader Challenge

January 1, 2015 – December 31, 2015

I first joined Book'd Out for the The Eclectic Reader Challenge last year, but this is the fourth year for this comfort-zone challenging reader event. The goal is to push us out of that comfort zone by reading up to 12 books during the year from 12 different categories. For full details on the challenge and to join up, click on the Challenge link above.

Here are the categories for 2015 and my tentative book plans for each one:

1. Retellings (of fairytales, legends, or myths): Briar Rose by Jane Yolen [Sleeping Beauty] (9/14/15) 
2. Set in a country that begins with "S" (Spain, Sweden, etc.): The Abominable Man by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö [Sweden] (5/29/15)
3. PI Crime (featuring a private investigator): Call for Michael Shayne by Brett Halliday (4/22/15)
4. Published before you were born (1969 for me): The Golden Slipper & Other Problems for Violet Strange by Anna Katharine Green [1915] (1/26/15)
5. Contemporary Romance: Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson (11/4/15)
6. Fiction for Foodies: Death Dines Out by Theodora Du Bois [death by limes!] (9/30/15)
7. Microhistory (nonfiction): The Poisoner's Handbook by Deborah Blum (3/22/15)
8. Science Fiction (set in space): The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle (4/12/15)
9. Sports (fiction or nonfiction): The Lack of the Irish by Ralph McInerny [football] (7/11/15)
10. Featuring Diversity: Swing Low, Sweet Harriet by George Baxt [features first gay detective--Pharoah Love--who is also African American] (9/13/15)
11.  Epistolary Fiction: Some of Your Blood by Theodor Sturgeon (2/13/15)
12. Middle Grade/YA Adventure: The Giver by Lois Lowry (9/4/15)