Hard as it is to believe, it’s Memorial Day again, and that means summer has unofficially started. Not only that, but the holiday marks the beginning of what has become an annual tradition for me: the Summer Reading List challenge. For the 7th year in a row, I hope to complete it, and I’d love to see anyone else join in. (This year, I didn’t forget until halfway through, so it should be a little easier!)
The rules haven’t changed. Really, they aren’t rules, but more like guidelines. This isn’t a competition. It’s a challenge. What’s important is that you’re honest with yourself.
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The goal is to read 3 new books between Memorial Day (May 30) and Labor Day (September 5) in the US, the traditional “unofficial” bounds of summer. (For those of you in the Southern Hemisphere reading this, it’s a winter reading list. If you’re in the tropics…I don’t know what to tell you.)
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A book is anything non-periodical, so no comics, graphic novels, or manga. Anything else works. If you’re not sure, just use common sense. Audiobooks are acceptable, but only if they’re books, not something like a podcast.
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One of the books should be of a genre you don’t normally read. For example, I’m big on fantasy and sci-fi, so I might read a romance, or a thriller, or something like that. Nonfiction, by the way, also works as a “new” genre, unless you do read it all the time.
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You can’t count books you wrote, because they obviously wouldn’t be new to you. (Yes, this rule exists solely to keep me from just rereading my books.)
As always, I’ll search for something new (at least to me!) and share it with you when I’ve finished reading it. I’ll post it over on the fediverse (@mikey@freespeechextremist.com is my main account there for the time being) and in more depth here at PPC, but feel free to discuss your own reading adventures wherever you like.
Have fun, and keep reading!