2019 Reading challenge

[redbird]

A year ago, the King County Library System posted a reading challenge, the goal of which is to broaden what kinds of books, and what kinds of authors, you read. I decided to give it a try, not counting rereading. (In categories where I have more than one book, these are mostly selected based on having been read first. These are the first I read in each category, or the first :

• Read a book about history: The Glass Universe, by Dana Sobel (about pioneering women astronomers who did a lot of the early work on variable stars) .
• Read a children’s book: Minor Mage, by T. Kingfisher. I agree with the author that this is a children's book; the editors disagreed, which is why this is listed as by T. Kingfisher instead of Ursula Vernon. (I read a moderate amount of YA, mostly where it overlaps with sf and fantasy.).
• Read a book about a subject that can be difficult to discuss: White Fragility: Why It's So Hard to Talk about Race, by Robin DiAngelo.
• Read a book of poetry: So Far So Good: Final Poems 2014-2018. (I'd hoped to make this a book by a poet I hadn't read before, but didn't manage that.)
• Read a book by a journalist: This was trickier than I expected it to be; Unthinkable, by Helen Thompson, fits here, I think.
• Read a book recommended by KCLS library staff: I found Kitchen Confidential, by Anthony Bourdain, on a KCLS recommended list from a few years ago.
• Read a book by an LGBTQ author: This was the easy one, except I needed my first two answers for other categories, leaving That Ain't Witchcraft, by Seanan McGuire.
• Read a book about a crime: OK, another easy one. The Poisoner's Handbook, by Deborah Bloom, for nonfiction, and Honest Doubt by Amanda Cross for mystery fiction. (A lot of my 2019 reading was mysteries, but a lot of that was rereading.)
• Read a book about family: Deep Roots, by Ruthanna Emrys, is about family, including both birth and chosen families. (This is also by an LGBT author, but I decided that I wouldn't count the same book twice.)
• Read a book by an immigrant author: Becky Chambers's Record of a Spaceborn Few.

Conclusion: This didn't work as well as I might have hoped at getting me to read things I otherwise would have. I would have read most of these anyhow: in particular, Deep Roots, Record of a Spaceborn Few, and That Ain't Witchcraft are all continuations of series I was reading and enjoying more or less as they're being published. I also note that if I was asked for a book with LGBTQ themes and/or major characters, I might have picked Catfishing on Catnet or The Raven and the Reindeer, but as far as I know Kritzer and Kingfisher are both heterosexual.

Comments

[alexseanchai]

this tells me you weren't really the target audience of the challenge

though I think the people who are the target audience of the challenge are largely either unaware their reading list isn't that diverse already or unwilling to do something as SJW-bullshitty as broaden their horizons

[redbird]

*nod* On the other hand, I could have stretched it a bit, by putting "not in a series I'm already reading" as a constraint.

And someone could do most of these without thinking about SJW stuff; anything by Isaac Asimov could count for immigrant author, and while my "difficult subject" books this year were about racism, estate planning and end-of-life care are also difficult for many people to talk about.

[alexseanchai]

true true true

[redbird]

This year's "ten to try" are:

Retelling of a fairytale or myth
Teaches you a new skill
About a journey
With a friend
About a person you’d like to meet
About nature
About music or a musician
About current events
Recommended by KCLS staff
By an author whose gender is different from yours

I have three or four of those from last year's list (I can check off "journey" with *Minor Mage*, which I used this year for "children's book"). Also, the tenth item confirms alexseanchai's point about me not being the target audience for this.

[mrissa]

Do you see why the editors thought that it wasn't a children's book, though? I thought it was, and then I read the ending, and I was like, ah, yes, I see why that...did not go. And I don't think it's why she said in the author's note, either.