2027 Reading Challenge

52 prompts, one a week · bookwormjim.com/reading-challenge

The 52 prompts

1. 1. A cozy book to start the year

   Try: The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune — A by-the-book caseworker visits an orphanage of magical children.

2. 2. A book about building better habits

   Try: Atomic Habits by James Clear — A step-by-step system for getting 1 percent better every day.

3. 3. A book set somewhere freezing

   Try: The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin — A lone envoy on the ice-bound planet Gethen.

4. 4. A true survival story

   Try: Endurance by Alfred Lansing — Shackleton's ship is trapped and crushed by Antarctic pack ice.

5. 5. A book under 150 pages

   Try: The Stranger by Albert Camus — Camus's 123-page novel about a detached clerk on trial.

6. 6. A book you were assigned in school and skipped

   Try: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald — 180 pages of Jazz Age longing.

7. 7. A love story with time travel

   Try: Outlander by Diana Gabaldon — A WWII nurse is transported from 1945 Scotland to 1743.

8. 8. A book with a color in the title

   Try: Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston — The First Son and a British prince fall for each other.

9. 9. A book published before 1900

   Try: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen — Elizabeth Bennet versus Mr. Darcy in Regency England.

10. 10. A book about money

    Try: The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel — Why behavior matters more than knowledge when it comes to money.

11. 11. A book set in Africa

    Try: Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe — Okonkwo's world in pre-colonial Nigeria is upended by outsiders.

12. 12. A book translated from another language

    Try: The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu — Chinese science fiction that begins during the Cultural Revolution.

13. 13. A book about the science of something you do every day

    Try: Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker — A neuroscientist on what sleep does for the brain and body.

14. 14. A book about a sport

    Try: Born to Run by Christopher McDougall — The Tarahumara of Mexico's Copper Canyons and the science of running.

15. 15. A book with a year in the title

    Try: 1776 by David McCullough — The year that decided America's fate, from both sides.

16. 16. The first book in a series

    Try: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling — Harry learns he's a wizard on his eleventh birthday.

17. 17. A memoir

    Try: Educated by Tara Westover — Raised by survivalists in Idaho, first classroom at seventeen.

18. 18. A book by someone who grew up in another country

    Try: Born a Crime by Trevor Noah — Growing up mixed-race in apartheid-era South Africa.

19. 19. A nonfiction book that reads like a thriller

    Try: Bad Blood by John Carreyrou — The reporting that exposed the Theranos blood-testing fraud.

20. 20. A book with a robot or AI

    Try: All Systems Red by Martha Wells — A security robot that would rather watch soap operas. 156 pages.

21. 21. A book about food

    Try: Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat — Four elements that explain how cooking works.

22. 22. A book about an invention

    Try: The Wright Brothers by David McCullough — Two Ohio bicycle mechanics work out how to fly.

23. 23. A book about the ancient world

    Try: SPQR by Mary Beard — Mary Beard's history of Rome from its founding myths onward.

24. 24. A book about the justice system

    Try: Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson — A young lawyer defends people the system has failed.

25. 25. A book about science and ethics

    Try: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot — Cells taken without consent in 1951 changed medical research.

26. 26. A beach read

    Try: Beach Read by Emily Henry — Two writers stuck in a rut swap genres for the summer.

27. 27. A summer read set on an island

    Try: We Were Liars by E. Lockhart — A wealthy family's private island and one summer nobody discusses.

28. 28. A classic whodunit

    Try: And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie — Ten strangers, one island, a nursery rhyme.

29. 29. A book set on a train

    Try: Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie — Poirot and a murdered passenger in a locked compartment.

30. 30. A heist story

    Try: Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo — Six outcasts attempt an impossible break-in.

31. 31. A book with a famous first line

    Try: Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier — "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again."

32. 32. A book written by two authors

    Try: Good Omens by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman — An angel and a demon team up to stop the Apocalypse.

33. 33. A quest story

    Try: The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien — A comfortable hobbit is dragged off on an adventure.

34. 34. A book with a magic school

    Try: A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin — A goatherd with a gift for magic goes to wizard school on Roke.

35. 35. A book about books

    Try: Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury — Firemen burn books until one of them starts asking questions.

36. 36. A book published in the 1990s

    Try: A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin — Noble houses scheme for the Iron Throne of Westeros.

37. 37. A book published in the 1940s

    Try: Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl — A psychiatrist's account of the camps and the search for meaning.

38. 38. A book over 1,000 pages

    Try: The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson — 1,007 pages of war and magic on the shattered plains of Roshar.

39. 39. A book told in letters

    Try: The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky — A shy freshman's letters to an anonymous friend.

40. 40. A book with an unusual narrator

    Try: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak — Death narrates a girl's life in Nazi Germany.

41. 41. A book set in Latin America

    Try: Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia — A socialite heads to the Mexican countryside to rescue her cousin.

42. 42. A book set in Asia

    Try: Ring by Koji Suzuki — A journalist traces a cursed videotape in Japan.

43. 43. A spooky classic for October

    Try: The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson — Four investigators move into a house with a reputation.

44. 44. A book you can finish in one sitting

    Try: The Turn of the Screw by Henry James — A governess, two children and 96 pages of dread.

45. 45. A psychological thriller

    Try: The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides — A painter shoots her husband, then never speaks again.

46. 46. A mystery with older main characters

    Try: The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman — Four retirees investigate cold cases until a real murder happens.

47. 47. A book published in the 2020s

    Try: Funny Story by Emily Henry — Two jilted exes become roommates in a lakeside town.

48. 48. A retelling of a classic

    Try: Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver — David Copperfield moved to modern Appalachia.

49. 49. A book set on another planet

    Try: The Martian by Andy Weir — An astronaut stranded on Mars has to science his way home.

50. 50. A book that became a movie

    Try: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins — Katniss volunteers for a televised fight to the death.

51. 51. A funny book

    Try: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams — Earth is demolished to make way for a galactic freeway.

52. 52. A feel-good book to end the year

    Try: A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman — A grumpy widower is slowly won over by his neighbors.