Read Harder Challenge - 2016

It's that most wonderful time of the year again!  A new year finds me once again undertaking the Reader Harder Challenge from Book Riot.  This year, rather that create a post with suggestions, they paired up with the New York Public Library to create a list of books that fit into each category. Check it out if you're interested in playing along.

Last year did not see me complete the full challenge.  I will say, in my defense, that I did end up reading more books than I posted here (because I ran out of time!), but that defense does not go so far as to say that I met the entire challenge.  That is my goal for this year.  Keep reading to see the list of books I intend to read, and follow along for updates throughout the year as I conquer each category!

As always, I love suggestions, so drop a line if you know a book I should read in one of these categories.

Read Harder Challenge - 2015

Hello, great world!

I am an avid reader who spent 2014 denying that part of myself that comes alive from reading!  I read a few books here and there (because I'm sure I would have died otherwise), but really let the undertakings of everyday life overwhelm something that, to me, is as important to my health as eating right and exercise: reading.

Since it's important to me to prioritize reading in the coming year, I've set about partaking in the 2015 Read Harder Challenge from Book Riot, one of my favorite readers' websites.  I figured that I would share that journey with you as the year progresses as a way to keep me honest and to remind myself of how far I've come.

Below is the challenge itself, which I'll update with names of books as I read them. Subsequent posts will discuss the books that I have finished. Feel free to make suggestions that fit into these categories!  If anything, they'll fit under the "recommended" section!

Indie Press - A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing

Image courtesy of Washington Post

A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing by Eimar McBride almost lost me at the get-go.  This book has caused a lot of buzz in the reading community, though, so I forced myself to push through.  Whether I was happy that I did or not I am still unsure about... but there's no denying that this is a book that lingers with you.

A girl grows up in an unstable household, with a controlling single mother and an uncontrollable brother with special needs.  Their relationship remains extremely complicated through a series of life events, as well as the introduction of various characters.  It's not giving too much away to say that the main character makes some objectively poor choices, almost compulsively, and the way that she deals with them speaks to the depths of the trauma she has lived through.

Told from the point of view of a girl growing up in Ireland, it begins with barely any recognizable speech.  In fact, throughout the whole book, the Irish dialect mixed with the idiosyncrasies of the main character rule the page, in such a way that by the end when I was reading it semi-fluently, I still wasn't sure if the writing got clearer as the main character grew up or if I was just getting used to the style of writing. Certainly, the half-formed thing that this girl is also carries through in her manner of thinking and thereby how her thoughts are being expressed on the page.

This is the most Irish thing I have read in a good long while, It has influences of James Joyce stamped all over it.  Once I learned to let go and simply try to feel the narrative rather than actively read, it was a better go-around for me.  This was an intense experience and I'm not sure I'll be putting myself through it again, but it is the first book in a long time that has stuck out to me so much.

Takes Place in Asia - A Thousand Splendid Suns

From Amazon - Believed to be fair use.

A Thousand Splendid Suns,from Khaled Hosseini (best known for Kite Runner), had all of the things you loved in Kite Runner and yet another story to take with you wherever you go.

This book tells the lives, almost-lives, and not-lives of two women as they attempt to survive, persevere, and thrive in Afghanistan during much of its tumultuous recent history.  Each must make impossible decisions and sacrifices in the pursuit of justice, their dreams, and love.  As their stories come together, these choices become harder.

Hosseini has certainly found his bread and butter in reflecting the complexity of the human experience.  Once again he tells a story of friendship, and the exploration thereof was as important to this text as it was to Kite Runner.  I keep comparing these two books, and that's not a bad thing!  What Kite Runner was to the exploration of a male experience, A Thousand Splendid Suns is to the female.  Both are easily universalized, and I enjoyed them immensely in part because of this. It was also an easy read, language-wise.  In fact, in some moments the forced grandness feels a bit contrived, but not so much that I was put off my reading. Additionally, many have said that the similarity to Kite Runner is a bad thing - to them, it feels a little "Dan Brown" in the way it sticks to a formula.  But I like the way Hosseini writes, and I look forward to picking up And the Mountains Echoed as a continuation of the positive experience I've had with his work.

YA + Poetry - Brown Girl Dreaming

From NationalBook.org -
Believed to be common use.

I am a teacher, and have taught K-8 (except, for some reason, I've never taught 6th graders!).  Most of my kids are brown, and so when Brown Girl Dreaming came onto the scene, I knew I had to read it and hopefully pass it along to my kids.

This one's written in free verse and telling (singing, really) the author's childhood, from Ohio to South Carolina (minus a father), to Brooklyn (plus a new brother), and her life with and without those she loves.  It's a story of finding your voice and whatever will be your gift to the world, and a snapshot of a world changing for the better.  Not every memory is beautiful but each is beautifully told.

Published in 2014 - Station Eleven

Emily St. John Mandel's Station Eleven's very creation is a testament to the fact that, as the book notes, "survival is insufficient."  Twenty years have passed since the Georgia Flu swept through the world faster than anyone could have imagined.  It has been twenty years since civilization has collapsed.  This book follows the pasts and (if they dare to dream them) futures of a loosely connected group of characters.  Their connecting thread is an actor dead just one day before the world began its descent into chaos.

Romance - A Rogue By Any Other Name

Goodreads.  Believed to constitute fair use.

Sarah MacLean's A Rogue by Any Other Name was a fun romance to read for my 2015 Read Harder Challenge! I like MacLean's historical romances because they often stand the gender conventions of the time on their head.  It's not the most historically accurate, but it's a delight to read, which is precisely what I am looking for.

This story revolves around Penelope and the disgraces Marquess of Bourne.  When the Marquess loses his fortune and family's legacy in a hubris-fueled moment of gambling, it is clear that he will stop at nothing to get back his family home.