Hello Readers! I finished my reading challenge for the year, and I think this is the earliest I’ve ever completed it. It’s nice to be done so I can focus on finishing up advanced reader copies, participate in Nanowrimo, and start picking up my seasonal reads. I enjoyed the challenge this year. I thought it included a nice variety of prompts. I was most excited about the advanced prompts when the list came out last year; they all included books from our TBRs. But a few of them ended up taking me the longest to fulfill. I guess there’s a reason they’ve been waiting on my backlist so long. 😉

This was my fourth year to participate in the Popsugar Reading Challenge. If you’ve never heard of the challenge, you can learn about it here. There’s also an informative Goodreads group here, as well as a Facebook group. What I like about this challenge is it pushes me out of my comfort zones a bit, but I can almost always find books off my own TBR to fill the prompts. The list creators are always encouraging readers to make the list their own and to interpret the prompts in the way that is best for their own use, as well. The challenge includes 40 regular prompts and 10 advanced prompts, and this year I tweaked the 40th prompt (favorite prompt from a past challenge) to add another 10 books.

You can see what I originally planned to read in My 2021 Popsugar Reading Challenge and what I’d managed to read halfway through the year in My 2021 Popsugar Reading Challenge Mid-Year Update. After comparing my original and finished lists, I managed to read 28 out of 57 books I’d originally planned (3 spots were left blank for mood reading), although I did shift a few books around to other prompts where they fit better. As usual, my advanced reader copies took over the list. I read 24 books off my backlist, 28 ARCs, and 8 newly acquired books, making my challenge total = 60 books.

Let’s see how I did!

Regular Prompts

• A book that’s published in 2021 – The Love Proof by Madeleine Henry (My Review)
• An Afrofuturist book – The Black God’s Drums by P. Djèlí Clark
• A book that has a heart, diamond, club, or spade on the cover – The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren (My Review)
• A book by an author who shares your zodiac sign – (Aquarius) Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo
• A dark academia book – The Maidens by Alex Michaelides (My Review)

• A book with a gem, mineral, or rock in the title – Chain of Iron by Cassandra Clare (My Review)
• A book where the main character works at your current or dream job – (Bookseller) The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan
• A book that has won the Women’s Prize For Fiction – The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
• A book with a family tree – The Duke and I by Julia Quinn
• A bestseller from the 1990s – Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman

• A book about forgetting – The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Duke (My Review)
• A book you have seen on someone’s bookshelf (in real life, on a Zoom call, in a TV show, etc.) – The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris (My Review)
• A locked-room mystery – One of Us is Lying by Karen M. McManus
• A book set in a restaurant – Anchored Hearts by Priscilla Oliveras (My Review)
• A book with a black-and-white cover – Brat: An ’80s Story by Andrew McCarthy (My Review)

• A book by an Indigenous author – There There by Tommy Orange
• A book that has the same title as a song – Mister Impossible by Maggie Stiefvater (My Review)
• A book about a subject you are passionate about – Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu (My Review)
• A book that discusses body positivity – Big Girl, Small Town by Michelle Gallen (My Review)
• A book found on a Black Lives Matter reading list – The Black Kids by Christina Hammonds Reed (My Review)

• A genre hybrid – (YA, Historical Fiction) We Are Not Free by Traci Chee (My Review)
• A book set mostly or entirely outdoors – Float Plan by Trish Doller (My Review)
• A book with something broken on the cover – Version Zero by David Yoon (My Review)
• A book by a Muslim American author – An Ember in the Ashes by Saaba Tahir
• A book that was published anonymously – Frankenstein by Mary Shelly (originally published anonymously)

• A book with an oxymoron in the title – Opposites Attract by Camilla Isley
• A book about do-overs or fresh starts – Love at First by Kate Clayborn (My Review)
• A magical realism book – The Book of Magic (Practical Magic, #2) by Alice Hoffman (My Review)
• A book set in multiple countries – The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
• A book set somewhere you’d “like” to visit in 2021 – (New York) Astrid Sees All by Natalie Standiford (My Review)

• A book by a blogger, vlogger, YouTube video creator, or other online personality – Hurricane Summer by Asha Bromfield (My Review)
• A book whose title starts with “Q,” “X,” or “Z” – Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams
• A book featuring three generations (grandparents, parent, child) – The Perfect Guests by Emma Rous (My Review)
• A book about a social justice issue – The Smash-Up by Ali Benjamin (My Review)
• A book in a different format than what you normally read (audiobooks, ebooks, graphic novels) – Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid (audiobook) (My Review – sort of – Should I Give Up on Audiobooks?)

• A book that has fewer than 1,000 reviews on Amazon or Goodreads – Happy Singles Day by Ann Marie Walker (My Review)
• A book you think your best friend would like – (My husband) Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir (My Review)
• A book about art or an artist – What Could Be Saved by Liese O’Halloran Schwarz (My Review)
• A book everyone seems to have read but you – Well Met by Jen DeLuca

Your favorite prompt from a past Popsugar Reading Challenge (I like to challenge myself by choosing a book from each past challenge, and I added one to round out my TBR to 60 books.)

• Overall – Reread – Chain of Gold by Cassandra Clare (My Review)
• 2015 – A book from an author you love but haven’t read – The Road Trip by Beth O’Leary (My Review)
• 2016 – Takes place during the summer – Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid (My Review)
• 2016 Summer Challenge – A road trip book – Hadley & Grace by Suzanne Redfearn (My Review)
• 2016 Fall Challenge – A book set in Fall/Autumn – Snowflakes at the Little Christmas Tree Farm by Jaimie Admans (This may seem like a strange choice, but it’s mostly set in the fall!) (My Review)
• 2017 – A book about an immigrant or refugee – Beautiful Country: A Memoir by Qian Julie Wang (My Review)
• 2018 – A book with a LGBTQ protagonist – Call Down the Hawk (The Dreamer Trilogy, #2) by Maggie Stiefvater (My Review)
• 2019 – A Debut – Prepped by Bethany Mangle (My Review)
• 2020 – A book with an upside down image on the cover – (her shoe) Slanted and Disenchanted by Lisa Czarina Michaud (My Review)
• 2020 Summer Challenge – A book set on vacation – People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry (My Review)
• 2020 Fall/Autumn Challenge – A book that includes someone falling – Never Saw You Coming by Erin Hahn (My Review)

Advanced Prompts

• The longest book (by pages) on your TBR list – (960 pages) Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
• The shortest book on your TBR list – (145 pages) The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury
• The book on your TBR list with the prettiest cover – Eight Perfect Hours by Lia Louis (My Review)
• The book on your TBR with the ugliest cover – Odd Woman Out: Exposure in Essays and Stories by Melanie Chartoff (My Review)
• The book that’s been on your TBR list for the longest amount of time – The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkein (Yay, I finally crossed this one off my tbr!)

• A book from you TBR list you meant to read last year but didn’t – The Last Star by Rick Yancey
• A book from your TBR list you associate with a favorite person, place, or thing – (thing) Moonlighting: An Oral History by Scott Ryan (My Review)
• A book from your TBR list chosen at random – The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary
• A DNF book from your TBR list – The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han
• A free book from your TBR list (gifted, borrowed, library) – (gifted from my Top Ten Tuesday Bookish Wishes post) The Geography of Lost Things by Jessica Brody

If you read to the end, Congratulations! 😉 Did you participate in the Popsugar Reading Challenge? Did we read any of the same books? Let me know in the comments!

Happy Wandering!