https://bookriot.com/2019/12/03/2020-read-harder-challenge/
https://bookriot.com/read-harder-2021/
Book Riot publishes a challenge to Read Harder. There are 24 books on the list that are designed to challenge you to read new genres, authors, and points of view.
January 1, 2021: The planned prompts have been updated to the 2021 list. Maybe this year will be better for reading. Harry Potter books listed in planned reading for 2020 has been moved to Complete Readings as I read the series twice in 2020. The remaining 2020 prompts were removed from the list.
Complete Readings 2020
Read a romance starring a single parent
- Yours at Midnight by Robin Bielman – read 1/1/2020
Read a doorstopper (over 500 pages) published after 1950, written by a woman
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling – read 2020
Read the LAST book in a series
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling – read 2020
Completed Readings 2021
Read a book featuring a beloved pet where the pet doesn’t die
- Walking Back to Happiness by Lucy Dillon – read 1/25/2021
Read a non-European novel in translation
- Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel – read 4/2/2021
Read a book by/about a non-Western world leader
- The Secret History: A Novel of Empress Theodora by Stephanie Thornton – read 4/28/2021
Read a book that demystifies a common mental illness
- Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen – read 5/2/2021
Read a fanfic
- Not From Others by FloreatCastellum – read 5/6/2021
Read a middle grade novel
- Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson – read 5/8/2021
Read a food memoir by an author of color
- Becoming by Michelle Obama – read 5/9/2021
Read a historical fiction with a POC or LGBTQ+ protagonist
- Empire by Devi Yesodharan – read 5/16/2021
Read a realistic YA book not set in the U.S., UK, or Canada
- Always Coca-Cola by Alexandra Chreiteh – read 5/16/2021
Read a memoir by a Latina author
- The Soul of a Woman by Isabel Allende – read 5/16/2021
Read a book set in the Midwest
- The Cinderella Deal by Jennifer Crusie – read 5/24/2021
Read an own voices book about disability
- The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova Bailey – read 6/6/2021
Read a work of investigative nonfiction by an author of color
- Those Who Wander by Vivian Ho – read 6/8/2021
Read an own voices YA book with a Black main character that isn’t about Black pain
- The Checklist by Addie Woolridge – read 6/12/2021
Read a children’s book that centers a disabled character but not their disability
- What Stars are Made Of by Sarah Allen – read 6/14/2021
Read an SFF anthology edited by a person of color
- New Suns edited by Nisi Shawl – read 6/18/2021
Read a genre novel by an Indigenous, First Nations, or Native American author
- Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice (SciFi/Post Apocalypse) – read 6/22/2021
Read a nonfiction book about anti-racism
- White Rage by Carol Anderson – read 6/27/2021
Planned Readings
Read a fat-positive romance
- I’ll Be the One by Lyla Lee
Read a book you’ve been intimidated to read
- Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
Read an LGBTQ+ history book
- David Bowie Made Me Gay by Darryl W. Bullock
Read a romance by a trans or nonbinary author
- Next Year, For Sure by Zoey Leigh Peterson
Read a book of nature poems
- Wild Embers by Nikita Gill
Read a book with a cover you don’t like
- Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding