Around the Year in 52 Books discussion

The results are in!

Top
A book by a new-to-you BIPOC author
A book with a monochromatic cover

Bottom
A book that includes a recipe
A book related to blackjack or gambling

The next suggestions thread will open tomorrow (July 19) morning (CST)! As a reminder, the next poll will be a multi-week poll.

In adding to the listopia I am SHOCKED at how many options I have for BIPOC author. I'm interested to see how people BIO this prompt because lord knows I need to narrow down my options or my entire plan will just be this one prompt lol.

I’m happy with both of the tops. I also liked the recipe one but did not vote for it since I thought it might be to narrow of a prompt for this challenge.

I am hoping the poll will open on July 19... August 19 is a long way away.

Edie, I keep doing this!! I'm spending a lot of time planning for school to start in August and I can't stop writing August instead of July. Thanks for point it out, it's been changed lol

I will probably use the BIPOC prompt to pick up a 2020 debut. I guess you could do a BIO to read a well known author you've never read before too.

Happy with monochromatic cover as I generally like cover prompts. Can't really remember what I voted for now 😄

I like the winners, but awwww I am sorry that "blackjack" was in the bottom, I thought that was such a clever idea for 2021 with many possible interpretations.

I voted for all 4 top and bottom. I would have loved for the gambling one to have gotten in, as new prompt ideas are sooo needed. For one thing, I’m tired of all those initial-related prompts. This was the first poll where I upvoted all 8 choices, so a big thanks for all the good ideas to those who suggested them.

I started adding books from my tbr to BIPOC list and got confused about which nations count as POC, googled the term and got even more confused:

"Today the term "person of color" (plural: people of color, persons of color; sometimes abbreviated POC)[1] is primarily used to describe any person who is not considered white in the United States."

So, ekhem, are Iranians seen as white in US (I assumed no, but I might as well ask)? What about Israeli? Lebanese? Argentinian? Latino? Italian? (the article on wikipedia mentioned that Italian American was not seen as white during some periods of history)

Sorry, if it's a dumb question.

Something I suggested made it on the list! Yay! My poor tbr is about to get so much bigger.

Entropia, ethnicity is a much debated subject! I would not over analyse too much and just go with what feels right to you. The point of the prompt (as I see it) is to read a book by someone whose ethnicity might disadvantage them in the publishing world. So I would not count a book by a white Italian author but would an Iranian.

Ellie, I completely agree with your sentiment.

This article was really good to help clarify for me.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nyti...

I don't think we will have trouble finding a BIPOC author we haven't read before. There are all genres - romance, fantasy, comedy, etc. in addition to literary fiction and nonfiction on historical or racial issues.

I've seen a lot of debate on whether it is should be Black, Indigenous and People of Color or if it is meant to be limited to Black, Indigenous People of Color. I likely will focus in on Black or Indigenous authors for myself just to limit it a bit but I think Ellie's sentiments are right!

I am happy with both the tops and a bit sad to see blackjack in the bottom as I thought that was a clever way to focus on "21".

I'm really glad the BIPOC author prompt got in - I have so many on my TBR I've been meaning to get to.

For the new-to-you BIPOC author, if you haven't already I HIGHLY recommend Roxane Gay.

She has a lot of great fiction and non-fiction books.

Also, I know voting has ended, but should the monochromatic color be changed to add "primarily" one color. Looking at the listopia, most of them would need to be removed due to lettering being a different color or small additions of other colors popping up.

Sorry about being so OCD on this.

I'm happy with the results. I was hoping for a couple more prompts though. For the BIPOC I want to read Dear Martin but I don't know if I can hold off until next year to read it.

I have to search through my books for monochromatic cover. I can't think of one offhand.

Joan wrote: "I'm happy with the results. I was hoping for a couple more prompts though. For the BIPOC I want to read Dear Martin but I don't know if I can hold off until next year to read it...."

Joan, this is the same one I have in mind for the prompt, although I am sure I can find about 100 more :-)

I am really loving the monochromatic cover also.

Happy about these two. I think for this poll I had 5 up votes and 3 down initially, then had to go back and change it because I forgot the cover one.

Hi everybody! I’ve pretty much disappeared from gr over the last few months but have been following the ‘21 voting process.

I’m super confused by the monochromatic cover prompt. That means one color, doesn’t it?

But most of the books on the listopia have more colors than one. The Martian and This Is How It Always Is - orange, yellow, red, black , white. The Power of Habit - yellow, red, black. The Concrete Rose - red, brown, black, white. They Both Die at the End - blue, white, black. The Four Winds - black, white, gold.

So...what does monochromatic mean?

dalex wrote: "Hi everybody! I’ve pretty much disappeared from gr over the last few months but have been following the ‘21 voting process.

I’m super confused by the monochromatic cover prompt. That means one co..."

Yay dalex is back!

Monochromatic means everything is one color. So a book with a light pink background, hot pink title, etc would be exactly monochromatic. Some people are being a little looser and adding books that are 'mostly' one color.

Jackie wrote: "dalex wrote: "Hi everybody! I’ve pretty much disappeared from gr over the last few months but have been following the ‘21 voting process.

I’m super confused by the monochromatic cover prompt. Tha..."

Can the mods clean up the Listopia then to accurately reflect the prompt? Or maybe create a separate KIS listopia for those looking to do an easier version of the prompt?

I'm happy with the 2 winners. They were both prompts that I voted for. I slightly preferred the retelling variant of the BIPOC prompt, but I can still use many of those books here since those are new-to-me authors, or leave that prompt in my rejects challenge. For monochromatic, I'd love to go with something that is entirely shades of one colour, but I'm also okay with the "mostly" version too since that will be much easier.

I was surprised blackjack was in the bottom! It's not one that I cared for either way. I didn't vote for or against it because I have a book that I recently bought that would work (Jackpot by Nic Stone), but I assumed it would be somewhere toward the middle! I'm glad the recipe didn't get in though. I had that prompt already this year for another challenge and it was a big struggle to find something, and I ended up not really loving the book I picked.

Bummed that the lesser known literary prize didn’t make it in. I might resubmit later in the process especially if we we don’t get many prize or list prompts. Pleased to see the BIPOC prompt get in. I preferred it over the BIPOC retelling of a classic simply because I’m a bit tired of the classic retelling prompts. looking forward to seeing what makes the cut for the next round of prompts.

Alicia wrote: "Can the mods clean up the Listopia then to accurately reflect the prompt? Or maybe create a separate KIS listopia for those looking to do an easier version of the prompt?"

If the mods are OK with it, I’m a GR librarian and can remove things from listopias. People will just keep adding, though, so you might just need to use your own judgement in choosing from the list...

I'm a librarian as well, Chrissy, but feel free to clean up the lists as you see fit. I don't get to look at the listopias as frequently as I'd like to -- I pretty much only pop over to them if someone comments on them.

dalex, I am PUMPED you are back. We missed you and your insights! As for monochromatic, I'd say that you will probably have to use your best judgement, especially when it comes to the lists.. like I said with Chrissy, we will try to keep them clean but it can be difficult. I'm personally going to limit it to the cover being a solid or mostly solid color (or at least shades of the same color), but allowing for the title and author names to be of a different color. So something to think about.

Alicia, I've deleted the parentheses altogether. We are trying to keep the list from having too many definitions or examples in parentheses, just to keep the list clean. When we post the weekly thread, I will include that tidbit on there.

Chrissy wrote: "Alicia wrote: "Can the mods clean up the Listopia then to accurately reflect the prompt? Or maybe create a separate KIS listopia for those looking to do an easier version of the prompt?"

If the mo..."

Thanks Chrissy! It may just be me. I've always been the annoying family member re: color and alphabetical organization. If others are fine with it, I'll ignore.

Thanks for the “welcome backs.” :) And thanks for insight about the monochromatic prompt. I downvoted it because I really couldn’t think of anything that fit. When the prompt got voted in I wanted to see what was on the listopia since many people obviously voted for it. The listopia just confused me. Haha.

Personally I don’t think the majority of the books really fit the prompt so it would theoretically be easy to sort it into two lists (sort of monochromatic and very monochromatic).

I will likely exclude black/white from my definition. So then the cover would have to be black/white + only one other color. I think it's easier to find books once you do that. I suppose technically that would be a KIS version.

Thanks, Ellie and Mary Beth for clarification on BIPOC.

If books I added don't fit strict definition of monochromatic, I'm okay with them being removed. I wasn't sure about some of them and I wasn't sure if the cover text should be monochromatic in relation to picture too and I added them anyway. ^^' Btw, now I think of it, this prompt might be quite a nightmare for colorblind people.

I am bummed we cannot resubmit blackjack now too - I wonder if it was because voters who don’t follow discussion didn’t realize it was in connection to the year 2021.

I would prefer the monochromatic cover prompt to include the word “primarily.” I think that was the intended spirit of the prompt. Finding a cover with no black or white on it at all is a bit too difficult.

I also was thinking something along the same lines as Entropia with the color blind thing. Some of the books on the list that don't look like they work might actually look monochromatic to some people. I personally would leave them on the list and just say that when you look through use your best judgement on if a book actually fits what you would consider monochromatic. I can see the argument that taking them off also makes it easier for people in that situation to have a more accurate read on what is monochromatic too. I still on fall on the side of instinct to keep them there. However I'm not one to be super strict about keeping stuff to the exact letter of how the prompt was written so maybe I'm not the best judge lol.

That all said I'm looking forward the ones that made it in. I'm a little bummed the blackjack is in the bottom and can't be resubmitted though! I don't think I upvoted it personally but maybe I should have because I agree with what has been said about it being a creative way to focus on 21.

Maybe it was the wording of the blackjack prompt that put people off? I like the idea of it having read the discussion but without it I probably would have interpreted it as only related to gambling/playing cards

I have several hardbacks bought second-hand, so they tend to have completely plain covers as either the dustjacket has gone, or they are very old editions (early 20th century) and never had dustjackets. They will work for me for the monochromatic covers!

i'm a little disappointed more prompts didn't make it through but i'm happy that the bipoc prompt did!

the monochromatic cover one is a tad confusing but i think it'll be fun to explore the kis/bio options and see how other people are interpreting it.

So the cover prompt is actually “a book with a cover that is only one color or shades of one color, not necessarily counting the title and author, which can be one or more additional colors.” Ha!

I wouldn't count black and white as separate colors since they're always the darkest or the lightest shade of any color to an extreme. So I'd count say black, white and red as monochromatic.

Avery wrote: "I am bummed we cannot resubmit blackjack now too - I wonder if it was because voters who don’t follow discussion didn’t realize it was in connection to the year 2021.

I would prefer the monochroma..."

I can't speak for the others that down-voted it, but I wasn't drawn to the gambling/blackjack prompt because it seemed either too specific (if I had to find a book about the game of blackjack) or too broad if it was meant to be stretched to include anything even remotely related to playing cards. Does that make sense?

Compared to a new-to-you BIPOC author or a monochromatic cover, which are very straightforward (you can't stretch a white author's book to complete the BIPOC author prompt; you can't read a book with 5 colors on the cover to fit the monochromatic prompt), this prompt just seemed like it was meant to be stretched and have a ton of wiggle room.

There is nothing wrong with that, of course. It's just my personal preference to have straightforward prompts. Or alternatively, prompts that are very obviously/openly freebies, like the summer challenge prompt, "Read a happy book."

I'd almost feel like I were cheating if I read, for example, a tragic romance novel completely unrelated to 21/gambling/blackjack/casinos just because blackjack uses playing cards, a quarter of which are hearts, and hearts = romance. I'd be more comfortable choosing a book about numbers/counting, games, math, money, casinos, or Las Vegas, and I just don't have any in mind that I'd want to read at the moment.

(Of course, if I hadn't read Casino Royale a couple of years ago, I'd totally have voted for this prompt!!)