Around the Year in 52 Books discussion

It's now time to get ready to vote for our 8th set of prompts! The thread will be open for at least 24 hours before the poll gets posted. This is a good opportunity to ask any question you may have regarding the prompts, do some research or ask for recommendations.

Voting will open on Thursday, August 13 and results will be posted on Monday, August 17.

How it works:
- When the voting opens, follow the link to the mini-poll that will be added at the end of this post
- You have a total of 8 votes this poll to spread across your favorite and least favorite prompts (you can also use less than 8 votes) - You can find examples of acceptable voting practices on the Introduction thread.
- The prompts with the more favorable votes (comparing top votes to bottom votes, and looking at the overall number of votes it received) will be added to the final list (between 2 and 5 depending on how the votes are spread)

We are asking people to include their Goodreads profile address when they vote. To find this, just go to your own profile and then copy the URL/web address. If for some reason you can't link to your Goodreads profile, please post your full Goodreads name with enough identifiable information that we'll be able to access your profile. We’ve introduced this for two reasons:

1. On a few occasions in each poll, people have used more than the allotted number of votes, either because they aren’t familiar with the rules or just by mistake. When this happens our only option is to disregard the vote as we can’t identify the voter to ask them to resubmit. By asking for your profile address we’ll be able to message you and ask you to vote again if you’ve accidentally used more than the allotted number of votes.

2. Unfortunately a very small number of people have voted more than once per poll and so we are asking for this information to prevent duplicate votes.

As a reminder: You have a total of 8 votes to use among your top and bottom votes. The mods have access to each individual vote, so we can see if you use more than 8 votes. If you use more than 8 votes in the poll, your vote will have to be deleted, so please make sure to follow the directions so your voice can be heard.

Possible Prompts:

1. A book about or set in outer space
2. A book with a character who can be found in a deck of cards
3. A book from the New York Public Library's 125 Books We Love List
4. A book with a non-binary/trans character or author
5. A book about a farm animal, or a protagonist whose characteristics resemble an ox
6. A medical memoir
7. A book involving an immigrant
8. Read an “Epic” book
9. A book recommended by someone you trust
10. A book from the "500 Great Books by Women" list
11. A book from one of The Million's most anticipated lists
12. A book from the Los Angeles Public Library Book List (excluding Best of Year lists)
13. A book by an author who publishes under a pen name or variant of their real name (including initials)
14. A book with elements of magic
15. A book about a hero



Feel free to discuss the prompts below, but please remember to be respectful to the other group members.

VOTE HERE: https://www.surveymoz.com/s/MPNDIS/

Discussion, examples, and links

1. A book about or set in outer space
This is in honor of the Mars rover due to land on Mars in February, plus the launch of an unmanned mission to the moon in November.

2. A book with a character who can be found in a deck of cards
This isn't limited to the 52 card deck (kings, queens, Jack, joker, ace (asexual character?) but also a tarot deck, eg. Magician, hermit, priestess, Death, etc.

3. A book from the New York Public Library's 125 Books We Love List, created to commemorate their 125th Anniversary
link: https://www.nypl.org/books-more/recom...
The list covers pretty much everything - classic literature, contemporary literature, world literature, historical fiction, non-fiction, short stories, poetry, graphic novels, fantasy, sci-fi, mystery, horror

5. A book about a farm animal, or a protagonist whose characteristics resemble an ox, in honor of 2021, the Chinese Year of the Ox
Examples: Books from the point of view of farm animals (War Horse, Black Beauty, Charlotte’s Web, Animal Farm) or featuring farmers, pet owners, vets, horse jockeys, possibly people in the circus if they work with domesticated animals, etc.

Note: The word “ox” is a misleading translation because it actually refers to any type of domesticated bovine, especially cows/cattle. 2022 will be the year of the tiger, I think followed by dragon and snake so we won’t get another farm or working animal for quite a while!

7. A book involving an immigrant
This could include a fiction or non-fiction book including an immigration story, adaptation to a new country, child of an immigrant, the same involving a refugee or policy on immigration.

8. Read an “Epic” book
It could be:
1. an epic fantasy or adventure story like one of the Lord of the Rings books
2. an epic family saga
3. an epic poem like The Iliad
4. a western epic
5. a book related to an epic battle (https://www.livescience.com/42716-epi...)

9. A book recommended by someone you trust
Examples: your mom, a coworker, a member of ATY, a book critic, President Obama, etc

10. A book from the "500 Great Books by Women" list
link: https://www.librarything.com/bookawar...

11. A book from one of The Million's most anticipated lists
link: https://themillions.com/?s=most+antic...
These lists are published monthly (as well as a longer list twice a year) listing the most anticipated new releases. It does go back to 2005, so you don't necessarily have to read a new release for this prompt.

12. A book from the Los Angeles Public Library Book List (excluding Best of Year lists)
link: https://www.lapl.org/collections-reso...

13. A book by an author who publishes under a pen name or variant of their real name (including initials).
ex: Toni Morrison, the Brontes, Stephen King, Nora Roberts

14. A book with elements of magic
Could be fantasy, magical realism, a non-ficiton or fiction book about a magician/witch, optical illusions, time travel books, a book with a glow in the dark cover, etc.

I feel like I don’t understand what a “medical memoir” is. Could I get some guidance on that?

Nadine wrote: "I feel like I don’t understand what a “medical memoir” is. Could I get some guidance on that?"

You beat me to it.

Oh no, earlier I looked at the LAPL lists and found lots books I want to read...on the best of lists! 🤣 I will have to take another look tomorrow.

This is a great set of prompts though, lots of things the list is lacking in.

I seem to recognise that 500 books list, and it's just not my cup of tea.

I assume a memoir about being sick, or caring for someone who has medical issues?

I was thinking the story of a doctor, nurse, researcher, etc.

Nadine wrote: "I feel like I don’t understand what a “medical memoir” is. Could I get some guidance on that?"

I love medical memoirs, basically a memoir by someone who works in medicine. Some examples:
War Doctor: Surgery on the Front Line
This Is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor
Breaking & Mending: A Doctor’s Story of Burnout and Recovery
Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death and Brain Surgery
When Breath Becomes Air

It could also apply to a memoir dealing with medical conditions or dealing with the medical industry.

I want to say that while I'm not a huge fan of list/award prompts, I'm really happy that a bunch of them are on 1 poll. Because of this, I'm more okay with a list/award prompt getting in because I now at least get to have my say of which is the most interesting to me, rather than list-prompt-lovers voting in an underwhelming list prompt because it's the only one in the poll.

To be clear, the New York Public Library's 125th Anniversary is for year 2020, not year 2021? I don't think that bothers me too much (okay maybe a little, I'd prefer to leave off the "anniversary" part of the prompt since it's unrelated to 2021) but I also just want to make sure the list won't get taken down or anything in 2021.

If the Card character prompt wins, I'm using this list of explanations for guidance. https://exemplore.com/fortune-divinat...

It opened my eyes to many possibilities and will definitely get my vote.

One of the mods pointed out there are other games with their own decks of cards. I remember a game called Happy Families which had a bunch of occupations in.

Avery wrote: "I want to say that while I'm not a huge fan of list/award prompts, I'm really happy that a bunch of them are on 1 poll. Because of this, I'm more okay with a list/award prompt getting in because I ..."

Oops! That is my bad, I did some hasty copy/pasting there. We don't usually include bits like "for the anniversary of" in the final list wording.

Also, I'm betting the 125 books we love list will still be available on the internet next year and if not, we can make a GR list of them if need be.

Medical Memoir was my suggestion, sorry for not giving much explanation! The way I intended it was as Ellie mentions above with some great examples.

From the 'patient' perspective a couple of examples could be Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness or Girl, Interrupted

Ooh Cards Against Humanity could make for an interesting result...

I would probably go through and add the 125 books to a listopia list, then allow people to upvote them if it gets in.

Would you also count something like All Creatures Great and Small as a medical memoir?

Nadine wrote: "I feel like I don’t understand what a “medical memoir” is. Could I get some guidance on that?"

There's a goodreads shelf: https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...

I don't know how reliable the list is, but it could be a good starting point!

Juliet wrote: "Would you also count something like All Creatures Great and Small as a medical memoir?"

That's a great idea! Animals need medical care too

Ellie wrote: "One of the mods pointed out there are other games with their own decks of cards. I remember a game called Happy Families which had a bunch of occupations in."

Yeah, tarot immediately came to mind after the good ol' four suits cards.

Juliet wrote: "Would you also count something like All Creatures Great and Small as a medical memoir?"

Ooh, that's on my nightstand right now. Great idea!

I definitely need to do a bit of research to decide, especially about the various list prompts. On first glance, the only one I really like is the Millions Most Anticipated lists.

I've found quite a few books I like on the LA lists, but primarily on the "Best of the Year" lists so it's too bad those are excluded. I'm not a fan at all of the 500 Books by Women list or the NY list, since I've already read the books that interest me from both of those.

If the moderators want to take off the exclusion part of the LAPL prompt, I am fine with that. I debated whether to limit it or not. I should’ve gone with not!

At the moment all the lists are on my down vote list. I felt either underwhelmed or overwhelmed by the choices. I guess, I just don’t enjoy reading lists of books.

Rachel wrote: "I definitely need to do a bit of research to decide, especially about the various list prompts. On first glance, the only one I really like is the Millions Most Anticipated lists.

I've found quit..."

I think I feel the exact same as you about all 4 of the list prompts. Millions is the only one I'm currently planning to upvote. I prefer the LA list second, and especially if it takes off the excluded lists! It can be a BIO option to exclude Best-of lists if it gets through!

I liked the sound of the 500 books by women list but when I took a quick look a lot of the titles seemed fairly literary , highbrow and maybe obscure. I found one or two that appealed but not nearly as many as I expected. I’ll definitely do some more looking though. That list is pretty overwhelming.

Jackie wrote: "Also, I'm betting the 125 books we love list will still be available on the internet next year and if not, we can make a GR list of them if need be."

I think there is already list for adult part :)

Juliet wrote: "Would you also count something like All Creatures Great and Small as a medical memoir?"

Absolutely!

I'll likely vote for the NYPL list as I have about 8 of those on my TBR anyway. I also am not a fan of the pre-exclusion for the LA list, so I prefer the NY one. But if we do remove that exclusion, I would likely vote for that list as it has a lot I'm interested in.

I'm going to upvote non-binary/trans prompt as I'm a big proponent of promoting diverse stories. I did suggest it, but my case for it is that it's a group that sometimes gets forgotten in the LGBTQIA category. It narrows down the category, but there are still a lot of good fiction and non-fiction options.

I'll also definitely be upvoting the deck of cards, immigrant, someone you trust, and magic.

So far my downvote will be a medical memoir, as the books I've read in this genre I've really hated.

Juliet wrote: "Would you also count something like All Creatures Great and Small as a medical memoir?"

I was thinking of a James Herriot book for the ox -farm animal suggestion

I just finished The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime That Changed Their Lives, which is about an agender teenager (which is a form of nonbinary and would count, I believe).

A few others would be The Vanishing Half and When the Moon Was Ours. I thought about Middlesex, if intersex counts as nonbinary or transgender.

Emily wrote: "I just finished The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime That Changed Their Lives, which is about an agender teenager (which is a form of nonbinary and would count, I..."

I think all of those count!! Also, here are some others that I've read, with either characters or authors, that I have really loved.

Map of Salt and Stars, Felix Ever After, The Death of Vivek Oji, Rivers Solomon, Zeyn Joukhadar, Sarah Gailey

Here are some other great lists for people that are curious.

https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

https://www.buzzfeed.com/isabeldaly/b...

https://medium.com/@strandbookstore/c...

Emily— The 57 Bus is a great fit. I learned so much when I read that book.

another round with a great selection of prompts!

i definitely voting for the space, deck of cards (love the ace idea!), immigrant, million's list, lapl lists, pen name & the enby/trans prompts

there are so many incredible nonbinary & trans authors out there like Mason Deaver, Casey McQuiston, author of Red, White & Royal Blue, Rin Chupeco, Victoria Lee (author of The Fever King), Yoon Ha Lee, Kacen Callender, Cori McCarthy, Alison Evans, Vivek Shraya, Austin Chant. i have a whole shelf here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...

i'll be downvoting the medical memoir prompt because, personally, i absolutely loathe reading about anything medical (especially with the current pandemic). just a personal thing, though. i am extremely squeamish and i will just skip it (or KIS it) if it makes it through the poll.

I think I will be just upvoting again this week! I like the deck of cards (especially tarot), LAPL list, magic element, immigrant, hero, pen name, and outer space. That leaves one more! I’m considering the farm animal prompt and using The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse. Great ideas everyone!

I think I'll have a lot of upvotes this round. Still mulling over the specifics.

Oh no!! I missed Emily's suggestion in the wild discussion thread!! Is it still possible to revise/rephrase my year of the ox prompt??

If it's not too late, I'd like to revise it to: A book about a farm animal, or a protagonist whose characteristics resemble an ox (in honor of 2021, the Chinese Year of the Ox)

And examples would be a protagonist that's strong, stubborn, or hardworking, or it could still be someone closely associated with farming or domesticated animals like in the original prompt (like a farmer or animal lover). It would also still include any animal protagonist.

If it's already locked in to the prompt, it's totally my bad :( I had to set an alarm to wake up and suggest it so I didn't have time to check the other threads.

Edit: I realized that I can re-submit this prompt with the new wording in the next poll, assuming it doesn't get voted in this time. So never mind, please disregard my little panic attack!

I'm in love with the deck of cards prompt. I thought it'd be hard at first, but then realized some tarot cards include "The Lovers" (any book with a romantic couple), "Strength" (any strong character), "Fortune," "The Fool," and of course, kings/queens etc. That one and the pen name prompt are my favorites from this batch.

My favorite list prompt is the New York public library one, mostly because it has a lot of books I feel like I should read in my lifetime, and I own a bunch of them already.

Is anyone else having trouble accessing the LAPL website? I keep getting an error message when I click the link

Sarah wrote: "Is anyone else having trouble accessing the LAPL website? I keep getting an error message when I click the link"

I have no problem accessing, and I'm in Denmark, so your problem is not likely an area access problem (you're in the UK, right?)

Emily wrote: "I just finished The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime That Changed Their Lives, which is about an agender teenager (which is a form of nonbinary and would count, I..."

Could we re-phrase it to say members of the LGBTQIA+ community instead of just nonbinary and trans people? Or at least add the +? An LGBTQIA+ friend just asked me to post here (for confidentiality's sake) that they do not like being put into the nonbinary/trans box just because they're more visible than intersex, genderfluid, and other identities currently.

I agree that we shouldn't put people who don't identify as trans or non-binary into those groups just because it seems "close enough".

I thought point of the prompt was that LGBTQIA+ prompts tend to lead to people reading LGB only, but it hasn't been worded to be inclusive of QIA+ and some people are interpreting like it is...

Very good point. Is there such a thing as TQIA+? Could that be worked in? Because the alternative, "LGBTQIA+ with a focus on TQIA+," sounds pretty harsh and almost mocking, doesn't it?

Conny wrote: "Very good point. Is there such a thing as TQIA+? Could that be worked in? Because the alternative, "LGBTQIA+ with a focus on TQIA+," sounds pretty harsh and almost mocking, doesn't it?"

I agree with both of you! And Conny, that's what I was thinking as well. Is there a way to put a positive spin on it? Like BIPOC, which refers to all people of color, but with an emphasis on black and indigenous people because they've historically been more oppressed than latinx, asian, and middle eastern people (at least in the U.S.)

The only thing that I can think of is "LGBTQIA+" might lead to more people voting for it? (I could see a lot of people down-voting nonbinary or trans character/author because it's very similar to a popsugar prompt this year) And people who want to push themselves could (and should) still choose to focus on TQIA+.

I like the NYPL list (obviously, since I suggested it). There are at least a dozen books on the list that I would like to read so I'm definitely upvoting it.

The LA Library list of lists is almost too much but I easily found some books I'm interested in so that will probably be an upvote also.

I found the 500 Women list entirely overwhelming. And it's supposedly an older list - "By Erica Bauermeister, Jesse Larsen, and Holly Smith (1994)" which makes it less interesting to me. Plus there are 508 books on the list. Definitely a downvote for me.

The Millions lists have tons of options, which I don't really like, but I can almost certainly find something to pick. I probably won't vote for it either way.

Most of the non-list prompts I don't have much of an opinion about and think they'd be super simple. Medical Memoir, however, is a downvote. I don't like non-fiction and that prompt is entirely too restrictive for me.

I was thinking the same thing about the enby/trans prompt, even as I was suggesting books (because intersex is something completely different than enby and trans, and I agree that "close enough" doesn't feel quite right). But I also don't want to open it up past the original suggester's intent, which was to have the LGBTQIA+ focus on the less represented gender expressions (aside from LGB).

What about

"A book with a nonbinary/trans/+ author or character" -- just adding the plus would allow for gender fluidity, intersex, etc. and it would keep it in the spirit of the prompt.

(Also, if you have concerns, please feel free to message me privately and we can figure out the best phrasing to include the people this prompt was meant to include.)

Emily wrote: "I was thinking the same thing about the enby/trans prompt, even as I was suggesting books (because intersex is something completely different than enby and trans, and I agree that "close enough" do..."

That phrasing sounds great. I'm not the one who suggested it, but I think you're right that the original intent was not to open it up to LGB books. Go Emily!! ^^ Hopefully it gets voted through!

Every year I excitedly await the release of the Millions Most Anticipated lists! I have found some GREAT books this way, so I am definitely upvoting this choice!!! I really hope it makes it in. I think it’s been suggested three years in a row now, but never a winner. For the KIS readers, it could be any of the MMA lists. For a BIO reader, it could be the first half of 2021 list (or second half of 2021, but that doesn’t come out until July).

I thought this article about "‘George Eliot’ joins 24 female authors making debuts under their real names" in The Guardian today was timely in light of the pen name prompt! https://www.theguardian.com/books/202...

I was just about to say I'm torn on The Millions most anticipated because the books I want to read most never seem to make it over here...and then low and behold I found we are finally getting We Ride Upon Sticks next year, which I first found on their lists. Maybe it's a sign.

I'd vote for LAPL if it included best of lists, I think there is a better mix of genre fiction on them than the themed lists.