Around the Year in 52 Books discussion

It's now time to get ready to vote for our next 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 in the evening of Wednesday, July 26 and results will be posted on Sunday, July 30.

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

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.

Possible Prompts:
1. A book with a hidden object on the cover
2. A book related to “soul”
3. A book related to something mentioned in the lyrics of What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong
4. A book with a person on the cover and you can’t see their whole face
5. A fiction book with a real person as a character
6. Read a book involving immigration, migration or relocation to another country.
7. A book by an author from a Southeast Asian country
8. A book featuring a "First Responder"
9. A book with a secondary color on the cover (orange, green or purple)
10. A book with a chilling atmosphere (scary, unsettling, cold)
11. A book with a main character who is Black, Indigenous, or a Person of Color
12. A book related to something you take for granted
13. A book related to athletics in honor of the Summer Olympics
14. A book set in BCE
15. A retelling of a familiar tale

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

VOTE HERE: https://forms.gle/MFKCvBBS5qAms1Dk7

Ideas, Lists, and Links from the Suggestion Thread

1. A book with a hidden object on the cover
Any book with a cover that has an image hidden in it, an optical illusion, or one object seeming to to be two things etc.
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
And many cover examples that I'm hoping Brittany will copy over into a post below :)

2. A book related to “soul”
Soul in the Title:
The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration Into the Wonder of Consciousness
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
Our Souls At Night by Kent Haruf – https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...
Soulless (Parasol Protecorate, #1) by GailCariger (Steampunk) - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6...
A Discovery of Witches (All Souls Trilogy) by Deborah Harkness - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8...
The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. Du Bois - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
Inés of My Soul by Isabel Allende - https://www.goodreads.com/search?q=in...

Good for the soul:
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
The Gift of Imperfection by Brene Brown - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7...
Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

About our soul:
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...
The Five People You Meet In Heaven by Mitch Albom - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4...
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4...
Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4...
The Gift of Imperfection by Brene Brown - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7...
The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom (Hardcover) by Miguel Ruiz - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6...
Anatomy of the Soul: Mind, God, and the Afterlife by Stephen Goldberg - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6...

Soul Music:
Higher Ground: Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Curtis Mayfield, and the Rise and Fall of American Soul by Craig Werner - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
Otis Redding: An Unfinished Life by Jonathan Gould - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...
The Influential Legends of Soul Music: The Lives of Sam Cooke, Otis Redding, Marvin Gaye, Aretha Franklin, and Stevie Wonder by Charles River Editors - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
Soul Train - The Music, Dance, and Style of a Generation by Ahmir Questlove Thompson - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

Soul food:
https://www.delish.com/kitchen-tools/...
https://blacksouthernbelle.com/soul-f...
Soul Food: The Surprising Story of an American Cuisine, One Plate at a Time by Adrian Miller - https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/sho...
The Taste of Country Cooking by Edna Lewis - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
The Cooking Gene: A Journey Through African American Culinary History in the Old South by Michael W. Twitty - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...

3. A book related to something mentioned in the lyrics of What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong
https://genius.com/Louis-armstrong-wh...

5. A fiction book with a real person as a character
https://historicalnovelsociety.org/ge...

6. Read a book involving Immigration, migration or relocation to another country.
*Commemorates the 70th anniversary of Ellis Island's closing. (Ellis Island is the symbol of immigration, and processed more than 12 million immigrants into the US.)

You could read a book:
a. about an immigrant who was processed in Ellis Island in New York, or Angel Island in San Francisco
b. involving immigration, migration, or relocation to another country, anywhere in the world.
c. involving migrant refugees escaping a warn torn country, violence, hunger, etc.
d. related to ancestry research at Ellis Island or other locations.
e. Migrants leaving Phoenix to live in Canada or upstate New York due to global warming.
f. People leaving the planet to live on a space colony
g. an expatriate from your country working for a global company in Singapore, France or India.
g. Read about a grueling migration adventure
h. Read about how a family adapts to a new culture and language over a course of years.

LINKS:
Immigration
https://www.goodreads.com/genres/immi...
Migration
https://www.goodreads.com/genres/migr...
Refugees
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...
Refugee Week
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
Immigration Experience
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/3...
Superheroes Refugees and Immigrants
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

7. A book by an author from a Southeast Asian country
Brunei, Cambodia, East Timor, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam

8. A book featuring a "First Responder"
Could be a firefighter, police officer, EMT/Ambulance, Diver - anyone who responds to an emergency or disaster

14. A book set before the year "0"
14. A book set in BCE
BCE = Before the Common Era; reworded by the mods for clarity

Wow, the suggestions were done so quick, I didn't have time to mentally process them!

There are a couple I need to think more on, such as a book about something I take for granted and set before '0' but nothing that jumps out at first glance as a huge NO. Hm.....

°~Amy~° wrote: "Wow, the suggestions were done so quick, I didn't have time to mentally process them!"

Me neither LMAO! I could hardly keep up!

Question...How are the results determined? Is it a certain % or number of upvotes? This is my first year here, and I'm really having a great time with the process. So many great suggestions! Ready to start reading, but haven't finished 2023 yet...lol

It's looking like 3 up (BIPOC character, not full face on cover, and Louis Armstrong song) and 5 down for me. I'm going to have to watch this discussion lol.

Robin wrote: "Question...How are the results determined? Is it a certain % or number of upvotes? This is my first year here, and I'm really having a great time with the process. So many great suggestions! Ready ..."

I wrote a formula; basically the net votes (tops - bottoms) and then factoring in the standard deviation. It's a mix of science and art though; sometimes we the mods will adjust things to account for outliers for example. Mostly we have a fairly steady number of voters so the formula does a good job of simplifying it for us.

Hidden object on cover

Any book with a cover that has an image hidden in it, an optical illusion, or one object seeming to to be two things etc.

Examples:
Six of Crows - buildings under wing
Educated - Person in nature inside pencil
They Both Die at the End - Skull face and Grim Reaper
Somebody's Daughter - Snake
My Sister, the Serial Killer - knife in glasses reflection


Hidden Faces-
The Violence
Black Cake
The Half Moon
Dead Reckoning
Her Lost Words: A Novel of Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley
The Vanishing Half


Busy cover where things can be hidden-
Demon Copperhead
The Inheritance Games
The Cartographers
Weyward
Lost in the Moment and Found


A major clue to the plot is hidden in plain sight on the cover - the paper airplane hints to a plot point of the book Yours Truly

A hidden object book like Where's Waldo?

“Hidden” and/or “objects” in title like The Hidden Memory of Objects

I found a GR list that has more options.
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

If there is any interest, I’d be awesome if anybody has other examples not on the list.

Thank you Brittany! You had so many good examples and I really did not want to copy them all over by hand lol. Goodreads is not nice about that sort of thing.

Jackie wrote: "Thank you Brittany! You had so many good examples and I really did not want to copy them all over by hand lol. Goodreads is not nice about that sort of thing."

No problem! Yeah I wish GR made these things a little easier lol.

There is a mystery writer whose main character in the series is a paramedic/deputy coroner in Pennsylvania. First book of the series is Circle of Influence by Annette Dashofy

Would this count as hidden object

There seems to be a helicopter in the sunglasses

And what about
The German Midwife as a fiction book with a real person as a character? Might be a stretch - the blurb mentions one of the characters is pregnant with the Führer's child.

Some ideas for fiction books with real people:


The Watchmaker of Filigree Street has Arthur Sullivan as a character (and is an AMAZING book).

The series beginning with Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor has Jane Austen.

Arthur & George has Arthur Conan Doyle.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

Hope Never Dies and Hope Rides Again and Feel the Bern

The series starting with My Lady Jane has various historical figures

is this book "hidden object" with the silhouettes of faces in the cave mouth wall?


The Last Neanderthal

Bec wrote: "Would this count as hidden object

There seems to be a helicopter in the sunglasses

And what about
The German Midwife as a fiction book with a real..."

I would say yes to both!

Nadine in NY wrote: "is this book "hidden object" with the silhouettes of faces in the cave mouth wall?


The Last Neanderthal "

Absolutely!

I can think of a few ideas for “set before 0 / BCE”.

Specific:
The Clan of the Cave Bear series

General anything involving:
Ancient Greece
Alexander the Great
Cleopatra
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Rome
Ancient Pueblo people
Non-fiction re: dinosaurs

This may all be obvious, but there were some eras that I wasn’t sure, off the top of my head, where they fell on the BCE/CE timeline.

Sandra wrote: "Some ideas for fiction books with real people"

Max Collins has an awesome "disaster" series where the main characters are authors:
The Titanic Murders - Jacques Futrelle (who perished aboard the Titanic)
The Hindenburg Murders - Leslie Charteris (The Saint series)
The Pearl Harbor Murders - Edgar Rice Burroughs (Tarzan)

There are six total. I've read 3 so far, and they are fantastic.

For help looking at Southeast Asian authors. Southeast Asia includes: Brunei, Cambodia, East Timor, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.


I've found that searching for "Southeast Asian" authors tends to give a lot of lists of Asian authors (primarily Chinese, Korean, and Japanese) and South Asian authors (primarily Indian), so it's better to search by country.

Some of my all-time favorite authors are from Malaysia & Vietnam, in particular: Zen Cho & Thanhhà Lại. These authors are now in Britain & the USA, respectively, but they were born in Southeast Asia and their books are full of the culture of their homelands.

Some Listopias (and of course we all know that Listopias are not 100% reliable):

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

Filipino Authors:
Speculative fiction: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/8...
Romance: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
general fiction:
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/8...
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

Indonesian Authors:
Fantasy novels: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
general fiction: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/8...

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

Singapore Writers Festival (this is not exclusively Southeast Asian authors, it's a mix):
2009 https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/3...

Thai Authors:
fiction: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/9...

Vietnamese Authors:
Literary fiction: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...
YA thrillers & fantasy: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...



Southeast Asian authors:
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

Gail W wrote: "There is a mystery writer whose main character in the series is a paramedic/deputy coroner in Pennsylvania. First book of the series is Circle of Influence by [author: Annette Dash..."

Others I thought of could be Emergency Room doctors/nurses and Search & Rescue, including dogs!

At first glance, it's a relatively underwhelming list for me. Nothing that I hate or wouldn't be able to manage, but several prompts that are not so exciting for me personally because I've done them (or very similar) on other challenges over the years.

I've have 4 fairly strong upvotes in mind and 2 or 3 down, but I'd like to use all my votes one way or another so I'll look at some of the lists and discussions.

It sounds like having the suggestions in the evening speeded things up and maybe included different people, we’ll have to try that again sometime later.

I have a question on prompt #4 - "can't see their whole face" - is the intent that you can see part of their face? So many covers have people facing completely away and none of their face can be seen. I know I can interpret it my own way, but I'm curious of the original intent.

Sue wrote: "I have a question on prompt #4 - "can't see their whole face" - is the intent that you can see part of their face? So many covers have people facing completely away and none of their face can be se..."

I obvioulsy have no idea of the original intent...but for me, given we have faceless person on the cover this year, to make it different I'm thinking of this one as you can see part of their face but not all. I went through my TBR and actually had heaps.

This is a tough week for me. I like secondary color and athletics but it’s a no for first responder. Other than that… I don’t know! I’m going to base my decision on whether the prompts match books I own that I want to read. The face prompt is a probable yes since it’s easy enough to find.

Once again, I missed nomination day. Some of the prompts were discussed in the wild discussion. Others are new to me. I have no idea how I'm voting yet.

1. A book with a hidden object on the cover - I think I like this one. I have no idea if I have a book on my TBR that fits.

2. A book related to “soul” - I'm probably voting for this. It seems to have lots of possibilities.

3. A book related to something mentioned in the lyrics of What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong - I love this and we haven't had a song prompt in a year or two.

4. A book with a person on the cover and you can’t see their whole face - This seems like the faceless prompt we just did this year.

5. A fiction book with a real person as a character - This one is cool. I think I manage to have a book or books fit this without trying.

6. Read a book involving immigration, migration or relocation to another country. - This seems recycled. We had this two years ago.

7. A book by an author from a Southeast Asian country - I have no books that fit.

8. A book featuring a "First Responder" - I read mysteries, so there is usually a cop. Not a hard prompt for me to fill.

9. A book with a secondary color on the cover (orange, green or purple) - This doesn't excite me, but I don't think it's hard to fill.

10. A book with a chilling atmosphere (scary, unsettling, cold) - The everyone is snowed in together and one of us is killer trope - I have a bunch of TBR books that would fit all 3 definitions of the world chilling. (And I still love that trope.)

11. A book with a main character who is Black, Indigenous, or a Person of Color - This seems recycled again, but not hard to fill.

12. A book related to something you take for granted - I saw the list. I like the idea of being grateful, but I have no clue what I would read.

13. A book related to athletics in honor of the Summer Olympics - I refused to do this prompt for PopSugar this year, and I'll be wildcarding if this gets in.

14. A book set before the year "0" - We had three centuries this year. And I read a book set before 1BC for the prompt. This seems recycled.

15. A retelling of a familiar tale - I have so many derivative or spin off works from P&P on my TBR. I would have loved this prompt more if it was "retellings or spinoffs". I'll probably still vote for it and give "retelling" an expanded definition in my head.

I'm a little confused by the "something you take for granted" prompt. Is the intent to specifically a book about someone who does NOT have the thing that I take for granted? Or any book that involves whatever thing I pick?

There is no year 0! Maybe that one should be reworded to be a book set BCE (before common era)?

Ancient Rome continued into CE so not all of it will apply. Julius Caesar and Cleopatra are BCE but some well known figures such as Caligula, Nero and Boudica are CE.

I too missed nomination day - UK time? I checked regularly.

1. A book with a hidden object on the cover
Not thrilled by this.

2. A book related to “soul”
Possible

3. A book related to something mentioned in the lyrics of What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong
Wide enough to be interesting

4. A book with a person on the cover and you can’t see their whole face
A definite down vote as we had 'faceless person on the cover this year'

Any of prompts 5-11 would be ok with me but there's nothing that leaps out as an up vote

12. A book related to something you take for granted
I like this prompt and would upvote

13. A book related to athletics in honor of the Summer Olympics
A downvote because PopSugar and the Summer Challenge this year have had a sports related prompt.

14. A book set before the year "0"
Ok.

15. A retelling of a familiar tale
Another downvote because it was a PopSugar prompt this year.

I'm also pretty underwhelmed by this selection. Was an X related prompt not put forward in the end?

Brittany wrote: "Jackie wrote: "Thank you Brittany! You had so many good examples and I really did not want to copy them all over by hand lol. Goodreads is not nice about that sort of thing."

No problem! Yeah I wi..."

For future reference, if I'm suggesting a prompt with a load of book covers on I put all the code into a shared Google doc and link to it for easy copying.

It always takes me a bit of time to register all the suggestions when I miss them happening. The only one that stands out is chilling atmosphere, because I like that it has two interpretations for people who won't read anything scary.

What a Wonderful World is irrevocably linked to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for me, because it's played at the end of the BBC version, and I guess that was the first time I heard it. The lyrics themselves seem to lend themselves to cover elements the most...so maybe.

I did soul on my rejects challenge this year and read A Witch's Guide to Fake Dating a Demon which is another way to interpret the prompt.

Books tagged with Faustian bargain:
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...

I'll probably vote this way:

UPVOTE:
1. A book with a hidden object on the cover
2. A book related to “soul”
6. Read a book involving immigration, migration or relocation to another country.
7. A book by an author from a Southeast Asian country
10. A book with a chilling atmosphere (scary, unsettling, cold)
13. A book related to athletics in honor of the Summer Olympics - only because the Beartown trilogy is on my TBR

DOWNVOTE
12. A book related to something you take for granted
15. A retelling of a familiar tale

NEUTRAL
14. A book set before the year "0"
4. A book with a person on the cover and you can’t see their whole face
11. A book with a main character who is Black, Indigenous, or a Person of Color
8. A book featuring a "First Responder"
9. A book with a secondary color on the cover (orange, green or purple)
3. A book related to something mentioned in the lyrics of What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong
5. A fiction book with a real person as a character

Also I see what people mean about the hidden objects being hard to see online. I've thought about buying Feed Them Silence so many times, so I'm familiar with the cover, but I thought it was just a line of ribbon or smoke that the wolf was stood on. Nope, it's a face!

I had two suggestions and hoped I could send them, but obviously, you are much faster, hahaha!! Well, that's life! I will try next time :D

Update: THOMAS, THANK YOU!! I just saw that one of my suggestions went through. You are a star!

Ups:
1. A book with a hidden object on the cover
9. A book with a secondary color on the cover (orange, green or purple)
11. A book with a main character who is Black, Indigenous, or a Person of Color
12. A book related to something you take for granted

Downs:
13. A book related to athletics in honor of the Summer Olympics
14. A book set before the year "0"

In Between:
2. A book related to “soul”
3. A book related to something mentioned in the lyrics of What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong
4. A book with a person on the cover and you can’t see their whole face
5. A fiction book with a real person as a character
6. Read a book involving immigration, migration or relocation to another country.
7. A book by an author from a Southeast Asian country
8. A book featuring a "First Responder"
10. A book with a chilling atmosphere (scary, unsettling, cold)
15. A retelling of a familiar tale

I am not really a fan of the hidden object cover. Or the before the year "0" prompt to be honest. Everything else I'm fairly neutral on. I did like First Responder for fire fighter (I watch Chicago Fire!) but it doesn't seem to be a popular one lol

Ellie wrote: "It always takes me a bit of time to register all the suggestions when I miss them happening."

I feel the same way. My first gut reaction was that nothing really stood out to me, but on second glance, I'm starting to like f ew of them.

If the Wonderful World prompt makes it in, I will probably take the line about the rainbow as a prompt to read something LBTQIA+-related.
The hidden object is intriguing; the chilling atmosphere and the first responder are both easy for me, as I read a lot of horror/thrillers/police/detective stuff. BIPOC main character is pretty much a standard prompt by now but also important, so I'll probably be voting for it.

My only two definite downvotes will be athletics and retelling. I'm not a big fan of retellings to begin with, and the prompt feels overdone, even though I understand of course that it's been opned up somehow. The problem is, if you open it up too much, it becomes too easy. There can be elements of classic tales/archetypical stories in almost every book if you look hard enough.

First impressions.

FAVORITE
⭐️Something you take for granted - this reminds me of why I loved some of my favorite books. This is a fresh concept, not a rehash, so I hope it gets in.

Wonderful world - It will make me smile and I have good options for it.
Soul - I hope it gets in this year. I have books that fit perfectly
Southeast Asian author- I have two must-read books for this that didn’t fit Asian diaspora.
Immigration - migration is a hot topic right now
Bipoc author - always a good topic for me
First responder - it’s time this had a chance
Fiction book with a real person- very easy for me
Cover with person with no face- very easy for me
Hidden object - maybe

Downvote - Year 0.

All the rest seem ok so far.

Rachel wrote: "I'm a little confused by the "something you take for granted" prompt. Is the intent to specifically a book about someone who does NOT have the thing that I take for granted? Or any book that involv..."

I don’t think you have to plan it so carefully. I would enjoy it more if it snuck up on me. You can try to pick a book about very poor people, but sometimes rich and powerful characters lack some things that you have. (Such as friends that love you just for you.) As a teenager, when I read about terrible parents, it made me realize my mother wasn’t a total monster.

I recommend A Thousand Splendid Suns. It has characters who don’t have any of the freedoms or opportunities that most western women take for granted. It’s also a great book.

@Pearl

Yes that’s similar to Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano in which a character has parents who don’t love or support him. He then marries into a big family full of love and support. Shows how easy it could be to take family for granted.

I missed suggestion time and have to get caught up on this thread and the wild to plan my votes .. but ... I just finished The Bandit Queens which would be a great fit for the 'something you take for granted'. Loads of social issues throughout, walking to the well to get water, sketchy power connectivity and one of the MC's goals is to buy a fridge. Many of the families don't have them.

We have this listopia from the centuries prompt this year for books set in BCE:

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

I will talk to the mods about maybe rewording the prompt and get back to y'all.

Also, I don't know if we do take it for granted anymore, but one thing this prompt makes me think of is large gatherings (without having to mask / take other precautions). It was definitely something I didn't realize I'd taken for granted until I was reading books during lockdown and was jealous of the descriptions of parties!

If the Wonderful World prompt makes it in, I'll be reading The Baron in the Trees, an old favorite I've been wanting to reread.

@Joanna - I like your interpretation of “taking for granted”, I.e., not having to mask and being able to go to parties without worrying about the life and death consequences.

It surprises me to see so many people saying they don't like the "What a Wonderful World" prompt when so many people were disappointed the "roses are red" rhyme did not get through for the multiweek poll. They cover almost exactly the same bases, including the roses, blue sky for the violets, and the sweetness of life and love. Anyway, I love that prompt the most. It's the kind of creative thing that made me drop Popsugar for ATY, and I really hope it gets in.

Nadine in NY wrote: "For help looking at Southeast Asian authors. Southeast Asia includes: Brunei, Cambodia, East Timor, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.
.."

I love this prompt- I read a lot of Indian, Chinese, and Korean authors, but not much from these countries. Except Kevin Kwan- would love him to release another book! And there's always the next book in the detective series Ovidia Yu

There do seem to be quite a few Vietnamese writers as well like Viet Thanh Nguyen who has a new book out this fall. And I would could Ocean Vuong even though his book takes place down the street where I grew up in Connecticut.

Amy (Other Amy) wrote: "It surprises me to see so many people saying they don't like the "What a Wonderful World" prompt when so many people were disappointed the "roses are red" rhyme did not get through for the multiwee..."

Are we reading the same thread? The comments seem mostly positive towards it.

As the person who suggested Roses Are Red in the first place, I am not sure I particularly wanted it as a single week prompt, so I guess that's maybe why it's not an automatic YAY from me.

Oddly, I was pro-Roses are Red, less so What a Wonderful World. Maybe because the latter seems a little too open with the options, but roses are red, as a multi-week, was a little more restrictive? Still not sure how I'll vote though, I'll look at the lyrics again and see if I can make some matches to my TBR.

Ellie wrote: "Are we reading the same thread? The comments seem mostly positive towards it."

Maybe the flavor of individual comments is striking us differently. I just reread and I do see a more even split, but negatives still coming out ahead. YMMV. I hope more people are being quietly YAY about it.