Pumpkin spice season is officially upon us, which means it’s time for the Carterhaugh Summer Reading Challenge wrap up!

(Click here for our first update, here for our second update!)

Here’s Sara with her wrap-up –

In my last update, I mentioned that I’d been reading a ton but not to the challenge specifically and that I’d have to be a little more strategic if I was actually going to complete it. 

Mission accomplished.

How? Mostly by reading Nimona by ND Stevenson. 

Behold:

“Read a book by an author that you’ve always meant to read but haven’t gotten around to yet,” “Read a Graphic Novel,” AND “Read the Book Behind a Movie You Love” – Um, thank you, ND Stevenson, for saving my bacon on this challenge. I’ve been a fan of his work ever since the magnificent She-Ra reboot that he helmed, and his film Nimona absolutely knocked my socks off earlier this year, but I’d never actually read any of his books. Unsurprisingly considering his other work, Nimona the graphic novel is somehow both extremely adorable and extremely powerful. It’s full of humor and frenetic energy and heart and transformation. It’s not tidy. It’s a little feral. It’s pretty perfect. It’s also our book club read for September (and if you’re not a member of our book club by this point, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR, GET IN THERE.)

“Read a Banned or Challenged Book” – I thought that Nimona might get me through this one, too, but I couldn’t find a record of it actually being banned or challenged. Luckily, I recently re-read Red, White, and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston, which definitely has been (which is ridiculous because it’s the cutest, sweetest, most optimistic book known to man.) In case you have somehow been living under a rock and haven’t read it yet, please let me send you good tidings under your rock: it’s the story of the son of the first female president of the United States falling in love with the prince of England, and it’s completely hilarious and delightful. They had me at Alex (the president’s son) insisting on storing the pardoned Thanksgiving turkeys in his bedroom in an effort to save the taxpayers the money of keeping them in a hotel room and then freaking out when he realized how gigantic turkeys actually are and envisioning them reenacting Jurassic Park on him. Shout out to McQuiston’s newest novel, The Pairing, that I also read last month as soon as it came out.

“Read a Poetry Collection” – I FINALLY read Deborah Sage’s completely delightful Sherlock Holmes-themed poetry collection, Doggerel in the Night-Time, and I feel like the title tells you everything you need to know. It absolutely radiates love for Sherlock Holmes literature, has a wonderful sense of humor, and is such a fun and whimsical way to engage with the fandom. As always, Sage’s poetic skill shines. But what I keep coming back to is the sense of playfulness and whimsy! It’s so hard to find funny poetry – a lot of places just won’t publish it, which is a real shame. I loved reading a full length poetry collection that leans unabashedly into humor while also being whip-smart and nerdy. A+.

And here’s Brittany’s –

Okay guys. Behold, once again, my shame. Sadly, I have not yet finished the challenge, but this year I got a LOT closer than I did last year. In fact, I’m only missing one category, and I’m hoping to finish that one by September 21st, so TECHNICALLY I will still finish before summer ends? That said, I did read a LOT to (almost) finish the challenge, so here we go. 

“Read a Book by an Actual Folklorist” – As Sara and I finished the first drafts of scripts for our upcoming Great Courses series on urban legends, I too finished Too Good To Be True: The Colossal Book of Urban Legends by Jan Harold Brunvand, and let me tell you, it is truly COLOSSAL! It’s a compendium of many of the legends Brunvand collected over several separate books, so it took a while to get through, but it was well worth it. We were able to use his observations about some well-known legends in several of the episodes, and we also incorporated some new-to-us legends that were just downright fantastic. Our favorite new one? “The Flying Kitten,” in which a kitten is accidentally launched through the air, but winds up safely dropped into the arms of a person who was just musing he’d like to adopt a cat!

“Read a Graphic Novel” and “Read the Book Behind a Movie You Love” – So, like Sara, I finally read Nimona by ND Stevenson, and it was just as charming as the movie (I LOVE SHARK NIMONA.) Seriously, come join us the book club this month to talk about it – it’s a quick read, and well WELL worth your time! 

“Read a Banned or Challenged Book” – So for this one I actually read another graphic novel, Drama by Raina Telgemeier (who also recently did comic versions of the first few books of a series I loved when I was little, The Baby-Sitters Club!) This one was already on my radar because it’s about a middle-school drama club, which was basically my life in middle school/high school, but I was shocked to see it when I was looking for a banned book to read. Apparently it’s on several banned books lists around the country. Why? Well, as far as I can tell, it’s popular and one of the main characters is gay and nobody blinks an eye about it. It’s just… a non-issue, aside from the fact the main character briefly has a crush on him and is slightly sad that he’s just not going to be into her. Literally, that’s it. Ugh. It’s a lovely little story that brought back some fond memories for me of theater-kid shenanigans and also just the, ahem, drama of being a young teenager. My only complaint was that it was mostly from the tech kids’ side, and I was a stage kid, so I did wish there was more about the acting side of it too!

“Read a Book Set Where You Live” – So I was hunting around for, like, a CIA fantasy book or something to fill this challenge category, but I wound up remembering that there was a light mystery series set very nearby that I’d been meaning to check out forever – one “written” by a cat! Wish You Were Here by Sneaky Pie Brown (and Rita Mae Brown) is the first book in an absolutely ENORMOUS series that follows the mysteries that arise in the Virginia town of Crozet. Mrs. Murphy, a very smart cat, and her corgi sidekick, Tucker, help their owner solve these mysteries (and are also mostly the POV characters.) I’m not going to lie – it’s hilarious and super, super cute. I’m pretty much endlessly amused at how smart the animals are and how dumb all the humans are. That said, this is a pretty old series (my Mom and sister read it years and years ago, I think they even went to a few book signings because the author(s) live around here too) AND it’s set in rural Virginia, so parts of it haven’t aged super well. Nothing terrible, but a few not so great things from today’s perspective for sure. Fun fact though: Rita Mae Brown, the human co-author, is actually a very well-known feminist and civil rights activist who, as a lesbian herself, spoke out frequently against the way lesbians were marginalized in early feminist circles. I kinda love that she was like “okay, I did that, I’m going to write as/with my cat now”! 

“Read a Book a Friend Picks for You” – I finally did finish Death in the Spires by K.J. Charles and it was, as predicted, awesome. By the end I was like I MUST KNOW WHAT HAPPENS and once all was revealed I was… what are the kids calling it these days? Shook? :P. It’s a great read, highly recommended. After I finished, Sara and I were talking about it and agreed it was pretty clear that the author had read The Secret History by Donna Tartt and was like “what if I did this but all the super problematic stuff is actually resolved in a much more satisfying way at the end?” Yep. Nailed it. 

The one category I’m still missing? “Read a Tolkien-Esque Book.” I have, however, taken The Adventures of Tom Bombadil out of the library, and darn it, I’m going to finish it. So if you’re like “OH NO, I am not done yet,” there is still time, my friend! You can do it!!

We hope you enjoyed this year’s Carterhaugh Summer Reading Challenge! We love doing these, so drop us a note and let us know what categories you’d like to see next year. “Read a book with a Byronic heroine?” “Read a novella based on a myth?” “Read a book about a book?” So many possibilities!!

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P.S. Speaking of the book club/Patreon, tonight is our September Fairy-Tale Salon! We’re going to be helping each other get unstuck in our various projects – one of our favorite salon topics – so click here and join at the Salonnières tier if you’d like to come!