It’s that time, y’all.

Welcome to the 2024 Carterhaugh School Summer Reading Challenge! We absolutely loved running this challenge last summer, so we’ve decided to bring it back.

Let us READ like the champions we are. 

All are welcome to participate, and it’s totally free. 

HOWEVER.

Should you be delighted by some seriously sweet resources and bonuses (or you just think Carterhaugh is cool and want to support our work), join our Patreon at any level. 

(For instance, consider joining our book club! Thematically appropriate AND helps us keep the fairy lights on!) 

More on the Patron bonuses below. But first, THE CHALLENGE.

Like last year, we have 15 challenge categories for you all to conquer. 

Note: This doesn’t necessarily mean you need to read 15 different books (though of course you can if you want to!) If you read a graphic novel with a purple color that’s about a werewolf, then well done, crafty friend, you have checked off three categories in one fell swoop, and we salute you. 

We’ve mostly kept the categories pretty broad so that you can choose books that speak to you. And if you’re one of those people who prefers to be given a list or a place to start, we’ve also included specific recommendations from us so that you’re never stumped!

Without further ado, the challenge categories this year are…

• Read a Tolkien-Esque Book 
  • In other words, read a book by JRR Tolkien OR a book that was heavily influenced by the legacy of The Lord of the Rings. You might have noticed us screaming about the LOTR-themed course we’re teaching in June (click here to sign up and join the revelry!), so we are up to our eyeballs in Tolkien. There are many different ways to complete this challenge. You can read a book by Tolkien (The Hobbit, the trilogy, The Silmarillion, etc.) OR a book about Tolkien’s writing (there are MANY) OR a book that’s indebted in some way to Tolkien (most American and British fantasy novels published in the last 40+ years). Be as expansive about this as you like! 
  • Our recommendations: We’re currently reading Tolkien: Maker of Middle-Earth edited by Catherine McIlwaine, which is the gorgeous art book for the museum exhibition of the same name. If you don’t want to read straight-up Tolkien, might we recommend Bitter Medicine by Mia Tsai, which has a really wonderful and international magical system (with magic calligraphy!) and a half-elf.
    
• Read a Novella
  • Novellas don’t get enough love, and we adore them! They’re long enough to really sink your teeth into but quick enough to speed through at a good clip. And then you get to feel smug about finishing a book on a faster timeline. A+, would recommend.
  • Our recommendations: The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw and This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone.
    
• Read a Mystery
  • There’s nothing like a really good mystery. Go classic with Agatha Christie or Dorothy L. Sayers! Or read something contemporary that sounds intriguing. Knock out this category ridiculously quickly with one of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories! If there’s a mystery central to the plot, go for it.
  • Our recommendations: Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers (classic, often cited as the first feminist detective novel) and Death in the Spires by K.J. Charles (contemporary, very Dark Academia).
    
• Read a book by an author that you’ve always meant to read but haven’t gotten around to yet
  • We all have these, right? Like ten people have told you to read this one author, and you keep meaning to, but you just don’t get around to it, and then three years have passed? Until last month, ours was Becky Chambers, and then we finally read her novella A Psalm for the Wild-Built, and it was VERY SATISFYING. 
  • Our recommendations: Obviously, we cannot guess exactly who these authors are for you, but here are some ideas, just in case: Anne Brontë, N.K Jemisin, James Joyce, Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Anna-Marie McLemore, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Lord Dunsany.
    
• Read a Feminist Fairy-Tale Retelling
  • This is our bread and butter. If you’ve been around Carterhaugh for more than five minutes, you know how much we love fairy tales, especially fairy tales that push back against our expectations of what the world “should” be. 
  • Our recommendations: Here’s a blog post we wrote with a list of queer fairy-tale retellings that you can investigate, but if you just want a couple excellent titles, we love Cinderella Is Dead by Kalynn Bayron and The Girls of the Kingfisher Club by Genevieve Valentine.
    
• Read a Book by an Actual Folklorist
  • Not a book on a folklore topic. One written by an actual folklorist! Sadly, our first book will not be out until next year (eeee!), but we have brilliant and prolific colleagues whose work deserves to be much better known! (Are we gonna come at you and be like “that’s not a REAL folklorist?” No, definitely not. Will we be thrilled if we hear back that you’re reading stuff by people with actual backgrounds and training in folklore studies? SO THRILLED.)
  • Our recommendations: There are so many great ones. Making Witches: Newfoundland Traditions of Spells and Counterspells by Barbara Rieti is about how perception of witchcraft is constructed. The Book of Yokai: Mysterious Creatures of Japanese Folklore by Michael Dylan Foster is all about supernatural Japanese folklore, and it has really charming illustrations by Shinonome Kijin. The Kiss of Death: Contagion, Contamination, and Folklore by Andrea Kitta is a fascinating discussion of how narratives about health and disease in pop culture and folklore have massive real world impacts. Ray Cashman’s Packy Jim: Folklore and Worldview on the Irish Border is all about his extensive work in Ireland. Jeana Jorgensen has some great, very readable intro-level books (Folklore 101 and Fairy Tales 101). If you’re looking for something lighter, check out Margaret Yocom’s KIN S FUR (a poetic retelling of “All Kinds of Fur”) or Terri Windling’s The Wood Wife.
    
• Read a Book with a Purple Cover
  • This is on our list solely because we feel like it’s the kind of request that a fairy would make during a challenge like this. Also, we really like the color purple. ENJOY.
  • Our recommendations: Toil & Trouble: 15 Tales of Women & Witchcraft edited by Tess Sharpe and Jessica Spotswood (a short story collection), The Bone Witch by Rin Chupeco, and Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl. (Hmm…these are all witchy…see, we knew we loved purple.) Or go browse your local library or bookstore and see what purple cover catches your eye!
    
• Read a Graphic Novel 
  • They’re so cool! Like reading a picture book for grownups. And it’s really fascinating to see how a story is conveyed in images, in addition to words – how things like color and shape and visual style are used to communicate action, emotion, and characterization. They can be incredibly sophisticated and beautiful, weird and irreverent, heavy and impactful – just about everything a book written in words can do. 
  • Our recommendations: The Prince and the Dressmaker by Jen Wang, Nimona by  ND Stevenson, and The Sandman (vol. 1) by Neil Gaiman.
    
• Read a Book that Makes You Laugh Out Loud
  • Or try to, anyway! It’s hard to know for sure before you actually read a book if it’s going to be exactly your cup of tea/ sense of humor. But if you deliberately set out to give it a shot, then it counts for this category. You can also re-read a book that you thought was hilarious in the past for this one. Laughing is good for us, says the science. It’s summer. Let’s try to seek out some giggles and joy.
  • Our recommendations: This is perhaps the most enormously subjective category on here. We know everyone’s sense of humor is different, and something that makes us cackle isn’t necessarily going to work for you. (Hell, sometimes something that makes one of us lose it has zero effect on the other! Not often though.) That being said, here are some books that we personally think are hilarious: Boyfriend Material by Alexis Hall, Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan, Red, White, and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston, and A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik.
    
• Read the Book Behind a Movie You Love
  • You loved a movie. You heard it was based on a book. And then you promptly forgot about it. Now is your chance to track it down and see how it stacks up to the film!
  • Our recommendations: Obviously, if you’ve seen any of the Lord of the Rings or Hobbit films but haven’t read the books, this is the perfect excuse to pick one up! Other possibilities might include The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle, The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote (conveniently, also a novella – again, we are NOT opposed to you doubling or even tripling up on categories!), The Princess Bride by William Goldman, or Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.
    
• Read a Banned or Challenged Book
  • There are so many of them. Too many of them. It’s very annoying, we are not here for it, and we will answer exactly zero emails explaining why actually all these books should be banned in Florida schools or whatever, just FYI. LET’S READ EM. 
  • Our recommendations: Here’s a list from the American Library Association of the most frequently challenged books last year for you to peruse. Might we recommend in particular a book by Toni Morrison? We also love Carry On by Rainbow Rowell (which we incidentally think is laugh-out-loud hilarious, if you want to check off that category, too. AND it has a purple cover. Just saying.)
    
• Read a Creature Feature
  • This is one of the few categories that we’ve carried over from last year because it just feels so summery to us! Pick your poison: vampires, zombies, witches, werewolves, sea monsters, fairies, whatever floats your supernatural boat, and go nuts.
  • Our recommendations: The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black and The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter by Theodora Goss instantly come to mind! Or Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor or Star Daughter by Shveta Thakrar. (Angels and demons and stars absolutely count.) Oh, and hey, if you’re thinking about tackling Dracula for this category, there’s this super cool streaming video series you might want to check out…
    
• Read a Book Set Where You Live
  • Get as local as you can. If you can find one set, even partially, in your city/ town, amazing! If not, go for your state (or international equivalent.) Don’t worry about perfection but get as close as you can. We know this will be much easier for people who live in major cities – we see you, New York City and London dwellers! But give it your best shot – you might be surprised what you’ll find!
  • Our recommendations: Alas, we really can’t give useful recommendations for this one since you do not all reside in Atlanta or the DC-ish area, but Sara is going to read Geekerella by Ashley Poston, which is apparently set at a con in Atlanta (or possibly re-read Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews.) Most of the books set in Northern Virginia are CIA/spy novels, naturally, so Brittany is still poking around, but she’s certain she’ll find something excellent (maybe a FANTASY CIA novel??)
    
• Read a Poetry Collection
  • Another quick win! Poetry collections are often really short but can pack a really big emotional punch. A great poetry collection is the perfect thing to savor on your porch with a glass of lemonade on a summer afternoon.
  • Our recommendations: We absolutely adore Says the Forest to the Girl by Carterhaugh regular Sally Rosen Kindred, which is completely stunning and only 40 pages long. You could also go super old school with a collection of Emily Dickinson or Shakespeare’s sonnets. We also love Apocrypha by Catherynne M. Valente, R E D by Chase Berggrun, and Drive Here and Devastate Me by Megan Falley.
    
• Read a Book a Friend Picks for You
  • This is NOT a repeat of reading your best friend’s favorite book from last year, but a chance to ask a trusted friend to curate a pick for you. In other words, it’s not about your friend’s favorite but a book they think will really speak to YOU. We (Sara and Brittany) don’t actually always love the same books – Brittany is ALL ABOUT THE VIBES (her words) and Sara loves weird humor and character-driven plots. But occasionally, one of us will come across a book and think “ok, this is PERFECT for Brittany” or vice versa. And it’s like being handed a really thoughtful present! So ask a friend who gets you to pick out a book they think you’ll love and see what happens!
  • Our recommendations: Ask a savvy friend. See what they find for you 🙂

As always, we’re looking forward to expanding our already ridiculous TBR piles, too… so be sure to tell us all about the books you pick!

As we said up top, this challenge is 100% FREE to take part in – you can post about it in the FB discussion group, on Instagram, wherever you like (and invite your friends!) If you want the full experience though, hop on over to our Patreon and join at any tier level (yep, even the $1/month tier) to get access to a bunch of BONUS stuff including behind the scenes posts, a pinned thread for challenge discussion/encouragement/book recs, a challenge bookmark PDF, AND a beautiful (fillable!) PDF challenge workbook including a checklist, a tracker with space for notes, and more. Click here to join the challenge insiders club!

We also revived our challenge t-shirts, because, well, of course we did. You can grab yours in a bunch of different colors in our Zazzle store by clicking here. You can also, as always, transfer the design to anything else your heart desires… fancy a sweatshirt, or a sticker, or, hey, a Carterhaugh reading challenge belt buckle? You can make that happen!

We hope you consider joining us for our reading challenge… and we can’t wait to hear all about the AWESOME books you discover! 

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