Victorian Reading Challenge 2018

Becky at Becky’s Book Reviews is hosting the 2018 Victorian Reading Challenge, a challenge I have not tried before. Since I have so many Victorian books on my Classics Club list, I’m going to give it a go. Becky has a checklist of different types of Victorian books and several options to choose from, with the only requirement being to read a minimum of four Victorian books:

Option A. Read alphabetically A-Z with authors OR titles OR a blend of authors/titles. I’ve decided that from now on X in reading challenges stands for multiple authors. I’m flipping my “x” to a “+”.

Option B. Choose one author to read exclusively for this challenge; perhaps challenge yourself to read chronologically OR to read through an entire series in one year.

Option C. Do as many books from the checklist as you can. Feel free to copy/paste this. You can replace the _ with an X or a ✔ (copy/paste it) when you finish reading a book.

Option D. Make the challenge completely your own and read as YOUR whimsy dictates.

I am choosing Option C, to read as many books from the checklist as I can. I’ve got eight Victorian books in store for 2018 in the following categories:

1. A book that was originally published serially: She by H. Rider Haggard
2. A book published between 1837-1840: Oliver Twist (1838) by Charles Dickens
3. A book published between 1841-1850: Twenty Years After (1845) by Alexandre Dumas
4. A book published between 1861-1870: Crime and Punishment (1866) by Fyodor Dostoevsky
5. A book published between 1881-1890: The Black Arrow (1888) by Robert Louis Stevenson
6. A book published between 1891-1900: Lilith (1895) by George MacDonald
7. A book published between 1902-1999 with a Victorian setting: The Secret Garden (1911) by Frances Burnett
8. A book with a place name in the title: The Well at the World’s End by William Morris

I’ll be recording my progress on the 2018 Reading Challenge page, and you can find Becky’s Victorian Reading Checklist below.

1. _ A book that was originally published serially
2. _ book published between 1837-1840
3. _ book published between 1841-1850
4. _ book published between 1851-1860
5. _ book published between 1861-1870
6. _ book published between 1871-1880
7. _ book published between 1881-1890
8. _ book published between 1891-1901
9. _ nonfiction published between 1837-1860
10. _ nonfiction published between 1861-1901
11. _ A book published between 1902-1999 with a Victorian setting
12. _ A book published between 2000-2018 with a Victorian setting
13. _ A fiction or nonfiction book about Queen Victoria
14. _ Biography of a Victorian
15. _ Nonfiction book about the Victorian era
16. _ free choice
17. _ place name in the title
18. _ character name in the title
19. _ book in a series
20. _ drama or melodrama
21. _ gothic, suspense, mystery
22. _ romance or historical
23. _ comedy
24. _ science fiction or fantasy
25. _ adventure, crime, western
26. _ poetry collection OR story collection
27. _ happily ever after
28. _ unhappily ever after
29. _ children’s book
30. _ translated into English from another language
31. _ a book under 250 pages
32. _ book over 500 pages
33. _ a book over 800 pages
34. _ A book that has been filmed as movie, miniseries, or television show
35. _ memorable heroine
36. _ memorable hero
37. _ British author
38. _ Irish author OR Irish setting
39. _ Scottish author OR Scottish setting
40. _ American author
41. _ reread
42. _ book with a subtitle (the longer the better!)

© 2017 Becky Laney of Becky’s Book Reviews