Dated reading challenges have a design flaw. On January 1 you are ahead; by June you are behind; by October you are picking short books to protect a number. The challenge stops being about reading and becomes about the calendar.
An undated challenge has no such pressure. It might take you eighteen months or four years, and neither is failing. Two of the best are below, written out in full so you can copy the tracker into a notebook.
Why undated works better
No catch-up debt. The single biggest reason people abandon a challenge is being visibly behind. Remove the deadline and there is nothing to be behind on.
It survives a bad reading year. Illness, a new baby, a hard job. An undated tracker just waits.
It rewards the right choice. A 700-page book counts the same as a 200-page one, so there is no incentive to read short.
You can run two at once. Most books will fit both trackers below, so one book fills a square in each.
The A to Z challenge
One book per letter, by the author’s surname. Twenty-six books, no deadline. Copy this into a notebook and fill it in as you go.
| Author | Title | Date | Author | Title | Date | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | N | ||||||
| B | O | ||||||
| C | P | ||||||
| D | Q | ||||||
| E | R | ||||||
| F | S | ||||||
| G | T | ||||||
| H | U | ||||||
| I | V | ||||||
| J | W | ||||||
| K | X | ||||||
| L | Y | ||||||
| M | Z |
The rules. Surname, not first name — first names produce a lot of A, J and M and not much else. Anything you read counts, including rereads. Fill letters in any order.
Q, X and Z. These are the whole challenge. Everyone gets to twenty-three letters in a year and then spends two years on three. That is a feature, and it is what makes people search a library catalog by author rather than reading whatever is on the front table.
If you want an out: allow the title’s first significant word for those three letters only, decided before you start. Deciding it after you are stuck is a different thing and you will know.
Around the world
One book per region, by the author’s nationality or where they grew up — not where the book is set. That distinction matters. A novel about Kenya by an American is an American book about Kenya, and the point of this challenge is to read people writing about their own place.
| Region | Aim for | Read |
|---|---|---|
| West Africa | 2 | |
| East and Southern Africa | 2 | |
| North Africa | 1 | |
| Middle East | 2 | |
| South Asia | 2 | |
| East Asia | 2 | |
| Southeast Asia | 2 | |
| Central Asia and the Caucasus | 1 | |
| Russia and Eastern Europe | 2 | |
| Western Europe | 2 | |
| Nordic countries | 1 | |
| Caribbean | 1 | |
| Central America and Mexico | 1 | |
| South America | 2 | |
| Australia and New Zealand | 1 | |
| Pacific Islands | 1 | |
| Indigenous North America | 1 | |
| Canada | 1 |
Twenty-seven books. Some regions will take a year to find something for, and the looking is a large part of the value — you will discover translated fiction imprints and small presses you did not know existed.
Where to look: translated-fiction lists from independent presses, international literary prizes, your library’s world literature shelf, and asking a bookseller, who will almost always know.
Four variants
| Challenge | How it works | Length |
|---|---|---|
| A book per decade | One published in each decade from 1900 to now, or go further back | 13 books |
| A book per state | Set in, or by an author from, each US state | 50 books, genuinely a decade |
| The shelf challenge | Every unread book you already own, before buying another | However many you own |
| A book per year of your life | One published in each year you have been alive | Your age |
The shelf challenge is the least fun and the most useful. Most readers own between fifteen and forty books they have never opened.
How to actually finish one
Run it alongside normal reading, not instead of it. Aim for roughly one challenge book in every three. A challenge that dictates everything you read becomes a chore in about two months.
Keep the tracker where you plan your reading, not in a drawer. One page in the front of a reading journal.
Do the hard squares when you are between books. Directionless is exactly when a prompt is useful.
Write the date. Finishing an A-to-Z over three years and being able to see when you read each one is the actual reward.
Do not start a third. Two at once is the ceiling. Three and you are managing trackers instead of reading.
Start with A to Z
Copy the twenty-six rows into a notebook and fill in every letter you can from books you have already read this year. Most people can fill eight or nine immediately, which is a good start and shows you exactly which letters will need work.
If you want a squares-based challenge instead of a list, bookish bingo is the shorter, faster version, and how to set up a reading journal covers where a tracker page fits alongside the log and the TBR.
For the notebooks and pads to keep it in, see bookish accessories and reading journals.