Up for a 2024 reading challenge?

It’s late December, which means it’s also the time when various sites post their reading challenges. If you’re doing one in 2024, here’s a guide to which of my books might fit particular categories. (If you’re doing a challenge not listed here, and other people can join in, send me a link and I’ll add it!) You might also want to check out my post about summer reading challenges from the summer of 2023.

The two challenges I’m pulling from for this post are the Book Riot’s Read Harder 2024 challenge and the 2024 PopSugar Reading Challenge. They have some overlapping categories, so I’m going to note which challenge applies, and the books I’ve written that might apply.

a cozy fantasy book

(Book Riot #1 and PopSugar 38)

It depends a bit on how you define cosy, but most of my books qualify. The Land Mysteries series has the least cosy plots, since it takes place during World War 2. You can find a full list, chronologically organised, over here.

a genre book by a disabled author

(Book Riot #12. They note this includes SFF, horror, mystery, romance, etc.)

Hi! That’s me. Pick any book I’ve written. If you’d like a book that also features a disabled character, check out the lists on that page sorted by broad category of disability (magical, physical, or mental).

a book based solely on the title

(Book Riot #16)

This one depends on you. My favourite titles are Wards of the Roses, and Best Foot Forward (yes, the abbreviation of that title was entirely intentional, though the full title also suits the book well.)

A (romance) with neurodivergent characters

(Book Riot #19 focusing on romance, or PopSugar 29, any main character)

I’ve got a lot of those! So many that I’ve got a convenient handy list of all the titles with neurodiverse characters. A few of these aren’t romances: Ancient Trust, Old As The Hills, Upon A Summer’s Day, and Three Graces. If you read some of my other characters as neurodiverse, I’m not going to argue with you. These are just the ones where it’s directly relevant to their romances or arcs.

A Coming of Age story

(PopSugar 02)

It’s not out yet (not even on my website!) but The Magic of Four will be out in May 2024. It’s a coming of age school story set at Schola in 1946-1947, following four fourteen-year-old students and their adventures during their second year at school.

A book about a 24-year old

(PopSugar 03)

Gil is 24 in Four Walls and a Heart. Ferry is 24 in Outcrossing. (Free!) Martin and Galen are 24 in In The Cards. (I think all these ages are clear in the text, but I’m drawing from my timeline.)

A book about a writer/author

(PopSugar 04)

For that, check out Mistress of Birds. Thalia’s an author, trying to figure out her options.

A book by a self-published author

(PopSugar 10)

That’d be any book again.

a travel destination on your bucket list

(PopSugar 17)

I don’t know where you want to go! Most of my books are set in England or Wales, but not necessarily bucket list destinations. (I do have plans for one set almost entirely in London coming, though).

Forged in Combat mostly takes place in Calcutta, India in 1882. Outcrossing takes place in the New Forest, in England. The Fossil Door takes place around Glencoe, Scotland. Best Foot Forward has significant scenes in Vienna and spends a good bit of time in and around Berlin. Nocturnal Quarry takes place along the East Coast of the United States, mostly New York City.

A book that features dragons

(PopSugar 23)

Well, one dragon and some implied others. That’s Fool’s Gold.

A main character who’s 42 years old

(PopSugar 28)

Pross is 42 in Magician’s Hoard.

One-word title needing a dictionary

(PopSugar 30: “A one-word title you had to look up in a dictionary”)

I don’t know about your vocabulary, but my possibly relevant one word title book is Pastiche.

Enemies to lovers plot

(PopSugar 32)

That’d be Best Foot Forward, though I usually frame it as enemies to ‘it’s complicated’. Alexander has some opinions on this topic.

A book with at least three POVs.

(PopSugar 34)

Choose from In The Cards (3), Chasing Legends (4), Upon A Summer’s Day (6), Illusion of a Boar (4), Three Graces (3), and the upcoming The Magic of Four (4). I suspect you could guess two of those from the titles…

A book written during NaNoWriMo

(PopSugar 37, referring to National Novel Writing Month)

For me, that’s Outcrossing (2017), In The Cards (2018), Pastiche (2019), Sailor’s Jewel (2020), Mistress of Birds (2021), Shoemaker’s Wife (2022), and the forthcoming Facets of the Bench (2023, coming out in August 2024). In all cases, the first 50K were written in November, and I finished them up in December (and a couple of cases, into January.) Plus editing later, of course!

A LGBTQ+ romance novel

(PopSugar 45)

Again, I’ve got a handy list for this one. A couple of these, the relevant content is demisexuality or asexuality. The content note at the end of the description on the book page has the relevant details.

A character sleeps for more than 24 hours

(PopSugar advanced prompt 01)

This is a little hard to tell, but I think Roland qualifies in Carry On. (He’s certainly not functionally conscious for a chunk of time in there.)

The 24th book of the author

(PopSugar 04)

This depends how you count: if you’re counting 24th published title, it’s Upon A Summer’s Day (which is not where I’d start with my book: at the very least read Old As The Hills first.)

If you’re counting 24th title and counting the three novellas in Winter’s Charms as different books (they were published together, but they’re distinct stories), then it’s Nocturnal Quarry. This also not a great place to start: it’s a character focused novella. You might want to read Best Foot Forward first.

Clearly 2025 has more promise for this question for me!