Saturday, July 16, 2022

16th Annual Canadian Reading Challenge

The Canadian Book Challenge was started in 2007 by John Mutford at the Book Mine Set and hosted by him for its first 10 years. Now the challenge is hosted by Shonna at Canadian Bookworm. Between 2012, when I started blogging, and 2020, I participated in four Canadian Reading Challenges; now I am back for my fifth attempt.

The goal is to read and review 13 or more Canadian books in a one year span: from Canada Day, July 1st, 2022, to Canada Day eve, June 30th, 2023. Reviews posted online are required. That is the hard part for me.


What constitutes a Canadian book?

Canadian books can include any genre or form (picture books, poetry, novels, non-fiction, plays, anthologies, graphic novels, cookbooks, etc). They can be written by Canadian authors (by birth or immigration) or about Canadians.

See the FAQ sheet for more information. 


What will I read?

I have already read one book for this challenge, Dead in the Water by Ted Woods, which I plan to review soon. I am currently reading The English Wife by Adrienne Chinn.


Other books I plan to read are:

  • Kelley Armstrong – A Darkness Absolute
  • Louise Penny  – The Long Way Home
  • Stef Penney – The Tenderness of Wolves
  • Alexandra Pratt – Lost Lands, Forgotten Stories
  • Robin Spano – Dead Politician Society
  • Michael van Rooy – An Ordinary Decent Criminal
  • L. R. Wright – Fall From Grace 
  • Iona Whishaw – A Killer in King's Cove


Other Canadian authors I have on my shelves are:

  • Vicky Delany
  • J. Robert Janes
  • Maureen Jennings
  • Dietrich Kalteis
  • Margaret Millar
  • Sam Wiebe
  • Eric Wright



10 comments:

Margot Kinberg said...

I really hope you enjoy this challenge, Tracy. You've got some great authors there: Penny, Penney, and Wright, to name just a few. What I like about Canadian crime fiction is that there's such variety in it. You've reminded me of how good it can be.

pattinase (abbott) said...

Sad how few of these names are familiar to me. I do like Margaret Laurence, Carol Shields, Brian Moore, Mordecai Richler. Margaret Millar, Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro, & Robertson Davies.

TracyK said...

I am looking forward to reading a lot of the Canadian books I have on my shelves, Margot. Some of which I learned about from you initially.

TracyK said...

Patti, you have reminded me I want to get back to books by Margaret Laurence and Brian Moore. I do have books by Robertson Davies. I have only read The Handmaids Tale by Atwood, many years ago. It was a good book, but if I continue reading her works I will have to find something less depressing.

Cath said...

Good luck. I can recommend A Tenderness of Wolves, very engrossing. I've done the Canadian challenge a couple of times but never had a lot of success. A booktuber whose channel I watch, Bookworm Adventure Girl, is Canadian and she features a lot of Canadian authors.

TracyK said...

Cath, I went and checked out the Bookworm Adventure Girl channel, and watched parts of two of the videos. She would definitely be a good source for Canadian books, so I will watch more. Thanks for that suggestion.

I too have had problems completing the challenge. I read and reviewed all books at least one year, and most of the other years I read enough to feel that I got some good out of the challenge. In the last year I would guess that I have read maybe 3 or 4 Canadian books and I wanted to motivate myself to get more from my shelves read.

I have had A Tenderness of Wolves more than 6 years so it will be good to get it read and I have had others say it was very good, so I hope I will like it too.

Mary R. said...

Glad you decided to join in! I don't think I have read any of these authors except Louise Penny so this post is a great resource for my current Canadian book list. Thanks!

TracyK said...

Mary, I do hope to read several Louise Penney books this year. Once I get started reading them it is hard to stop.

Three authors that were on your list of books read for the previous challenge are ones I also hope to read this year: Carole Shields, Emily St. John Mandel, and Robertson Davies.

And then there is The Jane Austen Society by Natalie Jenner that you just recently reviewed; that one sounds very good.

CLM said...

I have The Tenderness of Wolves and A Fall from Grace somewhere here; maybe I should move them higher on my tbr.

Several good ones on your list, including a few I think I recommended. I just read the newest Penny, which I had been saving. In some ways different from the others.

I am in the middle of the sequel to The Jane Austen Society - I did not realize they were related until I was into it. Annoying when that happens!

TracyK said...

Constance, I really like the RCMP Staff Sergeant Karl Alberg series by L. R. Wright. The first book was the best (The Suspect), at least for me.

I just finished The English Wife by Adrienne Chinn (two days ago) and enjoyed it, although it was more of a romance than I usually read. I loved the setting in Newfoundland. That was one you sent to me.

I did not realize that Bloomsbury Girls was a sequel to The Jane Austen Society.