In the summertime, I often enjoy coming up with a theme for my reading. Past themes have included Summer of Spies (courtesy of a bookish friend) and the 20 Crimes of Summer. For the past few years, I haven’t had the energy to indulge myself in any sort of a theme.
This year, though, feels different. It is my first full summer as a retiree, and I am having a great time with my reading right now. I’m already 110 books in for 2024, 33 books ahead of schedule to finish the year at 204, which was my reading goal.
So, I decided that a summer reading theme would be a great idea for this year.
So, here it is: the Great American Road Trip.
My plan is to read as close to 50 books – one set in each U.S. state – as I can between May 16 and the end of summer on August 31.
I actually started the themed reading a few days ago, & have already made a virtual trip through four states: California, Oregon (my home state), Washington and Idaho. I’ll be getting posts up for those books in the next day or so.
Even though the four states I’ve visited so far are geographically adjacent, I’m not going to be travelling in any specific order. I have already identified some library books that I’ll be reading, and my plan at this point is to hit a few more western states, and then I’ll be (virtually) flying to Florida and renting an imaginary car to explore the Southern US.
This is going to be a mood reading project. I am going to try to find books that have a strong sense of place attached, but all genres are fair game. There may be a few states where I linger for more than one book, if that is where my mood takes me. And while I’m hoping to hit all 50 states, if I find myself growing tired of this project, I will strand myself wherever I am and move on to other reading without a second thought!
What a brilliant idea! I hope you publish a list at the end to help people collect them all if they want to, too! Have fun!
I will definitely do that! I’m already five states behind, sigh.