Are you ready to go on an unforgettable journey from the comfort of your favorite reading chair? Throughout the year, we’ll be your travel guide!
We’re calling the 2021 reading challenge Book Voyage: Read Around the World because you’ll get to experience every continent and the vastly different landscapes and cultures that make up our beautiful planet.
For each region, we’ll provide a list of books ranging from novels to memoirs covering a variety of cities and topics.
You can revisit this post throughout the year as an index to all the book lists. Each one will be linked below. Make sure you’re notified when each new book list is published by joining our email list in the box below, along with our Read with the Book Girls Facebook group.
When you sign up for the free email list above, you’ll get an email a few minutes later with a link to print our custom map book tracker. Fun, right?
For the 2021 Reading Challenge, we’ll release the book list for a new region each month and have discussions in the Facebook group about the choices, just like we did for the Decades Reading Challenge. While we’d love you to join the group, it’s totally optional and you can participate only by email if you prefer.
Book Voyage Challenge Schedule
Click the month below to get our reading suggestions for each region.
- January: Arctic & Antarctic
- February: Western Europe
- March: Eastern Europe & Russia
- April: North Asia (list will be released on 3/20/21)
- May: Southern Asia (list will be released on 4/20/21)
- June: Books Set on an Island (list will be released on 5/20/21)
- July: Australia & New Zealand (list will be released on 6/20/21)
- August: Middle East (list will be released on 7/20/21)
- September: Africa (list will be released on 8/20/21)
- October: South America (list will be released on 9/20/21)
- November: North America (list will be released on 10/20/21)
- December: Books Spanning Multiple Continents (list will be released on 11/20/21)
Each list will be a mix of enjoyable fiction, memoirs, and other highly rated books from a variety of locations within the region. We always try to include light options for months when you’re busy or stressed, along with some deeper reads.
Do you share books on Instagram?
@READWITHTHEBOOKGIRLS
Use #bookvoyagechallenge when you post your challenge book so we can see what you read.
Don’t worry if you’re reading this after January, you’re welcome to join at any point throughout the year. Just jump into the current month and then work in the others. While we’re making a geographic circle, unlike the Decades Challenge, this one works just as well out of order.
Happy travels!
IMPORTANT NOTE: We took some liberties in dividing up the regions to create a 12 book challenge, so don’t give our map to your kids for a geography test. For example, Russia is located partially in Europe and partially in Asia, but for our purposes, it is grouped with Europe – East. Oceania is part of Australia, but we’re including the smaller island-nations in our summer island month along with other islands around the globe. There are other examples within our divisions of the Middle East, Europe, and Asia.
Love reading as much as we do?
Join us for more free content, reading challenges, and discussion over in the Book Girls’ Guide Facebook Group!
I’m so excited for this new book list! Thank you Book Girls for giving me a wonderful challenge for 2021!
I just heard about this group today and I can’t wait to get started.
I can’t a\seem to find the reading tracker help. I did order the first January book from Amazon.
Hi Patricia, I just requested the tracker be sent to your email, so it should be delivered there in the next 10 minutes. Let us know if you need any other help!
I am so excited about the new reading challenge! I am choosing my January book now. Thanks so much!
Hi!
I have a question, do ebooks and audiobooks are also accepted for this reading challenge? I really excited to join this challenge!
Absolutely! Whatever method you prefer for reading is great!
This sounds really interesting! Is there a hashtag for the challenge to use and find the posts on i.e. Instagram?
That is a fabulous idea! Use #bookvoyagechallenge – we love to see what everyone is reading!
Thank you, I most certainly will! Love bookstagramming and it gets so much easier with the hashtag 🙂
I love this idea for a reading challenge but I’m a bit disappointed that three months are dedicated to Asia but only one to Africa. Not to worry though, I will adjust mine to what I feel is equitable. Thank you for this great idea, after so many months of stay at home orders, I’m itching to travel, this will appease the bug until we can hit the road.
Hi Caroline, it’s perfect to adjust as you see fit. We split Asia into the northern and southern countries, but it still only gets two months of the challenge. None of the continents got more than two months, although we wish there were more months in the year so they could have! You can definitely pick a second African book instead of the second Asian continent book, or maybe do two from each. The Africa list will include options from around the continent to capture as many of the different cultures as we can, so hopefully, you’ll find many you want to read. Thanks!
Just realized you were most likely counting the Middle East zone as the 3rd Asia region since it overlaps Europe/Asia & Africa! It was tricky to divide everything up and try to represent as many cultures as we could. Happy reading!
I can definitely see how tricky it was. Thanks again for this great challenge!
Aaaah yea!! I’ve got help here! I’m doing my own version of your read around the world and I call it “Around the world in eighty books”.
I’ve signed up for your email as that will help me to choose a few books!
Good luck to you girls!
excited I found this challenge through GirlXoXo list. Looking forward to combining this challenge with others, particularly my Goodreads Around the World circumnavigation. Thanks for hosting such a great challenge
Love this idea and I just completed my Jan. read. When will the link be available for the Feb. book suggestions (and subsequent months)?
Hi Ruth, each new booklist will be available on the 20th of the prior month, so Feb’s list will be published 1/20. Thanks for reading with us!
I am really excited about the Book Voyage Challenge and am on my 2nd Arctic book (Tisha and now The Arctic Fury). I am, however having trouble finding the map/tracker to print. Can you help me?
Hi Bernadette, I just got it send over for you! You should have an email from [email protected] that links right to the map.
Do we have to read books on the lists to count or can we chose our own?
You’re welcome to choose your own! One thing to note is that if you want to participate in the discussion groups, they’re generally always books from our list since we base it on the number of people that read each book. That’s totally optional though, and you can find the details in the Facebook group ( https://www.facebook.com/groups/readwiththebookgirls ).