Note: If you’d prefer to watch our Announcement Video, click here.

General Information

Round 9 of Trope-ical Readathon (Round 7 of our month-long version) will begin August 1, 2023 in your own timezone! This readathon will be a team-based readathon throughout the entire month of August. There are six teams to choose from:

• Team Romance
• Team Science Fiction
• Team Fantasy
• Team Mystery/Horror/Thriller
• Team Contemporary/Literary/Historical Fiction
• Team Non-Fiction/Poetry

How you choose your team is up to you. Most people choose the genre they like reading the most. The books you read do NOT have to be the same genre as your team, so you don’t have to worry about trying to limit yourself to a specific genre.

There are 13 common challenges that everyone can do and 2 team-specific challenges, making a total of 15 possible challenges to complete. Each challenge is based on a common trope found in books. Additionally, each team has “Team Books” in their genre that they (and anyone else) can read for extra points (at most one per team).

Common Challenges

There are two ways to complete a common challenge: either you read a book with the given trope OR you read a book that satisfies the alternate prompt based off of that trope. You cannot double/triple/quadruple/etc. up on any challenges. In other words, you cannot use one book to satisfy multiple challenges and you cannot complete the same challenge multiple times for extra points. Once again, the books you read do NOT have to be the same genre as your team to count.

The challenges can be found in the following graphic. If you need more information on each challenge, or if you can’t view the graphic, detailed descriptions are given below.

• Absent/Dead Parent(s) Trope: Read a book where the main character’s parents are either absent throughout the book or have passed away prior to the start of the book. Alternatively, read a book with multiple authors.
• Hand-Picked Crew Trope: Read a book with a cast of characters that was hand-selected by someone for a specific purpose. Alternatively, read a book that you hand-selected because of its cover.
• The New Kid in Town Trope: Read a book where the main character(s) is new in town. Alternatively, read a genre that you don’t usually read.
• Multiple Timelines Trope: Read a book where the plot follows more than one timeline. Alternatively, read a book you previously DNFed.
• Love Triangle Trope: Read a book that features a love triangle. Alternatively, have your followers or friends choose between two books.
• Recent Loss Trope: Read a book where the main character(s) has recently loss someone/something important to them (e.g. family, friend, career, etc). Alternatively, read a recent (i.e. 2023) release.
• Mixed Media Trope: Read a book that includes letters, texts, emails, etc. Alternatively, listen to an audiobook or read an ebook.
• Outbreak/Pandemic Trope: Read a book that features an outbreak or pandemic of some kind. Alternatively, read a comfort read.
• Found Family Trope: Read a book where characters form a family dynamic, based on shared understanding of each other rather than blood ties. Alternatively, read a book that is part of a series.
• Food Themes Trope: Read a book that has a food-related plot. Alternatively, devour (i.e. read) a book in 24 hours.
• Revenge Trope: Read a book whose main theme revolves around revenge. Alternatively, read a banned book.
• Bookish Themes Trope: Read a book with bookish themes (e.g. writer/reader main character(s), a book about a book, etc.). Alternatively, read a book with a pun in the title.
• Retelling Trope: Read a book that is a retelling. Alternatively, read a book that has been adapted to a TV show and/or film.

Team Challenges

As mentioned above, each team has 2 team-specific challenges based off of tropes commonly found in those genres along with two choices for a Team Book (an old and new release). This is to ensure that we can make Team Books more accessible to our participants. You only have to read ONE of the Team Book choices to get the points for that team. You do not get extra points for reading both team books for the same team (unless you use the extra book for a common/team challenge).

Unlike the common challenges, team challenges do not have alternative prompts. If a book outside your team genre satisfies your team challenge, that still counts! You can choose to read any or all of the Team Books for extra points (max one team book per team), but you cannot use them to double up on points with other challenges.

You can see the team challenges and books by clicking through the gallery below. If you can’t view the graphics, we’ve written their content down below. Each team book is linked with an Amazon affiliate link if you’d like to purchase the book on Amazon.

Team Romance:
Team Challenge 1: Read a book with the “Holiday” trope
Team Challenge 2: Read a book with the “Meet Cute” trope
New Team Book: An Echo in the City by K.X. Song
Old Team Book: Ayesha at Last by Uzma Jalaluddin

Team Science-Fiction
Team Challenge 1: Read a book with the “Space Institute” trope
Team Challenge 2: Read a book with the “Alternate History” trope
New Team Book: Under This Forgetful Sky by Lauren Yero
Old Team Book: The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu

Team Fantasy
Team Challenge 1: Read a book with the “Portal Fantasy” trope
Team Challenge 2: Read a book with a non-human main character
New Team Book: To Shape a Dragon’s Breath by Moniquill Blackgoose
Old Team Book: The Deep by Rivers Solomon

Team Mystery/Horror/Thriller
Team Challenge 1: Read a book featuring the “Isolated Setting” trope
Team Challenge 2: Read a book featuring the “Cult” trope
New Team Book: A Disappearance in Fiji by Nilima Rao
Old Team Book: White Smoke by Tiffany D. Jackson

Team Contemporary/Literary/Historical Fiction
Team Challenge 1: Read a book with the “Heroes with Titles” trope
Team Challenge 2: Read a book with the “Reunion” trope
New Team Book: The Wind Knows My Name by Isabel Allende
Old Team Book: Dumplin’ by Julie Murphy

Team Non-Fiction Poetry
Team Challenge 1: Read a book about mental health
Team Challenge 2: Read a book about immigration or refugees
New Team Book: The Song of Us by Kate Fussner
Old Team Book: Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner

Content/Trigger Warnings

Rob and I will be reading the old team books prior to the start of Trope-ical Readathon and will be adding the trigger/content warnings for these books to our website BookTriggerWarnings.com (BTW) for anyone who needs them. We will also try to search reviews of ARCs for the new releases to see if any reviewers have provided warnings for those. BTW is also a good place to find books that have certain tropes.

For those who don’t know what Book Trigger Warnings is, BTW is a wiki dedicated to providing warnings, tropes, and rep info for any given book. There are over 6000 books listed on there already, and if you’d like to contribute to the site, just create a username and password! You can read our full announcement post here.

Point System

Since each team will have a different amount of members, scoring will be based off of average points earned. The point breakdown is as follows:

• Common Challenges: 50 POINTS EACH
• Team Challenges: 100 POINTS EACH
• Team Books: 150 POINTS EACH
• Pages Read: 1 POINT PER PAGE

Graphic novels CAN be counted towards pages read but CANNOT be used to satisfy any challenges. Only books equivalent to novellas and up (17,500 words and above; use your best judgement) can count for challenges. For audiobooks, you can use the Goodreads page count to calculate pages read.

Each day, you can click on the “Update Your Points” button above to fill out how many pages you read and what challenges you’ve completed. If you forget to update on a certain date, don’t worry! The forms will all remain active until the end of the readathon.

Reading Sprints

Reading sprints will be organized using our sprint account on Twitter (@TropeicalSprint). A reading sprint is a when a group of people come together to read as much as they can for a certain short period of time (generally between 5 – 45 min per sprint).

If you’d like to apply to be a sprint host for Trope-ical Readathon, please fill out this form.

Giveaways (International)

There will be 2 giveaways for registered participants (and 3 total winners)! Winners will receive either a book of their choice or a gift card, depending on location/availability.

• Giveaway #1: To enter, all you have to do is share your planned TBR (full or partial; you’re allowed to change your TBR at any point during the readathon). This can be via your blog, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, etc. Just make sure that you either tag us in it on Twitter or DM us a link and that you include the username you registered with. This giveaway ends when registration closes on August 6th at 11:59PM (US Central Time) so make sure to get your TBRs shared before then!
• Giveaway #2: To enter, all you have to do is accumulate at least 500 points. Once all the final scores are calculated, one winner will be chosen from the general pool of entries and one will be chosen from the winning team’s pool.

Registration Info

If you would like to participate, please click on the “Registration” button (above or below) and fill out the registration form with your username, contact information, and team. Don’t forget your username!! It’s how we will be keeping track of your points so it’s very important that it’s a unique name that you can remember. Registration will remain open until August 6th at 11:59PM (US Central Time).

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