My favorite reading challenge is back! r/Fantasy Book Bingo started its eleventh year on April 1, celebrating with the annual release of a new Bingo card. For those who aren’t familiar, it’s an annual reading challenge with 25 different categories of books to read for the following year. Anything you were less than halfway through on April 1 counts, as long as you finish by March 31, 2026. Get five in a row, you have a Bingo. Fill all 25 squares, and you have a full card, and if you’re a Redditor, you can get a sweet flair upgrade. The trick is that you can’t reuse authors–those 25 squares have to be from 25 different authors.

To add to the challenge, many readers do cards that all fit a particular theme. Maybe’s that’s filling the optional “hard mode” (as I did in 2021), or something different (like anti-hard mode, which I did in 2024). For the last four years, I’ve done two cards per year, one with a theme, and one without. This year, I’ve chosen to theme my entire card around a square I’ve been pushing for over the past year: Spot the Title. Every book I read for my themed card must have a title that appears verbatim somewhere in the text itself. This may be my trickiest hard mode for advanced planning, but I’m excited to give it a try.

Anyways, we have 25 squares, and the annual recommendation thread is absolutely fantastic for churning the TBR and finding interesting, oddly specific recommendations. So let’s take a look at each of the 25. What do I plan to read, what’s available for my themed card, and what do I recommend for others? As always, some squares are extremely easy. I’ll read a Self-Published Book, a POC Author, a 2025 Release, and a handful of others without even looking. But some squares are going to take some thought, and if you have any recommendations for the squares that look tricky–especially ones that drop the title in text–I’d love to hear them!

Knights and Paladins

One of the protagonists is a paladin or knight. Hard mode: the character has an oath or promise to keep.

My Recommendations

We start with perhaps the hardest square on the board. Knights aren’t especially rare in fantasy, but not many of my favorites have knight leads. Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold is excellent though, as is Nicola Griffith’s Spear.

Candidates from my TBR

Do I finally pull T. Kingfisher’s Paladin’s Grace off my TBR, even as my Kingfisher love has somewhat cooled? Or will What Feasts at Night, a newly minted Hugo finalist, fit because of the Sworn Soldier conceit? I’m honestly not sure. I do have a book club friend heartily recommending The Deeds of Paksenarrion by Elizabeth Moon, whose first book does fit the Spot the Title theme. I have another friend with lots of nostalgia for Tamora Pierce’s Alanna series, Christopher Buehlman’s Between Two Fires has been on the edges of my TBR for a while, and I could always finally get around to Words of Radiance. But I don’t have a lot here at the tippy top of my TBR and am happy to get recommendations.

Hidden Gem

A book with under 1,000 ratings on Goodreads. New releases and ARCs from popular authors do not count. Follow the spirit of the square! Hard mode: Published more than five years ago.

My Recommendations

My goodness, where do I start? I read a lot of books off the beaten path. My favorite author, R.A. Lafferty, is a name few recognize. His short story collections are elite, and he has some novels that are hilarious (Space Chantey) or else deeply weird (Fourth Mansions, The Three Armageddons of Enniscorthy Sweeny). On the self-pub side, I’m a big fan of Andy Giesler. The Nothing Within is wonderful, and Three Grams of Elsewhere is excellent as well. 1,000 is a pretty low threshold, so even a lot of offbeat favorites clear it. Then again, one of my top five novels of 2024, Mechanize My Hands to War by Erin K. Wagner, currently sits at 244. Lavie Tidhar’s Neom was one of my favorites a couple years ago and still sits below the threshold, and it’s the same with Indrapramit Das’ The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar. On the non-Lafferty short story side, The Digital Aesthete and Sarah Pinsker’s Lost Places are both fantastic, and I’ve read enough of Thomas Ha’s forthcoming Uncertain Sons and Other Stories to know it will be as well. There are a whole lot of choices.

Candidates from my TBR

What isn’t a candidate from my TBR? A good chunk of my SPSFC reading will fit, and a few books that I’ve filed away on previous recommendations–The Sign of the Dragon by Mary Soon Lee, Tuyo by Rachel Neumeier, The Nine by Tracy Townsend–fit as well. I’ve confirmed that the latter two are Spot the Title-approved.

Published in the 80s

Read a book first published between 1980 and 1989. Hard mode: written by an author of color.

My Recommendations

I’m a huge fan of The Steerswoman series by Rosemary Kirstein, which started in 1989. Another favorite, The Vorkosigan Saga by Lois McMaster Bujold, has multiple potential entry points (specifically Shards of Honor and The Warrior’s Apprentice) from the 80s.

Candidates from my TBR

This feels like a hard square because I don’t usually stumble upon 40 year-old books, but I have a whole lot of TBR options. Daggerspell by Katharine Kerr and The Shadow of the Torturer by Gene Wolfe both fit, and if I don’t use it for Paladins, the first Paksenarrion book fits Spot the Title, as do Toni Morrison’s Beloved, Diana Wynne Jones’ Howl’s Moving Castle, and Dan Simmons’ Hyperion. Beloved is even hard mode!

High Fashion

Read a book where clothing/fashion or fiber arts are important to the plot. This can be a crafty main character (such as Torn by Rowenna Miller) or a setting where fashion itself is explored (like A Mask of Mirrors by M.A. Carrick). Hard mode: The main character makes clothes or fibers.

My Recommendations

There’s honestly not a lot immediately coming to mind, though I’m sure I’ve read some good ones that fit. The Hunger Games certainly spends a lot of time on fashion as a subplot, and The Four Profound Weaves by R.B. Lemberg is a good one, as is the post-apocalyptic I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman.

Candidates from my TBR

Juliet Marillier’s Daughter of the Forest has been recommended to me several times, and I’m told Howl’s Moving Castle fits here too. That’s not many choices though, I’m open to suggestions!

Down with the System

Read a book in which a main plot revolves around disrupting a system. Hard mode: not a governmental system.

My Recommendations

This is another one that feels like a very, very common fantasy plot, so it’s no surprise that there are a lot of books I really enjoy that fit. M.L. Wang’s Blood Over Bright Haven and R.F. Kuang’s Babel fit, as does Emily Tesh’s Some Desperate Glory and Samantha Mills’ The Wings Upon Her Back, and those are just from the last couple years. Ogres by Adrian Tchaikovsky is great as well.

Candidates from my TBR

My first read of Bingo season already fits this, and it’s Spot the Title approved: Where the Axe is Buried by Ray Nayler. Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny would also fit. I honestly haven’t looked too hard on this square because I expect it to be pretty easy.

Impossible Places

Read a book set in a location that would break a physicist. The geometry? Non-Euclidean. The volume? Bigger on the inside. The directions? Merely a suggestion. Hard mode: more than 50% of the book takes place in the impossible place.

My Recommendations

Have you heard the good news about Piranesi by Susanna Clarke? Or The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard? Or Jeff VanderMeer’s Annihilation? Marie Brennan’s Driftwood and Ysabeau S. Wilce’s Flora Segunda would also be nice picks.

Candidates from my TBR

Please contain your shock, but I’m told Howl’s Moving Castle fits here. So does The Unmapping by Denise S. Robbins, which caught my attention after how much I liked my last speculative litfic about an impossible place (I may have mentioned The Other Valley).

A Book in Parts

Read a book that is separated into large sections within the main text. This can include things like acts, parts, days, years, and so on but has to be more than just chapter breaks. Hard mode: the book has four or more parts.

My Recommendations

Again, The Other Valley and Piranesi fit, as do Tananarive Due’s The Reformatory, the triply co-authored The Golden Key (Rawn, Roberson, and Elliott), and Robert Jackson Bennett’s The Tainted Cup and A Drop of Corruption. There are probably plenty of others that don’t immediately come to mind because I don’t immediately remember the structure of every book I read–the recommendations that come to mind are probably ones that I’ve either read recently or where the structure itself is memorable in some way.

Candidates from my TBR

There will be a lot. For instance, Where the Axe is Buried fits here. So does Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel. Both are Spot the Title. But I expect to come on several others organically.

Gods and Pantheons

Read a book featuring divine beings. Hard mode: there are multiple pantheons involved.

My Recommendations

I’m not especially into fantasy with particularly involved gods, but Lois McMaster Bujold’s World of the Five Gods universe immediately comes to mind.

Candidates from my TBR

Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny is a Spot the Title choice that’s been on the fringes of my TBR for a while. On my TBR for even longer? Malazan. Will I actually read it this year? Well, I do have an active buddy read request.

Last in a Series

Read the final book in a series. Hard mode: series is 4+ books long.

My Recommendations

Just read whichever series you’re nearly done with? I suppose I can recommend duologies with particularly strong second books, since they don’t require catching up on a full series. In that case, Carol Berg’s Lighthouse Duet and Arkady Martine’s Teixcalaan are excellent choices.

Book Club

Read a book that was or is an official group read on r/Fantasy. Hard mode: Read and actively participate in a book club running during this Bingo year.

My Recommendations

I lead the Hugo Readalong, so just jump in on a Hugo finalist? Or if you want an older one, check out Kindred, or The Long Price Quartet, or The Fifth Season, or Chain-Gang All-Stars, or Inda. There are a lot of tremendous books that have been book club selections.

Candidates from my TBR

This is actually a tricky one. Getting an unthemed selection is free, since I lead a book club on r/Fantasy. But none of my unread Hugo finalists fit my Spot the Title theme, so I’ll have to keep an eye out for a new one, or else scour the backlist to find a selection that fits the theme. Which I’ve already done, and you’ll never guess which book is a fit. I think this entire Bingo card is an elaborate ploy to get me to read Howl’s Moving Castle.

Parent Protagonist

Read a book where a main character has a child to care for. The child does not have to be biologically related to the character. Hard mode: the child is also a major character.

My Recommendations

A number of my underrated favorites actually fit this theme. The Sword of Kaigen by M.L. Wang and Saint Death’s Daughter by C.S.E. Cooney both deserve more readers. Shannon Chakraborty’s The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi is an excellent choice, as is N.K. Jemisin’s The Fifth Season. And it’s hard to get more thematically appropriate than Erin Ampersand’s indie litRPG series Apocalypse Parenting.

Candidates from my TBR

I’m told that Hyperion and Station Eleven fit here too. I don’t have a lot of other obvious TBR candidates, but this is a theme that pops up enough that I wouldn’t be shocked to find something organically.

Epistolary

The book must prominently feature any of the following: diary or journal entries, letters, messages, newspaper clippings, transcripts, etc. Hard mode: the book is entirely in epistolary format.

My Recommendations

This is a format I enjoy, and I have a number of excellent books to recommend. I mentioned Piranesi for the Impossible Places square, but it fits wonderfully here. So does Nothing But the Rain by Naomi Salman and Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer. All are excellent, and all are hard mode. And if you want to get off-the-beaten path, my weird sci-fi fave is perhaps at his weirdest in the epistolary The Three Armageddons of Enniscorthy Sweeny.

Candidates from my TBR

I’ve gotten a fair few recommendations for this one, though not many are on theme. I’m definitely planning on trying Stephen Graham Jones’ The Buffalo Hunter Hunter, Flowers for Algernon is a classic, This is How You Lose the Time War remains a glaring gap on my shelf, and I’ve been told Sorcery and Cecelia by Caroline Stevermer and Patricia Wrede is a whole lot of fun. I’m not sure I can spot titles in any of those, but Frankenstein is also a classic.

Published in 2025

A book published for the first time in 2025 (no reprints or new editions). Hard mode: it’s the author’s debut novel.

My Recommendations

2025 isn’t especially old yet, but my early favorite is Robert Jackson Bennett’s A Drop of Corruption. I’ve also read a good 75% of the stories in Thomas Ha’s Uncertain Sons and Other Stories and have seen enough to highly recommend it.

Candidates from my TBR

I’ve literally read two 2025 Spot the Titles before I got this post draft finished, in Where the Axe is Buried and Maria Dong’s Psychopomp. I’m sufficiently distracted by shiny new releases that this square will not be difficult.

Author of Color

Read a book written by a person of color. Hard mode: it is a horror novel.

My Recommendations

There are a lot of POC authors who are exceptional at horror, with Tananarive Due and Victor LaValle leading the line. I’d recommend The Reformatory by the former and either Lone Women or The Ballad of Black Tom by the latter. If you’re not looking for hard mode, there’s N.K. Jemisin, Octavia Butler, Nghi Vo, and. . . well, didn’t I just mention Uncertain Sons?

Candidates from my TBR

Didn’t I also just mention The Buffalo Hunter Hunter? Psychopomp fits as well, and The Bewitching by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, and Beloved, and Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad. Yeah I have plenty of choices here.

Small Press or Self-Published

Read a book published by a small press (not one of the Big Five publishing houses or Bloomsbury) or self-published. If a formerly self-published book has been picked up by a publisher, it only counts if you read it before it was picked up. Hard mode: the book has under 100 ratings on Goodreads OR written by a marginalized author.

My Recommendations

You can almost copy/paste from Hidden Gem here. Anything by Andy Giesler, The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar, The Digital Aesthete. The Sword of Kaigen fits as well, as does Apocalypse Parenting. And It Lasts Forever and then It’s Over by Anne de Marcken is a lovely literary zombie novella.

Candidates from my TBR

Realistically, this will be an easy one. Psychopomp is hard mode, as are a good chunk of the things I read as an SPSFC judge. The Sign of the Dragon makes another appearance here, as does Tuyo, and I’ve seen Isabel Pelech’s The Fire-Moon recommended more than once.

Biopunk

Read a book that focuses on biotechnology and/or its consequences. Hard mode: There is no electricity-based technology.

My Recommendations

Honestly, it’s a little tricky for me to get a handle on this square, because so much cyberpunk monkeys around with brains in a way that seems like it may fit the square but I’m not completely sure. If we’re counting brain-monkeying, both of my earlier Andy Giesler recommendations–The Nothing Within and Three Grams of Elsewhere–will fit. Otherwise? Well, Robert Jackson Bennett’s current series, starting with The Tainted Cup and continuing on to A Drop of Corruption fits perfectly. S Qiouyi Lu’s novella In The Watchful City surely fits though, as does Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Children of Time and Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s The Daughter of Doctor Moreau.

Candidates from my TBR

I may be taking recommendations here.  I’m not sure I have a lot of TBR items. I suppose there’s always Frankenstein, and I’ve been told that Caroline Hardaker’s Composite Creatures is a fit, as may be some of The Expanse?

Elves and/or Dwarves

Read a book that features the classical fantasy archetypes of elves and/or dwarves. They do not have to fit the classic tropes, but must be either named as elves and/or dwarves or be easily identified as such. Hard mode: the main character is an elf or dwarf.

My Recommendations

Well, Tolkien is a classic for a reason. For someone who grew up reading fantasy, my favorites list is suspiciously short on elves and dwarves though.

Candidates from my TBR

I have been told that Ella Enchanted is a delightful middle grade choice that fits here–and may be a good readaloud candidate with my oldest. I could always pull another Discworld book off the stack, or I could finally read one of the first recommendations I got when looking for fantasy online, The Dragonbone Chair. And I’m told that Paksenarrion fits here too.

LGBTQIA Protagonist

Read a book where a main character is under the LGBTQIA+ umbrella. Hard mode: the character is marginalized on at least one additional axis, such as being a person of color, disabled, a member of an ethnic/religious/cultural minority in the story, etc.

My Recommendations

Pick a really good book from the last several years at random? More seriously, Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is excellent (but extremely heavy), N.K. Jemisin’s The Killing Moon is a fantastic ride, and a lot of recent short series–Shelley Parker Chan’s Radiant Emperor, Arkady Martine’s Teixcalaan, Robert Jackson Bennett’s Shadow of the Leviathan–all fit. Oh yes, and last year’s Hugo-winner, Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesh.

Candidates from my TBR

Well, This is How You Lose the Time War is still a great fit. But I imagine I’ll hit this one multiple times without even trying.

Five SFF Short Stories

Any short SFF story as long as there are five of them. Hard mode: read an entire SFF collection or anthology.

My Recommendations

Hahahahahahaha how long do you have? Pull something off my Recommended Reading List from last year. Or from 2023. Or from 2022. Or check out my early favorites from 2025, like “The Tawlish Island Songbook of the Dead,” or “Never Eaten Vegetables,” or “Our Echoes Drifting Through the Marsh” (for the rules lawyers, Bingo explicitly does not distinguish between short stories and novelettes). Or if you want hard mode, check out those collections I recommended by Lafferty, or Pinsker, or Ha.

Candidates from my TBR

I read Clarkesworld every month? And many other things? And I’ve already found one Spot the Title story that I really enjoyed in “Still Water” by Zhang Ran, translated by Andy Dudak. Four more shouldn’t be much of a lift.

Stranger in a Strange Land

Read a book that deals with being a foreigner in a new culture. The character (or characters, if there are a group) must be either visiting or moving in as a minority. Hard mode: the main character is an immigrant or refugee.

My Recommendations

I’ve mentioned The Last Dragoners of Bowbazar a couple times, but it’s a perfect fit here. So are Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Elder Race and Ogres, and Josiah Bancroft’s Senlin Ascends. It’s a good theme.

Candidates from my TBR

C.J. Cherryh’s Foreigner series has been on my list for ages, and it probably fits my theme. Tuyo definitely does. I’ve also heard a lot about Mary Doria Russell’s The Sparrow and Mike Brooks’ The Black Coast.

Recycle a Bingo Square

Use a square from a previous year (2015-2024) as long as it does not repeat one on the current card (as in, you can’t have two book club squares). Hard mode: use the hard mode from the old square.

My Recommendations

Read a book? Literally any book. There will be a square that fits. It doesn’t even have to be speculative, because there have been non-speculative and non-fiction squares. Shoot, the first Bingo even had a Free Space. This square is a free space. There are certainly some fun old squares, like “A Wild Ginger Appears,” and there have been squares for Translated SFF, African SFF, Middle Eastern settings, etc. If you want to find a cool square and challenge yourself, go for it. But this is free.

Candidates from my TBR

Remember how I just have to read something?

Cozy SFF

“Cozy” is up to your preferences for what you find comforting, but the genre typically features: relatable characters, low stakes, minimal conflict, and a happy ending. Hard mode: the author is new to you.

My Recommendations

This is another old that’s a little tricky to get a handle on, because Cozy the Marketing Category is a bit narrower than Cozy the Bingo Square. Something like Monica Furlong’s Wise Child has antagonists and genuine peril, but so much of the time is spent gardening and making herbal tinctures and generally learning from a wise parental figure that it feels at least cozy-adjacent. It’s certainly cozy enough for this square.

Candidates from my TBR

The Wise Child prequel Juniper would surely fit my theme and presumably will feel cozy enough. I’ll be reading John Wiswell’s Someone You Can Build a Nest In as I read through the Hugo finalists, and that’s at least marketed as cozy horror, though my own feelings are to be determined. If I want something that fits the marketing, I’ve seen a fair bit of recent buzz for the debut The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong. And there’s at least one Redditor who has been recommending The Healer’s Road by S.E. Robertson for ages.

Generic Title

Read a book that has one or more of the following words in the title: blood, bone, broken, court, dark, shadow, song, sword, or throne (plural is allowed). Hard mode: contains more than one of the words, or one word and a color, number, or animal.

My Recommendations

A Shadow in Summer by Daniel Abraham opens one of my all-time favorite fantasy series, and I really enjoy M.L. Wang’s Blood over Bright Haven. If you never read A Game of Thrones, I guess now’s your chance?

Candidates from my TBR

I mentioned The Shadow of the Torturer back in the 80s, but it fits here too. I’ve had How High We Go in the Dark on my list for a couple years now, and I’ve liked M.H. Ayinde’s short fiction enough to try out A Song of Legends Lost. I’m not sure I have a Spot the Title pick yet, so I’ll be on the lookout there.

Not a Book

Do something new besides reading a book! Watch a TV show, play a game, learn how to summon a demon! Okay maybe not that last one… Spend time with fantasy, science fiction, or horror in another format. Movies, video games, TTRPGs, board games, etc, all count. There is no rule about how many episodes of a show will count, or whether or not you have to finish a video game. “New” is the keyword here. We do not want you to play a new save on a game you have played before, or to watch a new episode of a show you enjoy. You can do a whole new TTRPG or a new campaign in a system you have played before, but not a new session in a game you have been playing. Hard mode: review it on r/Fantasy

My Recommendations

I don’t watch a ton of TV these days, but I still have a soft spot for a lot of the sci-fi I watched in my 20s, like Firefly, Battlestar Galactica, Farscape, and Orphan Black. On the movie side, Mirrormask, The Fall, and 12 Monkeys are favorites. If you’re parents in the early elementary set, Dragomino is a kid-friendly board game with short play times, enough strategy to keep it interesting for parents, and. . . well, dragons.

Candidates from my TBR

I’ll probably watch a movie or TV show at some point? I guess I can’t just watch the new Wheel of Time season, but I may watch one of the Hugo finalists for Best Dramatic Presentation. I’ve also had Jon Bois’ multimedia webnovel 17776 on my list for a long time, and this feels like a great square to read it for.

Pirates

Read a book where characters engage in piracy. Hard mode: not seafaring pirates.

My Recommendations

I adore the Inda quartet by Sherwood Smith, The Princess Bride is a classic, and The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi sits here as well. If you’ve read Senlin Ascends, the sequel is hard mode and is very good.

Candidates from my TBR

No word on the Amina al-Sirafi sequel yet, but Proliferation by Erik A. Otto is in my SPSFC semifinal group and fits. I don’t think I have a Spot the Title candidate yet though–recommendations welcome!