Fantasy Bingo 2020-21 is here! | First Row Picks

Happy April 1st! Today is the day that the 2020-21 fantasy bingo card was released!

For those unfamiliar, the r/Fantasy subreddit hosts a bingo challenge every year, from April 1st-March 31st. If you find it later in the year you can retroactively add books you’ve read since April 1st to fulfill the prompts. At the end, you report your findings on the subreddit and for each bingo you get, you’re entered to win prizes! So a full card will get you twelve entries – five horizontal, five vertical, and two diagonal.

I’ve participated every year since 2017 but have yet to fully complete a card. But I’ve always ended up winning an ebook or two regardless!

If you’re interested in participating and want to know the full details, here is the 2020 announcement thread about it. And here is the list of recommendations, crowd sourced by all the participants!

And here is this year’s card!

Like every year I’ve posted about this challenge, I’m going to go through each square and give some potential books I might read for it. I try to pick these from books I already own, as my goal is to cut down my TBR not add to it. 😛

First row potential picks:

Novel translated from its original language. Hard Mode: written by a woman

• Anything fantasy-esque by Haruki Murakami. These are originally in Japanese, so perfect. Physically I have 1Q84. Not hard mode but it’d fill the square.
• Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. This was originally in German I believe, and it would count for hard mode. It would also count as my one allotted reread, as I read it back when I was 12 or so. I never did read the third one, Inkdeath, though, so a reread might actually be in store as it is.

Setting featuring snow, ice, or cold. Hard Mode: The entire book takes place is this setting

• The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K Le Guin – would count for hard mode!
• The Terror by Dan Simmons – this one is intimidating. The copy I have is a mass market paperback and honestly it’s about as thick as it is tall. I believe this would also count for hard mode. I think.

Optimistic SFF. Hard Mode: Not Becky Chambers

• The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet by Becky Chambers – obviously wouldn’t count for hard mode
• A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan – I’m reading this for the OWLs Magical Readathon as is, so this’ll most likely end up here. Hard mode!
• Theft of Swords by Michael J Sullivan – This is a chunker and it’s intimidating but I’m pretty sure I’m gonna really like it. Hard mode!

Novel featuring necromancy. Hard Mode: Necromancer is the protagonist

• The only book I have right now that I think would count would be The Girl in the Tower by Katherine Arden, but honestly I’m not sure and I don’t wanna check because spoilers. So this square will be a challenge, and honestly it makes me all the more set on my Nano 2020 novel, which contains a necromancer. Does it count if I read my own book?

Ace/Aro spec fic. Hard mode: Ace/Aro protagonist

• Right now, I don’t own anything that fits this prompt! I need to find something for this. If you have any suggestions, please let me know!

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And that’s it! My second and third row picks will be up sometimes next week, and the fourth and fifth row picks the week after that. If you decide to participate in this challenge, lemme know! Happy reading!