January 2021 – 24in48 Readathon

You asked for it, you waited for it, and it’s finally here: Introducing the 24in48 group read!

As with everything we do with this ‘thon and community, we were hyper-intentional about our picks for this first group read (and will be for all of them, going forward). It’s our hope that these two books will either help take your reading life in a new direction or reinforce your existing commitment to reading BIPOC, LGBTQIA+ books, and many intersections therein.

Our goal is to be as expansive, intersectional, and representational as possible as our group reads shelf grows. We’re already on the lookout for our summer reads. If you have recommendations for disability lit, neurodiverse books/topics, Native/Indigenous lit, and/or any other marginalized or social justice-related topics/voices, send them our way at 24in48readathonofficial [at] gmail [dot] com.

Two final notes before we get to the reason you’re all here!

We’re gonna try tagging group reads throughout the ‘thon weekend with #24in48GroupRead so folks who are joining the group read have an easier time finding each other.
The group reads are not “mandatory”, as with everything else 24in48 is about/includes. We encourage, ask, and hope that you’ll join us, but it’s not a requirement for participating in the weekend.

[Fiction] Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender

red book cover showing a trans boy in a gray tank with small tattoos and a rainbow flower crown around his head under the title Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender — The cover of Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender

An indie bestseller from Stonewall and Lamda Award winner Kacen Callender (they/them; he/him), here’s what you can look forward to:

Felix Love has never been in love—and, yes, he’s painfully aware of the irony. He desperately wants to know what it’s like and why it seems so easy for everyone but him to find someone. What’s worse is that, even though he is proud of his identity, Felix also secretly fears that he’s one marginalization too many—Black, queer, and transgender—to ever get his own happily-ever-after.

When an anonymous student begins sending him transphobic messages—after publicly posting Felix’s deadname alongside images of him before he transitioned—Felix comes up with a plan for revenge. What he didn’t count on: his catfish scenario landing him in a quasi–love triangle….

But as he navigates his complicated feelings, Felix begins a journey of questioning and self-discovery that helps redefine his most important relationship: how he feels about himself.

Here’s an interview with Kacen at YAPride.org

[Nonfiction] White Negroes: When Cornrows Were in Vogue … and Other Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation by Lauren Michele Jackson

Cover of White Negroes: When Cornrows Were in Vogue and Other Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation by Lauren Michele Jackson

A debut from assistant professor of English and cultural critic/New Yorker Staff writer Lauren Michele Jackson (she/her), here’s what to expect:

Exposes the new generation of whiteness thriving at the expense and borrowed ingenuity of black people—and explores how this intensifies racial inequality.

American culture loves blackness. From music and fashion to activism and language, black culture constantly achieves worldwide influence. Yet, when it comes to who is allowed to thrive from black hipness, the pioneers are usually left behind as black aesthetics are converted into mainstream success—and white profit.

Weaving together narrative, scholarship, and critique, Lauren Michele Jackson reveals why cultural appropriation—something that’s become embedded in our daily lives—deserves serious attention. It is a blueprint for taking wealth and power, and ultimately exacerbates the economic, political, and social inequity that persists in America. She unravels the racial contradictions lurking behind American culture as we know it—from shapeshifting celebrities and memes gone viral to brazen poets, loveable potheads, and faulty political leaders.

An audacious debut, White Negroes brilliantly summons a re-interrogation of Norman Mailer’s infamous 1957 essay of a similar name. It also introduces a bold new voice in Jackson. Piercing, curious, and bursting with pop cultural touchstones, White Negroes is a dispatch in awe of black creativity everywhere and an urgent call for our thoughtful consumption.

Here’s an interview with Lauren on NPR

If you have the means, support an indie bookstore by ordering these titles directly from them or via Bookshop.org! And don’t forget to get on that holds list at your local library, if that’s more your speed.

We can’t wait to read along with you on Feb 6&7th (have you signed up yet?).

Until then, wash your hands, wear a mask, and read good books.

-Kerry, Kristen, and Rachel

Dear Readathoners,

What a long, strange year it has been. We never anticipated when we hosted the Social Distancing readathon back in March that we’d basically be in the exact same position (some better, some worse) nearly a year later. But we find ourselves—as hosts, as readers, as friends—missing this community and knowing with ever more certainty that finding solace in each other is how we survive.

We also recognize that our reasons for canceling last summer’s readathon in July are as important and relevant as ever (if not more so, since we must not only practice anti-racism when everyone is watching, but all the time, constantly and consistently).

Our reasons for canceling last January’s readathon have also not changed; our lives have not gotten any less complicated or busy and our capacity to put in the kind of work that previous iterations of this event required have not increased.

So. Where does that leave us? As you might have guessed from the title of this post, we’ll back with 24in48 on

February 6-7, 2021

It’s going to look differently from traditional readathons of the past. We had to reset and acknowledge that we couldn’t commit to providing the kind of intense and involved event we used to host, but that we do want to continue doing 24in48 events. This community is too generous, too fantastic, too supportive to ditch these readathons forever. How can we possibly stay away?

gif of Kamala Harris dancing in the rain on a stage, holding an umbrella

We loved hosting the Social Distancing readathon in March, and with the changing operations of publishing (and frankly, mail service), it makes sense for us to pivot into an event focused less on prizes and more on what it was always meant to be about: Reading. For a whole weekend. Together (virtually).

As per normal, we’ll begin ‘thoning at 12:01 AM ET on Saturday, February 6th and run through 11:59PM ET on Sunday, February 7th. You are welcome to shoot for 24 hours, but we won’t be asking for proof in a check-in for prizes at the end. Our goal (for you and for ourselves) is to spend some dedicated time hunkered down in a book.

We’ll be checking in here and on social media (mostly Instagram and Twitter, with automatic Facebook pushes) every 12 hours. We won’t be checking in on Facebook or Litsy, but we encourage you to use your favorite platform to keep up with your community. We encourage everyone to use the #24in48 hashtag to connect with each other.

As we discussed in our post canceling the July 2020 readathon, one of the ways we as white women can encourage diversity in publishing is to encourage you as participants to read intentionally and choose BIPOC authors, and LGBTQ+, disabled, and neurodiverse authors (and any/all intersections of those you can find). We’ll still be asking you to log the books you read during the readathon on a Google form so we can spin through both the fun parts of the data (how many books we all read over the weekend) and identify where we need to improve (how diverse we read, but we won’t be logging those books in Goodreads.

Lastly, one of the pieces of feedback we’ve gotten consistently at the end of each readathon weekend is the desire for a group read during the #24in48 events. With that in mind, we’ll be introducing two group reads, one fiction and one nonfiction, that we can all read together over the weekend. Our picks intentionally champion voices, experiences, and perspectives other than our own. Stay tuned here for the announcement of our group read titles this Wednesday, January 6th.

In the meantime, you can sign up to participate here and follow us on Instagram and Twitter, and we’ll use the hashtag #24in48 all weekend. See you there!