2026 Classics Reading Challenge
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Let’s read more classic books together in 2026! Here are the monthly prompts for the Tea and Ink Society Classics Reading Challenge, with ideas to get you started.
2026 Reading Challenge for Classic Literature
It’s time for the fifth annual Classics Reading Challenge at Tea and Ink Society, with all new prompts, genres, and topics! Taking this classic reading challenge is a great way to motivate yourself to read more classics and to expand your literary repertoire to read different classics that you might not normally choose.
As always, you can adjust this challenge to suit you or to mesh with other challenges or book clubs you participate in, but here are some basic guidelines:
- All books must be written before 1975 (you can read a rediscovered classic that was published posthumously, for instance, or a short story collection that was compiled and published recently, but the stories themselves were written 50+ years ago)
- You may not count the same book for multiple categories
- Children’s chapter books are fine (but no picture or storybooks)
- Books may be re-reads from titles you’ve read in the past
- You may join the challenge at any time, even if you discover this late!
To help guide you through the challenge, I will publish blog posts throughout the year with suggestions for some of the prompts. Where I don’t have a blog post dedicated to a particular theme, I’ll still send out an email reminder to our newsletter list, and may include suggestions there as well. As always, my list of 101 must-read classic books to read will come in handy for some starting inspiration.
We also have a Tea and Ink Society Facebook group, which is a great place to share your reads and to ask for suggestions. To gain access to that group, subscribe to our Tea and Ink newsletter; the group is a perk for members, and you’ll receive a link after you join. You can also tag @teaandinksociety on Instagram to share your reads.
2026 Classics Reading Challenge Prompts
January: A “serial novel” you read throughout the course of the year
We all know many novels in the 1800s and early 1900s were serialized in magazines or journals before being published in book form. Readers would wait eagerly for each installment the way we might wait now for new episodes of a favourite show to drop. So for your first classic book of the challenge, recreate that experience and live with a novel for the whole year. You can pick one that was originally serialized, or just choose any classic novel you want to read incrementally and divide it up over the course of the year.
February: A nonfiction journal or diary
Get a peek into the personal life of someone who really lived, decades and centuries removed from you. You could read the famous diary of Samuel Pepys (Penguin and Modern Library have good selected editions), the expedition journals of Lewis and Clark or Robert Falcon Scott, or the diaries of Anne Frank or Lena Mukhina. There’s such a range of people and circumstances to choose from.
March: A book from the classics section of your local library
Of course there are classic books mixed throughout the library as a whole, but most libraries also have a specific section for “classics.” Go to this section, browse, and choose only from the options that are right there. With a constant influx of books, librarians have to make decisions about what existing books to keep and what to purge, and they take a book’s checkout history into account. So if we want to keep more classic books in libraries, we need to check them out to show they’re being read!
April: A classic Western novel or short story collection
Go west, Reader! The American west, that is. This is certainly a niche genre that maybe you love, or maybe you’ve never even come near! Either way, it’s time to saddle up and choose a novel that takes you to the plains or desert or mountains–anything west of the Mississippi River will do. Some titles to explore might be the foundational novel The Virginian by Owen Wister, Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey, True Grit by Charles Portis, The Ox-Bow Incident by Walter Van Tilburg Clark, or a short story collection by Dorothy M. Johnson.
May: An Edith Wharton novel
For each year’s challenge I like to feature a specific author, and this year we’re going to spotlight Edith Wharton. Wharton was a socialite and heiress who grew up during–and later wrote about–the Gilded Age of New York’s elite at the end of the 19th century. Wharton wrote 22 novels and novellas, so you’ll have plenty of options.
June: A book set in Africa
We also like to travel the world in our reading challenges! We’ve been to the Nordic region, Japan, Russia…now we’re going to the African continent. Read a fiction or nonfiction book set entirely or primarily in Africa, from any region. A few options to consider: Things Fall Apart, Cry, The Beloved Country, Out of Africa, The African Queen, Burning Grass, Weep Not, Child, and Efuru.
July: A classic thriller
Pick up a classic page turner like The 39 Steps by James Buchan, Laura by Vera Caspary, The Street by Ann Petry, This Rough Magic by Mary Stewart, or To Catch a Thief by David Dodge. There’s lots of “flavours” of thrillers–gothic, espionage, domestic, fugitive, noir–so see what sparks your interest.
August: A book written under a pseudonym
So many famous authors with easy name recognition didn’t actually use their real names! Mark Twain, George Eliot, Lewis Carroll, George Orwell, Ellery Queen, James Herriot, and O. Henry, to name a few! Read one of their books, and use the opportunity to learn more about the author behind it and why they chose their pen name. Alternatively, you could read a book by a well-known person who used their real name but also a pseudonym for anonymity at one point–read Mary Westmacott (Agatha Christie), Acton Bell (Anne Bronte), or “A Lady” (Jane Austen).
September: A short classic under 200 pages
At this point in the year, you might be busy or needing to play catch-up with past month’s reading prompts, so we’ll do something short! See what an author was able to accomplish with an economy of words, and knock out a quick classic. This post has some ideas to get you started.
October: A classic novel featuring brothers
Explore the sibling relationship between brothers through a classic book like The Brothers Karamazov, The Master of Ballantrae, East of Eden, or The Outsiders.
November: A classic novel featuring sisters
Switch to the sororal relationship and read a book with sisters in the cast. Little Women, Sense and Sensibility, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, or Howards End are good places to start.
December: A wintry mystery
We’ll round off the year with a classic mystery, heavy on the winter setting! The setting is so important in a detective novel because it can be worked into the mystery plot in such interesting ways–a tide or snow can reveal or obscure clues, bodies can be hid in interesting places, nature and weather can trap suspects in an isolated location. Many mystery authors have employed winter settings to great effect, so we’re going to cozy up with one of those. I’ll point you in the right direction if you need suggestions–I’ve got a whole list, so I’ll share that in a blog post! A few titles to start investigating are The Sittaford Mystery, Dead Men Don’t Ski, and Mystery in White.
Find previous years’ classics reading challenges here:
What a great challenge! I unfortunately did not complete this year but I will keep trying! Especially love the spotlight on Edith Wharton, she is very underrated! Kaitlyn (aka Lady Bookish)
I’m hoping I can write a whole blog post on her! That’s the goal!
I’m going to push myself and try to complete this as well as the 2022-2024 challenges for their respective months; I enjoyed doing the 2025 challenge and the Shakespeare challenge so much this year, and I figure that I can keep up the one-book-per-week pace for another year :). A few of these will be more difficult than usual challenges (ex. my library doesn’t actually have a Classics section, so I’m going to have to ad-lib that one). Looking forward to it! Thanks for putting your list together despite all your December tribulations.
That is awesome!! I often find I have more time to read than I think I do, and can squeeze quite a bit of reading into the cracks! A few paragraphs, a few pages, here and there adds up, doesn’t it?
This was the first year I successfully finished my reading challenge! I also made it through Shakespeare- woohoo! However, I have decided no Shakespeare in 2026 for me 😆 unless you count movies. Excited to read some more Dickens for the “seriel novel” and find some Westerns I haven’t read yet.
I don’t think my library has a specific classics section, but I can certainly go ask my librarians for all the classics they have in house.
And yes to an Edith Wharton post! Literary Life podcast did a series on The Age of Innocence and it was excellent – the movie from the early 90’s is also supposed to be really good.
I enjoyed the book and the 1990s film adaptation. It’s not what one thinks of as “a Martin Scorsese movie,” but he did a great job directing it.
Wow, he directed that? How interesting! Now I want to watch it even more…
Great, I will have to listen to that series! I’ve been wanting to see the 90s movie…in fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen any movies or miniseries of Wharton’s work, so I’ll have to rectify that. That is amazing that you finished all of the 2025 challenge and Shakespeare! I did not!! I am spreading Shakespeare out into this year and possibly next; I guess I was a little crazy to try to read all of his plays on top of all the other reading I try to do for the blog, local book club, and personal interest stuff. Shoot for the stars though, right? What Dickens will you pick for serial?
Great Expectations.
I’ve never read it or seen a movie/tv adaptation of it, so going in completely blind!
It’s so good! It has some really iconic scenes and characters–not just for Dickens, which is already saying something, but for literary history in general! And in spite of being one of his more melancholy books, there are a number of laugh-out-loud funny moments and phrasing as well. I hope you enjoy!
So excited to try this challenge again!
I’m so glad you’re joining us!
Your 2025 edition inspired me greatly, and this edition looks amazing, I will hopefully participate some months. I do appreciate your suggestions a lot especially because I don’t know what classics fall under what! Kudos on Wharton! I want to read more of her.
Thank you! I will try to put out more blog posts on individual months this year! If/when I don’t get to it, I’ll have suggestions in the email newsletter! Thanks for joining the reading challenges!
Is there a printable version of this?
In the last email newsletter I sent out, there was a link to the page that has the printable, as well as the password for accessing that page. I do try to include that information at the bottom of every email newsletter as well, after the sign off, if you need it again! On that printables page, click the “Reading Challenge Checklists” and it takes you to a template you can print and fill out. I hope that helps! (I won’t post the page and password here, as they’re supposed to be a private access for email subscribers, but I see that you are subscribed, so you should be able to find it in your email!)
Yay! Oh I’ve been (somewhat) patiently waiting for this list to come, to the point where my family just saw me do a happy dance when I got your email. I’m so looking forward to this new challenge! What interesting prompts, can’t wait to dig into it! This has truly been my favorite thing every year since 2022.
Thanks for putting in all your work! We appreciate you!
YAY for happy dances!! About books and reading plans! I love it! Thank you so much for your kind, encouraging words…it’s fuel to the tank, for sure!
The 2026 Classics Challenge looks like a lot of fun!
When I did the Charles Dickens quiz from an earlier blog post, I got Little Dorrit. It was tentatively on my TBR list for this year; that will work for a serialized novel.
I love March’s idea; leave it up to serendipity and see what calls me from the classics section.
I’m already looking forward to your posts on Edith Wharton and wintry mysteries; I read An English Murder by Cyril Hare last month and that would work for a wintry mystery. (Of course, I’m looking for something new that sounds intriguing for the challenge.)
Little Dorrit was ENORMOUSLY popular during its serialization in Dickens’s day! One of his highest-selling books by far. An English Murder is actually on my list of wintry mysteries to check out, and will probably be included in the roundup! But I’ll have some others, too, so you’ll have plenty of ideas!
Hi, I am excited to take part in the classic reading challenge because I have had Vanity Fair waiting patiently to be read. This year is the year-yay.
That’s great! See if you can find an edition that includes Thackeray’s original illustrations–they add a lot of fun and “commentary” to the text!
I chose Wilkie Collins, The Woman in White, as my serial read and now after reading much too late into the night, realize there is no way I will be able to spread this over a year! I must find out what happens to these characters who are so endearing (and those I despise)! Thank you for your annual book challenge and the multitude of recommendations. I’ve read many of them and they never disappoint!
Ooo, I agree, one does not simply avoid binge reading The Woman in White!
I have to say this post was beautiful. To hear what your priest said warmed my heart. I think that there has been a definite move in our hearts towards Jesus worldwide. So, thank you. Thank you for your warmth and sincerity and for the countless hours you spend making these fabulous blogs. You are a blessing.
Thank you, Cindy. My readers like you are a blessing to me in turn!
Well, I jumped ahead to April, as I started Louis L’Amour’s “The Lonesome Gods” before I came across the challenge. I’ll pick another for the “official” read in a few months. I’ve had a lovely copy of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” on my TBR shelf for a while now, so I’ll finally give it the deep read it deserves this year.
How prescient! And I love Uncle Tom’s Cabin…it was one of those you hear so much about, but don’t know if it’ll be good on its own merits…and it really is! Such a good book. I need to find a nice copy to own, however, as I only got it from the library but would like it to be in my permanent collection. Enjoy the challenge!
Perusing Facebook this afternoon, after a loooong break from FB, I found you again and requested to be on the email list {since I’m still not tickled with FB}. I’m loving this challenge and hope to be able to keep up {you know, “so many books; so little time”}. I’m hoping to do a lot of reading from my own shelves this year, so was happy to be enabled {in a good way} to read Middlemarch finally as my serial read. I’m looking forward to fulfilling other parts of the challenge which will nudge me into reading others that I’ve not yet gotten to, like Edith Wharton. Thanks for the inspiration!
Hi Kim! What email address did you use to subscribe? I can see your email address on the backend here in the comments, but it’s not on my mailing list…maybe you signed up with a different one? Anyway, just put whatever email address you want to subscribe with into the form on this page: https://teaandinksociety.com/flowchart-next-favorite-novel/ and you should be good to go! Enjoy Middlemarch! I love that one, although I don’t own a copy! I do want it for my permanent collection.
What’s great about this challenge is most of these books are public-domain/free and can be found at gutenberg.org or linereads.com
Yes! It’s amazing that in today’s world we can have access to even some of the most esoteric classics. Would be great to get some of them back in print, but I’d rather read them somehow than not!
Finally joining the reading challenge. Better late than never! Took me a while to find a western that sounded interesting to me for the month of April though. I ended up going with the Cowboy and the Cossack by Clair Huffaker. It fits the bill of being written before 1975, but I might be stretching it a bit because Siberia (where the book is set) is definitely not in the west. However, I think the author helped me a bit on that one because he started out the book with an epigraph from Kipling’s “The Ballad of East and West” saying that basically there is no East or West when two great forces from opposite ends of the world come together. Fingers crossed hoping it will be a good read. Would love to hear what others picked for this month’s theme.
That sounds interesting! Thanks for joining!