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This one is for our long-distance readers!
Join our 10-month-long Reading Marathon and test your endurance! Challenge yourself to reach the finish line by Sunday, November 30, 2025!
AAPLD cardholders only.
Must be 18 or older to participate.
Register in person or over the phone beginning on Saturday, February 1st, 2025. Pick up your reading log at Adult Services at the Main Library on Harnish (2600 Harnish Dr., Algonquin, IL 60102, 847-458-6060) or at the Eastgate Branch (115 Eastgate Drive, Algonquin, IL 60102, 847-658-4343).
To compete in the challenge, marathoners will read a book from each of the following 26 categories. Why 26? Because there are 26 miles in a marathon! Click on each category to find inspiration. (Categories may be completed in any order.)
Bonus: Marathoners will be able to participate in the Summer Reading Program and the Reading Marathon at the same time! Your reading during the months of June and July will count for both programs and qualify for both sets of prizes.
To earn everlasting renown and receive the Reading Marathon Finishers Prize, you can turn in your log as soon as you complete the program, but no later than November 30, 2025. Prizes will be available for pick up at both libraries beginning on Monday, December 15, 2025.
Ready. Set. Go!
Reading Marathon Categories
(Read in any order)
Books can be fiction or nonfiction, written for adults or young adults. Audio books count, graphic novels don’t. You can find your own titles in these categories or you can use the lists that we put together for you.
Read any book with a road on the cover or the word ‘road’ in the title. (Synonyms count. So, ‘highway’ or ‘route’, etc, are included. Paths count; sidewalks don’t.)
Read any athlete’s biography, autobiography, or memoir; all sports count.
Read any book in which most of the events take place at sea.
Read any book that includes a family relationship in the title. (Mother, father, daughter, son, sister, brother, etc. In-laws count.)
Read any book that has song lyrics or lines from poems in the title.
Read any book in which most of the events take place in or around a circus.
- Want to Visit
Read any book in which most of the events take place somewhere you would like to visit.
Read any book that is written primarily in the form of a diary, or as a series of letters. (Emails, texts, and IMs count)
Read any book published prior to 1900. (It doesn’t matter if your copy of the book was copyrighted more recently. So, for instance, all of Shakespeare counts.)
- Own It, Haven’t Read It
Read any book that is sitting on your bookshelves or on your reader, that you haven’t yet read.
- Set in My Birth Decade
Read any book that takes place primarily in the decade in which you were born. (For example: 1950 to 1959)
Read any book that has been adapted into a movie or TV series. (Regardless of how faithfully it was adapted.)
Read any book that was originally written in a language other than English.
Read any book in which most of the events take place in a country other than the United States.
Read any book that has a fruit or vegetable on the cover.
Read any book written in essay form. (Where any given essay can be read independently from the rest of the book.)
- Topic I Avoid
Read any book that centers on a topic you would typically avoid.
Read any book that has won a professional literary award (examples of literary awards include the Hugo Awards, Nebula Awards, Edgar Awards, Booker Prize, etc.)
- Always Wanted to Read
Read any book that you’ve always wanted to read but haven’t gotten to yet.
Read any book in which a high-stakes/arduous adventure or expedition takes place.
Read any book in which most of the events take place in the city of Chicago or its suburbs. (Evanston counts; Bloomington doesn’t.)
- NYT Bestseller
Read any book that has appeared on the bestseller list. (Any year counts.)
Read any book written by an author who lives in or was born in Illinois. (Dead authors count.)
Read any book that has been challenged, censored, or banned at any point in the last one hundred years.
Read any book that is at least 500 pages long. (Using the description in the library’s catalog, based on the original edition of the book. So paperbacks and Large Type count, even if the page numbers differ from the original.)
- Younger Than You
Read any book published after you were born.
![image of runners in marathon](https://www.aapld.org/wp-content/uploads/pic_post_250116_reading_marathon.png)