Welcome to Litsy!

REG OPENS: Sun., Nov. 23, 2025 @ 6pm (EST)

#AuldLangSpine is an annual reading event, which technically begins Jan. 1 but there‘s a lot of lead-up. 🙃 Space is limited.

When sign-ups go live, you‘ll fill out a Google Form including a list of 7-20 of your favorite reads from the past year. I play matchmaker & intentionally pair you with another Litten (based on genre preferences, etc). You begin the New Year by reading from your match‘s list.👇🏻

I‘m reviewing my reading year in preparation for #AuldLangSpine (eek!) and I‘m coming across several that I didn‘t review on Litsy. The Promise did not live up to the expectations I had—it‘s #EuropaEditions and it won the Booker in 2021. Though the set up is good: South Africa, white matriarch dies, grown children return home…will their mother‘s wishes to leave property to a long-time domestic worker, a black woman, be carried out?

Carrie, didn‘t you recommend this to me? If not, oops 😂 We chatted about a bunch of books when #ALSpine started and I seem to remember this being one of them. ANYWAY! It was fantastic! If it was you, thanks 😊 @CSeydel #TBRtarot

Is anyone else excited to have one whole side of the board done — AND a contender for Best Book in the final showdown slot? 😍

I‘m less enthused that I had to choose between The Usual Desire & Sleep. They‘re both fabulous. I think my decision was probably driven by recency bias...

With November‘s arrival, I‘ve got #AuldLangSpine on the brain. Registration usually goes live around Thanksgiving. As of now, that‘s still the plan! 🍂

A dual timeline narrative confronting the legacy of colonization from an Indigenous perspective.

In the 1850s, Mulanyin leaves his coastal home to come of age in a colonial town, where tensions between the local Indigenous community, newly arrived colonists, and ex-convicts are always simmering. He dreams of returning home with Nita, and believes that someday soon the white people will return across the sea and leave their land to heal.

cont'd

I‘m not okay. This one is in the running for my best book of the year. The premise is really messed up, but the love and grief, it‘s all so beautiful. I couldn‘t understand how it could possibly work. But it‘s such a good story. Such a human story. “Lewis tattooed her with beautiful poetry in a place she would never see but somehow read every second.” #AuldLangSpine @DebinHawaii I never would have picked this up otherwise. @monalyisha