SF&FKIT for 2025

Welcome to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Category Challenge for 2025!

Please sign up for a month and add a topic if you've selected one or leave blank if you're still pondering

JAN - amberwitch - Cozy Fantasy January SF&FKIT
FEB - Miss Brangwen - The Art of SFF February thread
MAR - Tess_W - Magical Realism
APR - DeltaQueen50 - Women Authors
MAY - KeithChaffee - Authors of Global South
JUN - Robertgreaves - Anthologies and Collections
JUL - h-mb - Alternative History
AUG - christina_reads - Space
SEP - susanna.fraser - Back to School SFF
OCT - majkia - Mysterious Artifacts
NOV - h-mb - The Day After
DEC - RosemaryLovesBooks - disabled main character

SF&FKIT wiki

Pondering

I would like to take February with "The Art of SFF".
If anyone else really wants February, I could do a couple of other months, too.

I could do "Women Authors" in April.

I'll take May; I'd like to do authors from the Global South.

>3 MissBrangwen:>4>5 Gotcha.

I'll take July (or any other month) with Alternative History.

I'll take September with a "back to school" challenge for SFF related to academia in some way--dark academia, wizard school, Starfleet academy, a major character is a teacher or professor, etc.

I would be glad to host January with a Cozy fantasy challenge. Suitable for cuddling up inside and wait out the bleakest month on the northern hemisphere.

Got everyone up to and including amberwitch. All great ideas!

Could I have March for Magical Realism please?

>11 Tess_W: You've got it. 5 more months to go.

>11 Tess_W: thats a good one!
In fact, I love all the challenges so far.
Looking forward to next year:)

I'll do June for Mysterious Artifacts.

We need four more volunteers to set up the year.

I can do another month, whichever. I'll have to think about a theme, perhaps something about "the day after one saved the country/world/universe, if it suits you.

>16 h-mb: I could also do another month if no one else has the time - how about New horizons in December for instance?

I'd be glad if either of you or both choose to do that.

>18 majkia: Consider it done:-)

I'm happy to volunteer for a month, with the theme of space. Can be space opera, space travel, life on other planets, etc.

>16 h-mb: >17 amberwitch: I'm not sure I understand what you have in mind with either of those themes. Could you say a bit more, maybe mention some titles that would fit what you're thinking?

>18 majkia: It's decided then, with "the day after". I can pick whichever month but I'll say November for the moment.

>21 KeithChaffee: 'Space' seems pretty clear to me when she says, space opera, time travel, life on other planets. Set in space.

I'm figuring the Day After is what happens after the Disaster, or Invasion or first contact, or whatever?

I'll do a second month if no one else steps up and for december we can alwys do the old standard of something I meant to read but didn't get to.

>23 majkia: I was thinking also of the day after the war is won/lost, after the hero becomes king or win his/her goal, after some closure has been attained. Many books stop there but for exemple, Tchaikovsky in Redemption's blade imagine what happens after the "dark lord" is killed. Marko Kloos in Aftershocks does it too. I'll be interested in books tackling what happens after the great deed has been accomplished.

>23 majkia: No, I understood "space." "New horizons" is the other one that I don't quite get.

>25 h-mb: Another example would be So This Is Ever After by F. T. Lukens. The Prophecy has been fulfilled. The Vile One has been slain and the Land freed. Now what?

I already have a KIT for October, so if somebody doesn't mind swapping I could do a month with a theme of anthologies and collections

>26 KeithChaffee: New horizons could be space explorations or emigration like The Sparrow, To be taught, if fortunate, Wess’har Wars, Six Wakes, The Deep Sky, The wrong stars.
It could be Emily Wilde exploring faerie, or Frontier Magic in an alternative West, The Girl who fell beneath the sea navigating a spirit world, A psalm for the Wild-built exploring an abandoned wilderness, Emilies adventures underground or in the aether.
Or anything really that you think would fit under this heading.

>28 Robertgreaves: I can swap with you for June

>30 majkia: OK, let's do that then. Thank you

>31 Robertgreaves: Thanks! Done

Only one more month left.

December is still open and hoping for a volunteer.

I would love to do December, how about sci-fi/fantasy with a disabled main character?!

Sounds great! You've got it.

Okay, we are set for the year. :) Thanks everyone.

January SF&FKIT is up!

The February thread is up: https://www.librarything.com/topic/367668

>38 MissBrangwen: Thanks!

April's thread is up: https://www.librarything.com/topic/369232#

Posted this in the wrong thread, apologies.

May's thread can be found here.

The June thread is now up: https://www.librarything.com/topic/370830

The July thread is now up here

The August thread is here: https://www.librarything.com/topic/372316

October is up: https://www.librarything.com/topic/373842

November is up : here

Just a heads-up that I have created the 2026 Category Challenge group: https://www.librarything.com/ngroups/24919/2026-Category-Challenge. Stop by to get a head start on planning next year's challenge!

(Cross-posted to a bunch of threads; sorry if you see this a thousand times!)

The setup topic for the 2026 SFFKit can be found here:

https://www.librarything.com/topic/375093

Please stop by and let us know if you'd like to host a month!

>1 majkia: it looks like >34 RosemaryLovesBooks: has left Librarything, so we have no host for december. I’d be happy to take over, but I am a little low on disabled main character suggestions. Anyone else interested?
Otherwise I can try the selected theme or find something I have a better insight into.

>51 amberwitch: I found some lists online; trying to pare down to SFF.
Feel free to use or pick a new theme.

Redsight by Meredith Mooring
Casandra in reverse by Holly Smale (changing the past)
The death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi
The long way to a small angry planet by Becky Chambers
Black sun by Rebecca Roanhorse
Songs of chaos by S.N. Lewitt
The speed of the dark by Elizabeth Moon

I have read and enjoyed Elizabeth Bear's white space booksand it seemed to me that the main characters in these books were neurodivergent, though that doesn't mean they're disabled.
Ancestral night and Machine

Disabled character was the topic I had the hardest time finding something for. I'm planning to read Sarah Pinsker's We Are Satellites, and even that felt like stretching the notion of "disabled" to its limit. (The main character is among the small minority of people who refuse to get a new brain implant installed, and finds herself increasingly left behind by the social changes it causes.)

I wouldn't object to switching to a different topic. Given the short time notice, something simple like award-winners or reader's choice would probably be better than a more restrictive topic that will have people hunting again.

The obvious example is Flowers for Algernon. I suppose the Percy Jackson series might count if you include dyslexia and ADHD as disabilities.

I did find this list:
https://metaphorsandmoonlight.com/books-with-disability/

I think Miles Vorkosigan would qualify.

>55 susanna.fraser: Miles would definitely qualify.

https://thedisabilityarchive.com/genre/ might be a good resource. I was really looking forward to this topic! I hope Rosemary's okay.

Decembers thread has been posted: https://www.librarything.com/topic/375621