Around the Year in 52 Books discussion

This comes from an entry in The Wild Discussion - What is your "jam"?
See definition and examples below.

Your "jam" is something about a book, other than genre or author, that will entice you to read it.

For example, I will read anything about people who move to France and fall in love with the culture/food/ a person.

Also I grew up on a sheep farm and I will read anything with sheep, such as Three Bags Full (precocious sheep help solve a mystery), or the nonfiction Follow the Flock: How Sheep Shaped Human Civilization, Sheepish: Two Women, Fifty Sheep, and Enough Wool to Save the Planet, etc. I recently bought just because of the cover!

I seem to have a thing for French policemen, specifically Bruno, Chief of Police and the jazz-playing Inspector Darac who debuts in Impure Blood. I”m well aware there are gendarmes I’ve yet to swipe right, I mean meet.

Also mould-breaking characters from the days of the (British) empire. I’m thinking here of The Ginger Tree and Burmese Days

My jams which might motivate me, but is no guarantee, are any of the following:

1. The cover
2. Time travel tags
3. Endorsements on the cover by writers that I love.
4. Set in a bookstore or library.

My list

1. Fake Dating/Fake Marriage/Marriage of convenience etc.
2. Cats or cat shifters.
3. Fiction set behind the scenes on a reality show.
4. Jane Austen retellings
5. Celebrity memoirs
6. Set in a library/book store

And then there is books about WW2 - I always say I've read enough of them and never need to read another - and then I find myself picking up just one more.....

Sad books. I just really seem to love books that make me sob.

My jam is books that encourage me to think about big ideas, feel a strong emotion, and learn something (cultural, historical, philosophical, scientific). On a lighter note, I’ve recently been enjoying Japanese books with cats!

Never thought about having a jam, but I suppose I do:

Dragons
Unknown women in history (fiction or non-fiction)

My jam includes: survival stories, shipwrecks, mutiny, cats, family saga, central setting involves a house, historical figures/events, and living organisms that talk but are not human (animals, trees, etc). I read all types of books but find these most fulfilling.

Joanne wrote: "Never thought about having a jam, but I suppose I do:

Dragons
Unknown women in history (fiction or non-fiction)"

I also read about unknown/lesser-known women, mostly in American history, and I get paid to talk about them!

Also, although I am a pacifist and feminist in "real life", I have a weakness for swashbuckling (pirates, musketeers, etc.)

Cats on the cover or as characters
Covers with birds
Set in India
Books about bookstores, libraries or books
Told from multiple POVs
Multi-generational sagas
Baseball stories, both fiction and non-fiction
Doorstops....I am attracted to books just because they are long, thick books.

Robin P wrote: "Joanne wrote: "Unknown women in history (fiction or non-fiction)"

I also read about unknown/lesser-known women, mostly in American hi..."

My jam is definitely lesser known people or events!
Though I also read a ton of WWII books, so... lesser known and extremely well known? lol
I love books where a woman (so far it's always been a woman) finds a book, letter, artifact etc connected to her family's history and has to find out what it means.
Twins. Don't know why, but take a book that sounds iffy and put twins in it, and I'm more likely to read it.

Probably some others, I may update as I read other people's answers!

As some have already mentioned, bookstores and libraries (especially magical ones).
Lovable crew of (space) misfits
Anything involving tall ships
Fiction with footnotes

I don't have one jam and sometimes it depend on the mood. For romance, though, marriage of convenience is my jam. However, since I'm not a romance fiction fan, this doesn't usually end up with books I love. I prefer romance when it's the secondary story or a cross/genre one.

My jam is finding books I really enjoy reading just because I love the writing and how the stories go etc--this is quite eclectic and doesn't always mean that one author is a go-to author for me. However, most of the time when I give 5 stars this has been a significant part of it, but never all of it.

I like stories where ordinary people come through and help each other, even in difficult circumstances. Examples are books by Emily St. John Mandel, Nevil Shute, David Rhodes,Carla Kelly, and Sarah Winman.But I rarely know that will be the subject before reading the book.

Werewolves seems to be my jam ot shapeshifters.

Unfortunately mine is an intriguing mystery which half the time means I end up very disappointed by the end

Things I tend to like in books:

- Jane Austen retellings or imaginings of what happened next for characters
- Alice in Wonderland retellings
- mermaids
- vampires
- the trope of everyone being stuck on an isolated island or resort and then people start dying one by one.

Things that draw me in:
1) found family
2) characters with integrity (although not always known ahead of time)
3) anything time related (travel, slip, warp, etc.)
4) strong female characters that are smart, snarky, and don't always make the best personal decisions
5) excellent sentence level writing

Maybe next month we can talk about things that send you running from a book?

Tracy wrote: "Things that draw me in:
1) found family
2) characters with integrity (although not always known ahead of time)
3) anything time related (travel, slip, warp, etc.)
4) strong female characters that a..."

Ooh, good idea for next month!

1) diseases, pandemics, the history of medicine, & especially quack doctors (I prefer these in non-fiction form)
2) spooky houses that maybe are haunting people or maybe people are just having painful psychological revelations they can't face in a spooky-ass house
3) the beauty/wellness industry is actually a cult/vampires/killing people/otherwise evil
4) uncontacted peoples (ie, in the Amazon, Papua New Guinea, etc)
5) Mt. Everest disasters
6) sad girls making terrible decisions (especially if they are over 30, even better if they are over 40)
7) utopian societies that devolve into dystopian hellscapes
8) a woman is making feminist art in the 1990s (especially in fiction)
9) Satanic panic
10) sumptuously-illustrated books about fashion history (non-fiction only)

Ciara wrote: "1) diseases, pandemics, the history of medicine, & especially quack doctors (I prefer these in non-fiction form)
2) spooky houses that maybe are haunting people or maybe people are just having pain..."

interesting list, reminds me of my daughter whose favorite subjects have included Weather, Islands, Bridges, Abandoned Shopping Malls, weird stories like Twilight Zone/Stranger Things, magicians, and unusual factoids in general.

Robin P wrote: "Ciara wrote: "1) diseases, pandemics, the history of medicine, & especially quack doctors (I prefer these in non-fiction form)
2) spooky houses that maybe are haunting people or maybe people are ju..."

When my daughter was little & she wanted me to hang out with her, she would leave a trail of books on these topics on the stairs leading up to my sewing room (where I usually was if I wasn't with her). She called it "Mommy bait". So I'd walk down the stairs & there would be Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster on one step, We Have Always Lived in the Castle on the next, State of Wonder, etc etc.

Ciara wrote: "Robin P wrote: "Ciara wrote: "1) diseases, pandemics, the history of medicine, & especially quack doctors (I prefer these in non-fiction form)
2) spooky houses that maybe are haunting people or may..."

I love that your daughter thought of "mommy-bait", especially since she used books. What a great memory!

my jams are eclectic. here are a few:

older man younger woman in romances
isekai and reverse isekai
reincarnation same or different world
time travel into the past
asian fantasy themed
death as a character

Such a variety of jams, very cool. I had to give this one some thought because I was mostly thinking of genres that attract me.

I like:
- spies, intelligence operations
- funny, ridiculous sci-fi
- sarcastic/irreverent characters
- fantasy with an element of realism to it
- ethical people/someone to root for (For example, I don't like the Amazon series The Boys because all the superheroes are horrible)

Mandy wrote: "my jams are eclectic. here are a few:

older man younger woman in romances
isekai and reverse isekai
reincarnation same or different world
time travel into the past
asian fantasy themed
death as a ..."

Mandy - have you read Reincarnation Blues ?

This fits two of your "jams" - reincarnation (obviously) and "death as a character". My husband and I both really enjoyed it!

Wow, you guys sure have some interesting answers! Most of them I would’ve never even thought of. I don’t think I have a jam really but I do like books with surprises or twists, laugh out loud moments and characters who develop over the years.

Books about:

- mountaineering
- journeys / quests / exploration
- maritime adventures / sea voyages
- settings that involve the extreme cold
- baseball
- lesser-known episodes in history
- books about books
- set in countries around the world (I have a goal to read a book set in each of the 297 countries, especially by an author from that country)

Pam wrote: "Wow, you guys sure have some interesting answers! Most of them I would’ve never even thought of. I don’t think I have a jam really but I do like books with surprises or twists, laugh out loud momen..."

Thanks for the reminder. I like series where the characters develop over time, for example Louise Penny's Gamache vs. Hercule Poirot who never changes. On the other hand, I like Sherlock Holmes and modern stories about him, even though he doesn't evolve. He does change and have a life in the series by Laurie R. King, which is my favorite.

My "jam" is elephants. If the book is about elephants, or has an elephant on the cover I simply must have it!

My "jam" list

Strong female main characters
Nonfiction social issues, or strong females in history
Dragons
Adventure stories - sailing to the end of the world and discovering dragons earn bonus points
Retelling of mythology or twists of mythology
Satire

I know there are a few more, but that
covers most of them.

Strong, intelligent, women characters; women in music; women in the arts

My must read topics are:

Books about cults/religious sects
Bleak atmosphere
Girls boarding schools

Books that take place in France, especially Paris
cats, especially if they have a cute picture on the cover
I've been reading a lot of cozies lately
mysteries/thrillers
historical fiction
books that make me laugh out loud
biographies