Tournament of Books - Chicago

The Tournament of Books is an annual "March Madness" battle royale among "the year's best novels," pairing two books each round in a month-long elimination tournament. 

Rather than rush to read all the books before March, however, we'll be reading two books per month as a bookclub, meeting for lunch in River North, with each month following one of the first round brackets of the official tournament and discussing as a group which book we enjoy better; forming our own brackets as well as a collective group bracket.

Will your bracket match the official one?

Book readings for the year:

February 2025: The Wedding People by Alison Espach and All Fours by Miranda July

March 2025: Liars by Sarah Maguso and The Book of George by Kate Greathead 

April 2025: Margo's Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe and Someone Like Us Dinaw Mengetsu

May 2025: Orbital by Samantha Harvey and The History of Sound by Ben Shattuck

June 2025: Colored Television by Danzy Senna and The Extinction of Irena Rey Jennifer Croft

July 2025: Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar and Rejection by Tony Tulathimutte

August 2025: Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino and Great Expectations by Vinson Cunningham

September 2025: James by Percival Everett and The Book Censor's Library by Bothayna Al-Essa

October 2025: Headshot by Rita Bullwinkel and The Book of Love by Kelly Link (Might extend to November if 700+ paged Book of Love is too much for one month) 

November & December 2025: Readers' Choice (other books from this year's longlist)