Articles – Marked for Plot

r/Fantasy 2025 Bingo Card #1 – Achillean Protagonists

This year for my r/fantasy book bingo challenge, I decided to limit myself to reading books exclusively with queer male protagonists. Specifically, I wanted to focus on gay/bi men in non-Romance stories when possible. I love romance books, but I wanted to push into some more ambitious spaces with this project. I ended up reading some books that easily fall into my all-time favorites. I also ended up with two more cards (a graphic novels card that I’m working on a post for and a ‘leftovers’ card when I realized I had enough books that worked for a third), but this was my focus for the year.

My goal was ‘read some gay shit and have a great time,’ and I have achieved that goal magnificently.

I’ve included short, one paragraph reviews of the 24 books (and one video game) that made the card below. For people who are more visual, I also made at-a-glance slides with pros/cons for each of the ~45 Achillean books I read since bingo started. While I could keep reading more to get an even more perfect card, I’d rather bank the reads I’m excited about for April and focus on reading other things for now.

12 Books I’m Prioritizing in 2026

I am a sidequest reader who frequently gets distracted by the shiny new recommendation that magically jumps to the top of my TBR. I don’t dislike this about myself; most of my favorite reads from 2025 were not at all on my radar before the year started. However, I find that picking a few titles I know I want to try helps keep me from putting interesting books on the treadmill of procrastination for too long, and to ensure promising new titles actually get read.

Here are 12 books I’m committing to reading at some point in the year 2026. While there would be some beauty to me reading exactly one every month, I know myself too well to try and commit to that plan. Some of these I’m confident that I’ll love, others are risks I’m excited to take, but all have taken root in the back of my brain and won’t let up until I finally buy myself a copy.

2025 Wrap up Post

Overall, I think 2025 was a great year for me as a reader. I really focused on reading more queer stories, which brought a lot of joy to me and exposed me to some new favorites I wouldn’t have discovered otherwise. I started really exploring what reading graphic novels as an adult might look like. I started this blog, which has also ended up bringing me a fair amount of joy. But what do the numbers say?