Congratulations to all who participated in the 2025 American Masterpieces Chapter-a-Day Read-Along! We began with Roots by Alex Haley, followed by Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove, and finished just today with the great white whale itself, Moby-Dick by Herman Melville. Whether you read all three with us or joined us for one or two, I’m glad you went along on this journey.

2025 was the first year of the new dedicated chapter-a-day blog and social media accounts, and I am pleased with how they all worked. Both longtime readers and new participants were able to access the daily quotes from a variety of places, and I plan on continuing to use them in 2026 and beyond.

As far as the books themselves, all three were rereads for me, and I enjoyed them all, each in their own way. It had been decades since I read Roots, and I was surprised at how much of the book featured Kunta Kinte compared to what I remembered. Lonesome Dove improved on a second reading, and it was the perfect book to read in the summer months. I have a great appreciation and love of Moby-Dick, but I had a change of jobs this fall and much of my brain space was in the transition, so I wasn’t able to give the book its fair share of attention. Plus, I had just read it a couple of years ago and it was still pretty fresh in my mind. I will definitely return to it in the future, but probably after waiting a good five or ten years–maybe after I retire and am in a new stage of life.

Thanks again for reading with us in 2025, and I hope you come along on the 2026 Leo Tolstoy Chapter-a-Day Read-Along that starts tomorrow with chapter 1 of Anna Karenina!

Here’s to savoring books, one chapter a day!