May 4, 2021

#AtoZChallenge 2021 Reflections

         Another year of A to Z complete!  Thanks to all those who stopped by and left comments for me this year.  I’m very grateful for your humor, your thoughtful ideas, your questions, and your engagement.  Usually I feel like I’m blogging into the void, and only in April do I really get to see some of you beautiful people who are out there!
        The alphabet format means that some Mythical and Imaginary Places that I would have loved to explore got left out, because they fell on a letter for which I already had someplace else.  The fantastic places I didn’t get to take you include Discworld, any planet in Star Trek, Wonderland and Looking-Glass Land, Westeros, Cloud Cuckoo Land, Fantastica, Hogwarts, Dictionopolis and Digitopolis, Narnia, Paflagonia, Waddingburn and Cockenzie Rood, Sleyne, Damar… not to mention that I could have found far more places from non-European legend.  
So few letters in the alphabet, so many wonderful worlds!  Do you have a favorite mythical or imaginary place I failed to mention?
        I tried to find the items on the scavenger hunt, and managed most of them.  I also tried to find them in as wide as possible an array of the 60-or-so blogs I visited somewhat regularly this year, but inevitably some blogs fulfilled more than one letter, while some of my favorite blogs had none, and some letters were represented in multiple blogs, while there were two letters I never did find.  Sometimes I made a bit of a stretch in counting something, in an effort to stretch the number of different blogs represented.  However, here’s my list:
A - The Great Raven (Greek Mythology)

B - Olga Godim (Book Cover Designs)
C - I never found one in this year’s Challenge, so how about a random post of mine with a Cobweb
D - The Other Side (D&D Monsters)
E - Atherton’s Magic Vapour (Horror Movies)
F - Tea, Sigh, Create (Herbs in Space)
G - Jingle Jangle Jungle (Totally Awesome 80’s Music)
H - P.T. Dilloway (Star Wars figures)  Do a Hood and a Helmet count as Hats?
I - Anne Higa (Flash Fiction)
J - Galeriaredelius (Metal Meets Textile)
K - Olga Godim (Book Cover Designs)
L - AJ Blythe (Poisons)
M - Welcome to My Magick Theatre (Dante and His World)
N - Mother Owl (Echoes)
O - Literacious (Early Literacy Tips) 
P - Balcony Sunrise (Nostalgia)
Q - Quilting Patchwork & Applique (Upcycling Textiles)
R - I never found one in this year’s Challenge, but I’ve got a rainbow in my post for V
T - Story Crossroads (Stories of Beating the Odds)
U - J Lenni Dorner (Blogs and Books)
V - Tao Talk (Jethro Tull Songs)
W - Gail M Baugniet (The Joys of Research)
X - The Quiet Writer (British Museums)
Y - The Multicolored Diary (Tarot Tales)
Z - Fallon Brown (Fiction Tropes)
      Bonus Z - Dara Rochlin Book Doctor (Weird Holidays)

        I would say, “See you next April!” but of course I hope to see you before then.  We’re open year-round!  As I resume my regularly-scheduled programming there will be lots of relief block prints, and lots of fantasy, and of course Words of the Month.  Or if all you want is a little Daily Delight, check out my Instagram of something that lifts my heart each day.  Maybe it will cheer you, as well.
        
[Pictures: The Discworld, poster illustration by Josh Kirby (Image from Fandom);
Map of Hogwarts, poster illustration by MinaLima (Image from MinaLima).]

10 comments:

Frédérique - Quilting Patchwork Appliqué said...

Well done Anne, with your challenge, and with the scavenger hunt!
Westeros is a great word too, but keep some new places for next year 😉

Lisa said...

I enjoyed the trips to the imaginary places. The ones you had to leave out sound interesting too.

Deborah Weber said...

So many mythical and imaginary places - it was a joy to travel to them via your series! Some of them even made it into my dreams, much to my delight. You've sparked my own imagination, and how does it get any better than that? Thank you for another delightful series, and I intend to be more than an April visitor. :-)

Charlotte (MotherOwl) said...

Congratulation on finishing the challenge. I visited a lot of new, imaginary places here. Thanks for the tour. I hope to 'see' you soon again.

PS. I just abhor those "prove you're not a robot"-thingies. I always have to try at least 5 times to get it rigth, so I comment less often than I would like to.

A Tarkabarka Hölgy said...

I loved your themes this year, and the images you chose. And you are right, there are enough imaginary places to fill more than one challenge! I'll see you around! :)

The Multicolored Diary

Olga Godim said...

I loved your A to Z series this year.
If you do it again next year, may I suggest the worlds created by two of my favorite fantasy writers?
Elfhome from Wen Spencer's Tinker series.
Samaria from Sharon Shinn's Angels series.
I don't know if there are any images of Samaria or Elfhome though.

Gail M Baugniet - Author said...

Congratulations on completing the AtoZChallenge2021 and the scavenger hunt. Your posts and colorful illustrations brightened the way through April. I had most of my posts written and scheduled ahead and still didn't make it through the sign-up list of participants and missed 6 of the scavenger hunt words. Still looking forward to next year, though.
https://gail-baugniet.blogspot.com/2021/05/atozchallenge-reflections-2021.html

Ronel Janse van Vuuren said...

I enjoyed your A-Z to fantastical places very much. See you around :-)

Ronel visiting for the A-Z Challenge with A-Z Reflections: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Anne E.G. Nydam said...

Thanks to all of you faithful visitors!

Frédérique and Olga, nope, next year will not be places again. It'll be something different. Of course, that doesn't mean I can't do posts on interesting fantasy places, in other months of the year.

Deborah, I'm honored to have given you dream-fodder!

MotherOwl, have you considered the possibility that you are, in fact, a robot? (Sorry they gave you a hard time.)

JadeLi said...

Anne, I just saw this and want to thank you for including Tao-Talk in your blogging list. For some reason I missed doing the reflections post this year. I came back to your blog because I'm working on a book review for your "Song Against Shadow" book, which I immensely enjoyed reading and am grabbing a link to your blog to include with it. Once the review is completed, I'll be doing a blog post on it and sharing the review on Goodreads and Amazon.

This is my 3rd year of following your A2Z and I want to thank you for taking the time to make it entertaining with the info and the illustrations.