Melanie’s Comments (group member since Sep 01, 2014)

Melanie’s comments from the Nothing But Reading Challenges group.

I'll have to move Down and Dirty to next week. The time change messed me up and I wont finish it for this week. I'll still finish it today, but it will be after the start of week 5.

Completion Post:



Book: The Judas Strain
Author: James Rollins
Date Read: 11/2/2019
Page Count: 668
Sin: Wrath Mini-Challenge
Sin Bingo (Yes or No): No
How it fits?: Task 85 Read a book with MPG Crime, Mystery, Thriller or Suspense that also meets the criteria for "Action & Adventure" — MPG Thriller & Male-centered action thriller with characters running from assassins and dealing with a terrorist event
SS Updated (Yes or No): Yes

For this week I'm on track to finish Down and Dirty by tomorrow, I have 8 stories left. I'm starting The Judas Strain now and will finish it by tonight. I may or may not get to Hitting the Books tomorrow. I want to make sure my long books are done first since they're worth a lot more points.

As to the Lust mini challenge, I'll have a look later tonight to see what I could pick up. I do know I have some of the bad books on my TBR, so I could maybe double up there.

Hmm I can read a 157 page book in less than 2 hours, so I may pick up Interstellar Super Explorer. And the allure of extra points is strong. Although looking at the sample, I don't know if I want to give 2 hours to that atrocity.

Fifty Shades of Mr. Darcy looks like a better read, so I'll definitely try that one.

Diane, your most recent book that doesn't fit anywhere (To Bedevil A Beauty) contains the phrase hot-tempered according to Amazon's look inside feature. It doesn't give the exact full sentence, so I don't know if you can search your book and post the full sentence and where it's at in the book? Then the book could be assigned to mini task #33 for 5 extra points.

Completion Post:



Book: Blue Moon
Author: Lee Child
Date Read: 10/30/2019
Page Count: 359
Sin: Wrath Mini-Challenge
Sin Bingo (Yes or No): No
How it fits?: Task 143 Read a book with MPG Crime, Mystery, Thriller or Suspense that also meets the criteria for "Thriller" — MPG Thriller & Fast-paced, action-packed read where Reacher takes on two warring mobs
SS Updated (Yes or No): Yes

I'm in again. October was a failure, so I'm hoping November is better.

Start of month:
Books on shelf: 40
Feedback Ratio: 85%

Books (ordered by pub date):





Added:


Finished:

End of Month:
Books on shelf:
Feedback Ratio:

Ora wrote: "In the status SS there is a column for the sloth mini challenge. All points, including bonus points should be tallied there."

Thanks, missed that. Checking there, it looks like our collections points aren't being included (we got 139 points in the mini for animals and that's all that's showing). The formula is showing 0*20 + 0*10 where other teams have however many collections they had instead of 0.

Question related to the points for the animal collections from the Sloth mini. It looks like we made 1 collection of tricky animals (20 points) and 2 collections of easy animals (2 x 10 points). But I don't see those 40 points being added to our score, unless I'm missing where they are?

I removed the other book I had on the list for this week, I just didn't have time to get to it. My reading the last few weeks has been pretty crappy. I'm hoping going forward to get back up to the level I should be at. Sorry I've fallen short of my books per week so far.

Next week's mini-challenge should be a lot easier for me as I've been craving mystery/thrillers and haven't been able to fit them in. So I'm going to throw the reading schedule I made out the window and just mood read. The only ones I know for sure I will be picking up are the new Jack Reacher book which comes out on Tuesday and a couple library books I've been wanting to get to.

Ora wrote: "Judy wrote: "I just had a look at our team spreadsheet and I noticed that both of Cici's BOM participations aren't being counted on the overview spreadsheet.

In the BOM spreadsheet, we have 280 p..."

I get what Judy meant. Her BOM points don't show on the Overall tab of the official spreadsheet which means they're not being counted towards our overall points. I think the issue is that the Overall tab has her full name of CiCi Miller but the BOM tab was entered as just CiCi.

Just wanted to throw out some other anthologies currently available in KU that I found that aren't historical in case anyone wants to add a longer read. I haven't read any of them so I can't vouch for them, but they're all over 500 pages.

- 1,014 pages
- 548 pages
- 560 pages
- 699 pages

Ora wrote: "Melanie, I have tried to find Down and Dirty and Seduced Under the Mistletoe: 16 Passionate Historical Romances Christmas Anthology on amazon and just won't come up...."

Hmm, I can't find them. I think it may have been the case where it was available for a limited time (a lot of these bigger anthologies are like that). And I just checked on Amazon and neither title will let you loan it to someone else.

So I see since I mentioned this book that members on several other teams are now planning on reading it, so if anyone on the team has KU, it is in there and the book is worth over 600 points.

Completion Post:



Book: Below the Surface
Author: Karen Harper
Date Read: 10/21/2019
Page Count: 400
Sin: Sloth Mini-Challenge
Sin Bingo (Yes or No): No
How it fits?: 4% — "The newest bull shark was at least seven feet long, his small, flat eyes staring at her each time he came near the surface."
SS Updated (Yes or No): Yes

Completion Post:



Book: Black Order
Author: James Rollins
Date Read: 10/19/2019
Page Count: 607
Sin: Pride
Sin Bingo (Yes or No): No
How it fits?: Top Shelf — Contemporary
SS Updated (Yes or No): Yes

Ora wrote: "They look like they are all anthologies and will work. It was discussed in the captain’s group before the challenge started about anthologies."

OK, great. Thank you! Different challenges have a tendency to have different rules about anthologies, so I thought it best to confirm before starting something over 1,000 pages.

Ok, so I'm going to start one of my longer Kindle books this weekend and I just want to double check with the captains to make sure these don't violate any rules.

The books don't have boxed set in the title, so they don't break that rule. And the novellas contained in the book are only available in the book, i.e. no way to shelve and rate separately the way you would with a box set.

So, are these fine for me to read and count for the challenge? I should be able to get to most of the below ones before the challenge ends, but I want to make sure they're ok first.

1,756 pp
1,583 pp
838 pp
3,031 pp
705 pp

Just an FYI, I have adjusted the bonus points formula for week 3 in the planning sheet so it will now calculate the points correctly based on if your book is a mini challenge book and what animal it is. I also added a column where you enter the animal so it's easier for others to see what's already been chosen.

I will definitely finish the 2 I have left on the spreadsheet bringing me up to 4 for the week. I also might be able to get in another ~300 pager but I'm not 100% sure on that, have to see how my weekend shakes out as I have quite a few errands to run and cleaning to do.

I also have 2 ARCS I need to read this weekend that are very short (164 pp and 118 pp), but I won't get to them until Saturday night/Sunday morning, so I'll wait to see where we're at before adding them since they're not worth much.