Beth’s Comments (group member since Aug 12, 2014)

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

If the captains think a team-writtten spreadsheet adds to their headache, I'll take it down. I think of it as a place to record all our "I'm reading a BLANK" messages without having to dig back to see what everyone said. But it's definitely not official -- only the captains can put books in places for real.

Bonus books get the extra point past their page count, so they do score us more. But you can only read for each task once, so you can only read 18 bonus books! (Assuming you read for a miss as your main task read, and that the rest of the team fills in the first two books to open it up for bonuses.)

I quote:
"- bonus points - 1 point per book
- after task for hit square is done (2 books read), members that weren't reading that task can read book to collect extra points (page numbers still count). Maximum is 8 bonus points per hit."

⁀☆‿Ang ‿☆⁀Team Tapir wrote: "Beth wrote: "
Book: Full Cicada Moon by Marilyn Hilton
Finished: 6/22/19
Rating: 3 stars
# of pages: 389 (goodreads says 400 but they are wrong)..."

17 people marked it Historical. 86 as Historical Fiction.

Right. And I'm putting a question mark to show that it's not official -- only the captains can make it official.

I put in some of the unplaced ones from the Read Thread from 68 on, but really this is more for future. If we like the idea I can keep doing this for the next challenges, or the captains can tell me to go back to my reading :-)

Can we make our own google doc that we can all update? That would be an easier way to keep track of what we are currently reading.

I could copy one of the tabs on google drive and then share it with people: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...

(I have to populate the read books manually because the official spreadsheet does it through magic). Can people try to edit this to see if I did it right? I'm not very spread-sheet savvy.

@Nancy Do you know about our spreadsheet?

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...

Not all the tabs are always up to the moment; sometimes the captains are off wasting time with their families or sleeping or something. :-) (Reading)

I'm going to try to finish Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town today, and that counts towards A-8 Contemporary (10 people listed it there). If it gets too grim I'll work on something lighter and finish it tomorrow.

Another question! I hope Carmen has gone to bed and doesn't answer immediately though.

Do hyphenated tags count? Like does Sci-Fi-Fantasy count as fantasy?

Question about eligibility:

I have a habit of picking a book up, starting to read it, and then putting it down for a month or so until I'm in the mood for it.

So I started Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in a College Town at a conference last month, read most of the first chapter, put it down again, and then picked it up again during Wobble (a few days ago). I went back and read from the beginning again. Can I count that book for the challenge? I've read it all during the challenge, but the first ten pages were a reread.

The other books I started back then (I had my own room, so I brought about twenty books and just browsed among them in the evenings -- it was wonderful!) I got a bigger percentage into, so I probably wouldn't go back to the beginning and so I wouldn't count them.

I'm putting these here because it's easier for me to check the discussion on my phone than the database. It looks like it's time to read some fantasy!

The Hits:

G-2 - read a book shelved as fantasy by at least 10 people
E-10 - read a book shelved as classics by at least 10 people
J-10 - read a book shelved as romance by at least 10 people
F-7 - read a book shelved as young adult by at least 10 people
F-10 - read a book shelved as young adult by at least 10 people
G-10 - read a book shelved as fantasy by at least 10 people
E-7 - read a book shelved as historical by at least 10 people
A-8 - read a book shelved as contemporary by at least 10 people

And the Misses:

H-1 - read a book where the author's first name is one of the top 100 female/male names in Ireland according to nameberry (http://nameberry.com/popular_names/Ir...)
I-1 - read a book which has the main location (setting) as Australia or New Zealand
D-9 - read a book by an author who died in 2010-2014
B-8 - read a book that is book 5 in a series
J-6 - read a book shelved as fantasy by at least 10 people
C-10 - read a book where the author's first name is one of the top 100 female/male names in England according to nameberry (http://nameberry.com/popular_names/En...)

Sheila wrote: "We maxed out. You mean we only get so many extra shots even though we keep getting hits?"

I think the extras are when we sink something, not just hit it. But well done, ladies! I think Sheila & Nancy are a little bit psychic. Or maybe they know how to read a graph.

And I think we are building towards a consensus that we like doing all the tasks, except for the people who just like to read. And if we do enough of it, we can still win, and then everyone will be happy :-)

Book: Here There Be Monsters
Finished: 6/24/16
Rating: 4 stars
# of pages: 110

Task applications:
Hits:
E-3 Romance (84)
D-10 paranormal (10) (paranormal-romance =14)
A-1 Fantasy (25)

Open Misses:
E-5 4 Word Title

@Bookworm There are enough hits (and I hope we'll soon have more) that we can all read hits and still have everyone do main tasks. When we start the next challenge I'll put my rule lawyer glasses on and see what the options are.

Hey, I read another book! It was for my book club but it looks like it has 100 pages so it counts for us too.

Sheila wrote: "So for example if one of my books was used to fulfill a hit task can I read another book for that same task or not?"

No, you only get one bite at each task. But notice that a few tasks are duplicated so you could read a mystery for E-2 and then another mystery for H-8.

Also we should magically determine where all the rest of the ships are so the rest of our picks are HITS. I leave that to someone with psychic powers. Otherwise randomly scattering our guesses after we hunt down the unsunk bits of hits works for me.

I will try to keep track of the votes:

VICTORY! (V!): Jennifer H

CHECK ALL THE LISTS (CATL): Beth, Sheila, Sallie

I JUST READ BOOKS SO WHATEVER (IJRBSW): Ang, Ashley

To show what I'm talking about, here are our hits:

A-1 read a book shelved as fantasy by at least 10 people
B-1 read a book shelved as historical by at least 10 people
B-3 read a book shelved as humor by at least 10 people
D-10 read a book shelved as paranormal by at least 10 people
E-2 read a book shelved as mystery by at least 10 people
E-3 read a book shelved as romance by at least 10 people
E-4 read a book shelved as young adult by at least 10 people
G-1 read a book shelved as humor by at least 10 people
H-8 read a book shelved as mystery by at least 10 people

So far I haven't read for any of these (although a couple of my books haven't been assigned yet). So I should read for these thing before working on more misses.

If we keep track personally of which hits we've done, the Captains can just let us know when the team has maxed them out (and then we cross them off our list). But it looks like there will be overlap in the hit categories -- I see humor and mystery twice already. Then if we've read all the HITS we can do, we start on the misses.

What do you think? Would you still have fun? I have to admit, I get a lot of pleasure out of figuring out how to get the odd categories in the misses, but that doesn't get us as many points. If people want to "win" I'm willing to focus on the HITS, but if we just are having fun I wouldn't mind continuing to knock out all the challenges, even the low point ones.

(edited because apparently I can't type)

I looked at the Battleship Rules again, and here are the point-maximizing hints:
*************************************
- bonus points - 1 point per book
- after task for hit square is done (2 books read), members that weren't reading that task can read book to collect extra points (page numbers still count). Maximum is 8 bonus points per hit.
- miss squares get only page number points
********************************************

So every book we read for a "miss" instead of an extra "hit" costs us one point -- the bonus point for a hit.

How about if we all try to read all the hits, and only worry about assignments on misses? We are limited to two books per hit. The mods can warn us when we've MAXed out a "hit" (only 8 points allowed). Remember that you can only read one book for each square. And then we can go and read for all the misses after we have the points in hand, if you are on a reading roll.

This is if we want to go for points. Personally I have a list-thing, so if instead we want to continue reading all of the challenges no matter what the point value I'm OK with that. I keep the monthly challenges around on my computer until I finish them, even if it takes me six months :-)

Book: A Case of Possession by KJ Charles
Finished: 6/23/16
Rating: 4 stars
# of pages: 159

Task applications:

D1- Tagged as Paranormal (181)
E-5 Title has 4 words

Completed task applications (could be a bonus book for):
B-1: Historical (218 users)
E-3 Romance (155)
E-2 Mystery (55)
A-1 Fantasy (205)

Carmen, is there no way to change the color of the sunk boats? That would be easy to see.

I just finished a paranormal as well :-).

I'm about to add A Case of Possession to the completed thread. It works for

D-10 Paranormal (181 users)
E-5 (Four Letter title)

I can start The Seventh Bride tomorrow; it's a fantasy (or so say 177 people).

I have Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen which is Book 16 in its series, but I read the e-arc last fall. Does that count as rereading? I guess it's more than six months anyway.

Or I could start A Case of Possession which is tagged as a romance and a fantasy (and romance=>Paranormal), so Carmen could put it wherever she liked. Maybe I should do that one next.

Erin ☕ *Proud Book Hoarder* wrote: "Sheila wrote: "What tasks are we not getting any takers for? That 25 letter title one has me flummoxed. I don't have anything close to that. My Dresden book should have several choices. Maybe I can..."

I did one that hasn't been assigned yet. I'm thinking I'll try author with a common name next. After I finish this book club book that I started too soon...

These are my favorite chips -- the ones in the purple bag: Hawaiian Sweet Maui Onion:
http://www.hawaiianbrandsnacks.com/st...

Book: Full Cicada Moon by Marilyn Hilton
Finished: 6/22/16
Rating: 3 stars
# of pages: 389 (goodreads says 400 but they are wrong)

Task applications: Uh... maybe bank it for the next round?

Completed task applications (could be a bonus book for): B-1 Historical, E-4 Young Adult,