Richard’s Comments (group member since Oct 23, 2023)

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

Elisabeth wrote: "a dog called Okra. Is that a better mini choice than ‘sky on cover?"

Sky on cover is easier to find than 'Okra' in the text.

kat (wanderfulbooks) wrote: "'out of your comfort zone' would be Richard picking a fiction read ;)"

Sure, I can do that. I'll do it for the team.

Melindam wrote: "Richard,

I'm sorry, but unless it's fiction, we cannot use it for characters. 😪"

Whoops my bad

I've got one coming up for "where characters spend some time in a wood"

Karen ⊰✿ wrote: "6 full spell-it-outs and then one incomplete. 🎉"

Whoa! Go team! 😎🎯

Karen ⊰✿ wrote: "Richard wrote: "That task needs a character, so it would need to be a fiction book"

Oh damn. I guess I won't do it then.

It's strange to me that with this rule, memoirs & biographies don't have characters...

Neurodivergent will be easy for me to find. I read at least one book a month on autism &/or ADHD, to learn more about my diagnoses.

✅ 3. Jake Barnes & Lady Brett Ashley (The Sun Also Rises)
a. 100-175 pages
Change Your Food, Change Your Mood: A Nutrition-Based Approach to Reducing Stress, Banishing the Blues, and Feeling Great - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. Set in Spain
Madrid: Midnight City - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
c. 'absinthe' in text
Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six M.I.T. Students Who Took Vegas for Millions - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
d. Orange cover
Overtaken by the Night: One Russian's Journey through Peace, War, Revolution, and Terror - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
e. celestial body in title
Moon Maine - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 4. Christian Grey & Anastasia Steele (Fifty Shades of Grey)
a. 200-299 pages
The Impostor Phenomenon: Overcoming the Fear That Haunts Your Success - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. MC had a troubled childhood
American Scary: A History of Horror, from Salem to Stephen King and Beyond - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
c. Grey cover
Pakistan: A Hard Country - ⭐️⭐️
d. part of a trilogy
Jurassic Park - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
e. Number in title
101 Ways to Really Satisfy Your Customers: How to Keep Your Customers and Attract New Ones - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 5. Holly Golightly (Breakfast at Tiffany's)
a. 350-450 pages
The Secret History of Wonder Woman - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. jewellery on cover
Bad Girls Throughout History: 100 Remarkable Women Who Changed the World - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
c. MC owns a cat
Torment Saint: The Life of Elliott Smith - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
d. Character smokes
Women to the Front: Australian Women Doctors of the First World War - ⭐️⭐️
e. character is a fashionista
Shopping Mall - ⭐️⭐️

6. Danny Zuko (Grease)
a. 200-299 pages
b. Car on cover
c. Set in 1950s
d. character wears leather jacket
e. author initals found in HICKEY

✅ 7. Hot Prof (Dino Island)
a. 100 to 175 pages
Scheisse! The Real German You Were Never Taught in School - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. rock on cover
North: Finding My Way While Running the Appalachian Trail - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 8. Tom & Summer (500 Days of Summer)
a. 100 to 175 pages
It Happened in France: A Renowned Journalist's Account of Life Under the Occupation 1940–1944 - ⭐️⭐️
b. 5 in page number
Oxford Handbook of Psychiatry - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 9. Nick & Amy Dunne (Gone Girl)
a. 350 to 450 pages
The Unity of Science: Exploring Our Universe, from the Big Bang to the Twenty-First Century - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. MC has financial struggles
Thanks for the Money: How to Use My Life Story to Become the Best Joel McHale You Can Be - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
c. alliterative title
The Element Encyclopedia of Secret Societies. The Ultimate A-Z of Ancient Mysteries, Lost Civilizations and Forgotten Wisdom - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
d. kidnapping important to plot
Henry VIII's Last Love: The Extraordinary Life of Katherine Willoughby, Lady-in-Waiting to the Tudors - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 10. Karenin (Anna Karenina)
a. 350 to 450 pages
MBA In A Day: What You Would Learn At Top-Tier Business Schools - ⭐️⭐️
b. train on cover
Arabic Phrases, Sayings & Idioms: Fast Arabic to Enrich your Language Now - ⭐️

✅ 11. Humbert Humber (Lolita)
a. 650+ pages
Istanbul: A Tale of Three Cities - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. author's first and last initial are the same letter
Do You Still Talk to Grandma?: When the Problematic People in Our Lives Are the Ones We Love - ⭐️⭐️
c. MC in a relationship under false pretenses
My Brain Has Too Many Tabs Open: How to Untangle Our Relationship with Tech - ⭐️⭐️
d. white cover
Eating on the Wild Side: The Missing Link to Optimum Health - ⭐️⭐️⭐️

✅ 12. Tomas & Tereza (The Unbearable Lightness of Being)
a. 100 to 175 pages
Karate Science: Dynamic Movement - ⭐️⭐️
b. MC owns a dog
Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
c. takes place in the 1960s
At Home with Muhammad Ali: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Forgiveness - ⭐️⭐️⭐️

✅ 13. George & Martha (Whose Afraid of Virginia Woolf)
a. 200 to 299 pages
The Balkans and the Byzantine World before and after the Captures of Constantinople, 1204 and 1453 - ⭐️
b. MC is married
The MGM Effect: How a Hollywood Studio Changed the World - ⭐️⭐️
c. character name is also a type of animal
The Secret Life of Birds: Who They Are and What They Do - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
d. made into TV show
The Queen's Gambit - ⭐️⭐️⭐️

✅ 14. Alaska (Looking for Alaska)
a. 650+ pages
The Codebreakers: The Story of Secret Writing - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. character name is also a US state
Beyond the Big Lie: The Epidemic of Political Lying, Why Republicans Do It More, and How It Could Burn Down Our Democracy - ⭐️⭐️
c. body of water on cover
Beyond the Pale: A Fable about Escaping the Hustle and Finding Yourself - ⭐️⭐️
d. green cover
Hamlet's BlackBerry: A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital Age - ⭐️

✅ 15. Hamlet (Hamlet)
a. 350 to 450 pages
It Starts with the Egg: How the Science of Egg Quality Can Help You Get Pregnant Naturally, Prevent Miscarriage, and Improve Your Odds in IVF - ⭐️⭐️
b. skull on cover
Shakespeare for Every Day of the Year - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
c. takes place in Europe
Emperors of Rome: The Story of Imperial Rome from Julius Caesar to the Last Emperor - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
d. author initials WS
Decoding Your Emotional Blueprint: A Powerful Guide to Transformation Through Disentangling Multigenerational Patterns - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 6. Danny Zuko (Grease)
a. 200-299 pages
Your Survival Instinct Is Killing You: Retrain Your Brain to Conquer Fear, Make Better Decisions, and Thrive in the 21s t Century - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. Car on cover
Haunted: Ghost Stories and Their Afterlives - ⭐️⭐️
c. Set in 1950s
Becoming Trader Joe: How I Did Business My Way and Still Beat the Big Guys - ⭐️⭐️
d. character wears leather jacket
Big Money Energy: How to Rule at Work, Dominate at Life, and Make Millions - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
e. author initals found in HICKEY
Send Yourself Roses: Thoughts on My Life, Love, and Leading Roles - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 16. James Bond (James Bond)
a. 650+ pages
The Oxford Handbook of Japanese Philosophy - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. MC is a spy
The Lost Airman: A True Story of Escape from Nazi Occupied France - ⭐️⭐️
c. "martini" in text
The Bar Book: Elements of Cocktail Technique - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
d. 7 in publication date
The Last Lighthouse Keeper: A Memoir - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 17. Albert & Celie (The Colour Purple)
a. 200 to 299 pages
Burnout: A Guide to Identifying Burnout and Pathways to Recovery - ⭐️⭐️
b. colour word in title
Wednesday Is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain of Synesthesia, - ⭐️⭐️⭐️

✅ 18. Tom & Daisy Buchannan (The Great Gatsby)
a. 500 to 650 pages
Becoming Elizabeth Arden: The Woman Behind the Global Beauty Empire - ⭐️⭐️
b. MC name is also a plant
Oranges: A Global History - ⭐️⭐️
c. takes place during the Jazz Age
The Secret of Chanel No. 5: The Intimate History of the World's Most Famous Perfume - ⭐️⭐️
d. author publishes including their middle name
Serious Cryptography, 2nd Edition: A Practical Introduction to Modern Encryption - ⭐️⭐️

✅ 19. John Willoughby & Marianne Dashwood (Sense & Sensibility)
a. 500 to 650 pages
Art of the 20th Century: Painting, Sculpture, New Media, Photography - ⭐️⭐️⭐️
b. MC has at least 3 siblings
The Nine: The True Story of a Band of Women Who Survived the Worst of Nazi Germany - ⭐️⭐️
c. character is a cheater
Death Punch'd: Surviving Five Finger Death Punch's Metal Mayhem - ⭐️⭐️
d. GREED letters found in title
The Most Interesting Book in the World - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I'm also appreciative of Mel's logistics.

Kelly (Maybedog) wrote: "Can anyone recommend a simple audiobook player where you can change the speed without changing the pitch?"

Another option is Speechify. That's a fun text-to speech app that you can use for free if you want, or pay for if you want Snoop, Mr Beast, Gwyneth Paltrow, Ali Abdaal, or even male or female voices in your own language.

Melindam wrote: "We are "missing" a G-book from our current last-but-one word, if anyone has one that works, pls think about that slot going begging. Thank you. 😊"

I read a G book today, but it has a low page count.

I'll put it in, but feel free to change it if you get a better scoring one.

The first Gardening mini is complete. Sorry about the delay...that Bioprocess Technology book was a beast.

Always happy to help

It worked for fish, lamb & grape. I figured Grape might be harder to find in other books.

Melindam wrote: "Could we use it for one of the food items instead?"

Maybe. I'll check.

Melindam wrote: "Unfortunately not. :("

All good. There's plenty more in my arsenal. 😎

Melindam wrote: "It's OK, pity about the page points. 🤭"

Can we save it for the next round? It's okay if not.

Melindam wrote: "according to the rules non-fiction books don't have "characters""

Oh sorry, I forgot

I've claimed some of the gardening ones

Niiiice. Go team! 😎🎯