Judith’s Comments (group member since Apr 15, 2015)

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

It's looking like Melanie's book might be the better option at this still early stage.

Melanie, you okay if we go with your book?

Though Kim, I highly recommend Clean Sweep, it's a great series :)

Well ILL makes for an easier match than EEP. If we want to keep it nice for now

What would people like to do?

After dodging the flying pigs we are feeling Vengeful on behalf of pigs everywhere! Well not really as most of us enjoy a piece of crispy bacon.

Perfect! We'll send it over to D1

Mary wrote: "Vengeful is on my to read list and I have a copy"

such a good book too!

DQs – Day 3 Protective Impulses-Pert Thing

11. What do you think about the revelation in the garden/the haunting? Did you see it coming, and do you think there are others involved with the “curse”?
I assumed it was the wife but I assumed Poole is involved in some way too. Maybe the reason she's haunting?

12. What do you think about Mr. Rochester sending away Jane and the staff? If you have read the original, how does this change Jane’s agency, and do you like the change? Either way, why do you think the author made it Mr. Rochester’s choice?
like most others I found this annoying and a disservice to the original. I think the author did it to add drama or something? Almost like those annoying 3rd act breakups that seem mandatory in most so-so romance books.

13. Have you ever visited an Apothecary’s Garden? Would you be interested in seeing one? Do you grow any herbs or are you interested in growing any?
No, but I'd love to visit the Poison Garden in the UK. I've grown small pots of herbs from time to time but never in a consistent way or something I'd classify as overly successful.

14. What do you think about the scene with Miss Ingram? What does this tell you about Mr. Rochester’s character and did that seem consistent with his character so far? Did his explanation make sense to you?
I think she's a petty mean girl and he was being a complete and utter dink. And his explanation was lame.

Eh, it’s still early in the line up. We have 8 more rounds to plan. Let’s save mean until like round 6 or 7.

Unless they bring it. Then we’ll meet ‘em behind the bleachers after school. Or whatever people who actually get into fights do 😬

Did you want to go with Esther the wonder pig? My library does not have a digital copy available.

And to be honest I never thought to search under estuary 😂

Okay so it’s back to us. Ideally we would match EST

I did find the book Esther on KU which I can read.

But does anyone else have a match?

It's 3 letters minimum. We can't make it too easy, it's a battle after all :)

One year (way before I was a mod) they had it where the overlap had to be the whole word and articles counted. One of the title ladders had to be like 20 books long. IT WAS SO HARD.

I read some garbage books in that game. The things I do for challenges!

We see your Age of Vice and are responding with Ice Planet Barbarians! And considering the content, seemed appropriate for this team. hehe! :P

Stacie wrote: "It's a KU borrow and I may even have it paperback so I'm good!"

Perfect, I'll lob this over to D1 :)

Stacie wrote: "I have Ice Planet Barbarians"

it would need to be started and finished the second week of Round 2 (22nd to 29th of June).

Does that work? I know it's a shorter book but wasn't sure if it was from the library with a return date too early

Anyone have a book they want to read that starts with ICE?

Vikki wrote: "I finished Starling House last night, all updated on spreadsheet. I've answered all the discussion questions - do I need to provide links or anything to make sure we get the points for that?"

I'll go grab them. Those get tracked on the BOM tab

Sarah wrote: "If that's okay with everyone that is."

I think that sounds like a good plan!

I'm a bit confused is Sarah taking the last Idaho spot or Lexi?

Tricia wrote: "Also if we supply drop a title to our partner district, does that mean we don't count it on our spreadsheet?
"

We get page points/it's in one of our resource piles. Think of the supply drop as a sort of mini challenge. For Round 1 we sent 3 books that were read before the mini challenge started so we didn't have to worry about covering more spots on top of the mini tasks.

I realized I never updated our tracking sheet, just the official sheet with what our sent supply drop books were. I fixed that, hopefully it makes a bit more sense now.

Once District 1 picks their first book, we'll let you all know what letters we need to overlap with

In order to succeed in the Arena you will need to battle with your competing District Tributes.

You have been matched with an opposition and will fight them twice (once in round 2 and once in round 3), switching who strikes first.

The fight will consist of parrying book titles back and forth, by matching the end of your opposing team's title with the start of your own. You can use or ignore articles at the start of the title. There must be an overlap of at least three letters.

Planning
To start the fight each pair will be spun a title by the Arena Masters. The first team must find a book with a title that overlaps by at least three letters, and declare their planned strike to their opposition team, who must then plan their riposte. Each team will plan out a maximum of 10 strikes each this way.
Books can be read in any language, but titles must be in English.

Note: planning must be completed within the first week, and you must NOT start reading any book until the second, fight, week.

Fighting
Once the fight phase starts each team simply reads their planned books!
There's no requirement to read them in the correct order, but if at the end of the week you have missed a planned strike then you will lose the battle, regardless of how many of the rest of the books you complete.

Supply Drops
Supply drops from your partner team can be used to provide ONE extension letter to help you make an overlap.
You can use either the first or last letter of your supply drop title to make the overlap work.
Supply drop books can be read during either of the two weeks, and may be started at any point during the challenge.

Points and Winning
Each team gets 5 bonus points for each completed strike
The winning team in each pair will get a further 5 bonus points
The winning team will be either:
- the team to make the last completed strike, if not all 20 books (across both teams) are read; or
- the team with the smallest number of overlap letters in their strikes, if all 20 books are read; or
- if there is a tie for number of overlap letters, a coin toss will be made by a neutral mod to decide the winner.

Example
Team A will strike first.
Their randomly assigned book title is Orphan Black.

Team A Strike 1: Blackwater (BLACK overlap, 5 letters)
Team B Strike 1: Terms and Conditions (TER overlap, 3 letters)
Team A Strike 2: Onset of Danger (ONS overlap, 3 letters)
Team B Strike 2: Anger (ANGER overlap, 5 letters)
Team A Strike 3: Gerald's Game (GER overlap, 3 letters)
Team B Strike 3: Me Before You PLUS a supply drop letter A (AME overlap, 3 letters)

Team A final total (of overlap letters) = 5 + 3 + 3 = 11 letters
Team B final total (of overlap letters) = 3 + 5 + 3 = 11 letters

Battle Pairings

District 1 & District 8
District 2 & The Capitol
District 3 & District 13
District 4 & District 12
District 5 & District 11
District 6 & District 10
District 7 & District 9

Timings
The first week in each of Round 2 and 3 shall be for planning your fight
The second week in each of Round 2 and 3 shall be for fighting your fight

In Round 2 Districts 1 - 7 will strike first
In Round 3 Districts 8 - The Capitol will strike first