Nothing But Reading Challenges discussion
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Pewter Blue
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Mary X
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Jul 29, 2013 04:59PM
482 books! I think we'll hit 500 before the next update. That's in actual read books. With our bonus points we are over 500 on the Mod's spreadsheet.
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Just added my latest book read The English Girl by Daniel Silva. I must admit that I am glad I didn't give up on this book. Once it got going it was a good read and I gave it 4 stars. I must admit that I like the human side of these spies rather than the thriller aspects. Now on to continue reading Elegy for Eddie and begin The Lemon Orchard by a fave author of mine, Luanne Rice.
Good Morning. Just a reminder, the August Challenge starts in 2 days. Books finished in August count for the challenge, start date doesn't matter.
I am sorting through my books for the August Challenge.Can't wait.
Just to say that last night I was going crazy from all of my groups and the various challenges I had signed on for. I decided this morning to list all of the challenges with dates, etc. and then realized that there was so many repetitive challenges from many different groups and then way too many groups to really participate and keep up with them and I therefore deleted several of them. I have three groups that I've been with for forever and wouldn't eliminate them and wouldn't eliminate this group since it took me some time to figure out what's what and everyone was so nice and answered my questions. I have always believed that less is more and to do a job right and less groups works better for me.
I have my own thread in one of my groups to keep track of all my challenges. I tend to join too many too.
I also get overzealous in joining challenges and then get overwhelmed that I can't finish them all! That's why I like this challenge - it's keeping me motivated to reach my yearly goal without dictating when I have to read everything.I have a private group for just me that I keep track of all my challenges in.
In one of my groups, a member set up our own challenge pages and it's most helpful because it's alphabetical and I can find my name easily and in some groups I'm able to click on topic and it alphabetizes the names otherwise wading through all of the names is difficult and time consuming. To tell the truth, I sometimes feel as though these groups are my full time job.
I keep track of my challenges a few ways but I am not always consistent with them, except for keeping track in a simple text file on the computer. I have my own GR group for tracking challenges and I have a thread in one of my groups (or maybe in a few groups, I don't know anymore) but I don't really like updating those two ways because when you add a book with the 'add book/author' tool, the book is just dropped in at the end of your post so you have to cut it and paste it to the section you want it in after you read it and that's just so cumbersome to me, especially when you have a lot of books to add. It's much easier to just keep everything in a text file and I write notes there, too. But, I do like having all of my challenges listed in my personal GR group because it looks neat and orderly and I can always go there for a quick glance. I organize them by groups and length of time. With the text file, I create a new text file for each month and/or season. I like being able to write notes next to each book title, too -- I include any initials that correspond to each book in case I do a spell-it-out somewhere or an A-Z challenge; I include cover colors and any details on the cover that might come in handy for challenges; I include the genre, character names, a line about the basic plot in case plots fit a type of challenge, the series name and number if it's in a series, plus I note what challenges the books fit. I know it sounds like a lot of work but it's really not that time consuming to do it that way. I enjoy the book keeping aspect and having a visual reference for the books I read. Always have enjoyed note-taking.
I also enjoy note taking and I keep an up to date journal. But this is in a notebook that began pre computer days so it's rally like a Bible to me. I have various other places where I keep my books recorded and imagine eventually I'll figure out something for my challenges.Maybe I will set up a page for my challenges and keep it in one of my groups but I would still need to enter information each time I rad a book for a challenge so it's almost like doing it twice to say nothing of the various places both on the computer and in notebooks and file boxes where I record this information.
I do the Serious Readers Reading Challenge and so I keep a plain list of what I read for that. I just keep that updated and then every so often I use it to update my other challenges. I open 2 windows with my challenge page on both. Then I just do down my list from where I last left off and add each book to every challenge it works for.
Mystery lovers, have you seen the new challenge here on NBRC??? Mystery Mayhem and Murder Squad Reading Challenge. Join up! :)
Help Me. I must have a bad case of the summer blahs cause...there were slim pickings today at the library for audio books when I spotted Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks. Traditionally I have never enjoyed his books although I have read quite a few just to make sure I didn't like his writing. I will say that his plots, while sappy, aren't all that bad in some books. So I borrowed this book and then realized that when the movie was released as a tie in, the Kindle was very affordable and I did download it then. Now I have the best of both worlds - can listen a bit and then read a bit. So I began the book and what do you know, it isn't that bad after all. Best part if my mind wanders, it isn't that intricate a plot that I can't catch up.
I frequently get books in print/ebook and audio if my library has both. I've "bought" a few classics for free on Kindle and then via their whishpersync service got the audiobook from audible cheap.
Haha, Nancy! I know what you mean - I've read a book or two of his and while they weren't great, there was just something about them that seemed to fit my mood at the time. I love that you seek help because you not only have the book but you also downloaded the movie, haha.
1 more day left before the August challenge starts. Remember books finished in August count. So if you wanted to start a new book tonight or tomorrow but were waiting for the challenge-anything finished in August counts.BTW; we are 484 books w/o counting bonus points
ilovebakedgoods (Teresa) wrote: "Haha, Nancy! I know what you mean - I've read a book or two of his and while they weren't great, there was just something about them that seemed to fit my mood at the time. I love that you seek hel..."Haven't downloaded the movie yet, only the book version.
A question - for the August reads, can we read whatever we want and the captains will find a place for them or do we need to follow the rules for the Octagon challenge for August.
You can read whatever you want and the captains will fit your books in (if they are able/if they fit any of the tasks). If you don't want to worry about making sure any of your reads fit the challenge, just post them in the "finished books" thread for the challenge and the captain will take them into account. Or, if you don't want to do that, you don't have to. I think Vicky or Mary will be tracking all of the team reads for August to see if/how they'll fit.
Thanks. I will put my finished reads into the folder marked for this purpose and let the captains figure this out.
Mary: Harry Dresden's Love Slave wrote: "1 more day left before the August challenge starts. Remember books finished in August count. So if you wanted to start a new book tonight or tomorrow but were waiting for the challenge-anything fin..."That's what I'm doing. :) I started a book yesterday but I needed to write some pals, so I'm taking it slower than usual so I can be done on Thursday. :)
I finished Elegy for Eddie by Jacqueline Winspear and noted this as book read for our tower team.Am currently listening to Safe Haven and will begin reading The Lemon Orchard today.
That's fine Nancy. We don't need to have a certain # for each category. As long as each category has at least 1 book we're good and that shouldn't be hard at all. I made a spreadsheet and as people mark books read, I'll fill them. It does help when people post them in the finished book thread as that's less shelves I have to check. It was more important for the 7% challenge because the categories had limits and levels & such to worry about. But this one is pretty easy. I made the categories as wide-open as I could to make it easier.
I had to put my dog down today. Cried like a baby but it had to be done. Now I don't know what to do with myself. My daughter and I are both hungry but no food appeals to us. I could go back to work but then I'd feel bad that I left my daughter all alone to grieve. On the other hand she has decided that smashing, shooting & blowing up stuff in a video game is helpful.
I'm so sorry, Mary: HDLS. My thoughts are with you and your daughter. 
Aw, Mary, I'm so sorry! *hugs* to you and your daughter.
Just an FYI: there's no specific time zone we have to wait to hit 8/1 before the challenge officially starts. It's just whenever your time zone hits 8/1. So anything you mark read after your time zone hits 8/1 can be used for this if I can fit it into a category and most books should work for at least 1 of the categories. This challenge will be pretty easy to do.
Nancy wrote: "I finished Elegy for Eddie by Jacqueline Winspear and noted this as book read for our tower team.Am currently listening to Safe Haven and will begin reading The Lemon Orchard today."
You have to let me know what u think of The Lemon Orchard. It was really cheap to download on Amazon one day - so I bought it.
Mary - so sorry for your loss. Been there and done that. I still miss my big dog Kimo - best pet I ever had.
For the most part all my books fit into the category for beach read. I will read any type of fiction story I enjoy which is pretty much all I read. I read for the same reasons I do at the beach that I do at home.
489 books. Lets see if we can hit 500 by the next update. I started a short audiobook today that I should finish tomorrow.
[image error]I actually feel a little relieved. I slept good last night knowing I would not wake up to a sick dog and have to finally make the decision. I think my daughter did too.
Sorry to hear about the loss of your dog.We are off to the funeral of a dear friend who died suddenly at 65. This is the second time this month this has happened to one of our friends. I pray for their families to find peace as for you also Mary.
MarySorry to hear about your dog. I am a huge animal lover, as is my son. We have had to say goodbye over the years to a few of our four legged family members. I always tell myself and my son that, although it is sad at the time and the loss will always be there, we know we loved them and that they knew that as well. We gave them a good life and we will see them at The Rainbow Bridge.
I will tell you the same.
Take care of yourself and your daughter.
I told my daughter that we gave him a loving happy life and we shouldn't feel guilty that we had to put him down. We got him from the pound so he certainly had a much better life than he might have.
There's a new cupcake coming.
It's mad and it's bad.
Some of you will be humming.
Some of you will be glad.
It's called the "Triple Threat"
And as it's name implies...
While it isn't a sure bet,
It increases your book count size.
493 books! Lets try and hit 500 by the next update!
I am so frustrated right now. I just had such a good group read that was organized with daily sections to read with questions - there was actually participation and discussion. Most my group reads really don't amount to much. I don't call stating wether you liked this or that much of a book discussion. And now it seems all the group reads I was going to do this month, for various clubs, are the same old mediocre unorganized poo, why are they even called discussions? Granted I really give credit to the ones who take the role of leading a discussion and come up with questions, because I just like to follow and participate. I don't know if I would actually want to lead a discussion.
I saw that Cadet Blue cashed in their chunkster points and they really increased their count.
We can definitely make 500 this update! I'm not too worried about teams with outstanding chunksters, I've been doing a bit of calculations on my own about when teams will finish and added the max number of chunksters to each team and they don't make too much of a difference for us. I'm working on finishing up two books.
I'm reading Ice Land which started off a little rough, it's written in the present tense and I think the tense is throwing me off because I'm so used to books being written in the past. It's getting quite good though and definitely sparking an interest in Norse mythology!
Right now I'm playing a video game and listening to A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World at 3x speed. It's boring me, but it's for another team challenge and it's too late to find another book that fits, so I'm trying to speed through it. It's part history about the discovery of America (North and South) prior to the Pilgrims arriving here and part travelogue/memoir about the authors trek to visit these places. Unfortunately it's mostly travelogue and less history than I would like and the way the two are coming together it seems unorganized from a historical perspective. Hoping to be done with it tonight!
I think there are new puzzles that we can do that might get us more points for our already read chunksters. I'll look into it but I suck at the puzzles.Imke did the Harry Potter puzzle one. So that one is done. Going to see if I can get one done. I did the HP one before I saw that she did it. We only need it done once per team.
eta: the HP is the only one up so far. Thank you IMKE for doing it for us.
Here's a link to the new set of puzzles if anyone wants to tackle them. Still reading the rules for redemption but I remember them saying the captain's group that they would be redeemable for turning our chunksters into counting for 3, even ones we have already read and redeemed cupcakes for.augustcupcakes
Now I'm going to have my Kindle read to me while I play Mahjongg.
Sarah wrote: "I am so frustrated right now. I just had such a good group read that was organized with daily sections to read with questions - there was actually participation and discussion. Most my group reads ..."Are you talking about the discussion for The Dovekeepers. I thought that was a great discussion with some of the best questions that members thought up and didn't rely instead on the ones from reading group guides or other websites. I think what makes for a good book discussion is the choice of a really good book. At one of the groups which feature a book of the month, I just saw some members who nominated romances, chick flicks and mysteries. Not all that thought provoking IMO.
Cadet Blue has only redeemed 5 chunksters, so far. They have a new member with 65 books read and that's why their number went up quite a bit. I forgot all about doing puzzles for the August challenge, haha. I love the puzzles.
I think romances and mysteries can be thought-provoking with the right audience and the right book. Those genres are pretty vast and I've had some of the best conversations over a simple gumshoe mystery or personality quirks of a heroine or a rake in historical romances. I guess maybe not thought provoking in a deep sense but engaging conversation, nonetheless.
Nancy wrote: "Sarah wrote: "I am so frustrated right now. I just had such a good group read that was organized with daily sections to read with questions - there was actually participation and discussion. Most m..."Yes. It is the discussion. I love books like that. I have tried to nominate the Pulitzer prize winner The Orphan Master's Son quite a lot with no success yet for this very reason. I want a good group and think it would be very educational and create a lot of discussion. But it is also fun to read all kinds of stuff. I don't mind being the one to bag on stuff I don't like either. I welcome all kinds of opinions. The reviews bagging on Fifty Shades of Grey was the funniest stuff I read last year.
... and I didn't realize in NBRC group all BOTM reads are done in this format so I am joining for Dark Places. Did not love Gone Girl but GONNA join anyway just to participate. And The Divergent BR sounds like it is gonna be more relaxed but still some of this format so I am better. I think I had a little bit of a meltdown from finishing that book and that group read on The Dovekeepers. I mean that book is now on my top five list. It is not every day you come across such a spectacular read. Last year it was 
, then this year started with
(unabridged version), in 2011 I read
and now
. Those are my favorite books I have ever read so far
... But there are lots of other great books I have enjoyed this year that deserve honorable mention:
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Nothing But Reading Challenges
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