Third Read-a-Thon - Progress Post

[Ed]

I didn't get any reading done today...went to a play "Indecent" at the La Jolla Playhouse, put up Christmas decorations and watched football games.

[Marta]

Ed, Their Eyes Were Watching God was on my radar but wasn't too sure about, with your endorsement I will add it to my list, sounds like a great book.

[Marina]

Friday I didn't get much reading done. I read 22 pages in Gathering Blue and that was it. I was at a Christmas Party all night, and yesterday I didn't read all day because, well I was a bit... Hmm tired!
In the evening I was ready for some reading so another 20 pages in Gathering Blue, and then I went to bed but my downstairs neighbours had a party and were quite noisy. I couldn't fall asleep so why not read some more?!
In total I've read 660 pages so far this week. It's more than expected, so I'm happy with the result so far!

It's still morning here in Denmark, and we have already done the cleaning, hoovering and shopping for next weeks groceries, so there should be time for some more reading today :-)

[Michelle, Mod Assistant]

Well, it wasn't a particularly enjoyable book for me but I did finish The Gift by Cecelia Ahern.

I don't know how much reading I will be able to get to today but I'll try to squeeze some more in before midnight tonight. If I don't get around to it, I will be satisfied with my 702 pages.

[Francesca]

Sophie wrote: "I'm glad to hear you like The Girl with All the Gifts, Francesca, I'm looking forward to reading it next year!"

I loved it! I hope you enjoy it!

[Luisa]

I finished Mostly Harmless and To Kill a Mockingbird. I don't know why it took me so much time to read To Kill A Mockingbird. I loved it so much!!

Also i reached my goal (pages) with Pride and Prejudice.

Now i'm still working on finish Nobel Prize Women in Science: Their Lives, Struggles, and Momentous Discoveries and Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage: Stories. I will probably not finish the first, since i still have almost 200 pages to read. But i think I will finish the second today.

[Sophie]

I'm going to bed, so it's time for a read-a-thon wrap up :)

It was a good reading week for me, some days I really managed to read a lot more than I normally would have, and some days were more on the normal side.

I read :
- 2 whole books : Ravage (313 pages) and The Importance of Being Earnest (58 pages)
- 470 pages of House of Leaves (and finished it)
- half of The Handmaid's Tale (that's about 150 pages, I can't know exactly on my kindle)
And I listened to more than 9 hours of Red Dragon's audiobook, which brings me to 75% of the book.

I liked the week-long read-a-thon a lot, it really allowed us to be more flexible, as life sometimes comes in the way of reading (silly life ;) ). And it allowed me to finish the 2015 Reading Challenge, yay! Now I can go on with the 2016 Popsugar Challenge hehe

Although I didn't participate in all the games because of lack of time or inspiration, I found them really fun, interesting and not too long to complete, so a big thanks to the mods for organizing this for us!!!

I hope you all had a very nice read-a-thon and wish you a very good "normal" week ;)

[Michelle, Mod Assistant]

Impressive Sophie! Approximately 1250 pages... give or take. I'm glad you got to finish your 2015 Reading Challenge too!

I have to say that I enjoyed the week long read-a-thon better than our previous 24 hour format too. It feels like it gives more members an opportunity to participate and that, as a mod, is the best feeling. Thanks for being part of it with us! :)

[Francesca]

Well, I managed to reach my target for this read-a-thon which was to finish The Girl With All The Gifts and at least start my next read, which I've done today, so I'm very pleased with my progress. I can see this book, Asking For It, being a very addictive read that I'm going to find very hard to put down but it's quite late now and I'm pretty tired. I've reached the end of the first chapter/section of the book so I feel like that's a good place to stop and go to bed.

I agree with everyone else, I think the week long read-a-thon was a much better idea. It made it easier for everyone to join in no matter what their schedules were like and no matter the time zone they were in. The games were fantastic too, I absolutely loved them!

[Michelle, Mod Assistant]

If there is interest, I'd love to see us carry the week long read-a-thons into the 2016 group too. The other mods and I have talked about including some prizes in future ones so I really hope that is something we're able to accomplish next year. We have such a fantastic group here and I feel very fortunate to get to be part of that so, again, thank you all for participating and just being part of the challenge this year. I hope you'll all join us next year too!

[Erica]

I loved the week long read-a-thon too :)
The last few days have been busy for me, so I didn't read as much as I wanted, but I did read the second half of The Pocket Wife (~160 pages), all of To Kill a Mockingbird (324 pages), and I'm about 67% into 11/22/63 (~570 pages), so somewhere around 1050 pages total. Not including all the picture books I read to my baby :)

[Michelle, Mod Assistant]

These were my final stats at midnight.

How many pages have you read? I finished with 808 pages read this week.

What are you reading now? I finished the Read-a-Thon still reading The Delta Anomaly, A New Hope: The Princess, the Scoundrel, and the Farm Boy, and The Rosie Project.

What have you finished reading? I finished My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories, The Gift, and three issues of The Wicked + The Divine (The Wicked + The Divine #9, The Wicked + The Divine #10, The Wicked + The Divine #11).

[Marina]

The read-a-thon ended for me last night, so here's my wrap up :)

I started the week with 300 pages left in London, which I finished.
During the week I read Where Rainbows End/Love, Rosie, I'm more than halfway through Gathering Blue and I started What I Loved yesterday.

In total I've read just about 950 pages. With a busy week, I don't think I could have done any better than that.

I think it's a good idea with the week long read-a-thon. It gives a better opportunity for more people to participate. If you don't have time to read one day, you'll probably have time the next day and it's still possible to take part of the games and discussions.

[Laura, Mod]

For some reason, I really struggled with staying awake the past week. It was a pretty stressful week with my clients so that may have contributed to it. Even though I should have had plenty of time in the evening, I found myself falling asleep a lot. So that was unfortunate.

Midnight: 367 pages
The Pilot's Wife: ~100 pages
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks: 30 pages

Midnight has been dragging a bit and I think it really could be a good 100 pages shorter, which hasn't exactly helped with my sleepiness.

I'm really loving The Pilot's Wife and I even had trouble putting it down before bed last night. Hopefully I finish it tonight :)

[Anne]

I read a lot during this readathon so it's a good thing. I really enjoyed having an excuse to read all the time during the week. I didn't finish the book i started during the weekend but it's an easy read and i shall finish it soon. I hope to take time to read like that again during the Holiday season.
Thanks for the games and all, it was nice to be a part of a motivating group.

[Marta]

Wrap-up for the week
Full books read:
The Color Purple, 293 pages
Pippi Longstocking, 116 pages, some illustrations
The Twits, 76 pages, lots of illustrations

Partially read:
Finished Embers, read 41%, about 80 print pages
Started Web Site Story, read 40%, about 110 print pages
50 pages from Buddhism without Beliefs : A Contemporary Guide to Awakening

That adds up to about 735 pages. I am quite happy with that, I read slowly.

[Zaz, Mood Minion]

Wrap-up for the week
Full books read:
5 picture books & kids' books for beginners.
The New Hunger, 105p.
La sorcière de la rue Mouffetard, 151p (children).

Partially read:
Finished Warm Bodies, 50%, about 110p.
Finished Elven Star, 40%, about 150p.
Continued The Fifth Season, 15%, about 65p.
Continued The Providence of Fire, 10%, about 60p.
Started Liesl & Po, 80p.

That's around 600p, which is not bad as I worked during the day (+work at home) and had an evening taken. I probably read less than the usual weeks.

[Sarah]

My goal for the week was to read the 3 books I had left for this challenge. I managed to read 4 books but only 2 of them were part of this challenge.

Full books read:
The Royal Pain 283 pages
The Royal Mess 224 pages
Guilty Pleasures 332 pages
Savage Nature 401 pages

Partially Read:
The Forgotten Garden 30% done about 22-25 pages

So all in all that would be 1262 to 1265 pages. Not to bad for a week of reading.

[Michelle]

Here's my wrap up. I got busy over the weekend so ended up not being able to read as much as I wanted to.

Books I finished:
The Alchemist: 197 pages
The Old Man and the Sea: 132 pages

Partially read:
The Brothers Karamazov: 41 pages
Inferno: 203 pages
Big Little Lies: 359 pages

Audiobook:
The Count of Monte Cristo: about 3 hours

So thats around 800 pages plus 3 hours of audio. Not bad.