2022 Reading Challenge discussion
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2016 Challenge Ideas
I have some ideas. Not sure I would be up to leading challenges just yet. I am still trying to figure out the website to some degree, but I figured I would offer them anyways. February: History- For the most part, history is written by the victor- usually a white male. Read books that have been written from the losing side's perspective.
Ideas for what might qualify:
- A book from a sympathetic Nazi/communist, etc.'s perspective
- A book written to consider what the world would be like if the other side had won
1. If Hitler/Japan had won WWII
2. If Germany had won WWI
3. If the American Revolution had been quashed
4. If Alexander the Great had failed to conquer
(You get the idea)
- A book written from a woman's point of view, on the losing or winning side
There are probably more examples, but I think the idea is pretty clear- books that imagine history in a different way.
April:Spring Cleaning- Come spring time you might be tempted to clean your house from top to bottom, but chances are you also want to clean up your life a little bit. Read books where characters grow and change to the point where their lives are completely different and they are better for it.
I might have more ideas later, but for now that's it.
Thanks, Stephanie! Feel free to post as many ideas as you have. Again, there's no pressure to lead challenges if you don't feel comfortable, but you're also welcome to dive in and try to lead if you want.If anyone has any questions about leading challenges and what that requires, you can always reach out to me.
Cassandra-bought myself a notebook with Fiction to Reality written on it so guess I'm in.Please put me down for five pairs-to begin with....
I have two suggestions off the top of my head:1. Outside My Comfort Zone (perhaps coupled with October's theme of "Scare") - Read books from genres/sub-genres with which you are largely unfamiliar or tend to avoid. For me, this might be Romance or Westerns. For someone else, it might be Graphic Novels, Science Fiction, or Biographies.
2. Rereading (This might go with with September's theme of "Reflections" or August's theme of "Friendship" or perhaps as a Quarterly challenge.) - Revisit books you've been meaning to reread, whether they are old friends/comfort reads, books you've read too long ago to fully recall or titles you want to revisit now that you're older or in a different place in life...or perhaps earlier books in a series you need to reread to refresh your mind for the next installment. (I almost never reread, so I'd like encouragement to do so!)
I would volunteer to lead either of these.
Sounds great, Pat! It's like the universe is telling you to do this challenge. Please make sure to post any progress updates in the topic for that challenge otherwise I'll probably miss it.
Only posted here,Cassandra,because had some trouble logging in....but will do the right thing in future..
No worries! I just don't want to miss your updates is all. :)
not sure if i posted this Build Your own Boxset Challange!
Choose 3 or 4 books that are related by Theme or title
- make sure you name your boxset or explain your reasoning as to why the book fits your choosen them.
example Dressing Your Personal Cowboy One Sexy Book at a Time or Undressing if You wish!
Blue Jeans, Tuesday Morrigan
Dark Roots and Cowboy Boots, Luann McLane
Scrooge Wore Spurs, Janet Daily
Under This Cowboy's Hat, Rob Knight
Blagica, you did post it in the other topic (and I saved it so I wouldn't forget) but thanks for posting it again in the new topic. :)
my memory is so bad i started a few more so i don't know which i actually posted which i didn't
Here is an idea for January's Theme Extremes:So January’s theme is extremes, here are some to explore:
1. The Weather can get pretty extreme in January...either really cold in the Northern Hemisphere or really hot in the Southern Hemisphere. Read a book that has an extreme weather event or a book that takes place during a hot hot summer or cold cold winter.
2. There are some extreme environments, and people love to explore them. Read a book about someone surviving in the wild outdoors or a book where someone travels to an extreme location (like outer space).
3. Extreme sports have become very popular over the years, so much so that some are in the Olympics! Read a book about an Olympic athlete or someone who went to extremes to play the sport they love.
4. Going with the sports theme, there is not sport more extreme and possibly dangerous than Martial Arts if not practiced correctly. Read a book about someone who participates in Martial Arts, or about someone who ends up in a very dangerous position.
5. Unfortunately, even with modern day science, extreme mental illness still disables millions. Read a book about someone who suffers from an extreme mental illness like bipolar or schizophrenia, or a book about a tragedy caused by someone with an extreme mental illness like suicide or mass shooter.
6. The media is dominated by news of those who practice extreme versions of their religions, if you could even call it following a religion. Read a book about a cult, or read a book about someone who is (was) a religious extremist.
7. Nationalism is often a good thing even if it’s extreme, just ask the founding fathers of a nation, but it can also lead to some serious conflicts like WWI. Read a book about the founding of a nation, or read a book about how extreme nationalism destroyed a nation.
8. Mathematics often talks about reaching extremes, but only the truly dedicated to the practice ever get to understand why math has such extremes. Read a book about a mathematician or read a book about a dedicated intellectual.
Please feel free to edit as needed.
I have an idea about a yearly challenge, actually I posted it to another discussion thread, but I cannot find it now, and it may be outdated. So, I am sorry to repost it again, in case you see the other one also.Nobel prize winners challenge: Read one book per author, from as many Nobel winner authors as possible. There are 112 winners in literature so far, so we have lot of choices.
Aysegul wrote: "I have an idea about a yearly challenge, actually I posted it to another discussion thread, but I cannot find it now, and it may be outdated. So, I am sorry to repost it again, in case you see the ..."Love it! I'm doing complete Pulitzer, plan on this one too..
Kadijah Michelle wrote: "Here is an idea for January's Theme Extremes:So January’s theme is extremes, here are some to explore:
1. The Weather can get pretty extreme in January...either really cold in the Northern H..."
Great ideas!
The Yearly Challenges are already decided for 2016, but I like the Nobel/Pulitzer idea. Maybe it could be a quarterly challenge.
April: Spring CleaningA challenge idea could be cleaning up series. You may have one or two books to finish in a series. You may have one to read in many series.
Another idea is a book that has been sitting on your "to read" shelf the longest.
I love both of those! I think we are a lot of people with unfinished series and those few poor books collecting dust in our tbr shelf, neer quite making it ;)
The Library Challenge Go to you local library and take out books from as many different genres as possible to read this month.
Rules: 1 book per genre, base on genre sections your library has.
Might work for the 'Spring Cleaning' theme as it stops you buying books!
Good luck Hannah. We had a similar challenge to what you're doing here in the group. It was pretty popular.
All of these are great and I would probably take part in many of them. I especially like Kadijah Michelle's idea for extremes with mental illness (psych major here).Let's see what I can think of.
January: Extremes Other than the ones named, I would love to see a return of the banned book challenge. I always found that a rather extreme reaction to the written word.
February: History Stephanie kind of mentioned it and I'd like to hop on her bandwagon and suggest alternative history. We know what happened, so what if...
March: Courage Read an autobiography/biography of a person you find courageous, be that a soldier, a civil rights leader, or even someone who went through something horrible and has/is coming out okay on the other side of it.
April: Spring Cleaning Books that you already own but haven't gotten around to reading?
June: Pride LGBTQ or an author writing about their experiences being a race that you personally are not.
August: Friendship Each person must ask for a rec from a Goodreads friend and read that book.
What's my favorite challenge
People pair up in teams of two and take turns reading books that should be able to make the other guess a simple fact about them based on the title or subject matter like favorite color or type of dog.
I just thought of one for the September Reflections- Many times, the books we like are a reflection of ourselves. In September read a book:
1. That has a character with the same first name as you (or written by an author with your same first name)
2. That was either written the year you were born or is set in the year you were born
3. Has a character of a comparable age to you
4. That has a character that was born in the state/city you were or the book in its entirety takes place in the state/city you were born in
That would be four books for the month, so maybe it should be a quarterly challenge, but I really like the idea of it. I was inspired by some challenge on another board I follow (that one is longer and much more involved, I think theirs had sixteen steps) but I think it works.
You could extrapolate this for family and do it for people in your family (husband, parents, whatever).
Bobbi wrote: "All of these are great and I would probably take part in many of them. I especially like Kadijah Michelle's idea for extremes with mental illness (psych major here).Let's see what I can think of...."'
I'm sure the banned books challenge will come up this year. Maybe a quarterly, we will see.
I love your idea for February! I can already see the challenge forming in my head for that one.
I think July's theme will have two sides: LGBT and National Pride.
And finally, friendship! I love the idea. The only thing we have to be careful of is making sure people have access to the books recommended. So maybe a person could list a bunch of books they have, and we have their friend pick one.
I am the one leading banned books this year if it reappears i would be happy to help out if needed.
Hi! Im new here and I just thought I would say some ideas.For the scary challenge: a book where the main character inflicts fear on other (could be another main character, citizens, etc.)
I know we're doing a group reads challenge for the 1st quarter. What about broadening the list to include the other nominated books? There are so many good ones suggested each month, that it might be fun to put those in a list and have a group reads runner up challenge.
That's an interesting idea, Megan! I often have trouble choosing between nominations. Maybe we could do that toward the end of the year and include poll nominations from previous months. We would end up with too many books if we did more than just the year, I think.Keep the suggestions coming, everyone!
I had an idea for two of the challenges:July - Leaders: this could be book by / about famous leaders from around the world, or even expanded to fiction with famous/charismatic leaders in books. I always like the monthly challenges that go "around the world" for inspiration...
November - Family: this could be book with family names in the title "like Mom, Son, Daughter, Husband, Cousin etc). Kind of like a mini-I Spy challenge! It could also be books about different family relationship, especially since November will be close to the start of the holiday season... examples could be book that show close families, estranged families, family reunions, family additions, etc...
Looking forward to all these challenges!
Renee wrote: "I had an idea for two of the challenges:July - Leaders: this could be book by / about famous leaders from around the world, or even expanded to fiction with famous/charismatic leaders in books. I..."
I really like the idea for mini I SPY!
Blagica wrote: "not sure if i posted this Build Your own Boxset Challange!
Choose 3 or 4 books that are related by Theme or title
- make sure you name your boxset or explain your reasoning as to why the book fi..."
love this idea sandi
I am reading the ideas and while they all sound great not all readers read "heavy" books. This is one of the reasons i have stayed away from the challenges last year. I personally am into more of the paranormal, mysteries and romance books although I am not opposed to getting into some of the books that are talked about but as a whole those are not the books I normally read due to my memory issues. So for those of us who like more along the lines of other genre's can they also be included? My ideas would be
January: Extremes- read a book from a genre' you normally would not read from.
February: History For me I would love to read a book on the history of the country of my heritage which is Ireland or my husband which is Mexico
March: Courage - read a book about someone who showed courage above and beyond examples Ann Franks, chris kyle, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light
April: Spring Cleaning
May: Celebrations
June: Pride- For me you could throw some supernatural paranormal in here cause they have prides OR we could do books like Reckless by Nicole Edwards
July: Leaders
August: Friendship
September: Reflections
October: Scare
November: Family
December: Holidays
Just some ideas I had ...sandi
Awesome! We appreciate your ideas and want to make sure you feel like there are challenges you can do. Of course, feel free to include books from those genres wherever they fit. We have quite a few yearly challenges that I think would work great.The box set idea is one of our first quarterly challenges this year. I hope you'll sign up! :)
Sandi,Keep the ideas coming. I don't read paranormal books. It's just not something I enjoy, but I know lots of people love them, and I would love to see a great challenge formed around this genre.
Renee,
I love your idea for July.
I am working on a monopoly board to do with books. Sandi I can add a couple paranormal concept to it if you think it is something you might be interested in joining
Are there any plans for a 2016 bingo?
Kiwi, not at this time - but we'd love to hear any ideas you have!
How do I sign up for the challenge?This is my list for the challenge. A couple will be re-reads that have already been on my list.
Is it OK to do a re-read? I have some on my list already to re-read.
Leona's List:
January: Extremes: Roman Mask by Thomas M.D. Brooke (reading now).
February: History: The Story of Mankind by Hendrik Willem van Loon.
March: Courage: The Revolutionary Paul Revere by Joel J. Miller.
April: Spring Cleaning: I will just pick a book from the shelf.
May: Celebrations : I will re-read The Secret Garden.
June: Pride: Something about America.
July: Leaders: Killing Lincoln by Bill O'Reilly ( a Christmas gift from my son).
August: Friendship: Black Beauty by Anna Swell.
September: Reflections: Spoken from the Heart by Laura Bush.
October: Scare: True Hauntings by Hazel M. Denning, Ph. D..
November: Family : Not sure at this time.
December: Holidays: Something to do with Christmas, probably a book by Debbie Macomber.
Cassandra wrote: "Kiwi, not at this time - but we'd love to hear any ideas you have!"I like the look of Full House Reading Challenge 2016, Link here, given there are no plans for a group one yet, I think I'll do that :P
Hi Leona! This topic is the place for members to suggest challenge ideas for us to maybe use later in the year.It looks like you've picked out a book for each of our monthly themes. We don't have a challenge like that - although the group read books fit the challenge (in January we're reading The Martian). That said, a few members do have personal challenges to read a book for each month's theme. If you want to do that on your own, you're welcome to keep track of it in your member corner.
Does that answer your question?
Kiwi wrote: "Cassandra wrote: "Kiwi, not at this time - but we'd love to hear any ideas you have!"I like the look of Full House Reading Challenge 2016, Link here, given there are no plans for a group one yet,..."
Thanks for the link, and I hope you do well with the Challenge. A Bingo Challenge might be a fun Quarterly Challenge this year. Keep checking in.
Zara wrote: "Good luck Hannah. We had a similar challenge to what you're doing here in the group. It was pretty popular."Ah, oops! Which topic is the challenge under?
Ok, so I don't know where this would fit...doesn't have to be a monthly challenge or a yearly....just an option for start/finish-whenever-you-want kind of challenge. Something like that. Maybe a quarterly. Maybe even next year, I don't know, ha ha. :) But anyway, the idea is a Star Wars-themed "Force Challenge" or something like that. I can think of a couple options:A) Spell challenges. Choose light side or dark side and spell characters from that side of the force.
*Light*
HAN
YODA
JEDI
SKYWALKER
(etc.)
*Dark*
VADER
KYLO
SITH
PALPATINE
(etc.)
B) Scavenger hunt.
Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Read a book that is the first in a series
Podracing - Read a book that involves a race of some kind
Author's initials found in "Qui Gon Jin"
Episode II: Attack of the Clones
(etc.)
Tasks completed:
1-5 :: Padawan
6-12 :: Jedi/Sith Apprentice
13-20 :: Jedi/Sith Master
If this is something of interest I can finish fleshing this out into a complete challenge. If not, I won't be offended and I won't put the time into it. Just thought it sounded pretty sweet to me! :D
I'm going to attempt a backlog monthly challenge this year,for each month i'm going to try and read a free and paid for book from that month for each of the years i've owned my kindle,i got my kindle august 2010 so the jan challenge would start in 2011.
Lorraine wrote: "I'm going to attempt a backlog monthly challenge this year,for each month i'm going to try and read a free and paid for book from that month for each of the years i've owned my kindle,i got my kind..."Nice challenge Lorraine, our TBR randomisor yearly challenge kind of works like that.
i've looked at the randomiser challenge but i don't add my tbr books to my list,i find i can't keep track of my read books if they're on there.
How do you keep track of your to-read books? If it's a spreadsheet or something, you could still use a random number generator to select books (it doesn't have to be through the Goodreads list function). Not sure if that helps or not, but I thought I'd through it out there.
the way I did mine was I double clicked on the to read books in my case it was 600 and then changed the order to random hope that helps.
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2022 Reading Challenge
Books mentioned in this topic
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (other topics)A Midsummer Night's Dream (other topics)
The Pillars of the Earth (other topics)
Much Ado About Nothing (other topics)
The Tempest (other topics)
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To help get you started, here are the themes for each month:
January: Extremes
February: History
March: Courage
April: Spring Cleaning
May: Celebrations
June: Pride
July: Leaders
August: Friendship
September: Reflections
October: Scare
November: Family
December: Holidays
A monthly challenge doesn't necessarily need to fit the theme, and sometimes we will have two monthly challenges.
We also have one or two challenges per quarter, so feel free to suggest ideas for those too.
We can't use every challenge idea that gets posted, but we do use many of them. If we do decide to use your challenge, you will have the opportunity to lead your challenge if you want. If you'd rather not, we can ask for volunteer leaders, so there's no pressure there!