Help needed or questions? Ask here!

[Becky]

Thank you so much for all the work that has gone into this. This is the first time I have discovered the challenge and I’m having lots of fun fitting my growing TBR pile into the various categories. It’s already made me think about reading books that I wouldn’t normally pick up. I’m keeping my plan on my iPad not on here but I’m really happy to be joining in. Thanks again.

[Katie]

We're glad to have you, Becky. Enjoy the challenge!

[Annagail]

how do i add my books to the different topics and such?

[Bryony]

Annagail wrote: "how do i add my books to the different topics and such?"

Hi Annagail, do you mean the weekly topics? If so you just post in the thread for that week to say what you’re reading and anything else you want to add to the discussion. Or if you mean the A-Z folders then you should check that there isn’t already a topic for your book and if there isn’t then click on the link “new topic” in the relevant letter folder.

Have a look at the first post in this thread too, and let us know if you have any other questions.

[Sabrina]

So I ended up writing about this group for a sociology assignment! The idea was to examine events of my life and analyze it from a sociological perspective. Being a very specific kind of social network, it was very easy to analyze in a sort of microcosm. Anyway, I'm copying my response here in case any one is interested in reading:

This year, as part of a New Year’s Resolution to read more, I decided to join an online reading group. The goal of the group is to read 52 books in a year (or one book a week), while meeting “challenge prompts” (EG: read a narrative nonfiction, read an “own voices” book, etc.) Individuals can document their progress in the group as well as discuss their reading choices in the group.
This group is an excellent example of the benefits of globalization. The people in the group are from all over the world, and through the power of the internet, are interconnected in a matter of seconds. I’ve noticed though, that most members of the group tend to be white women in their 30s-40s, creating a sort of internet cohort. In fact, I have yet to see any male presence in the group at all, despite being a group completely open to the public. There is perhaps something about joining a reading group that men may consider “un-masculine”, whereas women value the socialization aspects of the group. As for the age group, this is perhaps a manifestation of Erikson’s “middle adult” stage of life, where one must meet the challenge of making a difference versus self absorption. The group challenge to read diversely allows members to think outside themselves, thus helping them meet this important life cycle challenge. What is also interesting, is that many members experience culture shock when they read a book not originally written in their own language. For example, many members, including myself, are reading or have read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which is set in Sweden. Outside of not knowing what some of the words mean, some of the cultural practices the book shows are not ones I see in the United States. What is most fascinating about this I’ve found, is that you can experience culture shock without ever actually leaving your country or even talking to someone of from that country. And perhaps that’s part of the point of this group, to experience new culture without needing to even leave your bed.

[Angela]

Sabrina, that is a great analysis of this group.

[Sabrina]

Angela wrote: "Sabrina, that is a great analysis of this group."

Thank you! It was really interesting thinking about the group from this perspective. I tend to come upon epiphanies as I'm writing, so I didn't even realize the whole "culture shock" thing until I was writing it lol

[Laura, Celestial Sphere Mod]

Sabrina wrote: "Angela wrote: "Sabrina, that is a great analysis of this group."

Thank you! It was really interesting thinking about the group from this perspective. I tend to come upon epiphanies as I'm writing,..."

We do actually a few very active male members ;)

[Zaz]

Haha, I often have a culture shock when reading "US bullying". So far, I'm fine with other cultural sides in my readings (probably because I'm accustomed to read about various countries).

No idea why we have few active male members. I'm in other groups with more balanced genders or with a majority of men.
For the ages, it's more 25-40 than 30-40: https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/1...

[Sabrina]

Zaz wrote: "Haha, I often have a culture shock when reading "US bullying". So far, I'm fine with other cultural sides in my readings (probably because I'm accustomed to read about various countries).

No idea ..."

I didn't realize there was a poll about this! oh well it's not like my prof will know either way haha. I mostly just went with an average of who I've interacted with so far.

[Zaz]

No problem, you're near the range :)

[Pam]

Sabrina- Thanks for sharing your analysis of the group with us! It’s very interesting. With regard to cultural shock, I remember my husband commenting, after reading The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo, that Swedish people sure drink a lot of coffee and eat a lot of sandwiches! When I read the 2nd book, I saw what he was talking about! 😂

[Laura, Celestial Sphere Mod]

Thank you, Zaz, for including the 25 haha

I'm still 29 so I like to hold onto that last year before I have my existential crisis :)

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

Laura wrote: "Thank you, Zaz, for including the 25 haha

I'm still 29 so I like to hold onto that last year before I have my existential crisis :)"

SAME hahahaha.

[Jody]

I think I need to read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Although as an Australian living in Switzerland, I've got a bit of a mix of culture-norms, so maybe I won't be too shocked. 😂

[Jody]

Do you mind if I archive my extra challenge threads from past years into the archive folders? I'd rather just keep this year's in there, if possible, and I feel like the others are just clogging things up.

[Laura, Celestial Sphere Mod]

Which threads are you referring to? We will be archiving the 2017 plans and progress posts here soon. We just leave them here until the year gets under way to allow some late updates.

But if you want to archive your own then I don’t see an issue with it.

[Jody]

I mean the extra ones, in To Infinity and Beyond - I’ve got some there from 2016 and 2017. 😊

[Laura, Celestial Sphere Mod]

Oh ok, I think people typically include everything in one thread for the infinity and beyond section. But feel free to archive. There’s no real organization to that section so it will just go into the bunch.

[Jody]

I did this year and last, but not in 2016. Thanks.

[Emily]

Is there a place where the list of prompts for past years is stored? I'd like to look at the 2015 list if possible.

[Jody]

We were in another group in 2015, and did the POPSUGAR challenge, then we sprouted our own challenge and group from there.

You can still see the 2015 on their site if you google it - for some reason when I try to link it, the server doesn't like it. ☹️

[Laura, Celestial Sphere Mod]

I'm not sure if it will work since it's an old group but here is the link to 2015: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Perri]

How old is this group? Did it start as an off shoot from Popsugar?

[Katie]

This is the third year of the group. It did start as an offshoot of PopSugar as the group decided it wanted to come up with its own topics for the year.

[Tracy]

Are the shelves not working?? It looks like I've read no books, but I could swear the other day my progress was showing........

[Jillian]

Tracy wrote: "Are the shelves not working?? It looks like I've read no books, but I could swear the other day my progress was showing........"

Mine is showing the 2 books I have read for this challenge but sometime GR is glitchy so who knows.

[Zaz]

Tracy > your read books are showing when I click on your progress bar, so they are counted by the thing. Last year we had problem with stuff not updating, it was solved in March, so maybe it's a bug related to GR doing updates (there are several topics on the feedback group about problems with read shelves). On my side, it's working and it seems that Z&K's ones are working fine too.

[Tracy]

Its some kind of glitch in the system....books still aren't showing up and I can't get a dropdown on my groups icon. Its more annoying than anything. Hopefully they will fix it soon, but its good to know that everyone else can see my shelf :-/

[Emily]

Thanks for answering! I must be going crazy because I swore that one year we had a prompt that was like "Read a book with an element in the title" and I added Coming Up for Air to my TBR for it. But I guess it must have a different challenge because I don't see that one on the 2015 list.

[Lynda]

Hello, I'm new and trying to add my 2018 plan, but I got a message saying I need to confirm my email before I can add a new topic. How do I do this? I looked through my email inbox and don't see anything related.

Thanks,
Lynda

[Sabrina]

Lynda wrote: "Hello, I'm new and trying to add my 2018 plan, but I got a message saying I need to confirm my email before I can add a new topic. How do I do this? I looked through my email inbox and don't see an..."

I had the same problem a couple weeks ago. go to your settings and click account settings. the email verification should be at the top

[Lynda]

Sabrina wrote: "Lynda wrote: "Hello, I'm new and trying to add my 2018 plan, but I got a message saying I need to confirm my email before I can add a new topic. How do I do this? I looked through my email inbox an..."

Thanks! I had looked there but didn't see it. I'm good now!

[Karen]

I'm confused about the group challenge part of the read-a-thon. Is there a competition between the teams for the total amount read?

[Laura, Celestial Sphere Mod]

The details of the team challenge will be posted closer to the read-a-thon. In the past, we have done team bingo, battleship, and a board game.

Typically, there are tasks that the group works together to complete (pages read, book genres, themes, time spent, etc.).

[Emily]

Is there any rule against using a reread for a prompt?

[Bryony]

Emily wrote: "Is there any rule against using a reread for a prompt?"

There’s no rule about re-reads, you’re welcome to count one if it fits the prompt. :-)

[Emily]

Bryony wrote: "Emily wrote: "Is there any rule against using a reread for a prompt?"

There’s no rule about re-reads, you’re welcome to count a one if it fits the prompt. :-)"

OK, I will keep this in mind. I still feel doing so is a bit like cheating since, to me, the challenge is about exposing yourself to new books. But maybe I'll wait and retroactively count rereads for prompts if I need to at the end of the year.

[Bryony]

That sounds like a good idea to wait and see if you need to count any rereads at the end of the year. I tend not to re-read very much either (usually only books I read years ago) as I usually see my reading challenges as a way to discover new books, but I know some people really enjoy rereading so it’s nice that both options can work for this challenge.

[Marie (UK)]

what does "own voices" mean and what unique thing does it bring to reading?

[Sophie]

Hi Marie. For any question related to prompts, your best source is the Weekly Topic folder. You'll find the topic for own voices here.

[Marie (UK)]

Sophie wrote: "Hi Marie. For any question related to prompts, your best source is the Weekly Topic folder. You'll find the topic for own voices here."

thank you

[Lynda]

I read Into the Water by Paula Hawkins for prompt #28. For some reason, when I add the book cover to my reading plan, it comes up Water for Elephants. I have tried entering it several different ways ... with ISBN, without ISBN, with ISBN for Water for Elephants ... and it still comes up Water for Elephants. Any ideas?

[Lynda]

It's in my 2018 reading plan: Lynda's AYT 2018 Plan (Subject to Change on a Whim!).

[Sophie]

If you've read my last post, sorry I didn't read your query properly.

It's working for me:

Maybe try to copy this text without the * [*bookcover:Into the Water|33151805]

[Tracy]

Lynda wrote: "It's in my 2018 reading plan: Lynda's AYT 2018 Plan (Subject to Change on a Whim!)."

Thats so strange, I looked at your plan and I see exactly what you mean. Your link is showing up with the correct title Into the Water, but when you click on it it opens up as Water for Elephants :/

Testing cover:
Its working for me as well, so thats one weird glitch...

I agree with Sophie, copy and paste her text into your plan but remove the *. Then to add the title , paste it again and remove the * and the word cover.

Good luck.

So strange.

I don't know if there are any GR librarians in our group that can look into that or you could send an email to GR , describe the problem, and copy/paste the link to your challenge page so they can see it for themselves and maybe figure it out.

[Sophie]

Lynda, could you copy/paste the html text of the link on your plan with a * so we can see how it looks?

[Lynda]

Tracy wrote: "Lynda wrote: "It's in my 2018 reading plan: Lynda's AYT 2018 Plan (Subject to Change on a Whim!)."

Thats so strange, I looked at your plan and I see exactly what you mean. Your link is showing up ..."

Tracy wrote: "Lynda wrote: "It's in my 2018 reading plan: Lynda's AYT 2018 Plan (Subject to Change on a Whim!)."

Thats so strange, I looked at your plan and I see exactly what you mean. Your link is showing up ..."

Sophie wrote: "Lynda, could you copy/paste the html text of the link on your plan with a * so we can see how it looks?"

Sophie wrote: "Lynda, could you copy/paste the html text of the link on your plan with a * so we can see how it looks?"

Sophie wrote: "If you've read my last post, sorry I didn't read your query properly.

It's working for me:

Maybe try to copy this text without the * [*bookcover:Into the Water..."

Sophie wrote: "If you've read my last post, sorry I didn't read your query properly.

It's working for me: [bookcover:Into the Water|33151805]

Maybe try to copy this text without the * [*bookcover:Into the Water..."

[Lynda]

Thanks, ladies - Sophie's html text worked.

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

Question: Should we be trying to stay spoiler-free in the A-Z folders? I've been looking at those folders only after I finish a book, as a place for discussion, but I realize some people use them for other purposes. Want to make sure I'm using the spoiler tag if those are meant to be a spoiler free zone.