It's the end of the year...already?!

[Michele]

Hi! It's time to check in and see how everyone is doing with their reading for the Challenge. I'll admit the Challenge was...challenging at times, but it looks like I may actually finish! This past week, I was able to complete two more, leaving just one more book to read before the end of the year.

Share how you are doing (and it's perfectly OK if you won't complete the Challenge; doing some is great!) and if you would be interested in attempting another challenge in 2019. If you would like to post a list of your titles (or upload a PDF of your booklog), you can do so in this thread. I would love to see what others chose for some of the categories!

[Valerie]

I finished my final book on Nov. 21. I agree that it was very challenging at times, which is why I went the audiobook route for many of my selections. Otherwise I am not sure I would have been able to complete the challenge.

I loved that this challenge got me to read a lot of non-fiction this year. Sometimes I forget how much I really love non-fiction, and I get out of the habit of reading it. I also enjoy challenges where the goal is not just "read as many books as you can," but rather challenge me to read a variety of authors and subjects.

I would definitely like to do another challenge in 2019!

Here is my list:

1 Fiction: Royalty: The Ludwig Conspiracy, Oliver Potzsch
2 Fiction: Colonial to Civil War: The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
3 Fiction: Non-European or American: Norwegian Wood, Haruki Murakami
4 Fiction: Two genres: The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury
5 Fiction: Fictionalized biography: Circling the Sun, Paula McClain
6 Fiction: Best Fiction 20th Century: Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston
7 Fiction: Collection of short stories: Complete Stories, Dorothy Parker
8 Either: Bestseller 1950-1999: The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCullough
9 Either: Author never read before: The Death of Mrs. Westaway, Ruth Ware
10 Either: Outside comfort zone: Three, Ted Dekker
11 Either: Based on the cover: Bellman & Black, Diane Setterfield
12 Either: Reread childhood favorite: Homecoming, Cynthia Voigt
13 Nonfiction: Satisfies a curiosity: Dr. Mutter's Marvels, Cristin O'Keefe Aprowicz
14 Nonfiction: Personal passion: Books for Living, Will Schwalbe
15 Nonfiction: Dewey 000 range: Dear Fahrenheit 451, Annie Spence
16 Nonfiction: Dewey 100 range: Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places, Colin Dickey
17 Nonfiction: Dewey 200 range: Rapture Ready: Adventures in the Parallel Universe of Christian Pop Culture, Daniel Radosh
18 Nonfiction: Dewey 300 range: Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History, Katy Tur
19 Nonfiction: Dewey 400 range: The Professor and the Madman, Simon Winchester
20 Nonfiction: Dewey 500 range: The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs, Steve Brusatte
21 Nonfiction: Dewey 600 range: Under a Flaming Sky: The Great Hinckley Firestorm of 1894, Daniel James Brown
22 Nonfiction: Dewey 700 range: I'll Take You There: Mavis Staples, the Staple Singers, and the March Up Freedom's Highway, Greg Kot
23 Nonfiction: Dewey 800 range: Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris
24 Nonfiction: Dewey 900 range: The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride, Daniel James Brown
25 Nonfiction: Biography: Dorothy Parker: What Fresh Hell is This?, Marion Meade

[Michele]

I, too, "read" a few by listening to audiobooks, but I surprised myself by not "reading" too many that way! Here's what I read:

FICTION
1 Historical involving royalty: The Canterbury Papers (Healey, 2003)
2 Historical pre-Civil War: The Kingsbridge Plot (Meyers, 1993)
3 Non-European: Malice (Higashino, 2014) ~ audio
4 Two strong genres: The Affinity Bridge (Mann, 2009)
5 Fictional bio: Mr. Dickents and His Carol (Silva, 2017)
6 Best of 20th C: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (Spark, 1961)
7 Short Stories: Dark Side of the Loon (anthology, 2018)
8 Best-seller from 20th C: Day of the Jackal (Forsyth, 1971) ~ audio
9 Author never read: the Transcendental Murder (Langton, 1964)
10 Outside comfort zone: The Last Policeman (Winters, 2012)
11 Based on cover: Her Royal Spyness (Bowen, 2007)
12 Re-read from childhood: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (Konigsburg, 1967)

NONFICTION
13 Satisfies curiosity: You are Here: Personal Geographies and Other Maps of the Imagination (Harmon, 2004)
14 Subject passionate about: DIY MFA (Pereira, 2016)
15 Dewey 000: A Little Guide to Your Well-Read Life (Leveen, 2005)
16 Dewey 100: Walking a Literary Labyrinth (Malone, 2003)
17 Dewey 200: Virgin Time (Hampl, 1992)
18 Dewey 300: Devil in the White City (Larsen, 2003)
19 Dewey 400: Between You & Me (Norris, 2016)
20 Dewey 500: H is for Hawk (MacDonald, 2014) ~ audio
21 Dewey 600: The Telling Room (Paterniti, 2013)
22 Dewey 700: The Art Detective (Mould, 2010) ~ audio
23 Dewey 800: A Circle of Quiet (L'Engle, 1972)
24 Dewey 900: Atlas of Remote Islands (Schalansky, 2009)
25 Biography: Christmas: A Biography (Flanders, 2017)