Nothing But Reading Challenges discussion
The Floor is Lava
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Team Krakatoa Go Go
I'm OK with going up to Magma but I don't know how much I can help with going on to a higher level and I think Erin said she was iffy on that too. But if we go up I will do my best to try and help at that higher level. That's all I was saying.
I am going to reevaluate the books I added to see if they work for the other word options. I know I picked one because it worked for audio or why.
Why why? I think you mean Who. *three stooges routine*
Yes, sorry. Who. And I'm not trying to be difficult. I just honestly don't know how much I can contribute to keeping us up in the higher level. But I won't pitch a fit if we go up that level. Does that make sense?
Definitely a learning curve on this one.
I think if we bumped up to 41-60 Magma, we may end up in the lower end of that category and less chance of winning it. We could do it, but not sure we could consistently get 60 every round. Like Mary, I am in for trying if that's what the team wants to do. Us reading 5 books each a week right now comes to 20 books per week, 40 per round, which is already a decent amount of reading if things come up and some members can't make that five. With 60 we'd need 7-8 books per week per member.
If you finish a book that fits a slot I have reserved that I haven't finished yet on the spell it out, by all means bump me out and replace. I won't be offended. I see Megan and I are the main ones right now with unfinished books.
I should be done with the one I'm reading soon (Alpha and Omega) - it's an easy read and better than I figured it would be.
I won’t be offended either if I am bumped out of a spot because a finished book works there.
Erin *Proud Book Hoarder* wrote: "I think if we bumped up to 41-60 Magma, we may end up in the lower end of that category and less chance of winning it. We could do it, but not sure we could consistently get 60 every round. Like Mary, I am in for trying if that's what the team wants to do..."
But that is just it: there currently are NO teams in Magma.
Any teams considering moving up are teams just like us: teams that signed on for Crater, and are realizing that they will finish 40 books well in advance of the end of Round 1, and are trying to figure out what to do based on what they think other teams are going to do.
If we end up being the only team in Crater to request being moved to Magma, then so long as we hit the requirements during Round 1 (e.g., more than 40 books, corret # of people reading for Safe Zone 2) then we would not have to read any set number of books to stay on top there. We would be able to read like, I dunno, 0-10 books total in Rounds 2-4 and still be on top there!
If we end up being one of only a small number of teams who request to be moved to Magma, then we will be one of like 2-4 teams who -- having originally signed on for 40 -- will not reach anywhere near the max of 60. My guess is we'd all be hovering in the 45-50 book range, so the winning team will have to win on smart point gains and not just pure book numbers. The more books the better our chances, sure; but it's unlikely that any teams in this scenario are going to be reading anywhere near 60 books.
If we stay put, we are unlikely to win our Crater category unless one of the other high-performing teams either
A) doesn't make it to 40;
B) chooses really dumb spell-outs;
C) makes mistakes and gets injuries;
or
D) moves to Magma without us, leaving us behind and potentially re-leveling the Crater field, so to speak.
ETA: The next few days will hopefully tell us if our chances of winning in Magma are any better than they currently are if we stay in Crater. Given the info we currently have, and the amount I am personally willing and able to ready by Sun night, I think our chances may be better in Magma.
And fwiw, I don't think anybody else is being difficult :)I am just trying to figure out what our best chance of winning is, in ANY category, given our current position.
It's probably ME who is being the most difficult -- or at least the most OCD.
Am I competitive? No....
I keep going back and forth on moving up. Mostly because I don't know how much help I'll be. I thought I'd knock out 3 or 4 books this past weekend and that didn't happen. But like I said, if we do move up, I will do my best to help get us higher into the Magma level.
My boss (aka Mom) said she's leaving early today. That means office audio book time for Mary.
Someone mentioned earlier their work audio book time being iffy. My job is like that. If both owners leave early than I can listen. If not then I can't. Mom has been lingering lately even though we are insanely slow right now.
eta: I'll start Undercover Captor because I see the book I had in A for audio has been replaced. (perfectly ok with me). I was too lazy to load Becoming discs onto Itunes last night after water zumba.
All good points too Alysa. I am fine really either way, both levels would be fun.Just finished Alpha and Omega, now reading the Daniel Faust book and 20% in to that one.
So of course Mom leaves early but another guy has decided he needs to do computer work. (He normally doesn't use it much).
I hope they post the next round of tasks soon -- I really wanna start Hope for the Best but what if it'd be better to save it in case there's a "10th book in a series" task?!
Gah, I hate waiting for important information.
LOL Me too. I think waiting for word of the week was easier than waiting for tasks - the suspense of tasks can really get ya
I will probably pick something else to read for that letter and hold HftB at least an extra few days just in case. I just feel like, based on the Countdown tasks from Round 1, there's gonna be more stuff with numbers in it in some way, and its not every day one finds oneself all the way up to #10 in a series :D
Ha! Well huh! That team I mentioned that looked like they might have better points than us if they manage to reach 40 books? They finally updated their spreadsheet and they’re actually doing all 3 Safe zones. That actually gives us somewhat of a better shot at besting them, since the 120 points they got for Zone 1 is less than... certain other things they could have done instead. I will continue to keep an eye on other teams though. 😁
Well... it’s all still going to come down to whether they hit 40 books total. If they do, I think they will still beat us (in Crater) on points. It just won’t be by as embarrassing of a margin.
@Erin, can you add a length for your Treasure Island audible? Maybe in w/ the title since we don’t have a column for that.It is shelved on MP as childrens so we will need to show verified length.
I took a peak at the new tasks, which are posted btw. Task 10 is book that starts with O so you can read your 10th book in a series if you really want to read it this round. Kind of sorry I started Becoming because I could have used it for task 2 but that's ok it's not a hard one to cover.
The only ones that are a bit trickier, in my opinion are 7 and 3, but mainly 7.
I say to myself that I will hold out on looking for books until Friday but I know I won't. But I can refrain from talking about the next round anymore if the team wants to hold off on planning that.
I need a new ebook to read so I'll see what we need for this round.forgot about House of Pomegranates so I'll just read that.
OK, one more comment on round 2 tasks: I've asked for clarification on the tasks involving the NPR and 1001 books to read before you die lists. It doesn't say where we find these books. There's multiple shelves and lists for both on goodreads. Just so we don't get singed or the minor technicality of using the wrong bookshelf or listopia lists. Both those book lists are updated and changed at least occasionally.well duh, I totally missed the links provided. Egg on my face this morning.
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "I took a peak at the new tasks, which are posted btw. Task 10 is book that starts with O so you can read your 10th book in a series if you really want to read it this round. Kind of sorry I start..."
For me I think 9 and 7 will be the trickiest -- and 9 is only tricky because I blew through so many "Canada" books during Right Side Up Spring ;)
I should possibly take #4 just because I seem to be the fastest reader these days (depending on density of chosen text), although it might work out just as well to have me take multiple shorter books and 1 other person read just the 1 long one.
Dunno yet.
I'm gonna start making a more formal list of options.
Also just asked for a clarification that will help determine spell-outs... which will in turn help determine whether or not we should skip SafeZone 1 again, or do it for the bonus points.
In other news, I finished Black Wings Beating last night, but it was technically after midnight because I ended up read a bunch of House of Stairs. I'll finish that today! So they will both have a read date of 8/21.
I just started Winner's Curse too. I was not intentional but I have been reading so many print books! They are all print books! IDK what is wrong with me. I hate carrying print books around on the subway.
So far I have only looked at task 6, the 1001 books list. I might call dibs on that one. I own 2 short books for that and several if I count longer ones. With all the classics I have read over the years, I thought I would have read more. But I've only read 83 on that list. I do see a ton on my wish list on there.
Going to check the NPR list now.
One of my favorite series is set in Canada but it won't be a shorter book. I'll request the next one from the library anyway just in case.
So... first I am doing ALL THE MATH! *grabby fingers* so we can get best point values for Safezone 3 when we get there, and plan ahead a bit for tricky letters. (I for one do not want to pick books in Counttdown that I realize have an O character or whatever that could have been held back for use in SZ3!)
I like Excel better than Google sheets for some of this stuff, so I will work offline and then add results to planning spreadsheet in a bit.
I think there's bonus points for doing all the safe zones this time. I saw it mentioned in the Volcanoligists thread.
There's a 50 pt bonus for doing Safe Zone 1. Plus, if anyone happens to do a current BOM and participates (e.g. DQ or discussion), we can use that to rejuvenate on the off chance that we get injuries in Rounds 2-4.I have worked out that doing SZ1 will get us 10 pts more than the most that I could squeeze out of all possible Safe Zone 3 combinations. And that's if we MAXIMIZE point value in SZ3... which we might not be able to do because it is a lot of Y, O, U, I and Ns.
Do we think we can cover all that??
If not, we can pick a few other words instead for variety, but we will not reach maximum points. (And yes, for now, I am still considering us as being in Crater.)
I will put it in the spreadsheet tab for R2 just so you call can see...
In any case, we should def do SZ1 this time.
Okay I posted the proposed "BEST VALUE" plan. Apparently I am mathing instead of reading during my lunch break today. XD
If we don't think we can cover all these tricky letters, I am happy to replace some of these words with the next tier down (fewer points, more letter variety), since I have done all the work on a fancy chart!
What exactly is an MPG for the MPG Sci Fi task??
megan wrote: "What exactly is an MPG for the MPG Sci Fi task??"Has to be shelved as Sci Fi on the main page of the book.
Although all the examples that I checked have it written out as Science Fiction. We may need to clarify if that counts.
For example:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...
For the NPR List task:The only books on there that I could possibly take happen to have O and N authors, which I need to save for SZ3!!!
I don't have KU and I'm not sure if I wanna get it for this month but there was one book on my TBR that is on the NPR list, that happens to be on KU and is not very long...
If anyone is interested, I will pop the title on the spreadsheet.
I found something on the NPR if no one else does. I was going to call dibs on the 1001 list as I have a couple of short audio books for that one. But I won't be heartbroken if someone else really wants that task. So far I also have something for the set in Canada and African American author.
But that's all I've looked for so far so I'm sure I have something for everything.
I have a short audio book that starts with O but I think they will ding us for it because it has a lot of poetry tags even though it's a multi-writing style book and not solely poetry.
I think let's not make the spreadsheet as complcated as last time with "fake claims" -- let's just put in the stuff we want, and simply communicate better here if we want to change anything. :D
The Current BOM discussions have already started and are pretty much done for August as far as I can tell. I did Good Omens. The others start in September. But the next adult one starts on 9/2 and I am willing to read that and volunteer for questions. It's also MPG Science Fiction which is what I think they want but we'll wait for them to verify Alyssa's question in the Volcanologist thread.
Where is the part about getting bonus points for reading and volunteering to write questions for BOM? I cannot see that anywhere. All is see is where 2 of the zone 1 books need to be current or previous BOM books.
Can the book be read for task 8?
I am much better with Excel over google spreadsheets myself.As for finishing Round 1: I am sneak reading House of Pomegranates here and there at work. It's short.
More than halfway done with Becoming and will knock another disc out this evening while driving to and from a meeting.
I'll probably start Undercover Captor tomorrow morning unless someone really wants that spot. It's not long and I should have it finished early Friday.
I see 10 books that people have claimed and are reading/about to read. So I'll scope out another short ebook/audio or two for some extra words in case we decide to bump up a level.
The info is here:https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
If we don't get any injuries, we don't get additional bonus point for BOM participation per se, because we have nothing to "rejuvenate".
But if we do get any injuries at any point, we would be able to claim these BOM points as an offset.
September BOMS can be used in SZ1 because it's "current or prior BOMs, except we would need to make sure our timing lines up for starting SZ1 on or after 9/2.
Well the book works for C in ACID without any further investigation. But I would prefer not to have to do questions if I can help it. I'll request it from the library just in case. But I don't see any obvious errors we've made. I will gladly double check people's book links if needed just to make sure they meet page guidelines etc.,
It's to use in future rounds. Like if we get an injury in Round 2, 3, or 4, we can use the BOM rejuv points gained during Round 2 (or 3 or 4 if the Mods offer the same option).
Ah gotcha. But it's moot, for me, anyway because there's a long wait list for every digital copy at my library and it's not on Hoopla. I could request the print copy but then it might take me a few days to read it. I can't sneak read a print book at work like I can an ebook.I did find several short audio books on Audible Escape that work for H, O and N's if we want to add short spell outs once we hit our 40.
(How many I can do will depend on what day it is when we decide)
If we keep my proposed spell-out plan, we will need primarily stuff that works for I N O U and Y, so that's good about your Audible Escape shorts for O and N.I am having a hard time finding some stuff for Countdown tasks that I don't wanna save for those letters!
I *might* be able to get a print copy of the adult Sept BOM in time for use for "C" during SZ1. I'm not certain yet. I will know sometime on Saturday.
I def want to read the other book that I put in for SZ1, for "A", but it will be very quick.
Also re the September BOM - Because of the timing if I do snag a copy, we will need to complete Safe Zone Group 2 first, and then Group 1, then Group 3.
OK I perused my stash of short kindle books and this time I made better notes on them on my planning sheet for use in future rounds. But I have short audio or kindle books for INOUY. Including 2 for Y. Most are well under 250 pages.
Plus a bunch of kindle shorts for most letters of the alphabet. I'm tired of looking today.
Re Task 8 - Can be Science Fiction instead of abbreviated as Sci-Fi
*phew!*
So... I think I know what we should do regarding staying in Crater or moving up to Magma, but I don’t wanna put it here in case other teams are spying on us! So I will PM everybody later tonight and see what you think of my latest idea 😉
I'm down for whatever. I'll throw some books into next weeks tasks on the spreadsheet, like last time.
I just have two books I'd like to read for the next spell it out, because they are from the library and one is a real life book club book need to read by the 3rd. Luckily they are an I and O
Alysa wrote: "@Erin, can you add a length for your Treasure Island audible? Maybe in w/ the title since we don’t have a column for that.It is shelved on MP as childrens so we will need to show verified length."
Treasure Island definitely isn't what I'd consider children writing with it's heavy writing style, but I know it's labeled children a lot (sigh). Will add a note just in case. EDIT: See it was added, thank you.
Alysa wrote: "I think let's not make the spreadsheet as complcated as last time with "fake claims" -- let's just put in the stuff we want, and simply communicate better here if we want to change anything. :D"Sounds good, last time I was getting a bit confused by that, claiming spots may just be easier and more direct.
I wasn't able to get on yesterday but I did finish a book and update last night. Should be done with my Faust book early today.
I claimed 3 on the initial 10 where I have short audio books. But I'm good with switching with someone. I have a bunch of Kindle books that are just over 100 pages and hit most of the alphabet. So I'll kind of wait to fill in some of those.
I haven't even looked for zone 1 and 2 books yet. I'll do that today or tomorrow.
I only read a page or 2 of House of Pomegranates. If someone has a book for that spot, you will not offend me if you remove it.
eta: I have multiple books for the NPR and Science Fiction tasks. They just aren't really short ones.
Nothing But Reading Challenges
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Once we are able to make a final decision re staying in Crater or moving to Magma (which we have until the end of Round 1 to do, and cannot ask after that), that will obviously help a lot. #LSHIC