SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion
What Else Are You Reading?
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Series Project (Progress/Finish Your Series in 2021)
I'm presuming this is limited to SF&F series?
OK. How do we go about this bingo. I see the series thing and the bonuses, but the other?
During the year, you fill in a bingo square whenever you've finished a series (or caught up with one) that corresponds to that square: "favorite author" = you've read a series written by your favorite author (or one of your favorites). Debut author = you've read a series in which the first book was the author's debut. Quartet = you've finished a series that comprises 4 books, etc. Each finished/caught up series can only count once, so one needs to finish 9 series overall to get the 🏆.The whole idea is that many of us have noticed that we start a lot of series and then never get around to finishing them, e.g. because group reads generally don't include sequels. So this thread is meant to help people motivate themselves and remind themselves to finish some of their started series. 🙂
I was MADE for this challenge!!! [much chest thumping and posturing]
I have a question 🙋🏻♀️: How can we read a sequel of a series by an author new to us? I have a duo loft on my shelves (been there forever) by an author I’ve never read before, but I would have to start with the first one of the series. I would’ve thought if the author were unfamiliar you haven’t read any of their books. Or am I being dense? Help!
the sequel icons are a separate challenge - the second book in the series would qualify for one of the bonus icons if it met the criteria.I'm going to read the Bloodlight Chronicles (Redemption, Reconciliation and Retribution) by Steve Stanton for my new to me author. The three books in the trilogy were part of a Humble Bundle a while back.
The bingo prompts always refer to whole series, only the bonus challenges refer to individual books. So the "New to You" prompt refers to a whole series by an author you've never read so far (as of now). You can interpret it as either starting (and finishing) a series next year by an author you haven't read yet, or alternatively you can also count a series you've already started by an author from whom you hadn't read anything else previously.
Mike wrote: "I was MADE for this challenge!!! [much chest thumping and posturing]"LOL! 😄
Ah, thank you Chessie! I missed the but about the bonus icons being fit sequels. And thanks for the additional clarification about the new to you author bit, @Jo!
Mod
A good chance that this is the only challenge I set myself for 2021 as I plan to mood read all year long. Looking forward to totally immersing myself in one universe at a time and ending many journeys.
I’m a big mood reader too, Ryan. I might be able to do this challenge though. I’ve been wanting to finish the southern reach trilogy, and of course, the locked tomb (wait, that one might not be coming out next year actually). Plus I’ve been wanting to get on the stormlight train. Do duologies count? I’ve been carefully hoarding the second dreamblood book for when I can really, properly enjoy it. And I’ve been wanting to read the ancillary series too.
This looks fab, Eva! I have 46 books on my "unfinished series" shelf, and I try to only add the next book in the series to keep my tbr from being entirely unmanageable. I know I won't get to all of them, but I've got 12 I for sure want to try to finish.
I also have 46 books on my similar shelf. it was over 60 a couple of years ago but I have been slowly whittling it down while still starting new series and finding incomplete series that should have been on the shelf. I consider anything under 50 to be manageable.
This looks awesome, thanks for setting up some great prompts and rewards Eva!!
Thanks for setting this up, Eva. I'll have to look if I can find 9 series I actually want to finish. ^^' I'm more prone to stop caring after the first books ...
Yay! I'm glad this seems to work for mood readers, as well. At first I also wanted to include seasonal goals, but then I realized people can just aim to get e.g. one row or one column in a season, and the bonus challenges are exactly 12 so that you can aim to complete 1 per month if you like. @Kristenelle: yes, duologies count for everything except the bottom row of the bingo. Even (or especially if) you've already read book one.
I needed this challenge in my life. If I don't count very long series (like Discworld) or the series that I've caught up with and won't have a sequel in 2021 (like The Locked Tomb), I still have 34 series to catch up to. A lot to choose from 😁I get part B of the challenge (sequels only), but I have question to part A. It seems I don't really have anything that would fit in one of the bingo squares on the list of my started series. I was however planning to start a new one that would fit perfectly there. Will it count for the challenge, if I both start and finish the series in 2021?
Yes, that counts! You can start a series in 2021 and finish it for the bingo. You also don't have to count all the Discworld universe novels as one single series, e.g. you can count the City Watch series, the Rincewind series, the Witches, etc. separately (as Goodreads does, as well).
I needed this challenge! I think this is the right time to tackle my series and I love the emoji - cats!
I doubt I get a menagerie of icons here, but hoping to get a couple at least. Thanks for this.
I am proud to say I will commit to doing 1 square! I have no doubt I can meet it! Haha! Report again in 2021.
Oh nice! I copied the bingo picture and the prompts to my personal thread. I hope that's OK.
Thank you, Eva. This is probably the only challenge I can do in 2021.I can do three squares - fantasy - SF- genrebender.
One square might contain more than one series, though. I have more SF than F atm.
@Ryan: Price permits, I'm also planning to catch up with the Firefly books next year. I've two more to go.
Me, being me, will attempt to fill the card. However, I don't think I'll attempt the Drizzt books or The Saga of Recluce books until I've harvested the squares. It's the genre bender series, I might have problems with but maybe Lynn Hightower's Elaki series (roman policier and sci-fi with an alien cop partnered with a human) will work there.
@Leticia: of course, go ahead!@Silvana: you'd still get a ninja cat at least for completing that row and you'd fulfill some of the bonus challenges (e.g. stars/planets on the cover). And maybe some of the SF series are trilogies or quartets or something, so you could fill those squares with them? Or written by an author who was new to you when you started the series? I didn't mean to imply that a series read for the "trilogy" square can't be in the fantasy/SF etc. genre, just that you can't count one series twice. :-)
CBRetriever wrote: "Me, being me, will attempt to fill the card. However, I don't think I'll attempt the Drizzt books or The Saga of Recluce books until I've harvested the squares. It's the genre bender series, I migh..."I tore through the Drizzt books - he has to be my favorite character of all.
and it's not necessary to read a whole series for the spots on the card, finishing a series is an option too, so if Patrick Rothfuss publishes the third book in his Kingkiller trilogy, one could fulfill the "finishing/catching up with" criteria. Hopes, hopes, hopes....
CBRetriever wrote: "Me, being me, will attempt to fill the card. However, I don't think I'll attempt the Drizzt books or The Saga of Recluce books until I've harvested the squares. It's the genre bender series, I migh..."Sounds like a genre-bender to me (and you'd earn a detective, too 🕵️♂️). Anything that has strong elements of any other genre (literary, historical, mystery/crime, thriller, YA, romance,...) or has both fantasy and SF elements would count.
Eva wrote: "@Leticia: of course, go ahead!@Silvana: you'd still get a ninja cat at least for completing that row and you'd fulfill some of the bonus challenges (e.g. stars/planets on the cover). And maybe so..."
One thing about challenge prompts (and challenges) is that I spent too much time and energy thinking about/typing/updating it while I should be reading books instead ;p
So, I'll keep it simple next year and a ninja cat will do :D
Heck yes! I have so many unfinished series on my shelf right now.
Anybody knows of any lists with 4 volume series by chance? I'm just trying to find one, but don't know how to successfully look for it.
Gabi wrote: "Anybody knows of any lists with 4 volume series by chance? I'm just trying to find one, but don't know how to successfully look for it."Looks like Emma Newman's Planetfall series has 4 books in it.
I am having trouble identifying "debut authors" in my ongoing reads.
Gabi wrote: "Anybody knows of any lists with 4 volume series by chance? I'm just trying to find one, but don't know how to successfully look for it."I couldn't find any official lists, but here are a few I know of:
Sing the Four Quarters
The Grace of Kings
Fire Logic
A Shadow in Summer
Mélusine
Daughter of Mystery
Daniel Abraham's Long Price Quartet also has four books.
One of the recent Humble Bundles helped me there quite a bit as there were several series from authors that I hadn't read before.for 4 books I have these options:
Seed to Harvest: The Complete Patternist Series by Octavia E. Butler
Elaki by Lynn S. Hightower
The Long War Series by A.J. Smith contains 4 books and it sounds like everything is wrapped up in the last book
The Riryia Chronicles by Michael J. Sullivan is 4 books with an added novella
The Witches of Karres by James H. Schmitz has three sequels by Mercedes Lackey (1) and Eric Flint (2)
I've already read the Riryia Chronicles and the Witches of Karres series, so I'll go with Butler or Smith because I'm using the Elaki series for a Genre Bender
Oh, if I *only* read from started series, I could probably fill 3 or more cards. I have so many series to finish, but I can’t take the time to count them or the number of books left. Not as organized with a series shelf as @Kaa et al. @Gabi, if you haven’t read the Rain Wilds series that follows the Tawny Man Trilogy by Robin Hobb that is a series of 4.
Thanks for all the quadrology suggestions. So far I've either already read them or they don't sound especially appealing to me. I'll keep looking.ETA: LOL! I just found that Tchaikovsky has the Shadows of the Apt series, which works as a Debut author series AND has an accompanying series of short story collections (together with other authors) as Tales of the Apt, which has 4 books. So at the risk of being sick of the sight of Tchaikovsky at the end of the year, I could use this one for the quadrology.
Tales of the Apt is 4 short story anthologies. They're good as are the Shadows of the Apt series.
Some other Quartets: - Becky Chambers' Wayfarers series (The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet etc.) is going to be a quadrilogy next year
- Tales of the Ketty Jay (Retribution Falls etc.) is a Steampunk/SF/Fantasy/Satire series
- The Earthsea Quartet by Ursula Le Guin
- The Rigante by David Gemmell
- Fallen Blade by Kelly McCullough
- The Hyperion Cantos by Dan Simmons
- Hyddenworld by William Horwood
- The Faithful and The Fallen by John Gwynne
- Bobiverse by Dennis E. Taylor
- Mars Trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson (if you also count book 3.5 which is the short story collection "The Martians")
- The Folk of the Air by Holly Black (same as above with book 3.5)
- The Burning by Evan Winter is going to be a quartet (currently only 2 books are out, so that is an easy way to get this square)
Coralie wrote: "I also have 46 books on my similar shelf. it was over 60 a couple of years ago but I have been slowly whittling it down while still starting new series and finding incomplete series that should hav..."Ugghhhh to finding books that should have been on the shelf are were not! I just discovered that I didn't have Rosewater Redemption, which I definitely want to read next year.
And then all the discussion of Tchaikovsky made me realize that I didn't have The Expert System's Challenge or Bear Head on my list either.
I echo Eva's suggestion on Ketty Jay tales, it is silly fun and a good palate cleanser.
This is a great idea... hopefully finishing some of my existing series will make me feel better about all the new ones I'll inevitably start in 2021
Here's another QuartetThe Nicci Chronicles (Sword of Truth Universe) by Terry Goodkind
Death's Mistress: Sister of Darkness (2017)
Shroud of Eternity: Sister of Darkness (2018)
Siege of Stone: Sister of Darkness (2018)
Heart of Black Ice: Sister of Darkness (2020)
and
J.V. Jones Sword of Shadows is a quartet as well
I read Peter Brett's First book ages ago in paper, but can I use that as a Debut author if I reread it in Kindle and finish the rest of the series or does it need to be a book I've never read before/
and is there a reason this isn't in the Challenge section of the forum?
SciFi and Fantasy Book Club
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Villains will be vanquished, worlds will be saved, epic finales will be seen. 🙌 There will be a bingo, there will be bonus challenges, and there will be tiny emoji prizes. You can read *any* series you like (although of course buddy-reads are always welcome).
A) The 2021 Series Bingo (referring to whole series)
Each filled-in bingo row earns you one ninja-cat: 🐱👤
Each filled-in column earns you one astro-cat: 🐱🚀
Your prize for a diagonal will be a hipster cat: 🐱👓
Fill in the whole bingo card by *finishing/catching up with* one whole series for each of the bingo prompts, and you get a big catfight which you can dramatize and describe as you wish. You also get a winner's trophy: 🏆 which you can award to one of the cat teams if you like.
("New to you" or "debut" refers to the first book of the series, but the whole series needs to be read for each square.)
B) Bonus challenges (referring to individual sequel books)
You can earn the following tiny little symbols by reading a (sequel) book in a series which
1) has a dragon (or the word dragon) on the cover: you get the dragon 🐉
2) has a weapon (or the name of a weapon) on the cover: you collect the knife 🔪
3) has a person on the cover: you collect the dancer 💃
4) has a landscape on the cover: you collect the flower 🌺
5) has stars or planets on the cover: you collect the star ✨
6) has an fantastical/not real creature or the name of one on the cover: you collect the unicorn 🦄
7) has a real animal/name of one on the cover: you collect that animal's emoji 🐰🐒🐅🦅🦚🐟 etc. (repeatable)
8) features a murder investigation: you collect the detective 🕵️♂️
9) features an alien/vampire/zombie/ghost: you collect the 👽or 🧛♂️ or 🧟♀️ or 👻 (repeatable)
10) features a love story/couple/some romantic elements: you collect the hearts 💕
11) features space travel: you collect the UFO 🛸
12) features a very cold, icy environment or a very hot one: you collect ice ❄ or fire 🔥 (repeatable)
If you collect all 12 categories, you get a medal: 🏅
The books you read for challenge B) should not be the first books in a series, but sequels. If you read a series sequel that doesn't match any of the bonus challenges, you get a lucky lady bug 🐞 for each as a consolation.
Participants who complete both the bingo and all 12 bonus challenges by the end of 2021 get a gold medal: 🥇 and much acclaim and applause!
Feel free to post your thoughts, the series you plan on reading (if possible please link the cover images) and how it's going here. You can also freely add bonus challenges of your own that I didn't think of above. I hope you'll have a wonderful and successful reading year in 2021!