The Seasonal Reading Challenge discussion

Hello! I'm just starting this challenge for the first time :) Looks like fun.

3. In 1492 Columbus Sailed The Ocean Blue - In Honor Of Columbus Day (October) - Read A Novel Where The Main Character Travels At Sea Or A Non-Fiction Book About Sea Travel.

For this I read Graceling by Kristin Cashore.

I read Beautiful Boy-A Father's Journey through his Son's Addiction. This meets the requirements of task 10.2

Donna Jo wrote: "Finished:
25.5 Janice's Task The Eagle's Prophecy by Simon Scarrow

My favorite Roman soldiers Macro and Cato are sent out to secretly re..."
You've been holding out on me.... Macro and Cato?

Jennifer wrote: "25. 5. JANICE'S TASK - Fortune Telling Has Long Been A Halloween Tradition: Read A Book With "Fortune" Or "Prophecy" In The Title, OR That Features Fortune-Telling, Prophecy Or Prediction(s) As The..."

Oh, I like this choice--although it's a book I probably wouldn't pick up for myself--it fits the task.

10.10. This Task Is The Cat's Meow - Read A Book That...
• Has The Word Cat(s) In The Title.
• Or Has A Picture Of A Cat(s) On The Cover.

Catfantastic 1 edited by Andre Norton and Martin H. Greenberg
This is the first of a series of anthologies. I would like to know what 27 "favorite" books went into the Witch World with librarian Judith Justin in Wilanne S. Belden's "Gate of the Kittens".

running total: 9 tasks, 9 books, 90 points

For Task 15.2 I read The Plot Against America by Philip Roth...I definitely do not think the world would be better today if this is how everything had happened (war with Canada!). This country is far from perfect, but at least it wasn't controlled by Nazis...It was all so depressing.

(my ticker refuses to show the correct number of points)

Books Read: 9
Tasks Completed: 8
Total Points: 110
Total Pages: 2592+391=2983

I'm finally on the scoreboard. I completed task 25.10 by reading Son of a Witch A Novel by Gregory Maguire. Such a letdown after Wicked!

Total points = 25

Finished 25.3: When You Are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris

Absoultely hilarious.

Total Points: 80

No new points yet.
I've finished I'm a Stranger Here Myself by poet Ogden Nash last night as part of Nicole's task (25.1). I really enjoy Nash's humerous look at human foibles and ordinary, everyday thoughts and deeds.

Finished reading these:

5 POINT TASKS:

1.
2. Twilight (re-read) 5
3. Pemberley's Promise 5
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9. Atonement
10. The Eyre Affair



10 POINT TASKS:

1. All Men are Mortal
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.


15 POINT TASKS:

1.
2.
3. Succubus Blues 15
4.
5.
6.
7. Twenties Girl
8. Agatha Christie
9.
10.


20 POINT TASKS:

1.
2.
3. The Shadow of the Wind


25 POINT TASKS:

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10. The Devil's Cub

Just finished The Mirror for 5 points for the time travel task.


New Total:

Jamie (23)-- 35 Points

5.7 Giving Thanks - In Honor Of Thanksgiving (November 26th) Read A Book That Relates To The Thing You Are Most Thankful For.
• Please Tell Us What That Is When You Claim Points.
Book of Lies by Melzer (Thankful for BOOKS)
5 points
150 total

BJ Rose wrote: "3 more tasks, and only one disappointing book - after loving 'The Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime', I looked forward to enjoying 'A Spot of Bother', but it didn't work for me.

5.10 Fall Back ..."

I agree BJ Rose, I didn't like A Spot of Bother nearly as much as Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time. Although I did think some of the final scenes in 'A Spot of Bother' were pretty funny, they weren't enough to make me fall in love with the book.

Cynthia - I think this update (message #617) may have been missed. I'm on the Leaderboard with 25 points, but this task made it 50 for me. Thanks!

Katie wrote: "25.4. CANDACE'S TASK - Read A Book That Has Been Written Within The Last 10 Years And Made Into A Movie Within The Last 5. Read The Book And Watch The Movie Both, Then Post A Little Review Of The T..."

30.1 Current Job: I'm a receptionist in a law firm, so I read Beach Road by James Patterson. It's main character is a lawyer.
Dream Job: to be a wildlife photographer, so I read Slow Man by J.M. Coetzee, whose main character was a photographer.



Total points: 30/690
Tasks completed: 1
Books read: 3/59
Total pages: 914

Completed task 15.7, listen to an audiobook (or read a book) while doing some form of exercise:

Read The Serpent's Shadow while (not-so-)vigorously riding the bike and running on the ellipse. I swear, the only reason you can get me to exercise at all is because I know I can get designated don't-bother-me time to read. Happy me!

Total Points = 85

Task 10.1 Arabella by Georgette Heyer first published in 1949


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15 POINT TASK
9. Your Homework Assignment (Should You Choose To Accept It) Is To Read A Book With The Word Home OR Work In The Title.
• After Reading The Book You Have To Design A Homework Assignment That Relates Somehow To That Book. Post The Details Of The Assignment When You Claim Points For This Task.
Work A Story of Experience, Louisa May Alcott.

Homework assignment: Alcott details a wide variety of jobs available to young women in the late nineteenth century. In an essay compare and contrast the options available to Christie Devon in Alcott's novel to options available to young women today. Would Christie be able to make it in society today? Would you be able to make it in Christie's society?

I have completed Cait's task (#25.8) by reading the following:

• Name Of A Person In The Title: Phil
The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil--George Saunders

• Name Of A Place In The Title: Sarajevo
The Fixer A Story from Sarajevo-Joe Sacco

• Thing/Object In The Title: Handbook
The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook-Joshua Piven & David Borgenicht

I visited my boyfriend over the weekend and spent about 3 hours reading children's books to his 16 month old. Most of the reading included him hopping in my lap, giving me a book, and then getting up 20 seconds later when he got bored. I would keep reading, and he'd eventually come back. Good way to spend a few hours :)

Some of the books read were: We're Going on a Bear Hunt, The Berenstain Bears go to School, The BB go Trick or Treat, and Froggy Goes to School.

So that completes task 10.3 for me and brings me up to 40 points

Sara ♥ wrote: "Krista wrote: "I KNOW Sara, I'm right behind you there with 4 multi-book tasks started. Someday we'll post those points! I decided after the Summer Challenge that I would read more of the books in the order I wanted.

I'm glad someone else is feeling my pain! I'm not necessarily trying to read them in the order I want to (I want to read almost all of them), but I AM trying to read them before they're due back to the library... without renewing each one 7000 times (like last challenge) and that's... a bit constraining... ..."

Yes, I am having to work in books sooner in the challenge because of the library return date. I'm also having to work in books that I have been in my library hold queue for months that have finally come it. Each challenge I tell myself I'm going to limit myself to books I actually own, but it never seems to work that way. It's about a 50/50 split right now.

I posted oncce this morning but forgot to include the author. Plus I have since completed to other tasks.

Beautiful Boy- A Father's Journey through His Son's addiction by David Sceff (Task 10.2)

Winnie the Pooh by A.A.Milne (Task 10.3)

Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane(Group Read Task 20.3)

Another partial task done. I finished A Christmas Carol for Donna Jo's task (25.2: related authors). I'm using Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins as my related authors (related by marriage).
I always enjoy reading The Christmas Carol and read it almost every December. I'm a bit early this year but I still very much enjoyed it.

10.3
A new house for the Morrisons by Penny Carter
Heavens All Star Jazz Band by Don Carter
The Walloping Willow-blind adapted and illustrated by Jim LaMarche
The Foundling by Carol Carrick
Patrick's Dinosaurs on the Internet by Carol Carrick

bringing my total points to a whopping 25!!

I finished task 20.3 by reading The Shadow of the Wind. I can't decide if I liked it or not, but it definitely kept my interest the whole time.

That brings my total to 60 points.




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Yeah I can't add, my total should actually be 30.
20.1 task and 10.3 task completed

I have completed task 10.9 with Killer Angelsand 20.3 with Shutter Island.
Total points: 40

Sara ♥ wrote: "Krista wrote: "I KNOW Sara, I'm right behind you there with 4 multi-book tasks started. Someday we'll post those points! I decided after the Summer Challenge that I would read more of the books in ..."

Right there with you both...I think I have 4-5 parts of different tasks done, so it might be a while for me too, but I am working on some of the bigger point or multi point tasks. Same issues with books from library coming into play after waiting so long too. Good luck to both of you ;-)

I am new to GR, and this challenge is just way too much fun to pass over. So, here are the books I have read since Sept. 1 that fit the tasks:

5.3- Columbus (Castaways of the flying Dutchman - Brian jacques)
5.4 - Adoption (Truancy Origins - Isamu Fukui)
10.10-Cats (To visit the queen - Diane Duane)

Total Points: 20

I finished task 15.1 (Prepositions) using "to" for my preposition.

I read: "My Soul to Take" by Rachel Vincent

AND

"To the Tower Born" by Robin Maxwell

I finished another task -

20.3 - Group Read - Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane

Total Books Read = 10
Tasks Completed = 6
Tasks In Progress = 8

I finished my second task, Hispanic Heritage Month (10.4), with The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende. After finishing it, I'm a little disappointed in myself. It was a 4 star read right up the end, when I lost the mood with about 60 pages left, and the book dropped to 3 stars. Still, Isabel Allende has definitely been added to my list of authors to read more by.

Total points: 20
2 tasks complete - 8 tasks in progress
4 books read
1,360 pages read

For 10 point task #3, I read:

The Frog Prince, Continued by Jon Scieszka [32 pgs:]
Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak [48 pgs:]
The Incredible Book-Eating Boy by Oliver Jeffers [32 pgs:]

My favorite by far was The Incredible Book-Eating Boy. Funny and great art!

Challenge 20.1 - Christian fiction - The Shack

Well... the story of how this book came to me had a twist or two in itself...

I think it's mainly aimed at people who have faith but issues or doubts. As a person without that faith (but with a wonder of all that's around us and a feeling that 'there has to be something more...') it didn't really impact me beyond the story itself.

That said, it did reduce me to tears of both sadness and, on one occasion, from happiness. But then I am an old softy from time to time. Both extremes were partly due to my own life events, current and past.

It did make me reconsider the 10 Commandments, with the possibility of changing it from "You must observe these 10 things in order to..." to "If you live within a certain way, with love for all, then you would be ABLE to follow/enjoy these 10 things..."

so that was good :)

I just finished The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton for the coming of age task (5.9).

I think this would have been an especially powerful book if I'd read it first as a teenager but I still enjoyed it quite a bit as an adult reading it for the first time and gave it 4 stars.




TASKS COMPLETED: 8
TASKS PARTIALLY COMPLETED: 3
BOOKS READ: 10 (+4 kids books)
PAGES READ: 3,360
POINTS EARNED: 45
NUMBER OF BOOKS READ FROM MY 'OWNED AND UNREAD' SHELF: 9

I'm hoping to do a lot better on this challenge than I have on the last ones. Teehee.

5 Point Tasks
1-Our children Are Our Future-The Pictish Child by Jane Yolen
2-An Apple A Day-Sadie's Trade by Launi K Anderson
3-Columbus Sailed the Ocean Blue-The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis
6-Terrifying Titles-Mary, Bloody Mary by Carolyn Meyer
7-Giving Thanks-The Book of Three by Lloyd Alexander
I'm thankful for friendship (and books).
8-Two Heads are better than one-King Arthur by Joan B Mason and Sarah Hines Stephens
10-Fall Back in Time-Knights of the Kitchen Table by Jon Sciezka

10 Point Tasks
1-Buddy Holly-Mr. Popper's Penguins by Richard and Florence Atwater
7-Faster than a Speeding Bullet-Rapunzel's Revenge by Shannon Hale and Nathan Hale

15 Point Tasks

20 Point Tasks

25 Point Tasks
4-The City of Ember by Jeanne Duproa
Unfortunately I saw the movie before I actually read the book so it was hard reading the book not based off the movie. In the end I think that I definately liked the book better. The movie is a very sad adaptation of the book and I cringe whenever I think about it now. They left out a ton of things and added other things that didn't make much sense like the giant mole. Sometimes I wonder if they even read the book.
5-Fortune Telling-Gregor and the Marks of Secret by Suzanne Collins
10-Monsterfest-Witch Week by Dianna Wynne Jones

30 Point Task

50 Point Task

Total Points: 130

I completed task 5.9 by reading The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

Point Total: 140
Page Total: 2292

I completed task 15.7 (P.E.) by listening while exercising to Harriet the Spy. Quite fun. Harriet is an interesting and complex character! I had never read this when I was younger. Glad to finally see what all the fuss is about.

Total Points: 180

15.8. Geography Lessons - Read Two Books That Take Place Countries That Correspond To Your Initials. If Your First Or Last Initial Is A Letter That Has No Country (I Think This Would Be Only X Or W) Then You Could Substitute Your Middle Initial.
• My Initials Are CS So I Could Read A Book That Take Place In Canada AND One That Takes Place In Spain.

The initials are J C

J set in Japan
The Ramen King and I How the Inventor of Instant Noodles Fixed My Love Life by Andy Raskin

C set in Canada
Burying Ariel by Gail Bowen

running total: tasks 10, books 11, points 105

I finished several books last week, but most were for parts of challenges. So only one points update.

25 Points
4. Book Turned Into Movie: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling.

Originally, this had been my least favorite book of the series, because I hated CAPS LOCK HARRY. But re-listening to this on audio I really, really liked it. Maybe it's better on its second read, when I'm not worried about what will happen next and can just enjoy the story. Also, I usually watch the movie so far away from when I read the book that I don't see the differences between the two. This time I really noticed how much they abridged...a shame, because they sacrificed some of my favorite scenes for that. But it has to be done. The first time I watched, I definitely liked the movie a lot more. This time, I think I liked the book more, because it had a lot more plot (though I'm pretty sure one of my favorite lines was movie, only: Harry to Umbridge as she is taken away by centaurs "Sorry, professor. I mustn't tell lies." Bwahahaha, burned).

Total Points: 175

Jennifer wrote: "25. 5. JANICE'S TASK - Fortune Telling Has Long Been A Halloween Tradition: Read A Book With "Fortune" Or "Prophecy" In The Title, OR That Features Fortune-Telling, Prophecy Or Prediction(s) As The..."

Have you/are you going to watch The Vampire Diaries TV show? I haven't read the books, but the show looks interesting.

My sister-in-law said the pilot was pretty cute... We get TERRIBLE reception of the WB, but I might see if I can watch it online...

Finished a couple more--

10.10: CAT SITTER ON A HOT TIN ROOF by Blaize Clement

I liked this catty mystery and will be looking for others in the series.

and

20.1--THE YADA, YADA PRAYER GROUP GETS DECKED OUT by Netta Jackson

Not really my type of read, but it was OK.

This brings me to 235 points!

Finished 10.7 with The Extraordinary Adventures of Ordinary Basil by Wiley Miller.

Fun, *very* quick. If you're looking for something to put in this slot, I think it is a good choice.

That has me at:
Total Points: 115
Completed Tasks: 7
Books Read: 15 (including children's books)
Pages Read: 2835

Katie wrote: "Cynthia - I think this update (message #617) may have been missed. I'm on the Leaderboard with 25 points, but this task made it 50 for me. Thanks!

Katie wrote: "25.4. CANDACE'S TASK - Read A Book ..."I think somehow the changes I made to the leaderboard didn't get saved during one of the updates because a couple other people have told me that I had the correct scores on my spreadsheet but I've fixes it now.

25.8 Nouns
Name of a Person Silas Marner by George Eliot
Name of a Place Beasts of New York: A Childrens Book for Grown Ups by Jon Evans
Thing/Object The Family Bones by Kimberly Raiser

Bonnie said:
Have you/are you going to watch The Vampire Diaries TV show? I haven't read the books, but the show looks interesting.

yes, bonnie i did watch the pilot. it was cute. i get addicted to shows (and obviously books) really easily and i cant wait for the next episode; neither can my dvr!

Matthew wrote: "I am new to GR, and this challenge is just way too much fun to pass over. So, here are the books I have read since Sept. 1 that fit the tasks:

5.3- Columbus (Castaways of the flying Dutchman - B..."

I picked Castaway too for this challenge. I just love Brian Jacques

Completed:

10.6 - Flight by Sherman Alexie
10.9 - March by Geraldine Brooks
15.7 - Harry Potter & The Chamber of Secrets while doing the elliptical/stairmaster machines

Old Points: 120
New Points: 35
Total Completed Points: 155

Finished my first book for this challenge!

5.6 Terrifying Titles - Wicked The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

Which Puts Me At:

Total Points: 5
Tasks Completed:1
Books Read: 1
Pages Read: 406

I have a few quick reads I'm hoping to get through tomorrow to bump up my points, I feel so behind! haha