2025 Reading Challenge discussion

Megan wrote: "I've decided that instead of stressing myself out to finish a challenge that never provided an end date, I'm going to take a cue from my Florida weather. It's hot as blazes outside and we're still ..."

I think I'll follow that rule as well :) It's still in the high nineties here (inland southern California) and you can't even go to the mountains to escape - it's in the eighties at 5,400 feet. Definitely still summer.

Just completed #13 (more than 500 pages) - Dark Age by Pierce Brown. Good lord, Pierce Brown, how many times will you rip out my heart in your books, only to piece it together again with scotch tape and hope? Another beautifully and brutally told book about the best and worst in humans and society. At least I've learned after five books that nothing in this universe will ever go as planned. Definitely worth reading! 4.5 stars

17/21

Just completed #2 (adaptation) - Five Feet Apart by Rachel Lippincott. I've never read a book that started as a screenplay and was novelized before the movie released. Really interesting concept, and I appreciate the awareness it brings to cystic fibrosis. I found the relationships to be a bit two-dimensional, even for YA, but I loved the ending. Worth reading! 4 stars

18/21

Megan wrote: "I've decided that instead of stressing myself out to finish a challenge that never provided an end date, I'm going to take a cue from my Florida weather. It's hot as blazes outside and we're still ..."

Great thinking/acting outside the box. Unfortunately, I live in Washington state. I set the autumnal equinox but I don't think that is long enough. However, I do own a house in California (Sacramento) so I could always use that as my summer compass. :)

*Completed* "Armchair Traveler" - The Summer Country. A visit to Barbados, or the Caribbean in general? Sign me up!

And where I am, the forecast for next week calls for triple-digit highs. That is still summer in my book, regardless of the date.

UPDATE: I have completed all challenges, including the expert ones. I am skipping three (the book was better, reccomendation and bandwagon), but I make the rules for my challenges, so who cares

✔• It takes two: Read a coauthored book. I've Got You Under My Skin by Mary Higgins Clark & Alafair Burke


PROGRESS: 18/22

Just completed #19 (third book on TBR) - Mr. Maybe by Jane Green. Ugh, this is one of those '90's books that did not age well. The main character was a twit that I kept screaming at, the author kept repeating gender-based nonsense through her character's inner dialogue, and the story overall wasn't good. Not worth reading. 1 star

19/21

*Completed* "Not From Around Here" - Memoirs of a Geisha. Finally managed to find a book set in a different culture that I liked enough to keep reading all the way through. This book could also have doubled for "Armchair Traveler," as I would like to visit Japan some day.

Just completed #20 (number in title) - Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty. I love this book! I really enjoyed the vast majority of the characters, particularly the romance writer! And just when I thought about halfway through I knew where this one was going, it took a quick left turn and got even better. Definitely worth reading! 5 stars

20/21

*Completed* "Back to School" - City of Scoundrels: The 12 Days of Disaster That Gave Birth to Modern Chicago. Before reading this, I didn't know much about this period of Chicago's history, or how much it impacted the city. The book is very absorbing, and it's easy to learn a lot without feeling like you're "studying."

1. Good as Gold: Every note played
2. The Book is Better: The Sun Is Also a Star
3. Short and Sweet: Sea Prayer
4. On the Bandwagon: Where the Crawdads Sing
5. Actually Want to Read: The Indigo Girl
6. Not From Around Here: The Golden Hour
7. In the Friend Zone: Flowers For Algernon
8. It Takes Two: Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
9. Wheel of Format: Drama
10. New Voices: The Silent Patient
11. Past Love: And Then there were none (loved AC as a teenager so I randomly chose 1 title)
12. Armchair traveler: The Book of Dreams

I finished a couple of days late, Sept5, but got them all done!!

Just completed #18 (genre explorer - true crime) - Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou. This is an utterly fascinating and terrifying work of investigative journalism! To think that this woman put patients' lives at risk speaks to the very worst about corporate greed. Well-written and supported. My only criticism was it was a bit dry in the first quarter of the book. Definitely worth reading! 4.5 stars

21/21 - completed!

✔• The book is better: Read a book being adapted for TV or film this year. The Passage by Justin Cronin



PROGRESS: 19/22

✔• Not from around here: Read a book set in a different culture from your own. Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin


PROGRESS: 20/22

✔• Genre explorer: Read a book from a genre you've never read before. Fatal Shadows (MM Romance)


PROGRESS: 21/22

✔• Good as gold: Read a book that won a Goodreads Choice Award. The Opposite of Loneliness: Essays and Stories 2014 Best Nonfiction


PROGRESS: 22/22

CHALLENGE COMPLETED!

I have finished 18/21. Slowly working on 19. Not sure if I will make it by Autumnal Solstice though. I will continue till I finish.

You can do it! You are almost there

I'm really not sure where to cut this off; the Autumnal Equinox has come and gone, but today it was ninety-eight degrees, so conflicting cues abound!

My original goal was to do as many as possible before the end of the summer, and even if I stop now I'll have done quite a few:

*Completed* Good as Gold - Elizabeth the Queen: The Life of a Modern Monarch

*Completed* The Book is Better - Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats

*Completed* Short and Sweet - For a Breath I Tarry

*Completed* On the Bandwagon - The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

*Completed* Actually want to read - Locust: The Devastating Rise and Mysterious Disappearance of the Insect that Shaped the American Frontier

*Completed* Not from around here - Memoirs of a Geisha

In the friend zone - because I don't get a lot of recommendations, I decided to omit this one.

*Completed* It takes two: Theodore Roosevelt for the Defense: The Courtroom Battle to Save His Legacy

*Completed* Wheel of format - Macbeth

*Completed* New Voices - Descendant of the Crane

*Completed* Past love - The Secret Garden

*Completed* Armchair traveler - The Summer Country

*Completed* Stay Awhile - The Eustace Diamonds

*Completed* Stranger than Fiction - Bottle of Lies: The Inside Story of the Generic Drug Boom

*Completed* Continental Drift - The Food Explorer: The True Adventures of the Globe-Trotting Botanist Who Transformed What America Eats

*Completed* Primary Reading - America, 1908: The Dawn of Flight, the Race to the Pole, the Invention of the Model T, and the Making of a Modern Nation

*Completed* Back to School - City of Scoundrels: The 12 Days of Disaster That Gave Birth to Modern Chicago