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Uber User
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Location: Middle TN, USA | Although I have not completed any of the Challenges as yet, I know several have. Here is the place to Crow and maybe brag just a little. Go Ahead!! You deserve it!  |
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Uber User
Posts: 770
Location: SC, USA | Okay, I'll jump in first. I am currently signed up for 19 challenges. Two of those last until Dec 2015, so I plan to do most of that reading next year. Of the seventeen remaining, I have completed eight: the Pick and Mix, Guardian, Fantasia, Short Fiction, Young Adult, The Ones, WoGF, the End of the World. All this has been accomplished by great "strategery "(as one of the former Presidents would say) in choosing books with overlap between several challenges. I have 16 more books to read by the end of the year to complete the other 10 challenges. To this point, I have read 58 individual books.
The two challenges that are in the most jeopardy now are Authors of Color (7 books remaining) and The Second Best (4 books remaining).
Rhonda |
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Uber User
Posts: 794
| Only 3 out of 16 completed so far having read a total of 46 books. Most still look doable but Short Fiction and In Translation look problematic. I'm also trying to complete the Nebula winners this year 5 to go but only 1 will count towards the challenges. |
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | I've finished 3 challenges in 3 books so far this month: 12 Awards, Guardian and Fantasia. That's 7 of my 12 2014 challenges done, and only six books to go for the rest. I'm currently struggling to decide on my final Masterwork. Read a bit more of Frankenstein last night, but I'm not sure I'm in the mood. |
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Extreme Veteran
Posts: 534
Location: Great Lakes, USA | I have finished the Read More of that Author, Creature Feature, Pick and Mix, Short Fiction and Nebula Nominees (personal challenge) challenges. I have joined 23 challenges, but 5 finish in 2015. I will finish the New Books of 2014 Challenge this year, though. I have two books started right now that count for this challenge and that will put me at 8/8 when I finish them. I don't plan to stop reading 2014 books when I finish this challenge, but I may slow down and concentrate on the challenges that I need to finish.
I am not sure if I will finish the Authors of Color and the Masterworks Challenges, as I am a bit behind in those. I should finish the rest. I have a lot of time to read over the Christmas holiday. I will take a suitcase full of books and read one or two a day for a week. I may be able to catch up. I have 18 left to read for this year's challenges. That keeps changing as I find other books I want to read that fit in a challenge or find something else that counts for multiple challenges. |
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | DrNefario - 2014-09-12 8:31 PM
I've finished 3 challenges in 3 books so far this month: 12 Awards, Guardian and Fantasia. That's 7 of my 12 2014 challenges done, and only six books to go for the rest. I'm currently struggling to decide on my final Masterwork. Read a bit more of Frankenstein last night, but I'm not sure I'm in the mood.
Well, rather than abandoning Frankenstein, I decided to push through it and get it out of the way. I finished it a few hours ago, which means I've now finished the Masterworks Challenge, too. |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1004
Location: UK | Out of my 13 challenges,I have finished the Masterworks, My Bucket List,and have read all the books for the Young Adult and Creature Features challenges but still have one review to write for the YA,two for the Creatures to say I have completely finished those challenges. I am in the process of reading Charles de Lint's Moonheart and Dean Koontz's Odd Thomas,which will complete the Faerie Mythology, Fantasia, and Book of Ones challenges by the end of this month
Then I will have 7 books left to read to finish off the other six challenges. I want to work hard and finish them all by the end of October,because I am going to have knee surgery - FINALLY - on November 24th,and I need everything off my plate by then,and I still have 19 other books to read for my 12x12 (12 books each from 12 caegories144 books in all challenge on Shelfari) so I have to get cracking!
I am most pleased with the My Bucket List challenge which really made me tackle books I had felt I should read for years. A Canticle for Leibowitz,This Immortal,Tigana,Preludes and Nocturnes,Shadow of the Torturer were all outstanding reads,and only Man in the High Castle and Pawn of Prophecy were a bit disappointing. And at least I have now read them and can appreciate comments or discussions involving them I hate being in the dark! lol.
So glad this RYO is going to be ongoing,I think it is an outstanding success and I am already pencilling in books I want to read next year,and look forward to juggling the titles to fit as many challenges as possible!
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | Finished the End of the World challenge last night, with Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins, the last Hunger Games book. Not wholly satisfying but very easy to read. I thought I was actually going to finish it a week or so back with Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, but that didn't really fit my personal interpretation of the rules so I decided not to count it.
The End of the World is a great theme that fits a lot of interesting books, and I think it's one of my favourite challenges.
I have just three books to go to finish my 2014 challenges. Right now I feel quite keen to just get them done, so I can free myself to read what I like, but I'm sure I'll be looking for more guidance after a few weeks of that. Maybe not quite so much constraint as this year, but then I am still finishing pretty early. |
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Uber User
Posts: 794
| Finished End of the World myself a few days ago with Stephen Baxter's Flood. Pretty good book but goes on too long, the disasters become rather repetitive.
5 Challenges down, 11 to go. I've shuffled some of the books to try and get more overlap. The killer is the books that only count for one challenge, In Translation and Short Fiction and particularly bad for this. |
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | And that's Read the Sequel finished, with The Farthest Shore by Ursula Le Guin. A really good book, which I don't think I'd have appreciated at all as a kid. The elegant use of language would have been wasted on me, and there probably wasn't enough action. Strange to read it right after the action-packed but kind of hollow spectacle of Mockingjay.
I found it a lot harder to read sequels than I did book ones.
Two books and two challenges left, from my 2014 selection. It will be a bit longer before I finish the next one. |
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Uber User
Posts: 770
Location: SC, USA | @JustifiedSinner, I know what you mean about the 1 book = 1 challenge issue. I've read almost all of the books that have large overlaps, and now I have the ones that only fulfill 1 or 2 challenges to go. However, I was very happy last night when I figured out how to drop my overall number left to read from 12 to 11 by dropping two books and adding one to fulfill both requirements. |
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | Me again! I've just finished Second Best with The Killing Moon by N K Jemisin, which I'm counting for the WFA.
This was a late substitution. I was originally planning to read Gone Girl for the Shirley Jackson, but I realised I could double up with Read More if I went for the Jemisin, and that leaves me with just one book (and one review) to complete my 2014 challenges. |
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Extreme Veteran
Posts: 305
| Ah! Having made an early decision to have few if any overlaps between challenges (and thus having just 5 challenges plus a more personal one if trying to read 75 books this year) I must confess that I'm not writing any reviews... I can't figure out how to do a quick review (I'm sooo impressed by the person who did a review in haiku) and pressing myself to do a longer review might stop me from reading as many books. Which would make me my own worse enemy.
And yet I like reading the reviews you all write!
So-I've paced myself and am close to finishing 10-11/12 in each challenge: LGBT, POC, masterworks, and women writers. I have one more for the Elizabeth Noun challenge. And I might just make the 75 books! I might not choose to set such a high total number again but it's been a good exercise and some fun reading.
I noticed some folks mentioned their faves in each challenge. How bout the rest of you? I'll add mine in a bit. |
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | And that's me done. The Ocean at the End of the Lane completes the Read More of That Author challenge, the last of my 12 2014 challenges, all done in 49 books.
Of course, I'm thinking of adding the Published in 2014 challenge now. |
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Uber User
Posts: 770
Location: SC, USA | Way to go, DrN! |
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | DrNefario - 2014-10-06 10:04 PM
Of course, I'm thinking of adding the Published in 2014 challenge now.
I have added the New Books in 2014 challenge.  It runs long enough for me to count it as a 2015 challenge, though, along with my other two outstanding challenges (Gemmell & Reader's Choice). |
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Uber User
Posts: 770
Location: SC, USA | I just finished the Marxists, Socialist, etc Challenge. It looks as if I might be the only one. The next closest reader has completed four books. I really liked the books I chose for this challenge, and several of them I would not have read otherwise. So it is a bit of a disappointment that there are not more readers (and finishers) |
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Uber User
Posts: 794
| I loved your choice of Edith Nesbit. Both she and her husband were Fabians, of course. Having hit on Bernard Shaw (and given his virginity, unsurprisingly been rebuffed) she had an affair with H. G. Wells and was understandably annoyed when he also had an affair with her daughter. Her socialist credentials were well and truly embedded, so to speak. |
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Uber User
Posts: 770
Location: SC, USA | Justified, I love Edith Nesbit's bio. It is so full of Victorian weirdness. Her husband was afraid to tell his mother they got married, so lived at home with the mother for a while. Then when they did live together, he had an affair and got a woman pregnant. She moved in with them and Edith adopted the children that the woman and the husband had together (2, I think). However, for her to be a Fabian her children's books are still very class-conscious. I wish they were less so. |
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Uber User
Posts: 794
| Have you read A. S. Byatt's "The Children's Book"? It is a thinly veiled account of the Blunt/Nesbit marriage and it's effect on her own children. It involves various characters both historic (such as J. M. Barrie, William Morris and Oscar Wilde) and based on historic characters (Wells and Henry Salt for example). It also includes a retelling of David Garnett's very strange "Lady into Fox". Worth reading in you have the time. |
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Uber User
Posts: 369
Location: Middle TN, USA | Well I can finally do a little "crowing" of my own! I finished my first challenge. "I Just Have to Read More of That Author" is now complete. |
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Uber User
Posts: 770
Location: SC, USA | Justified, I didn't know about that book at all. Luckily, my colleague down the hall is a hugh fan of A. S. Byatt. She's loaning me the book which will go into the queue somewhere behind the 7 challenge novels that i have left.
And Congrats Badseedgirl! |
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Extreme Veteran
Posts: 534
Location: Great Lakes, USA | I read The Handmaid's Tale and by reading it, finished three challenges - Bucket, Banned Books and End of the World. It also counted for three other challenges. I am starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel and may actually be able to finish my 2014 challenges in 2014. |
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1004
Location: UK | Iam still plodding through Iain M Banks Consider Phlebas,which would complete all my challenges for the yea.rHowever it is going very very slowly,I read for what seems ages,then discover I have barely read 10pages !Still 50 pages to go,so it will be several days at the snail's pace I am going,but it should be wrapped up this week,and I can go off for my knee op on Nov 24th knowing I have completed all my challenges for the year,having read 64 books in total.
I am waiting VERY impatiently for Dave and the gang to unveil all these mysterious spectacular changes for next year.And I am already scoping out fabulous reads for 2015. |
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Uber User
Posts: 526
Location: UK | I finished my not-very-popular Gemmell Awards challenge the other day, with Malice by John Gwynne (Morningstar 2013 winner), a pretty ordinary but solid epic fantasy series opener. As predicted, page counts were high: 3 of the 4 were over 500 pages, with Wise Man's Fear roughly 1000. Prince of Thorns was a suprisingly slender 320-odd.
I must admit, I love this kind of stuff, and would happily wallow in it all day long. It's mainly my insistence on a varied diet that stops me doing so, along with other challenges, lists and faddish enthusiasms. |
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Regular
Posts: 92
| Only tried one challenge this year which was the SF Grandmasters challenge from 2012. Finished it yesterday with some definite hits but felt I was struggling a little with the challenge towards the end. Not sure what I will try for 2015. |
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Veteran
Posts: 137
Location: Alief, TX | Finished my first challenge, The Guardian List Challenge, which I notice doesn't have it's own chat thread.
My seven books were:
A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter M. Miller, Jr
The Man Who Was Thursday, by G.K. Chesterton
Neuromancer, by William Gibson
The Prestige, by Christopher Priest
Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut
The Space Merchants, by Frederick Pohl & C.M. Kornbluth
The Strange Case of Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde, by R.L. Stevenson
This may turn out to be my most satisfying challenge. Several of these books are among my five favorite of the year. It was also one of the easiest challenges, because I already own about half the books on the Guardian List.
On to more reading! |
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Veteran
Posts: 111
Location: Austin, Tx | jontlaw - 2014-12-11 11:12 AM
Finished my first challenge, The Guardian List Challenge
What did you think of The Guardian List?
It was my first challenge and the one I finished first. I found the books on the list to be off the beaten path as far as "fantasy" goes (or science fiction/horror for that matter). I got the suspicion that their definition of fantasy is different than mine. For example, I read both "Crash" by JG Ballard and "The Wasp Factory" by Ian Banks and found them both to be more weird/disturbing than really containing fantastical elements. They're not based in reality, but they don't exactly take place in any world that isn't our own. I am curious how many other books on the list fall into that "not-fantasy, not not fantasy" place. |
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Veteran
Posts: 137
Location: Alief, TX | Yes, I really like the Guardian list. It really redefines a lot of categories on the site. Lots of trippy stuff, things that really expand the definition of fantasy. It also really expands the time period the site covers. When you think about it, sticking to just the award years is fairly narrow. This list takes up back a couple of centuries, especially all that early Gothic horror. I've read more books from this list than any other, and I own still more. |
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Uber User
Posts: 370
Location: Beaverton, Oregon, USA | Woohoo! I finished all my 15 2014 challenges! I had a lot of overlap. I read 62 books. Some were quite short, practically novellas, but a few were huge, taking me 3 weeks in the case of Dhalgren. And I was able to incorporate all the books from my book club. After reading the last couple of posts, I checked the Guardian challenge and just discovered I only need to read one more book to finish the guardian challenge. So I may try to pick up Dune or American Gods, since those are on my Read It Again, Sam challenge. It's been a long time since I read them and need a reread to write reviews. We'll see if I can finish one or the other. Next year, I think I'm going to take it a little easier. |
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Admin
Posts: 3942
Location: Dallas, Texas | Well done, Sir! My prediction is that you'll be doing more challenges next year than this year so let's have no more of this "Next year, I think I'm going to take it a little easier." business  When we put in the reading levels you'll be able to dip into even more challenges. By the way, epic beard man! |
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Uber User
Posts: 370
Location: Beaverton, Oregon, USA | Thanks Dave! It's about 9 months old! |
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Uber User
Posts: 770
Location: SC, USA | I have finished all of my challenges. They are listed below
12 Months/12 Awards
Have to Read More By
LGBT
Short Fiction
WoGF
AofC
In Translation
Marxists, etc
YA
End of the Word
Faerie
Fantasia
Pick and Mix
The Book of Ones
The Guardian
The Second Best
Bucket List
I read 76 books to fill 233 slots in these challenges
My favorite books of the year were:
Among Others
The Golem and the Jinni
Cryptonomicon
The Years of Rice and Salt
Hollow City
The Freedom Maze
China Mountain Zhang
Redwood and Wildfire
Little Brother
Girl Who Circumnavigated the Fairyland
My ongoing challenges that are ending next year are
SFF Detective: 2/12
Gaslamp Fantasy: 4/18
New Books 2014: 0/8
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Veteran
Posts: 137
Location: Alief, TX | Finished the "I Just Have to Read More of That Author" Challenge.
The Pride of Chanur, by C.J. Cherryh
Chanur's Venture, by C.J. Cherryh
Timeless, by Gail Carriger
Dreadnought, by Cherie Priest
Ganymede, by Cherie Priest
Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld
Goliath, by Scott Westerfeld
Ghosts of Manhattan, by George Mann
Ghosts of War, by George Mann
A Scanner Darkly, by Philip K. Dick
Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
The Man Who Was Thursday, by G.K. Chesterton
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Veteran
Posts: 137
Location: Alief, TX | Finished the Masterworks Challenge. This was an amazing group of books. Most of them I already owned, and just need a push to get them read. Most of the best books I read all year are listed here.
1. A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter M. Miller, Jr
2. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
3. the Difference Engine, by Bruce Sterling & William Gibson
4. Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, by Philip K. Dick
5. The Prestige, by Christopher Priest
6. The Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut
7. The Space Merchants, by Frederick Pohl & C.M. Kornbluth
8. The Anubis Gates, by Tim Powers
9. Grendel, by John Gardner
10. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury
11. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis
12. Witch World, by Andre Norton |
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Uber User
Posts: 794
| Done all I can do. I can do no more but lie a broken man on the far shores of 2014.
Of the 20 challenges I attempted during the year I abandoned one (YA) almost immediately when I found I had misread the rules. Two (In Translation(4/12) and Short Fiction (5/12)) I have made little headway with. I read 63 books to complete the 17 challenges below:
The 35: 35/35
12 Awards: 12/12
Fantasia: 12/12
End of the World: 12/12
Have to Read More: 12/12
2nd Best: 12/12
Read the Sequel: 12/12
Mythopoeic: 12/12
Book of Ones: 12/12
Pick & Mix: 12/12
WoGF: 12/12
Masterworks: 12/12
Trilogies: 9/9
Your Bucket List 9/9
Guardian List 7/7
Creature Feature 6/6
Killer B's 3/3 |
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Veteran
Posts: 137
Location: Alief, TX | Finished another challenge, The 35. It was a really great way to collect a lot of different things under one heading.
1. The Alienist, by Caleb Carr
2. The Anubis Gates, by Tim Powers
3. At the Mountains of Madness, by H.P. Lovecraft
4. Baltimore, by Mike Mignola & Christopher Golden
5. Behemoth, by Scott Westerfeld
6. A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter M. Miller Jr
7. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
8. Chanur's Venture, by C.J. Cherryh
9. The Difference Engine, by Bruce Sterling & William Gibson
10. Dreadnought, by Cherie Priest
11. The Faded Sun: Kutath, by C.J. Cherryh
12. Fiddlehead, by Cherie Priest
13. Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, by Philip K. Dick
14. Ganymede, by Cherie Priest
15. Ghosts of Manhattan, by George Mann
16. Ghosts of War, by George Mann
17. Goliath, by Scott Westerfeld
18. Grendel, by John Gardner
19. The Inexplicables, by Cherie Priest
20. Leviathan, by Scott Westerfeld
21. The Man Who Was Thursday, by G.K. Chesterton
22. Morlock Knights, by K.W. Jeter
23. Neuromancer, by William Gibson
24. Out of the Silent Planet, by C.S. Lewis
25. Perelandra, by C.S. Lewis
26. The Postman, by David Brin
27. The Prestige, by Christopher Priest
28. The Pride of Chanur, by C.J. Cherryh
29. Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut
30. Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
31. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury
32. The Space Merchants, by Frederick Pohl & C.M. Kornbluth
33. The Strange Case of Dr Jeckyl & Mr Hyde, by R.L. Stevenson
34. Timeless, by Gail Carriger
35. Waiting for the Barbarians, by J.M. Coetzee
Edited by jontlaw 2014-12-28 2:42 PM
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Extreme Veteran
Posts: 534
Location: Great Lakes, USA | I finished all of my 2014 Challenges:
Women of Genre Fiction
Read the Sequel
I Just Have to Read More of that Author
Book of Ones
Bucket List
Nebula
Pick & Mix
Creature Feature
Short Fiction
End of the World
Retrohugo
Banned Books
The Number of the Counting Shall Be 3
Masterworks
Guardian
Elizabeth Nouns
Second Best
35
Authors of Color
Fantasia
I also finished the New Books of 2014 Challenge.
My favorite books of the year were:
Annihilation
Ancillary Sword
Remnant Population
I also really liked these:
Diamond Dogs, Turquoise Days
Maelstrom
Crux
Servant of the Underworld
Hild
Authority
Acceptance
Now to finish Foundation's Triumph to complete the Killer Bs Challenge for January and to read some nongenre books before the new 2015 Challenges start. I'm thinking I shouldn't join so many this time. But, somehow I don't think that's going to happen.
Edited by daxxh 2014-12-28 3:39 PM
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Member
Posts: 44
Location: Seattle, WA | In 2014 I took on two challenge and hosted a third. This led me to new Grand Masters, Masterworks, and some intriguing Young Adult books : I finished a total of 25 books for this, which constituted 1/4th of my yearly reading.
The top three for me were all part of the Young Adult challenge:
* The Stars My Destination (Alfred Bester)
* The H-Bomb Girl (Stephen Baxter)
* Ship Breaker (Paolo Bacigalupi)
Three that didn't really work for me were
* Glow (Amy Kathleen Ryan)
* Abarat (Clive Barker)
* Little, Big (John Crowley)
Looking forward to tackling another reading challenge in 2015, and also reading more of your great reviews!
--Thomcat |
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Uber User
Posts: 1057
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Those of you who participated in the Killer B's Challenge might enjoy this photo, which was just shared by Greg Benford on Facebook:
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Have You Completed a Challenge, Well Here is the Place To Crow!