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Location: UK | Well, I've foolishly signed up for five of the challenges, and I'm still tempted by a couple more. The problem is that my intended reading for the year includes books that could fill about 3-6 places in most of the challenges, so it doesn't seem like I'd have to go too far out of my way to fill the rest, but it all adds up.
The five challenges add up to a possible 60 books, which is more than I read last year, but I only need to make each book count for two challenges to knock it down to 30, which I think is about doable. Two of the challenges are mutually exclusive, so there's no way I can get it below 24. I'm expecting it to work out at about 36-40 books, which will be something of a stretch. Last year I read 57 books, 34 of which were SF&F.
I wanted to do the WoGF again because I felt I had unfinished business. I had a few books that didn't quite make my final list last year, and a few more from recommendations at the end of last year's challenge. Additionally, many of my favourite books of the year were read for the WoGF, so this is going to be a priority. I may yet decide to ignore the random author requirement, though.
I guess I really ought to make a point of finishing my own challenge, The Book of Ones, too. I'm not expecting that to be a difficult one. It's the only one I've already filled all 12 slots in, although I'm a bit concerned about the eligibility of one book.
The other three - 12 Awards in 12 Months, Second Best and Masterworks - I think I'll just have to see how I get on. The awards in particular may force me into reading some horror, which is not really my thing. There are 14 awards on WWE, currently, and I've read all the Hugo winners. There will be a new one this year, but there's a chance I'll have already read it.
The really good thing is that most of the books I've been meaning to read for years seem to fall under one challenge or another, so I shouldn't need to venture outside the boundaries too often. |
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Location: Neither here...nor there | DrNefario - 2014-01-15 5:17 PM The awards in particular may force me into reading some horror, which is not really my thing. There are 14 awards on WWE, currently, and I've read all the Hugo winners. There will be a new one this year, but there's a chance I'll have already read it. .
Many of the books nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award tend to be more psychological thriller - dark fantastic than horror so you should be safe with that one. I would highly recommend The Drowning Girl, and The Silent Land is also very good. And Gone Girl is straight up literary mystery - no horror creepiness at all. The Bram Stoker books seem to be mostly hardcore horror, with the exception of the aforementioned The Drowning Girl, which won last year.
I've signed up for 6 challenges, and with crossovers I have a total of 56 books to read. I read a little over 100 books per year so I'm not too worried about completing the challenges as long as I stay focused and organized. (And providing no one comes up with more brilliant challenge ideas!) Some titles I want to read aren't in the database, but I'm hoping the Powers That Be will add them by year's end so I can fill in all the pretty little boxes.
Good luck with your challenges, DrNefario.....and everyone else!
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Location: UK | I've got The Drowning Girl on my wishlist. There's a fair chance I'll pick it up before the end of the year. i guess there's no great rush to fill in the spaces, given that we're barely half way through January. I will admit I've started a spreadsheet to try to keep track of which books are good for which challenges, and which awards I have covered.
I hadn't spotted Gone Girl. I've seen that on offer several times, but I've passed over it because I'm trying to control my in-tray a bit. I see there's also a Chuck Palahniuk in the Stoker nominees. I've read a few of his and always found them interesting. I think I'll focus on the books I already own to begin with, though. |
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Uber User
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| A spreadsheet is a good idea. I joined a bunch of challenges. The only one I worried about is the Translation Challenge which is going to be tough. I need to buy 11 books for the Women of GF Challenge. I have a bunch of women authors on my TBR but except for 1 they are not new to me.
My main problem is that I'm trying to cut down my TBR so that I've set myself the target of only buying 1 book for 5 read. That means 55 books just to finish the WoGF challenge. I may have painted myself into a corner here.
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Extreme Veteran
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Location: Great Lakes, USA | I am only signed up for two challenges, but am very tempted to sign up for the Masterworks Challenge and the Number of the Counting Shall Be Three Challenge. If I choose my WoGF books right, I will only have to read five more for the Masterworks Challenge. Three of the Counting Challenge will count towards the Read the Sequel Challenge. But, with all the nonfiction I read and the technical stuff I have to read for work and the library holds that will appear in a month or so, I am not sure that I can do four challenges. I have books on my TBR bookcases that would fit the Second Best, the 12 Awards in 12 Months, and Read More of That Author Challenges as well. Too many fun challenges...
DrNefario - 2014-01-16 7:39 AM
I've got The Drowning Girl on my wishlist. There's a fair chance I'll pick it up before the end of the year. i guess there's no great rush to fill in the spaces, given that we're barely half way through January. I will admit I've started a spreadsheet to try to keep track of which books are good for which challenges, and which awards I have covered.
I read The Drowning Girl for the 2013 WoGF Challenge and I didn't like it at all. Not saying that you won't, since a lot of people did like it and it won the Bram Stoker Award. I didn't think it fit any of the genres. To me it was just a general fiction novel and although the prose was eloquent in places, the characters weren't that likable and it rambled on and on. Had it not been nominated for a Nebula Award, I never would have picked it up to read. And had I not been stuck on a plane with it, I probably wouldn't have finished it.
Edited by daxxh 2014-01-16 12:33 PM
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Location: Neither here...nor there | O dear. I'm now I'm up to 10 challenges and 69 books.
Must. Stop.
Edited by HRO 2014-01-19 7:58 AM
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| So you had to go and create another one huh? (And which of course I had to join). I'm up to 14 which would be 168 books without overlap. With overlap? I don't know I've lost count. |
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Location: UK | I like the look of that new one, too, but I'm worried that it might be a step too far. Even though I've already read a book that would count towards it... |
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Location: Neither here...nor there | justifiedsinner - 2014-01-19 11:21 AM So you had to go and create another one huh? (And which of course I had to join). I'm up to 14 which would be 168 books without overlap. With overlap? I don't know I've lost count.
Yep, I sure did. 
Without overlap, I would have 108 books. Doable, yet ridiculous. Thanks goodness overlap brings it down to "only" 69. I have a crazy long & complicated Word document to keep track of everything.
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Location: Neither here...nor there | DrNefario - 2014-01-19 12:42 PM I like the look of that new one, too, but I'm worried that it might be a step too far. Even though I've already read a book that would count towards it...
The End of the World challenge works well with a lot of the other challenges, so I hope you'll consider joining. Of course, we have to draw the line somewhere and stop joining challenges, don't we? Er, maybe not. |
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Uber User
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Location: UK | Well, I caved in and joined. And added the sequels one while I was at it. I think I'm going to prioritize, and concentrate my efforts on a couple of challenges, and then just see where I get with the others. It's not like there's a penalty for failing.
Almost everything I want to read in the WWE genres is now likely to fall under one challenge or another. |
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Elite Veteran
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Location: UK | Phew! Thank goodness I already had a challenge to read 144 books,and even with overlapping I am up to 170 plus reads now.Perhaps I should just ban myself from looking at the RYO challenge page! |
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Location: Neither here...nor there | DrNefario - 2014-01-20 8:26 AM It's not like there's a penalty for failing.....
Uh oh, you didn't read the fine print when you signed up did you?
"...death awaits you all with nasty, big, pointy teeth." (Tim, of Monty Python & the Holy Grail) |
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New User
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| Hey everyone. Some really cool books being requested. I'm curious if anyone knows of any Marxist/Socialist/Bolshevik writers who are women. I've made a challenge with this theme but I feel like its an old white man's club in there. Hmmmm...perhaps there is some connection here.  |
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Location: Neither here...nor there | Textual - 2014-01-22 2:46 PM Hey everyone. Some really cool books being requested. I'm curious if anyone knows of any Marxist/Socialist/Bolshevik writers who are women. I've made a challenge with this theme but I feel like its an old white man's club in there. Hmmmm...perhaps there is some connection here.
Disclaimer: I know nothing about what qualifies for this challenge.
That being said, there is THIS LIST of "50 Sci-Fi & Fantasy Works Every Socialist Should Read" that was put together by China Mieville. |
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| Thanks very much. Will mine this for authors and see if I can get a slightly more varied set of works. |
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Location: UK | Which challenges are people finding it hardest to fill?
Weirdly, in my case, it seems to be Read the Sequel. I have loads of possible sequels I can read, but hardly any of them double up for other challenges. |
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Location: SC, USA | So far, for me, it is The Second Best. Most of the books I have on my TBR have won one of the awards or were never under consideration. This one will probably be one of the last ones I finish because it will take the most strategizing and locating of copies. |
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Location: Neither here...nor there | My most difficult challenge is Short Fiction because (1) a lot of what I planned to read isn't in the database and (2) there isn't any easy way to find the short fiction that IS in the database (no subgenre tag, no lists, no awards. etc). I had to go hunting elsewhere and then check the database; I went through probably 100+ options before I managed to fill most of the slots. (I still have three empty slots and I'm hoping some of my requests are added to the database by the end of the year.)
I'm guessing that I'm not the only one struggling, though, if the vast number of empty slots on the challenge page is evidence.
At least I learned my lesson to research whether a challenge is doable before signing up for it! |
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| Rhondak101 - 2014-02-05 10:50 AM
So far, for me, it is The Second Best. Most of the books I have on my TBR have won one of the awards or were never under consideration. This one will probably be one of the last ones I finish because it will take the most strategizing and locating of copies.
Funnily enough, I was thinking of having another challenge called "The Unloved" for books not being on any list or nominated for any prize in WWE. Since I was on so many challenges I decided to leave this until next year. (I assuming we're doing a re-do in 2015). |
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| HRO - 2014-02-05 11:43 AM
My most difficult challenge is Short Fiction because (1) a lot of what I planned to read isn't in the database and (2) there isn't any easy way to find the short fiction that IS in the database (no subgenre tag, no lists, no awards. etc). I had to go hunting elsewhere and then check the database; I went through probably 100+ options before I managed to fill most of the slots. (I still have three empty slots and I'm hoping some of my requests are added to the database by the end of the year.)
I'm guessing that I'm not the only one struggling, though, if the vast number of empty slots on the challenge page is evidence.
At least I learned my lesson to research whether a challenge is doable before signing up for it!
The PKD and the Mythopeotic feature short story collections some are more obvious than others unfortunately. |
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Uber User
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| In Translation and Short fiction are going to be the hardest for me. There just isn't much overlap with the other challenges. For short stories I usually try to read one short SF story for each SF novel I read. With an average of 8 short stories per collection that would be 96 SF novels. |
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Location: Neither here...nor there | justifiedsinner - 2014-02-05 12:02 PM
HRO - 2014-02-05 11:43 AM
My most difficult challenge is Short Fiction because (1) a lot of what I planned to read isn't in the database and (2) there isn't any easy way to find the short fiction that IS in the database (no subgenre tag, no lists, no awards. etc).
The PKD and the Mythopeotic feature short story collections some are more obvious than others unfortunately.
Most of the prizes have a short story collection category but only the novel categories are included in the prize listings on WWEnd. I think the PKD and the Mythopoeic are the only prizes that give an award to either a novel or a collection, without separating them out into categories.
For example, Angry Candy by Harlan Ellison won the World Fantasy Award and was nominated for the Bram Stoker and the Locus Award (all for the "best collection" category). Silently and Very Fast by Catherynne Valente won the Locus Award for Best Novella and Stranger Things Happen by Kelly Link was nominated for the World Fantasy Award for Best Collection. None of that info is included in the listing for those books here on WWEnd.
Edited by HRO 2014-02-05 11:35 AM
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| Yes, Kelly Link would fall into my Unloved category which is unfair since I believe she is very popular. I can see the difficulty in including individual short stories and novellas in the DB but collections shouldn't pose the same problem. I guess it's a matter of time. First novel prizes aren't included either.
One big omission on the short story front is Ted Chiang's collection "Stories of Your Life and Others", widely regarded as the best collection in a decade. His story "Hell is the Absence of God" is one of the most heartbreaking I've read, in any genre. |
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Uber User
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Location: SC, USA | Yes, In Translation is also a hard one. I have not "officially" signed up for it yet. I'm waiting to see how many books I can find that will fit with other challenges I'm already doing. I've started a list. I'm now getting very excited when I discover that a book is in translation that I had not realized before. My list thus far is The Little Prince (also Guardian and Short Fiction) The Master and Margarita (also Guardian) Solaris (Guardian and Socialist) Vathek (Guardian and Short Fiction) The Meaning of the Night (not on WWE and not sure if it belongs. it might be more thriller than horror). Hmm..a little slow on the uptake here. It seems that Translation and Guardian might make a very good combo |
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Uber User
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| Yes, all mine were from the Guardian list that I have on my TBR. Easton Press Masterpieces of Science also has a few; Verne, Lem, Zamyatin.
I hadn't considered Vathek but I see it was originally French. I had my hopes for Michel Faber, but although he is Dutch I believe he writes in English.
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Extreme Veteran
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Location: Great Lakes, USA | I read At the Mouth of the River of Bees by Kij Johnson before I signed up for the 2013 WoGF last year. It is an EXCELLENT short story collection, if some of you are hunting for books to fill that challenge and haven't read it.
I have signed up for too many challenges (eleven), but have managed to get the number of books down to 39 to complete them all. My problem is sticking to that list. I keep finding new books to read that either don't fit any challenge or will only count for one challenge. The Read the Sequel Challenge, which is my challenge, ended up being the most difficult to find books for that will fulfill more than one challenge.
I must stick to the list. I must stick to the list. I must stick to the list. |
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Uber User
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Location: SC, USA | Ursula K. Le Guin identifies herself as a socialist. Cicely Hamilton And, I found this interesting bit: Lilith Lorraine, whose real name was Mary M. Wright, was a poet, Texas crime reporter, and early feminist utopian; she ended up with an FBI file because of her socialist views. She chose the pen name Lilith in honor of a fellow “troublemaker,” i.e., the Biblical Adam’s first wife. I don't know how many of Lorriane's books are in print and available. |
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Location: SC, USA | Also Joanna Russ identified herself as a socialist feminist. |
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| I've posted a long list of Short Fiction works in the WWE db over in the thread for that challenge. I'll work on doing the same for translated works to help those working on that challenge. Translated works are some of the most interesting, so I'm really excited about this challenge!
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Location: Dallas, Texas | Engelbrecht - 2014-02-07 10:58 PM I've posted a long list of Short Fiction works in the WWE db over in the thread for that challenge. I'll work on doing the same for translated works to help those working on that challenge. Translated works are some of the most interesting, so I'm really excited about this challenge! That's a great list you made, thanks! Like the short fiction list, if you get us a list of all the books that are translated works we'll make an official list out of them. I've always wondered how many translated works we had in the DB. I'm only familiar with a handful and I'm sure this will be really helpful for the whole community. And it always seems easier to build on a known list so we'll make a real effort to expand on it from there.
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Uber User
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| I was thinking about setting up a public challenge for LGBT spec fic authors, but I'm finding the process a little intimidating - host blog? What's entailed in being a host? Is it, like, a lot of responsibility? *confused* |
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Location: Dallas, Texas | FeminineFantastique - 2014-02-20 11:27 PM I was thinking about setting up a public challenge for LGBT spec fic authors, but I'm finding the process a little intimidating - host blog? What's entailed in being a host? Is it, like, a lot of responsibility? *confused* Hi FemFan, welcome to WWEnd! Happy to have you aboard. Setting up a challenge is really easy. All you have to do is create a theme, which you've already got, explain the goals and rules for the challenge like how many books, how many reviews (if any) and how long you want the challenge to last (3, 6 or 12 months etc.). You'll want to make a banner for you challenge too to draw the folks in and also give participants something they can post on their blogs etc. I can help with that if you like or one of our other members can jump in to help too. The last thing is to create a thread for your challenge where folks can discuss authors and books etc. and where you can answer any questions that come up. That's the basics of a RYO challenge. Your particular challenge may need a little further work/guidance on your part to help people get going. I'm sure we have some (many?) LGBT authors on WWEnd but we don't track that info so there's no way for us to tell who the qualifying authors might me. You'll want to post a list of recommended authors or point people to some off site resources where they can find that info. We can add any traditionally published authors your challenge readers request though we've had precious little time to do much of that lately so delays are inevitable. (We have a solution in the works but 60hr work weeks are making Dave a dull boy.)
I don't think it will be a lot of responsibility beyond that. People will look to you for a few answers and author recs etc. but you'll have other members who will pitch in to help each other out.
I say go for it! I think if you look around you'll find most of our challenge hosts are having a good time with it. We're all here to help in whatever way we can.
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Uber User
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| Thanks for all the info! I will need help with that banner, alas. It's been many moons since I've dabbled with Gimp or Photoshop. As far as finding authors is concerned, the Lambda Awards is a good place to start, which I will post in the relevant thread once this baby is created.
I'll go ahead and set it up. I hope no one takes issue with the fact that I'm not LGBT. It just seemed relevant and like it should be there, y'know? |
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Uber User
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Location: UK | Although I was intending to get the maximum leverage out of my existing unread book pile, I've just worked out that I've already bought at least ten books with an eye on the challenges. One was mostly unavoidable - it would have been exceptionally fortunate if my random pick for the WoGF was an author I already owned - but really I just can't help myself.
At least one of them - Big Machine by Victor LaValle - is not even going to end up being used. I bought it as a Shirley Jackson winner, and ended up buying and reading Generation Loss by Elizabeth Hand instead.
Never mind. |
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Location: suburb of Minneapolis, MN | How do you remove yourself from a challenge, or at least, not get any email notifications about it? |
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Location: UK | I don't get any email notifications about anything. Is that a forum setting? (Control Panel, at the top of this page.) |
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Location: UK | I was slightly ahead of schedule on my 10 challenges, having passed the half-way point in just 5 months. As a reward for all my hard work, I decided to join 2 more.
I've signed up for Pick'n'Mix, which I'm planning to treat as a List version of the 12 Awards challenge - ie. 12 books from 12 different Lists - and Fantasia, which is really just an excuse for me to read some fantasy and still get to count it somewhere. I'm only counting epic/heroic/sword-and-sorcery style fantasy, the kind which used to make up quite a lot of my reading but which has been on the backburner while I've been doing challenges for the last couple of years. It ought to be set in a secondary world, with mediaeval technology and where it is possible for your day job to be "wizard".
I'm hoping the Pick'n'Mix will be more-or-less free, based on the books I was already planning to read, and the Fantasia challenge will not add too many. My previous excursions off-list have largely been books that would fit Fantasia. I need to do some work on my spreadsheet, though. |
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Location: UK | The results are in: Pick'n'Mix is indeed free. I've already read 10 of them, and have 4 more possibilities for the last 2 slots.
Fantasia looks like it's going to cost me at least one additional book, but I pretty much already have it picked out. |
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Member
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Location: suburb of Minneapolis, MN | I've slowed up due to illness and surgery, but almost have one challenge completed (hopefully finished this month). Many of my books afterwards actually fit multiple challenges and help me to find new-to-me authors as well as knock down my TBR list. Will I complete all of my challenges? That's 6 months away. I am fairly confident that I can eventually meet all of them. |
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Location: UK | I've just finished my second challenge, out of 12, and am one book from completing 2 others. I've read 31 books from a list of 51, leaving me with 20 to read. That sounds like great progress, but 20 books in 5 months is still 4 books a month, which is quite hard going when there are other things I want to read. |
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I've posted a 2015 version of:
All Books Read in 2015 - This has an outrageous number of books as a "goal", but it's not a challenge, it's just a place to track all the books you read this calendar year, so the number is high to leave plenty of room for all of them.
Edited by illegible_scribble 2015-01-06 10:45 PM
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Location: Dublin, OH | I'm sure this has been asked and answered previously - I apologize, but its late and I'm tired, and I'm hoping some kind person will just answer my question. Last year for the first time, I signed up for several RYO challenges and was religiously updating my books in WWE. I believe I completed all of the several challenges I signed up for and was looking forward to seeing my RYO page with all of the slots completed! However, I've been so busy with family over the holidays and today was the first chance in almost a month that I've had a chance to login to the site. While I find that I can now sign up for brand new 2019 challenges, I was really looking forward to seeing my 2018 achievement! Is there anywhere I can go to do this, or are the 2018 RYO's gone forever? |
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| rretzler - 2019-01-03 5:28 PM
While I find that I can now sign up for brand new 2019 challenges, I was really looking forward to seeing my 2018 achievement! Is there anywhere I can go to do this, or are the 2018 RYO's gone forever? First, the record of your Challenges is still there. So you can rest easy about that. At the bottom of the RYO Challenge main page is a link "Click to view past challenges". Clicking on that will expand a list of past Challenge banners, but it only goes back 40-some Challenges. The older ones don't show right now. But you can see the ones you've just completed. The new version of the website will have the ability to view all your past Challenge results. I'm not sure what the timeline is for the golive of the new website; there have been various things (work-wise and personal life-wise) which the Site Admins have had to deal with getting in the way of completing the overhaul. But it's coming. My advice would be to just rock on with your 2019 Challenges for right now. At some point, you will be able to see your past Challenge results in My World. |
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