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This year I am the booklord What's this all about? We make reading goals, then keep track of the books we read. Not much to it. This isn't pyf so say some stuff about the books you read beyond listing them. Why is it rad? What did you hate? How is your grandmother? So where's the challenge In this crazy new world we live in you can make your own challenge. Want to try and read 200 books in a year? Go for it. I suggest you branch out a little from that though. Read all of Proust's In Search of Lost Time? You go girl. Read the "classics"? Work it girlfriend. Just declare what your challenge is and pop in every now and then to tell us how its going. I will also keep a general track of how people are doing in the first couple of posts and give you nice little graphics that say hey you reach a milestone or something. However since its 2015, the year of the sheep, instead of being free spirits you should follow me and take on my challenge designed to get people out of their comfort zones and read a bunch of different things by doing each of the following: 1. The vanilla read a set number of books in a year. 2. Read a female author 3. The non-white author 4. Philosophy 5. History 6. An essay 7. A collection of poetry 8. Something post-modern 9. Something absurdist 10. The Blind Owl (Free translation if your ok with reading on a screen or cant find a copy!) 11. Something on either hate or love 12. Something dealing with space 13. Something dealing with the unreal 14. Wildcard (Some one else taking the challenge will tell you what to read) 15. Something published this year or the past three months 16. That one book that has been sitting on your desk waiting for a long time 17. A play 18. Biography 19. The color red 20. Something banned or censored 21. Short story(s) 22. A mystery There are no real rules so feel free to stretch and define what you put in these categories as you see fit. Not only will you get the smug sense of self satisfaction by taking on and overcoming this challenge, I will figure out some sort of special reward for you at the end of the year. Stravinsky fucked around with this message at 04:16 on Jan 8, 2015 |
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Jan 1, 2015 22:04
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Those taking my challenge Lumius-50 books Namirsolo-70 books,10 classics, plus Ulysses Prolonged Shame-100 books,12 presidential biographies and 25 nonfiction books Hantama-50 books Quidnose-24 books Radio!-52 books Fellwenner-52 books Erakko- 40 books DannyTanner Meander-60 books Spadoink-60 books (I interpreted your post as taking part) ltr-52 books clq-40 books,3 pratchet,3 stephen king,five Norwegians with one published in 2015 knees of putty Trek Junkie-50 books High Warlord Zog-52 previously unread authors saphron-30 books Siminu-52 books elbow-60 books Cithen-42 books Captain Vittles-24 books true.spoon-52 books Chamberk-52 books The Berzerker-35 books Bobby The Rookie-50 books belt-52 books, every other one nonfiction Popular Human guppy-30 books Guy A. Person-12 female,12 nonfiction,12 non-American/European books,Gravity's Rainbow Dienes-52 books,  Roydrowsy-100 books,10% rereads, 10% like 100 years old Mahlertov Cocktail-45 books tookie-60 books Sodacan-26 books, a DFW collection/novel, a Dostoevsky,Camus' "The Plague", Gene Wolfes side stories Corrode-40 books SwimGood-25 books Stravinsky fucked around with this message at 05:13 on Jan 8, 2015 |
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Jan 1, 2015 22:05
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Misc. Challenges Tsyni-26 Books, + trolling me with comics apophenium-30 books,5 non-fiction, and at least 5 (unique) females Aethersphere-30 books (not sure if taking my challenge or not will move if asked) screenwritersblues-45 books thespaceinvader-70 books CestMoi-Harold Bloom's Western Canon ZakAce-90 books and a smattering from op challenge Aphra Bane-37 books, this challenge list Damo-40 Books,8 Non-Fiction,4 Non-SciFi/Fantasy Fiction,4 Books by women anilEhilated-20 non scifi,House of leaves Albinator- Jonathan Yardley’s favorite books oliven-45 books Walh Hara-52 books,20% female authors,10 different nationalities, Blind owl Talas-60 books,finish discworld Blind Sally-books sitting around unread nerdman42-18 books Ex-Priest Tobin-35 books rrrrrrrrrrrt-24 books phuqueyoo- all murakami, and killing himself with the wheel of time HIJK-15 books Hocus Pocus-72 books, all of Herman Hesse, read more John Steinbeck,blind owl, more Kobo Abe,straya,Jane Austen and of mysteries such hawks-26 books, branch out from scifi/nonfiction Arrgytehpirate-30 books Burning Rain-70 books, 2 from the rebellious and seperarist catalan language Loten-30 books Strong Mouse-50 books Ursus Veritas-20 books, suicidal? ToxicFrog-96 books,25% max on rereads,10% nonfiction Whalley-52 books thehomemaster-52 books mrchinchin25-20 books,all of Neal Asher's Polity/AgentCormac/3rd thing books, finish Malazan fritzov-35 books Stravinsky fucked around with this message at 05:13 on Jan 8, 2015 |
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Jan 1, 2015 22:05
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hell, why not one more?
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Jan 1, 2015 22:05
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I am going to aim for 50 books. I think I had a good mix of classics, contemporary, plays and different kinds of authors so I will take up the list you wrote up as part of the challenge.
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Jan 1, 2015 22:33
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I'm trying for 70 books this year. At least 10 of them will be classics. I'm taking a crack at Ulysses this year. I'll also attempt your list. I'm currently reading a book by a black woman, so that will take care of two of them!
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Jan 1, 2015 22:40
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I'm aiming for 100 books again this year, with at least 12 presidential biographies and 25 nonfiction books (in addition to the prez bios). I'll also take on Stravinsky's challenge. Here's my Goodreads page, if anyone wants to be friends: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/8528817-squids 
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Jan 1, 2015 22:54
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Going to go for 26 again. Didn't hit it last year, but my time is now. As a challenge I'm going to shoot for at least half of them being comic books, in honour of Stravinksy being the book lord.
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Jan 1, 2015 22:58
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Sign me up for 30 books. I'm going to try to read at least 5 non-fiction, and at least 5 (unique) female authors. Feel free to add me on Goodreads.
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Jan 1, 2015 23:31
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I will try for 50 books this year. Read about 30 books in 2014 but I had to write a long thesis so I hope I will make my goal this year. I will also go for Stravinskys challenge. How are you going to do "14. Wildcard (Some one else taking the challenge will tell you what to read)" ?
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Jan 1, 2015 23:45
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I failed super hard and only read 20 books last year. Sad times. Still, I'm hoping to do 30 this year! I really like the idea of a challenge. How will it work? Like, I am reading 30 books, so of those 30 books, one has to be by a female author, one has to be a collection of poetry, etc.? Or would it be that I would read 30 books, and then extra books on top of that? If you're looking for some ideas, maybe a piece of YA Fiction, a memoir, a 'new age' book, something written by another goon, or read books from some "100 books you must read before you die" list that's undoubtedly out there somewhere.
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Jan 2, 2015 00:00
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Going for 45 this year, since the past two have been pretty drat easy at 30. I know that I'm friends with most of you goons, but here's my goodreads account anyway. https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5153430-jarrett Aethersphere posted:I failed super hard and only read 20 books last year. Sad times. You didn't fail. 20 books is more than the average person reads in an year.
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Jan 2, 2015 00:19
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Going for 24 this year - I figure I can handle two books a month ...hopefully. :\ I'm also going to follow the challenges in the OP because that sounds super fun and I want to read outside of my comfort zone for sure!
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Jan 2, 2015 00:43
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My aim is 70. As usual I'll try to come out of my wheelhouse a little more, but probably not succeed. 1: Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson - in progress.
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Jan 2, 2015 00:51
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Going for 52, as usual, but I'll do the Stravinsky Challenge™ too since it seems easy enough. Booklord, do you have any suggestions for books in the various categories? Especially the post-modern, absurdist, and hate/love categories.
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Jan 2, 2015 01:02
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I'm not going to go for any specific number of books but I'm going to try and read mostly books from Harold Bloom's Western Canon http://home.comcast.net/~dwtaylor1/theocraticcanon.html, particularly the earlier stuff in the first two categories that I haven't read much of.
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Jan 2, 2015 01:10
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Seeing as I managed to read 90 books last year, I'll start with that number. I'll probably try to widen my scope of reading as well - I'll try to read some more classics (e.g. The Count of Monte Cristo, Effie Briest, Anna Karenina). I've already read one female author (Robin Hobb), specifically the first book in her Liveships trilogy, 'Ship of Magic'. The idea of sentient ships is interesting, and fantasy books generally don't get nautical very often. 4/5 stars. Other parts of Stravinsky's challenge I will probably cover: Non-white author (does Alexandre Dumas count? Because he had African ancestry); something dealing with space; something published recently. I could also add to that by reading a collection of short stories, and I have plenty of books at home which need to be read at some point.
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Jan 2, 2015 01:13
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I met my goal of 45 last year but it was a bit of a desperate stretch towards the end, so this year I'm scaling back to 37. It seems I managed to meet most of Stravinksy's challenge criteria last year so I'm not doing too bad diversity-wise. I'm considering doing this challenge list that I mentioned in the last thread. Which reminds me how absurd but also kind of hilarious it is that reading books by women is apparently something a lot of people have to go out of their way to do. I guess it makes for a nice, easy warm-up hurdle in terms of an overall reading challenge, but still. my goodreads. I use it a fair bit. Feel free to add me.
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Jan 2, 2015 03:09
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I'm aiming for 52 books, which I doubt will be a problem normally, but I'm going to be going through a lot of the bigger books/series that have been in my to read pile for years now. I like your list, Stravinsky, and will tackle it as well. If someone wants to give me a Wildcard read, let me know.This is my GR profile.Radio! posted:Booklord, do you have any suggestions for books in the various categories? Especially the post-modern, absurdist, and hate/love categories. I'm not the Booklord, but for post-modern give William Gaddis a try. There's a discussion here. Fellwenner fucked around with this message at 04:24 on Jan 2, 2015 |
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Jan 2, 2015 04:18
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Going for 40 books and the booklord's challenge.
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Jan 2, 2015 04:28
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What about short stories, my Booklord? e: school is owning me so I'll just try to enjoy reading and work on the Booklord's challenge... gr DannyTanner fucked around with this message at 06:44 on Jan 5, 2015 |
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Jan 2, 2015 04:28
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I am in for 100 books again. I think my personal goals are as follows: 10 Percent of my reads this year will be re-reads. I buy and hold on to so many books and I tell myself I am going to re-read things, but seldom do. Now is my chance to change that. 10 Percent of my reads will be "old". I'm aiming for books over 100 years old, but I will probably count something 80 or 90 years old. (I'll be tapping into a lot of public domain stuff for this I figure) In the meantime, I plan on being mindful of reading books by women, and non-fiction, but I'm not building a goal off of it at this time.
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Jan 2, 2015 05:39
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I'm in - down for 60 books this year (cutting back slightly from my usual 70), and will do the Booklord's Challenge. Today was a day off so I sat down and read Nocturnes by Kazuo Ishiguro. It's a collection of five short stories themed around music and musicians, and was rather pleasant to read (and one of the stories was rather funny). If you want to try a collection of short stories, it's worth a read. He's also a non-white author, but I've been reading a lot of Ishiguro recently so might try something a bit different for that goal. The next two books I have ready to read are The Shallows by Nicholas Carr, which appears to be about how the internet is rewiring people's brains, and The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe, which is about astronauts! My goodreads page is here https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/8416512
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Jan 2, 2015 05:43
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Aethersphere posted:I failed super hard and only read 20 books last year. Sad times. It sounds like the general intent of the challenge is to go outside of your comfort zone and try new things, so as long as you're doing something along those lines then you're gold.
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Jan 2, 2015 06:08
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I've never done this before, so I have no idea how many books I can read in a year. Let's say I'm in for.... 40. Shouldn't be too hard since I'm planning on reading a lot of Discworld this year, and that's a good 30 easy reads I have left right there. I won't read all 30, but that's a lot of easy reads to pad out my total so 40 should be doable. My speed at reading isn't really what holds me back from finishing a ton of books a year, it's usually my indecisive nature at picking what the heck I'm going to read next. I'm really bad at that, I can never decide easily. The hours I've spent, wasted, staring at my bookshelf trying to decide what to read when I have so much cool stuff... it's sad. Luckily, I have the Discworld series to fall back on this year when I get into that situation. I can always just read a Discworld when I'm indecisive. However, to make it more interesting I will set some sub goals. Say, 8 Non-fiction books, 4 non-sci fi/fantasy fiction, and 4 books by women. I know that sounds pathetic as hell, but in my defense I don't really own a ton of books by women so 4 will be a realistic goal there. It's 4 more books by woman than I probably would have read otherwise, and that's the whole point, right? I know my sub challenges aren't that much, but this is mostly about just sheer number of books I can get myself to read. If I can read a book a week for the year, any book, I'll be happy. The extra goals are just icing on the cake. So yeah: 40 Books Meager sub goals: 8 Non-Fiction 4 Non sci-fi/fantasy fiction 4 Books by women Good luck you guys, I hope 2015 is a great year of reading, learning, and entertainment for you all. Damo fucked around with this message at 13:07 on Jan 18, 2015 |
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Jan 2, 2015 06:09
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Damo posted:Discworld You're in for a treat... I think some of my happiest hours of reading have been reading Discworld books for the first time. Regarding the indecisiveness, I found that my goodreads account has helped immensely in keeping track of books I've come across and would like to read. Seeing what other goons have reviewed is a good way of getting ideas. It also has a recommendations tool, but personally it's never had any great suggestions for me.
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Jan 2, 2015 11:55
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I do read a lot of sci-fi and fantasy, so let's say... 20 non-SF books? As a sub-challenge, I'm going to start with what's been sitting on my shelf for about a year, House of Leaves. It gets a lot of flak around here so I'm genuinely curious; wanted to start it up about a million times but never really got to it.
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Jan 2, 2015 16:09
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The Washington Post's chief book reviewer retired about a month ago, and in his last column listed some of his all-time favourites. The list is at http://www.washingtonpost.com/enter...3340_story.html I haven't always agreed with him on what's a good book, but he was generally a pretty solid critic, so I'm going to try and work my way through his list in 2015, loosely alternating fiction and non-fiction. It's 30 books, which is more than I usually manage, so we'll see how I do.
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Jan 2, 2015 16:26
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I met my goal of 40 books last year, so I'm aiming for 45. I don't want to set specific sub goals but I do want to try putting some non-English and/or non-fantasy/sci-fi books in there.
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Jan 2, 2015 16:36
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anilEhilated posted:I do read a lot of sci-fi and fantasy, so let's say... 20 non-SF books? As a sub-challenge, I'm going to start with what's been sitting on my shelf for about a year, House of Leaves. It gets a lot of flak around here so I'm genuinely curious; wanted to start it up about a million times but never really got to it. Yeah, it's fairly divisive, although I think the general consensus amongst readers is that the Navidson Record parts are at least pretty entertaining. I keep wanting to re-read the book but I'm not sure I can technically call it a proper re-read if I ignore everything else involving Johnny Truant. Ugh, Johnny Truant 
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Jan 2, 2015 17:05
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I'm shooting for 60 again this year. My regular reading range already hits on a lot of Stravinsky's list, and my reading list for last year includes some great suggestions for folks looking for non-white and/or female authors, as well as the plays of Tomson Highway, which I highly recommend.
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Jan 2, 2015 17:24
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Goals: - 52 books again - once again at least 20% of the books should be from female authors - at least 10 different nationalities (no idea how difficult/easy this one is) - The Blind Owl if I can find it in the library
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Jan 2, 2015 17:47
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I did 86 last year, but since I'm starting a master's degree I am going to aim for 60 books and see how that goes. As an addendum, I'm going to finish the Discworld novels this year. Only 20 to go...
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Jan 2, 2015 18:12
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I'm in for 52 again this year and might as well do Stravinsky's challenge mode. I do hope we get examples of some of the categories.
ltr fucked around with this message at 18:34 on Jan 2, 2015 |
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Jan 2, 2015 18:30
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Stravinsky posted:This year I am the booklord challenge You should have done this a year ago rather than bitching about what people read. Glad you're doing it now, though.
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Jan 2, 2015 18:59
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Radio! posted:Going for 52, as usual, but I'll do the Stravinsky Challenge™ too since it seems easy enough. Booklord, do you have any suggestions for books in the various categories? Especially the post-modern, absurdist, and hate/love categories. Good post modern books: Something by Thomas Pynchon (Gravity's Rainbow is hard to read but one of the best books ever written, Mason & Dixon is easier + very good, Crying of Lot 49 isn't 1000 pages long and some people like it but I thought it was bad.), J R (haven't read but everyone loves it, also difficult to read), White Noise (same as J R), If on a winter's night a traveller (reads very nicely, quite short, not as good as the others but still very good), Nabokov stuff (Pale Fire is really great) Good absurdist books: I'm not really sure about these but La Peste is good. Stuff by Samuel Beckett? I've never really been sure of the difference between absurdist and just existential literature so find something someone else calls absurdist and good and read that. Dostoeyevsky? IDK. I've heard people call My Idea of Fun by WIll Self absurdist and it's a pretty good book. Good books about love/hate: What we talk about when we talk about love (lovely short stories about love + rural America, v good, v sparse style which makes it a nice read), Lolita (classic AMerican love story), this category is really quite broad because lots of things are about this so I'm going to recommend two books I really love, Invisible Cities (love of a place?? you should read it anyway it's beautiful) and Moscow to the End of the Line (also called Moscow - Petushki, about a man who is getting a train to see his son and he gets very drunk on the train and starts talking to people about his life and problems)
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Jan 2, 2015 19:10
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I should say, I'm mostly going to aim for this: 16. That one book that has been sitting on your desk waiting for a long time But there are dozens of them sitting on my desk waiting for a long time, and they are an assortment of philosophy, history, and literature.
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Jan 2, 2015 19:22
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I think I'll try for 18 books. I'll probably have a lot of stuff going on this year, so 18 seems like an alright number to try for. Nothing impressive, but a start.
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Jan 2, 2015 19:37
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Aiming for 35; I'll knock this number up further if I can find a way out of my crappy 70-hour-a-week job.
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Jan 2, 2015 19:44
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CestMoi posted:Good post modern books: Something by Thomas Pynchon (Gravity's Rainbow is hard to read but one of the best books ever written, Mason & Dixon is easier + very good, Crying of Lot 49 isn't 1000 pages long and some people like it but I thought it was bad.), J R (haven't read but everyone loves it, also difficult to read), White Noise (same as J R), If on a winter's night a traveller (reads very nicely, quite short, not as good as the others but still very good), Nabokov stuff (Pale Fire is really great) For post-modern books: Vonnegut is great and easy to read even for somebody unfamiliar with the genre. For absurdist books: I'm pretty sure Catch-22 counts as one (and if not, it should), but the classical and most obvious example of the genre is probably Kafka.
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Jan 2, 2015 19:45
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