The 2014 Annual Reading Challenge Discussion Thread!

[Rev. Bob]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

Historical Fiction - Robin Hood, Civil War, etc.

I am neither historical nor fiction!

[CRussel]

Moving right along on my challenge, and I'm also doing well on one part of it that I never really articulated, but had in the back of my mind - being better at abandoning books I am not actually enjoying. I used to just keep reading regardless, but that just doesn't make sense with so many books in my TBR. And I've just abandoned my 4th and 5th books this year. One by a favourite author, but just a bad book, the other an author that lots of other people like, in a genre I like, but that was just not working for me. And given that this is the second book of hers I've abandoned, I think I can be quite confident that I don't need to bother trying any more.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

Here is what I use with a brief description. Bold items are ones that I have read this year so far.

Spoiler:

Adventure - The journey is the important part (Allen Quatermain, etc)
Children's - Kids books (Holes, Bridge to Terabithia)
Classic - Verne, Twain, etc. Can almost certainly be another genre too.
Fantasy - Swords and sorcery (set in a fantasy setting)
Fiction Misc - Literary or other non-genre fiction
Historical Fiction - Robin Hood, Civil War, etc.
Horror - More than just vampires
Mystery - Holmes, Marple, Drew, Hardy (not thrillers)
N-F (Non-Fiction)/Biographies - (Auto) Biographies, True Stories, etc.
N-F/History - History Books
N-F/Humor - Humor
N-F/Other - General Knowledge
N-F/Philosophy - Plato, etc.
N-F/Reference - Textbooks, manuals, etc.
N-F/Religion - Christian study or reference
Paranormal - Superheroes, mutants, modern magic, etc. (inludes urban fantasy like Dresden)
Post-Apocalyptic - Includes Dystopian (Hunger Games, Wool, etc.)
Religious Fiction - Lehay, Jenkins, Peretti, etc. (Left Behind, etc)
Science Fiction - General science fiction, i.e., medical, computers, etc.
Space SciFi - Aliens, space opera, military sci fi, etc.
Steampunk - w/ or w/o magic
Suspense - Less action, more suspense
Thriller, Legal - Crime, police, etc. (Grisham, Patterson)
Thriller, MedTech - Medical/techno thrillers (Crichton, Preston)
Thriller, Political - Military, espionage, conspiracy, etc. (Clancy, Ludlum)
Unknown - Books in progress by authors I follow that don't have enough description to classify yet.
Western - Lamour, etc.

Holy genres Batman!

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by HomeInMyShoes

Holy genres Batman!

You asked....

[Tarana]

Suspense - Less action, more suspense
Thriller, Legal - Crime, police, etc. (Grisham, Patterson)
Thriller, MedTech - Medical/techno thrillers (Crichton, Preston)
Thriller, Political - Military, espionage, conspiracy, etc. (Clancy, Ludlum)

I like these categories. I've been trying to think of sensible categorization for my mystery/thriller/crime stuff and this really helps. It will help family members figure out what they want on their ereaders without having to always ask me.

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by Tarana

I like these categories. I've been trying to think of sensible categorization for my mystery/thriller/crime stuff and this really helps. It will help family members figure out what they want on their ereaders without having to always ask me.

That's basically why I came up with that breakdown. There are so many different types of thrillers and a Jack Ryan book just won't cut it when you want a Jurassic Park (which I could probably call science fiction, but don't since they tried to explain how it could be done with current technology).

[Katsunami]

I'm going to update my reading challenge post. The Dread.... I'm way behind. Be back in a bit.

Edit: Damn. It seems my sudden lack of time in the 10 weeks was profond. I've basically read nothing. If I keep up this pace I'll be failing my challenge in an even more epic way than last year.

[Tarana]

I'm barely keeping up with my reading challenge right now, but part of that is longer books and proofing some books I had OCR'd and converted. That process is slowish, but the Calibre editor is really easy to use, although I still haven't figured out how to do headings. I'm having surgery in June, so for roughly 1-2 weeks, I will have nothing else to do but read/listen.

[Katsunami]

Some OT information about headings:

Spoiler:

Headings can be done using the <h1>, <h2> tags, and so on.

Use <h1 id="unique_id">...</h1> to create unique headings.
Use <h1 class="chapter">...</h1> to create a heading class "chapter". (You can have more than one in a class, as opposed to an id.)

You can mark them up like this, in the stylesheet:

h1 {
(every and all h1 headings without exception)
}

h1 #unique_id {
(for one heading, with the unique_id)
}

h1.chapter {
(for all h1 headings denoted as chapter headings)
}

PS: A heading can have both a class *and* an id if need be.

[DrNefario]

If I was actually finishing book 32 right now instead of browsing the web, I'd be back on target for the first time in months.

[pdurrant]

I've just finished my 100th book of the year. But I've over-spent in these first five months. I shall have to do better in the rest of the year.

[sun surfer]

I hope all the rest of your challenges are going well and congrats on cracking 100, pdurrant. I've finished reading a book club non-winner which completes the mini-challenge I gave myself after I finished my half-year challenge early, so now my challenges are complete(!) until July. Oddly enough, after completing the last book I've discovered that my page count for the year now stands at 6666.

[jbcohen]

Very good Sun Surfer, I am not so lucky as to finish this early. Perhaps next year you should set you sights a little higher.

I am just short of 17k page read, I am currently running ahead of my orginal goal, where I would need to be at 11,250 to be where I need to be there. However, my expanded goal I am not likely to meet, I would need to be at 21k to be where I need to be there.

[sun surfer]

Originally Posted by jbcohen

Very good Sun Surfer, I am not so lucky as to finish this early. Perhaps next year you should set you sights a little higher.

Thanks. My challenge was actually only a half-year challenge, so I haven't finished quite as early as all that! It would've been over by the end of next month regardless. I'm starting a new half-year challenge for July and am mulling over what to make of it.

[pdurrant]

Another month gone, and we're 5/12ths of the way through the year! How are people doing on their challenges?

I have now completed (or abandoned) 104 books. And on the whole, I've enjoyed them a lot.

It's also not impossible for me to make my target of no more than $40 spent on ebooks each month, although I admit to being a little over budget at the moment. At the end of May I was $62.51 over budget. I hope to end June only around $42 over budget, be under $20 over budget by the end of July, and be back under budget by the end of August. We shall see.

Keeping a tight watch on my spending has been good for my average purchase price this year - currently running at just $1.35.

But I have bought 195 new books. It's only because I amalgamated 55 short stories from my TBR into a couple of anthologies (now read), and discarded about 50 freebies from my TBR that my TBR has reduced.

My TBR is now 21 lower than at the start of the year. I'll be buying at least another 28 ebooks over the next 7 months, and almost certainly more. However, if I can end the year with a TBR down by 50 over the start of the year I'll be very pleased indeed.


Overall, I'm pleased with my choice of challenge this year, and I'm optimistic that I will make my main objective of not spending more than $480 in total on ebooks this year.