The 2014 Annual Reading Challenge Discussion Thread!

[Xanthe]

I've been doing good with my reading but poorly with updating my list here. I've got a lot of books marked as "read" on Calibre Companion that haven't been added here yet.

[pdurrant]

It can be time-consuming to update, but I think it's worth it in the end.

I update my calibre database, my reading challenge post and Don's "what are we reading" thread. I have found that making sure my unread count in calibre matches my unread count in my reading challenge post helps me ensure that I've updated properly.

[jscarbo]

Originally Posted by DrNefario

I'm doing pretty well. I'm half way through my sub-challenges, now, with almost a month to spare, and right at this second my TBR challenge (add no more than twice as many as I remove) is on target.

I will, however, be taking a big hit to the TBR from the Hugo voter packet, which, I learned from the bargains forum, was released a couple of days ago. (I'm not sure what happened to the promised email notification. Maybe they are staggering them to try to spread the server load a bit.) Luckily this will largely be short fiction, so I should be able to get through a good chunk of it quite quickly.

I didn't get my email either but have downloaded the voter packet and come up with a reading plan which will hopefully work and allow me to get through the nominated works before the voting deadline.

My plan is as follows: First, I'll read all of the shorter works (novellas, novelettes and short stories) in their entirety. Then I'll start on the novels, saving the Wheel of Time series for last.

There are five nominations in the novels category, three of which are from Orbit Books. Orbit elected to only provide samples, not full copies, so I'll read the samples. If I decide any of them are worth considering for my Hugo vote, I'll buy the full copies and read them in their entirety.

The Wheel of Time series deserves special mention, because it is the entire 14 book series that was nominated and it was incredibly generous of Tor to provide full copies of the entire series to Hugo voters. For that reason alone, the series deserves my consideration.

Also, even though it isn't everyone's favorite series, it has been one of the most popular, bestselling fantasy series ever written. Almost all fantasy readers, and certainly most Hugo voters, are familiar with the series and already have an opinion, whether or not they've read the entire series.

In my case, like many other readers, I read the first several books but gave up on the series when Robert Jordan seemed to get bogged down and the story stalled out and become boring. In my case, that was Book Five, which I'm not sure I ever even finished.

I don't know if have the time or interest to re-read the early books or to read the next few in their entirety. However, I'll definitely read the last three books completed by Brandon Sanderson and, if I have time, I'll read the earlier books I haven't previously read.

Tor has thoughtfully provided a Hugo refresher for those who don't want to re-read (or read) the entire series. I expect it to be of great value to me if I can't make it through the entire series. Here's the link: http://www.tor.com/blogs/2014/06/the...hugo-refresher

[Hampshire Nanny]

I'm half-way to my goal of 150 books for the year. Today I finished book #75, Restless in the Grave by Dana Stabenow. This was a hardback book checked out from the library -- part of my goal of finishing off as many series as I can accomplish this year. Also part of my plan to avoid purchasing books for myself in 2014. Restless in the Grave is the 19th of 20 books in Stabenow's series starring PI Kate Shugak. In this book, Kate goes to work for a State Trooper Liam Campbell, the star of another of Stabenow's series. Liam hires Kate to determine if a murder was committed, which concerns Liam since his wife Wy would be the number 1 suspect in any investigation. 'Twas another excellent book where the places and culture of Alaska are as much stars as the named characters. I definitely recommend this series if you like character-driven mysteries.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

It can be time-consuming to update, but I think it's worth it in the end.

I update my calibre database, my reading challenge post and Don's "what are we reading" thread. I have found that making sure my unread count in calibre matches my unread count in my reading challenge post helps me ensure that I've updated properly.

It's time consuming. And last year I let it get ahead of me, and ultimately abandoned it. But I'm determined to keep it up this year, and so far I'm doing well at it. And it is worth it.

[jbcohen]

These things get away from all of us CRussel. In my own experience I went on a vacation in April and got a tad behind in my reading, I have been trying to catchup ever since.

[Katsunami]

While I'm still quite far behind, it seems I'm starting to catch up on the reading I lost when the period from March to May unexpectedly became very busy.

List of projections (target: 14,600 pages, using my personal Kindle page count):

January 15: 17.568 pages, Success
January 26: 14.993 pages, Success
Febuary 02: 14.933 pages, Success
Febuary 09: 15.622 pages, Success
Febuary 17: 15.695 pages, Success
March 13: 10.782 pages, Fail
May 25: 8.002 pages, Fail
June 8: 8.700 pages, Fail
June 14: 9.112 pages, Fail

For some reason, I'm going through my re-read of the Belgariad and Malloreon like a hot knife through butter. When I read these books the first time, around 15 years ago, I had to quit halfway through the first book of the Malloreon and pick the series up again at a later date.

Now, I seem I just can't stop reading. Yesterday, I finished Belgariad 5, and I read 75% of Malloreon 1 today, due to a very long public transport trip; I might actually finish it before I go to sleep.

If I do so, and update my list before I go to sleep, my projected page count for the end of the year will be 9.970. Raising my projected page count by 2000 pages between may 25th and June 14 is a lot of reading (for me, at least, using this particular page count method).

(And no... I'm not hurrying, skimming or skipping; just reading more )

[Katsunami]

My end-of-year projection is now at 9,677 pages. It's still a far cry from the planned 14,600, but it did rise from 8.002 to 9.677 in between May 25 and June 19. (After dropping from 15,695 to 10,782 between Feb 17 and March 13....)

[jbcohen]

Been going through Amazon's bargain bin and finding some real gems down there. I picked up a copy of David Wood's masterpiece, so far its great, called Buckaneer where the two main characters, Dane Cook and Brokenbake are finishing a quest that Dane's father left undone when he died some years ago. Just picked up tonight a copy of KT Tomb's book The Minoan Mask, just got started and its looking great thus far.

[Hampshire Nanny]

Originally Posted by Hampshire Nanny

I'm half-way to my goal of 150 books for the year. Today I finished book #75

June is almost over and the year is almost 1/2 completed, and I've read 85 books this year. As things are going now, I expect to finish one more book before midnight on Monday evening.

Recent reads:
76. Independent Study by Joelle Charbonneau
77. Sub-Human by David Simpson
78. Post-Human by David Simpson
79. Bad Blood by Dana Stabenow
80. Sorcery and Cecelia by Patricia C Wrede and Caroline Stevermer
81. The Sixth Man by David Baldacci
82. Trans-Human by David Simpson
83. Burn by Nevada Barr
84. The Grand Tour by Patricia C Wrede and Caroline Stevermer
85. The Rope by Nevada Barr

Most of these have been library books -- a mixture of books borrowed from Amazon's Kindle Owners' Lending Library, Freading, Overdrive, and paper books from my local library.

[HarryT]

I've finished the first half of the year on 72 books, so I'm well up on my vague goal of reading 100 books in the year. I've been alternating reading all Agatha Christie's books in publication order, with reading other things (mainly my Baen backlist) in-between.

[DrNefario]

Thanks to piling through a lot of short stories to offset the big TBR-dump of the Hugo packet, I am just on target for my TBR challenge. If only I can hold out for the rest of the day.

[pdurrant]

Well, at the half-way point I am slightly over budget, but I have reduced my TBR a little bit.

My commuting reading time is showing up in my stats - currently at 120 books read so far this year, on track for my highest total since I started keeping track in 2010.

But I must keep a tight control over my spending to be in with a chance of making my target of no more than $480 (£320 at a nominal $1.5:£1) spent on ebooks this year.

[EDIT]
It seems I'll end the half year with 122 ebooks read, 205 ebooks bought and $44.55 over budget. Which means I need to aim for $32/month for the rest of the year to get back inside my $480 budget for the whole year.

[jbcohen]

$480/12 months a year = $40 a month / 4 weeks per month, average = $10 per week. $10 is most likely going to be dooable since the average amazon price of the NY Times best sellers is $7.43. Book publishers are probably angry at Amazon for lowering hte prices of their products.

I am checking out some books that I can get for $1 each, bargain basement bin.

[Dazrin]

It doesn't look like I will finish my current book today in order to get over the 15,000 page mark, so at almost 15,000 pages read, I am at just over 60% of my goal for the year. My projection is leveling out after plummeting since January, but that is due to having a very good reading month in January (1.8x my monthly goal), so it hasn't been a problem.

My sub-goals are on target too, but I have really been wanting to re-read the Farseer trilogy which won't help two of them (re-read and diversity/non-fantasy goals). In the end, I don't think it will change the results but it will make things much closer.