the grand 2015 reading challenge thread

[billy_bob]

.you're really only competing against yourself.

Still losing

 

[el-ahrairah]

1. Kyme & Priestley, ed. - Tales Of Heresy
2. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - Out Of The Pit
3. Mike Lee - Fallen Angels
4. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain
5. Stella Gibbons - Christmas At Cold Comfort Farm

 

[el-ahrairah]

. I have given up on ... watership down.

you're dead to me.

 

[billy_bob]

4. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain

Now that takes me back. Did you win?

 

[el-ahrairah]

Now that takes me back. Did you win?

yep. i have decided to try and work my way through the Fighting Fantasy series in order - but I need to beat them. I tried this one about a six times until the map was complete enough to work my way through the maze with ease. In your face, warlock.

 

[billy_bob]

yep. i have decided to try and work my way through the Fighting Fantasy series in order - but I need to beat them. I tried this one about a six times until the map was complete enough to work my way through the maze with ease. In your face, warlock.

I didn't keep mine

Funnily enough was thinking about them and looking up some of the hilarious 80s fantasy art covers online just the other day. I'm sure there was one (can't remember which) that had some glitch in that made it completely unbeatable - maybe corrected in later editions I guess....

 

[el-ahrairah]

i didnt' keep them either - part of the challenge will be to track them down... i've rebought about a dozen in the last year so i've got a few to be going on with... here's hoping i don't find the unbeatable one.

 

[starfish]

First one done.
1. The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide.

 

[toggle]

1. Mike Cronin - The failure of British fascism
2. Raymond E Feist - Rides a Dread legion
3. Robin Hobb - Dragon keeper
4. Terry Pratchet - Unseen Academicals
5. Campagna and Campiglio - What are we fighting for?
6. Dunleavy et al. - Voices of the people
7. Conan Doyle - A study in Scarlet
8. Stuart Bell - The conservative party and british politics
9. Robin Hobb - Dragon haven
10. William Morris - News from Nowehere
11. Philippa Gregory - The white Queen
12. Raymond E Feist - Exile's return

13. Catherine Hall - White, male and middle class
14. D. H. lawrence - lady Chatterley's lover
15. Raymond E Feist - Flight of the nighthawks

 

[Manter]

you're dead to me.

Did hate it though. I have subsequently finished it. Still not a fan....

 

[rich!]

11. The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All, Laird Barron
12. GRR Martin & Gardner Dozois eds, Dangerous Women, Part 2.

13. City of Bones, Cassandra Clare

 

[rich!]

.you're really only competing against yourself.

And you, obv

 

[toggle]

And you, obv

 

[MrSki]

youse two have got a proper head start. I a going to have to read those Astrix or Rupert the Bear shite just to catch up.

 

[Kidda]

1/30 Inferno by Dan Brown
2/30 Saga by Brian K Vaughan and Fiona Staples
3/30 Tales of the city by Armistead Maupin

 

[D'wards]

This year i have abandoned the challenge, only because I found it massively informed my reading choices - I left Lonesome Dove and Wolf Hall unread last year because I thought it might throw my progress off

 

[belboid]

This year i have abandoned the challenge, only because I found it massively informed my reading choices - I left Lonesome Dove and Wolf Hall unread last year because I thought it might throw my progress off

Similarly, I was going to read The Luminaries last year, but by the time I got through the other things I needed to read, there was no way I'd have made it all the way through by the end of the year, so dumped it for something much lighter and shorter. I will read it this year tho

 

[ringo]

This year i have abandoned the challenge, only because I found it massively informed my reading choices - I left Lonesome Dove and Wolf Hall unread last year because I thought it might throw my progress off

I nearly did this, but then completed by October and the pressure was off to read longer books. This year I'm avoiding that by keeping to a similar total and not giving a shite about targets.

 

[toggle]

i haven't set a total at all. cause i'll either meet it my the end of january or set one so high that i'd need to read Mr men books all december to meet it. But ti's a list of stuff i'm completing. I get to see what interested me over the year and I get ideas from other people cause through this thread, I start to get some ideas about whether i want to try somehting based on whose list i saw it on.

 

[rich!]

You may notice I'm selecting short sf/f trash

 

[MrSki]

1. The Widow's Secret - Brian Thompson
2. The Sacred Art of Stealing - Christopher Brookmyre
3. Pandaemonium - Christopher Brookmyre

 

[imposs1904]

1/52 The In Between Time by Alexander Baron

2/52 King Mob : A Critical Hidden History by David Wise with Stuart Wise & Nick Brandt

 

[el-ahrairah]

1. Kyme & Priestley, ed. - Tales Of Heresy
2. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - Out Of The Pit
3. Mike Lee - Fallen Angels
4. Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone - The Warlock Of Firetop Mountain
5. Stella Gibbons - Christmas At Cold Comfort Farm
6. Anne Lecki - Ancillary Justice

 

[marty21]

1/60 - 'Til Death - Ed McBain
2/60 - How to Connect with Nature - Tristan Gooley
3/60 - The Dead Women of Juarez - Sam Hawken

 

[BoatieBird]

1/60 - JM Barrie - Peter Pan*
2/60 - Joe Hill - NOS4R2

3/60 - Arthur Ransome - Swallows and Amazons*

Really enjoyed this, pure escapism

So now I've not only submitted the essay on Peter Pan, I've read S&A which is the set book for next week's study.
This buys me about a week of guilt free reading for pleasure

 

[belboid]

1/31 - 23 Shades of Black - Ken Wishnia
2/31 - Richard Ayoade - Ayoade On Ayoade: a cinematic odyssey

3/31 - Iain Banks - The Quarry

Didn't realise that Banks didn't know he'd got the big C till he'd almost finished the book. Even more poignant on discovering that.

 

[Greebo]

1/60 The Cowboy and the Cossack - Clair Huffaker

 

[toggle]

1. Mike Cronin - The failure of British fascism
2. Raymond E Feist - Rides a Dread legion
3. Robin Hobb - Dragon keeper
4. Terry Pratchet - Unseen Academicals
5. Campagna and Campiglio - What are we fighting for?
6. Dunleavy et al. - Voices of the people
7. Conan Doyle - A study in Scarlet
8. Stuart Bell - The conservative party and british politics
9. Robin Hobb - Dragon haven
10. William Morris - News from Nowehere
11. Philippa Gregory - The white Queen
12. Raymond E Feist - Exile's return
13. Catherine Hall - White, male and middle class
14. D. H. lawrence - lady Chatterley's lover
15. Raymond E Feist - Flight of the nighthawks

16. jack London - call of the wild
17. jack london - white fang
18. H Rider haggard - King Solomon's mines

 

[chainsawjob]

1. In the Midst of Life - Jennifer Worth

About death and dying, the care of people who are dying, the ethics/dilemmas of resuscitation, and how attitudes/medical approaches to dying and death have changed over the last half-century or so. Very compelling and interesting. Tackles the issues sensitively and knowledgeably, and doesn't shy away from difficult questions like quality of life, euthanasia, and the commercial aspects of healthcare. Grim subject, but hopeful book.

 

[ringo]

1/45 Head On - Julian Cope
2/45 Bad Monkeys - Matt Ruff
3/45 The Ladies Of Grace Adieu - Susanna Clarke