April 20, 2015

Semi-Charmed Summer 2015 Book Challenge

In case you guys haven't noticed, I love to read . My poor mom had the hardest time grounding me when I was a kid because I would just lock myself in my room and read a book. I have always been a book nerd. If someone were to buy me every book on my Amazon Wish List right now, I would be love them forever.

Every year, I try to set a goal of reading a certain number of books. For the past few years, I haven't been successful in meeting those goals because I've taken on some of the longest books ever written including Anna Karenina (964 pages), War and Peace (1,392 pages), (1,796 pages), and since I don't like reading more than one book at a time, it has definitely slowed me down.

While I have some long books on my list this year, I'm still not so secretly trying to make my way through this 2015 Reading Challenge and while I'm in the middle of that, I've also decided to make another attempt at one of Megan's book challenges. Megan was one one of the first bloggers that I started reading and every year, she does a Winter and Summer Book Challenge. Last year, I tried to do her Summer Book Challenge and never followed through with it after I someone won in the first month. This year, taking the "I don't have to win" approach, I'm tackling the challenge again, especially since some of the categories will also count toward the other book challenge I'm doing.


The challenge starts on May 1st and ends on August 31st. I'm hoping that I'll be taking a lot of long plane rides during that time that will help me get a lot more reading done than normal. Each book must be at least 200 pages long and can only be used toward one category. The challenge is worth 200 points and the first five people who get to 200 points get to pick a category for the next challenge.

Taking into account all of the books I'm itching to read this year, I've put together a preliminary list of books I plan to read for this challenge.

5 points: Freebie! Read any book that fits the general rules. Undecided. Will probably be my Book Club's May pick.
10 points: Read a book you have never heard of before. (Just go to a shelf and pick a book based on the cover, the title, whatever you want!) "The Angel of Losses" by Stephanie Feldman
10 points: Read a book that has been on your TBR list for at least two years. (If you've had a Goodreads account for 2+ years, this will be easy to figure out. If you don’t, do your best to pick a book you’re pretty sure you’ve been wanting to read for years.) "My Beloved World" by Sonia Sotomayor
10 points: Read a book that won a Goodreads “Best Book” award in 2014. "Yes Please" by Amy Poehler
15 points: Read a book by an author who is completely new to you. "The Buried Giant" by Kazuo Ishiguro
15 points: 
Read a book by an author you have read before. (No re-reads for this one.) "The Lacuna" by Barbara Kingsolver
15 points: Read a book with "light" or "dark" in the title. (Or "lightness" or "darkness.") "All The Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr
20 points: Read a book with the name of a city, state or country in the title. "Last Train to Istanbul" by Ayse Kulin
20 points: Read a book with an animal on the cover. Undecided.
25 points: Read a book that is part of a series with at least four books. "The Giver" by Lois Lowry
25 points: Read a book that is longer than 500 pages long. — Submitted by winter finisher Kristen from See You in a Porridge. "The Bully Pulpit" by Doris Kearns Goodwin (910 pages)
30 points: Read a book with an alliterative title. (All words in the title must begin with the same letter; no exceptions for articles or prepositions. Examples: Gone Girl or Nicholas Nickleby. Yes, this is tough, which is why it's worth the most points!) "Love's Labor's Lost" by William Shakespeare

There you go! While Megan's challenge doesn't allow you to read one book for multiple categories, I'm allowing it for my own personal challenge! 9 of the 10 books I've listed here will count toward the other challenge, which is awesome! I'll be posting monthly updates on how I'm doing with Megan's challenge, and of course, you can keep an eye out for my second quarterly book reviews post sometime in June!

Have you read any of the books I've listed here?
Any that you recommend? Maybe some of these you don't recommend?
What's on your summer reading list?

5 comments:

  1. I LOVE to read, too! MY mom would take away my books when I was in trouble because she knew I'd just read in my room. I also got in trouble in school hiding my books under my desk and reading instead of listening to the teacher, oops!

    Great job, lady!

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  2. This looks like a fun way to get some reading in. If I didn't have my own year-long challenge (which has become very challenging at times) going on, I would definitely jump in.

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  3. I've been wanting to read the Kazuo Ishiguro book too since I read and loved Never Let Me Go. And I think Sonia Sotomayor's memoir would be fascinating!

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  4. I was the same way growing up--I could sit and read in my room for HOURS!
    Love that you try and challenge yourself, and it looks like you're doing an awesome job so far!!

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  5. Yay, thanks for joining again! :) My mom solved that problem by grounding me from books. I HAD to go outside and do something else haha. The horror.... But really, it looks like you have a great list, and I absolutely love when my challenge books help people fulfill other challenges they're doing! Good luck with both!

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