NBRC: Tower Teams Read 2013, Round II discussion

There is going to be another RAT in October. Yippee!! These are so much fun. Naturally the theme is Halloween. The RAT runs over two weeks - Oct. 4th - Oct. 19th. Details of this challenge can be found HERE

The purpose of this post is to invite you all to consider joining this challenge. If you decide to can you please say so in this thread so I can add you to the s/sheet that I'm setting up.

Like with all these challenges we can earn more BAPs (Book Advantage Points).

So let's make this fun and Read, Read, Read to earn those much needed BAPs.

Kimberly wrote: "I think I'll participate. I'd like to see what it is before I commit though.

When I click on the "HERE" link, I get a message that says "sorry, that group is secret"."

Sorry about that Kimberly. When I am allowed to pass on the information in detail I will. Essentially it's a two week RAT which can be done in one of two ways or if you're really game you can do both options. It's still in its draft phase so I'll let you know more when I'm able to. My humble apologies for this.

Update: What I can tell you is that one of the challenges is a page count one, similar sort of thing to what we did as a team in August, and the other one is a treasure hunt.

I'm in since I'm a challenge junkie BRING IT ON!!!!

Tina wrote: "I'm in since I'm a challenge junkie BRING IT ON!!!!"

A woman after my own heart Tina. LOL

I'm definitely in!

here is the details for the October challenges

Kimberly wrote: "I'll participate -

I'll challenge myself to read 1,000 pages between 4/10 and 19/10.

I assume I use my own local time zone to calculate the start and finish dated (i.e., I'm in Australia (like..."

Hi Kimberly,

I'll be using our Australian time zone. In a way, I think we get an advantage (maybe unfair perhaps. lol) but in essence we get an extra day or part thereof if we use our own time zone.

I have managed to work out that 3pm (afternoon of course) here on say today's date is midnight in GRs land the same day. This means that we could start reading at 3pm 4th October our time and finish at 3pm 19th October our time. That way, we're still working on the same dates we're just a number of hours ahead (15hrs ahead I think). Does this make sense?

I'll make note of your page challenge.

Our we going to do both challenges? Do I need to post how many pages I think I'll read?

Tina wrote: "Our we going to do both challenges? Do I need to post how many pages I think I'll read?"

I was thinking we'd do the first challenge as it seems to be the easiest one to follow. Would that work for you Tina? If you could post how many you think you'll read I'll add it to the spreadsheet so I can work out what needs to be worked out.

That fine by me, put me down for 1500 pages!

Tina wrote: "That fine by me, put me down for 1500 pages!"

done. thanks.

If we do add the other challenge I have a lot of paranormal books lined up this month!

Maria Helena and Kimberly would you like to add the other challenge as well or are you happy to just stick with the other one?

We can always try the other one! (we can double count books that works for both and that is always nice)

Kimberly wrote: "Zara wrote: "Maria Helena and Kimberly would you like to add the other challenge as well or are you happy to just stick with the other one?"

Of course! It's a team effort right?"

It is indeed a team effort Kimberly. Great.

Tina and Kimberly - we need to pick 5 themes for the 2nd challenge. We will need to read 1 book from one of the themes, 2 books from the next theme and so on. Any ideas on which ones you want to do?

I was thinking:
Theme #2:Masters of Horror and Fantastic
Read a book from a master of horror and Fantastic like Stephen King or Dean Koontz, or if you prefer a more lighter approach, like Neil Gaiman or Terry Pratcher.
Theme #4:Trick or Treat
Let your inner child on the loose in a trick or treat spell-it-out challenge.
Theme #7:Halloween Party
Use your imagination to create the perfect party item (spell-it-out challenge)

The spell-it-out themes should be fairly easy. For those, we don't actually have to do all the letters in the word (if the word has 7 letters and we are doing that theme for task #4 we only need to do 4 of the letters) so they might be good for task #4 and #5.

What do you think?

Maria Helena wrote: "Tina and Kimberly - we need to pick 5 themes for the 2nd challenge. We will need to read 1 book from one of the themes, 2 books from the next theme and so on. Any ideas on which ones you want to do..."

Sounds good, also #8 Super Natural Creatures and maybe #10 Special Abilities

This is an impressive list Kimberly.

I love Gummi Bears as the spell-it-out. Gummi Bears taste really nice. Yum. lol

Do books with less than 160 pages count toward # of pages read or does it need to be 160 pages to count?

Tina, checking with Sonia.

Sorry, for the delay.
Only books eligible for the round II counts. So, they need to have 160 pages.

How about this for the 2nd challenge:

Task 1: #10 Special abilities
Task 2: #2 Masters of horror and fantastic
Task 3: #8 Supernatural creatures
Task 4: #4 Trick or treat spell-it-out GUMMIE BEARS
Task 5: #7 Halloween party spell-it-out

We still need a word for #7.

I have plenty of books that will work for the spell-it-out challenges(no matter what words we use) and 1 book for #2 but none for #8 or 10. I have some that would work for #9 (black, red and orange covers) if we want to exchange that for one of the other themes.

I have lots for #8, switching 9 for 10 would work if you have a book for it. What about cauldron for #7? Would Anne Rice work for #2? I'm a little confused on how to post my pages, what do we go by, some of my ebooks have weird numbering so should I go by the amount in an actual book? And we are supposed to post our pages every day so when we finish a book do we post the # of pages in the book or how many we read that day?

If it's cool with the rest of you, I'll do the 4 books for GUMMI BEARS as follows:



G
U
M: My Life as a White Trash Zombie: 310 pages
M
I
B: Blue Dahlia: 372 pages
E: The Elephant Whisperer: Learning About Life, Loyalty And Freedom From A Remarkable Herd Of Elephants: 368 pages
A
R
S: Still Life: 293 pages

My start time is at 1:00 am local time on Saturday.

OK, Tina and Kimberly - are you ok with the following for our 2nd challenge:


----------------------------
CHALLENGE SETUP
----------------------------

Task 1: #9 Halloween Cover Hunt
1 book - Maria Helena
Task 2: #2 Masters of horror and fantastic
2 books - Maria Helena & Tina
Task 3: #8 Supernatural creatures
3 books - Tina (& Kimberly?)
Task 4: #4 Trick or treat spell-it-out GUMMIE BEARS
4 books - Kimberly (& Tina or Maria Helena?)
Task 5: #7 Halloween party spell-it-out CAULDRON
5 books - Maria Helena (& Tina?)

Remember, we can read books in whatever order we want but we can only submit the finished tasks in order.

-----------
BOOKS
-----------
Kimberly's books
My life as a white trash zombie could also work for task 3 (#8)
Blue Dahlia could also work for letter R in task 5 (#7)
Still Life could also work for letter L in task 5 (#7)

Tina's books
I think horror books by Anne Rice should work for task 2 (#2).

Maria Helena's books
I'll start with Fractured by Karin Slaughter for task 1 (#9) and something by Neil Gaiman for task 2 (#2). And then I'll read whatever is needed to fill letters in the last two tasks.

--------------
POSTING
--------------
For the second challenge, it is enough if you let me know in this thread when you have finished a book for one of the tasks. I will keep track of all of them in a spreadsheet and post it to the main challenge whenever we have finished a task.

Since all 3 of us also participate in the first challenge (the read-a-thon), we also need to post updates on number of pages read. I will make up a strategy for this together with Zara (she will be in charge of doing the "official" updates for that challenge for our team) and we'll let you know how we want to do this before Oct 4 when the two challenges start.

I will also sort out how the mods wants us to count pages for ebooks/audiobooks before then.


Hopefully I've answered all questions we had about this challenge for now. Let me know if anything is still unclear...

#2 Merrick by Anne Rice
#3 Angels of Bourbon Street
#4 Melody
I also have The Rogue Hunter which could work for 3 different challenges and Beautiful Pain could also work for #4

Kimberly wrote: "Yes! Thank you! Are we the only ones in our whole group participating?"

As far as I know, it is only the three of us this time (but Zara is also doing the page count version of the read-a-thon)

Here's an example of how I intend to count pages as most of my books are audiobooks:

- The Elephant Whisperer is 10 hours and 54 minutes long (or 654 minutes);
- The most popular version of it in print has 368 pages;
- 368/654 = 0.56 pages/minute;
- If I listen for 60 minutes, I will count it as 34 pages;
- Once I have finished the book, I will ensure that the last update makes the total page count 368 pages.

Does that make sense?

Sounds good to me, Kimberly.

Here is a new thread where we all should post frequent updates about how many pages we have read for challenge #1. Zara will then do the daily summaries.

For challenge #2, let's keep the updates in this thread.

For audibooks (and ebooks) we'll follow Kimberly's example in message 36.

Everyone ready to start reading?

I have finished Fractured for task 1.

I believe I saw somewhere that we have dates that each challenge opens but I can't find it anywhere now, does anyone know? I think challenge 2 opens 10/7 if so I should have Merrick done by then I also have The Coven: Uninvited done which would work for task #3.

Tina wrote: "I believe I saw somewhere that we have dates that each challenge opens but I can't find it anywhere now, does anyone know? I think challenge 2 opens 10/7 if so I should have Merrick done by then I..."

We changed the rules. As long as the tasks are posted in the correct order, the posting can be done anytime.

~Sonia

Moderators of Nothing but Reading Challenges (All the Mods) wrote: "Tina wrote: "I believe I saw somewhere that we have dates that each challenge opens but I can't find it anywhere now, does anyone know? I think challenge 2 opens 10/7 if so I should have Merrick d..."

Thanks!!

I'd like to join in this month.

Do we have a thread to see where we are at for challenge #2? I'm almost finished with Merrick and will post a little later today when done.

I made a new thread here were we can post our books. The first post has an overview of the tasks and which books have been read for each task.

finished Merrick for task 2 and am starting Angels of Bourbon Street
Do we have someone else reading a book that would fit into task 2?

I can read a Neil Gaiman book for task 2, if no one else have a book in mind.

I am reading a book that has 288 e pages or 336 actual pages, do we go by what form we are reading or which has the greatest # of pages?

Tina wrote: "I am reading a book that has 288 e pages or 336 actual pages, do we go by what form we are reading or which has the greatest # of pages?"

I'll check with the mods