Dewey's 24 Hour Read-a-Thon discussion

I do actually have a blog, but I don't really get any interaction on it. I like this group and want to have somewhere maybe a little chattier, so I'm starting a thread here! This way I'll also have somewhere to express my excitement about the upcoming read-a-thon! On my blog I pretty much just do a starting post and then updates every couple hours, nothing leading up to the event.

So, two weeks and a bit to go! Eeeeeee!

I haven't started putting together my reading pile yet, partly because I'm still working on the pre-read-a-thon board game, so I'm not sure what I'll need to read for that over the next two weeks. But I always have my standards: a couple of R.L. Stine books (currently mostly Fear Street), a couple of Animorphs books, usually some graphic novels, and often one longer middle grade or YA book that takes a larger chunk of time. (Sometimes I think I'm stuck in a rut in terms of my reading choices, but I've learned from experience what works and what doesn't for me. I need to be able to switch it up frequently, and adult books bog me down.)

Also, apparently this is gonna be my 20th Dewey's 24 Hour Read-a-Thon!! :O I've done every single one since October 2011. There have been a few that I didn't do well (e.g. when I had to go to a wedding during the day, when I had a friend's kid's birthday party, when I was on a trip at a cabin...) but I've always done my best, and I've done the full 24 hours for most of them! I look forward to it so much every 6 months! :)

Yay welcome, Lianne! I love this space for the readathon, though sometimes it gets overwhelming. lol. Sometimes I just ignore all notifications and then catch up on Sunday. Congrats on your 20th Dewey's! I can't believe you've stayed up the whole time for most of them. My hero! I've gotten extremely close, 22 hours but that's it. And the older I get, the less I care. lol. It's still fun!

Elyse wrote: "Yay welcome, Lianne! I love this space for the readathon, though sometimes it gets overwhelming. lol. Sometimes I just ignore all notifications and then catch up on Sunday. Congrats on your 20th De..."

I am very intense about the read-a-thon lol! Participating for only part of it was never an option! I do have some trouble with my eyes drifting closed and reading the same paragraph 87 times lol, but that actually tends to happen most in the morning. Staying up all night comes pretty naturally to me.

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "Elyse wrote: "Yay welcome, Lianne! I love this space for the readathon, though sometimes it gets overwhelming. lol. Sometimes I just ignore all notifications and then catch up on Sunday. Congrats o..."

I am so not a night owl. Mornings are so much easier for me and I looooove my sleep. lol.

I just saw the Bingo board! I've never done the Bingo challenge before. (I'm really all about the reading and don't do much in the way of supplemental activities.) I'm quite particular about my readathoning and don't like being told what to do lol. But, the tasks on this Bingo board are all very doable and adaptable to reading whatever you want! So I think I'll give it a shot this time!

Hmm, how to decide on the oldest book on my TBR? I have 190 TBR books that I added to Goodreads in May 2009, 33 of which I added on May 2, 2009. Maybe I'll try to pick one that I'm pretty sure I've had since childhood.

I'm going to give bingo a shot too but it will be more on the back burner, hoping books I planned for other reasons fit kind of thing. It will be my first time using the bingo chart.

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "I just saw the Bingo board! I've never done the Bingo challenge before. (I'm really all about the reading and don't do much in the way of supplemental activities.) I'm quite particular about my rea..."

Well, it sounds like you get to choose from those 33! Or assign them numbers and do a randomizer for more fun! I've done the Bingo board in the past but did not do one at all during any of last year's Dewey's. But I'm thinking of doing this one!

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "I do actually have a blog, but I don't really get any interaction on it. I like this group and want to have somewhere maybe a little chattier, so I'm starting a thread here! This way I'll also have..."

I used this here, even when I had a blog too. I love the activity and atmosphere here for such an event. I hope you love doing it this way as well! And wow! 20th time. I am not sure what my count it, I think most of them since 2013/2014. I always look forward to them each year.

Elyse wrote: "Yay welcome, Lianne! I love this space for the readathon, though sometimes it gets overwhelming. lol. Sometimes I just ignore all notifications and then catch up on Sunday. Congrats on your 20th De..."

I am not very active everywhere on the readathon day but I love chatting and pre-cheering up until I go to sleep the night before and then, like you, come back on Sunday and Monday to revisit.

Technically we should all be busy reading on Read-a-thon day, but I enjoy the social media check-in breaks, but for blogging or full thread updates sometimes I agree it's over the next day or so that I'll get around to updating.

Erin *Proud Book Hoarder* wrote: "Technically we should all be busy reading on Read-a-thon day, but I enjoy the social media check-in breaks, but for blogging or full thread updates sometimes I agree it's over the next day or so th..."

I'm definitely busy reading on the day of. I try to make my update breaks as quick as possible. On my blog I even make posts in advance so that I just have to fill in the numbers. I'm very serious about my page count for the day lol! But it's still nice to have a little bit of interaction with people to add to the excitement. One time I had friends over for the read-a-thon... It didn't go well lol. They were not as serious about the focus.

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "Erin *Proud Book Hoarder* wrote: "Technically we should all be busy reading on Read-a-thon day, but I enjoy the social media check-in breaks, but for blogging or full thread updates sometimes I agr..."

haha this is why I don't involve others. They just won't take it as seriously as me and all fun will be ruined. lol

Erin *Proud Book Hoarder* wrote: "Technically we should all be busy reading on Read-a-thon day, but I enjoy the social media check-in breaks, but for blogging or full thread updates sometimes I agree it's over the next day or so th..."

I sometimes don't even get around to doing the wrap-up survey until the Monday. Not to mention entering read books into the database (then again, I do the data entry and updates for the whole family, and my youngest reads a lot of manga. XD

Lianne, this space really is the best for that sense of community. Especially in the pre-readathon stages. And I like to take a gander at what people were reading, after the fact. I used to try to do a lot of commenting and cheering on multiple platform during the readathon, but I ended up reading less than I do on a normal weekend. :P So now I keep my head down as much as possible during the event.

Elyse wrote: "Yay welcome, Lianne! I love this space for the readathon, though sometimes it gets overwhelming. lol. Sometimes I just ignore all notifications and then catch up on Sunday. Congrats on your 20th De..."

I usually get so focused on reading during the readathon that i forget to come in here and catch up with everyone. I try to pop in at least every few hours but....

So I tend to do most of the catching up and summarizing the event on Sunday.

OK, apparently I'm feeling indecisive this read-a-thon lol. Well and the bingo card is definitely contributing to the problem. Anyway now I have a huge stack and whatever, I'm going with it. Better to have too much than not enough.





So, five graphic novels of varying lengths (Twin Spica is over 400 pages; the rest are pretty short), six middle grade novels (ranging from 71 to 182 pages), and one YA book of short stories.

Graphic novel pages: 940
Standard prose pages: 1185
Total pages: 2125

I don't expect to read all of Stars Above, but it's a book I got as a gift, which was a difficult bingo space for me to fill lol. So I figure even if I just read a story or two from it I can knock off that space. Might be something to do at the very end, as I often finish a book with like an hour to go and have to just start a new one knowing I won't finish it.

Now I just gotta plan my blog posts and food... (Caffeine has been accounted for lol!)

OK I just realized there is no R.L. Stine in that pile, which has maybe never happened before in 20 read-a-thons, and now I'm having an existential crisis. But also I already have 2125 pages of reading material there lol. Here's to trying new things, I guess?? There are at least a few other spooky novels in there.

Spooky will work in exchange but I know what you mean when you realize you left an author out you usually include. Looks like an ambitious and fun list --- and of course the caffeine being accounted for ;)

Bingo progress:

B I N G O
✔️✔️✔️✔️✔️
✔️✔️✔️✔️✔️
✔️✔️✔️✔️✔️
✔️✔️✔️✔️✔️
✔️✔️✔️✔️✔️

B
✔️ Read a book that's won an award - Lumberjanes, Vol. 5: Band Together (technically it's the comic as a whole that won an award, not this specific volume, but it's the closest I could get lol)
✔️ Read a humorous book - Lumberjanes, Vol. 5: Band Together
✔️ A book set in Spring or Summer - Bat and the End of Everything
✔️ Read a total of 150 pages
✔️ Read a children's book - Bat and the End of Everything

I
✔️ Read a book with no supernatural elements - Bat and the End of Everything
✔️ Read a book with a one-word title - Fray
✔️ Participate in a challenge - did the hour 10 challenge on Facebook (menagerie of animals from your favourite books)
✔️ Read a book with an even number of pages - Bat and the End of Everything
✔️ Read a book with an animal on the cover - Bat and the End of Everything

N
✔️ Read a book with a unique cover - Santa Claus Doesn't Mop Floors
✔️ Read a standalone - The Phantom of Five Chimneys
✔️ FREE SPACE
✔️ Read the oldest book on your TBR - The Familiar (Animorphs #41) - on my TBR for over a decade, which I'm calling old enough to count, lol!
✔️ Read a book recommended or gifted to you - Stars Above (Lunar Chronicles #4.5) - I got it for Christmas a couple years ago.

G
✔️ Flip a coin to pick your first read - flipped between Bat and the End of Everything and The Familiar, and landed on Bat!
✔️ Re-read a favourite - Lumberjanes, Vol. 5: Band Together (really the whole series is the "favourite" I'm rereading)
✔️ Read in 3 separate locations - bed, couch, bean bag chair
✔️ Read a book published before 2000 - The Phantom of Five Chimneys (1998)
✔️ Share a recipe on social media

O
✔️ Participate in a 60 minute reading sprint - first hour sprint
✔️ Enjoy a snack or drink that's new to you - pear and gorgonzola flatbread pizza! Leftover from last night's supper, which is the first time I've ever tried this strange and interesting food!
✔️ A character that shares similar characteristics to you - Bat and the End of Everything (Bat and I are both autistic)
✔️ Make your own bookmark
✔️ Read in your PJs

(Thanks to Kate for this handy format that I totally snagged, including the check mark which copies and pastes fine!)

I've definitely got to give 'Lumberjanes' a try after all the people I see reading them. Good luck tomorrow!

Ann A wrote: "I've definitely got to give 'Lumberjanes' a try after all the people I see reading them. Good luck tomorrow!"

They're so good!! Thanks, you too! :)

Good luck Lianne. Enjoy the readathon and Bingo!! ;)

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "OK, apparently I'm feeling indecisive this read-a-thon lol. Well and the bingo card is definitely contributing to the problem. Anyway now I have a huge stack and whatever, I'm going with it. Better..."

Yeah, that's why I just read what I feel like reading and then see if it fits any of the squares lol
Good luck and happy reading Lianne!

First book done, just past the two hour mark! Finished Bat and the End of Everything. It was delightful and also made me cry at the end.

Now, onto Fray!

Glad it's going well so far!

Second book done, just in time for my four hour update! Fray by Joss Whedon.

Total pages in first four hours: 398

Great start!! Amazing!

A quarter of the way through the day! Crazy how fast it goes, eh? My pace has definitely slowed in the last two hours, due to two factors: 1) The Phantom of Five Chimneys has way more words per page than my first two books did, and 2) I've started having trouble keeping my eyes open. Darn that comfy bean bag chair!!

Amusingly, I've completed 15/25 bingo squares and haven't even gotten one line, lol! But if I read a Lumberjanes book next, that'll cross off a few squares and give me three lines in one fell swoop!

Finished my 3rd book! Took a little longer than I'd hoped, but so it goes. The Phantom of Five Chimneys is done! And I've started on Lumberjanes, Vol. 5: Band Together.

I'm at 549 pages so far, 1/3 of the way through the read-a-thon.

4th book down! Lumberjanes, Vol. 5: Band Together.

Continuing my pattern of alternating middle grade novels and graphic novels, I'm now starting The Familiar (Animorphs #41).

By the way if anyone could tell me if any of the books on my stack have a "unique cover" I would be eternally grateful lmao. I really don't understand the question.

Finished The Familiar! 5 books down!

Now I'm gonna start the biggest book on my stack (but it's graphic so the pages'll go quicker), Twin Spica, Vol. 12.

Two more books finished! Twin Spica, Vol. 12, and Santa Claus Doesn't Mop Floors.

Since I'm still feeling good right now, and things might get harder later, I'm gonna break my pattern of alternating graphic novels and middle grade novels, so as to save more graphic novels for later. So next I'll try Revenge of the Computer Phantoms. I have no idea what to expect from this bizarre little 90s book I picked up at a library sale lol.

You have been reading some fun books! Great job!

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "By the way if anyone could tell me if any of the books on my stack have a "unique cover" I would be eternally grateful lmao. I really don't understand the question."

This stumped me. Like the animorphs cover are unique unto the series, but alike to each other. Maybe something that doesn't look similar to another cover you've seen before?

Maybe that Santa Claus one for unique? Never seen him mop before!

Jamie wrote: "You have been reading some fun books! Great job!"

Thanks! Yeah, I was feeling a bit uncertain about my stack this time, but I've enjoyed myself consistently throughout the day! :)

Yeah I think I will go with the Santa Claus one for the unique cover. Maybe I'm just too focused on patterns lol. Like I know that every Bailey School Kids book pretty much looks like that, but they do each have a different creature (in this case Santa) on them, making each of them pretty unique.

Finished my 8th and 9th books! Revenge of the Computer Phantoms and Dr. Horrible and Other Horrible Stories.

Finished Lumberjanes, Vol. 6: Sink or Swim! You guys I literally cannot believe that I've read 10 books. I thought my pile was so huge and here I am with only two books left.

I'm gonna start on Stars Above, because I need to read some of it for a bingo square. Then I'll decide whether to continue with that or try to squeeze in that Baby-Sitters Club book...

I got through 71 pages of Stars Above Stars Above. Almost through the second story in the book.

Grand totals:
Books: 10 (plus a little bit)
Pages: 1660

More updates to come after sleep, perhaps!

Great job, Lianne! And you got that blackout, nice!

Elyse wrote: "Great job, Lianne! And you got that blackout, nice!"

Thanks! :)

Now I'm just trying not to be immediately brought down from my read-a-thon high by the fact that the next one is ruined! *sob* (By ruined I mean it's gonna be a reverse one, and I'm upset, but who knows what'll happen in 6 months, and I'm just gonna try to put this badness out of my mind for now.)

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "I got through 71 pages of Stars Above Stars Above. Almost through the second story in the book.

Grand totals:
Books: 10 (plus a little bit)
Pages: 1660

More updates to come after ..."

Great totals Lianne!

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "Elyse wrote: "Great job, Lianne! And you got that blackout, nice!"

Thanks! :)

Now I'm just trying not to be immediately brought down from my read-a-thon high by the fact that the next one is ruin..."

Well, stop fretting because it has been cancelled. lol.

Elyse wrote: "Well, stop fretting because it has been cancelled. lol."

The summer reverse one, yes, which is unfortunate but also doesn't affect me since I never do it. But what I'm fretting about is the fact that the October one is now apparently going to be a reverse read-a-thon. :(

Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "Elyse wrote: "Well, stop fretting because it has been cancelled. lol."

The summer reverse one, yes, which is unfortunate but also doesn't affect me since I never do it. But what I'm fretting about..."

Luckily it isn't. Everything stays the same :)

Susy wrote: "Lianne (The Towering Pile) wrote: "Elyse wrote: "Well, stop fretting because it has been cancelled. lol."

The summer reverse one, yes, which is unfortunate but also doesn't affect me since I never..."

Yes, I'm very thankful for that! The prospect of an event I look forward to for months having its format messed with was an upsetting one lol. Glad it's gonna be business as usual.

I can't believe it's already time to start thinking about the October read-a-thon!! I'm gonna use the pre-read-a-thon stuff to try to get back into the swing of reading. Every year I think I'll make time for lots of reading in the summer, and every year I seem to read less than the summer before lol. I'm 22 books behind on my Goodreads goal! Time to get back to curling up with a book and some hot chocolate.

I see that the first long lap just started! So let's see how much I can read between now and the 19th. I'm going to try to finish these books that I'm currently reading:
Music for Tigers by Michelle Kadarusman
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
This Book Is Anti-Racist: 20 Lessons on How to Wake Up, Take Action, and Do the Work by Tiffany Jewell
The Third Planet from Altair by Edward Packard

I might also read some Lumberjanes, as I have a stack of them out from the library. And other library books I need to get to as well... We shall see!

OK, my first lap went a little differently than I'd planned, but I still reached some of my goals! I did finish two of my currently reading books:
Music for Tigers by Michelle Kadarusman
The Third Planet from Altair by Edward Packard

And I made progress on one of the others, House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

I also read these two books in their entirety:
Surviving the City by Tasha Spillett and Natasha Donovan
From the Roots Up by Tasha Spillett and Natasha Donovan

And I started these two books and made good progress on them:
Bloom by Kenneth Oppel
The Mystery of Black Hollow Lane by Julia Nobel (audiobook)

OMG Bloom is SO GOOD. I'm almost done it, and I have the second book ready to go!

So, my goals for the second lap (which is only a week) are as follows. Try to finish these currently reading books:
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
This Book Is Anti-Racist: 20 Lessons on How to Wake Up, Take Action, and Do the Work by Tiffany Jewell
Bloom by Kenneth Oppel
The Mystery of Black Hollow Lane by Julia Nobel

It's also very likely I'll begin the sequel to Bloom, Hatch. And then of course there are all the Lumberjanes still!

I think the second lap ended last night. I finished these currently reading books:
Bloom by Kenneth Oppel
The Mystery of Black Hollow Lane by Julia Nobel

I made more progress on House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. Still not done, though!

And I started Hatch by Kenneth Oppel.

Nothing impressive but not too bad for one week.

Looks like lap 3 is a longer one at two weeks long! I should surely be able to finish my current reads in that time lol (aside from my really long reads). Current reads to finish:
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
This Book Is Anti-Racist: 20 Lessons on How to Wake Up, Take Action, and Do the Work by Tiffany Jewell
Hatch by Kenneth Oppel
The Secret of White Stone Gate by Julia Nobel (audiobook that I just started this morning)

I should also try to make some progress on The Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe, which I've been reading for many months but neglecting lately. And aside from that I may read some short books to try to catch up a bit on my Goodreads goal.

Lap 3 done! And I actually hit my goals this time!

Finished these books in progress:
The Secret of White Stone Gate by Julia Nobel
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
Hatch by Kenneth Oppel
This Book Is Anti-Racist: 20 Lessons on How to Wake Up, Take Action, and Do the Work by Tiffany Jewell

Also read in full:
Barry Squires, Full Tilt Barry Squires, Full Tilt by Heather Smith (audiobook)
Broken Date by R.L. Stine (technically I just finished this one this morning, but I'm counting it in lap 3)

And I made very small amounts of progress on:
Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe
Les Miserables

I also started a new audiobook that I'm not quite done yet:
Me and Banksy