Play Book Tag discussion

We started with 64 authors at the beginning of the year! And after 6 rounds of voting, we narrowed it down to ONE.

This author won this round both outright (as if each person had only one vote to cast) and via extra votes.

And the winner is:

Jane Austen

Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist. She wrote many books of romantic fiction about the gentry. Her works made her one of the most famous and beloved writers in English literature. She is one of the great masters of the English novel.

Austen's works criticized sentimental novels in the late 18th century, and are part of the change to nineteenth-century realism. She wrote about typical people in everyday life. This gave the English novel its first distinctly modern character. Austen's stories are often comic,[4] but they also show how women depended on marriage for social standing and economic security. Her works are also about moral problems. - Simple Wikipedia

Learn more about Jane's work and see her publications here on Goodreads at:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...

There's no way I would have guessed this, but some of you did. Three of our members predicted that Jane Austen would be our winner. Stay tuned to see who won after our tie breaker. Interestingly, this individual never cast a single vote! In addition, our winner was the only person who selected three authors of the final four!

Our runners up picked two of the final four - -still very impressive.

Overall, 11 people picked at least one of the final four with Alice Hoffman being the most popular selection of these voters.

Please note, you will have until the end of the year to read Jane Austen if you'd like to receive 20 participation points. If you already read a Jane Austen book this year, I am going to have a thread in Activities and Challenges where you can claim your points by posting a link to your review from this year.

An announcement of our winners will be made in Activites and Challenges, hopefully later today.

Excellent choice, people!

I’m glad I have to the end of the year to finish an Austen book though Anita - currently stuck in the middle of Mansfield Park (reason for halt is me, not the book…)

I’ve loved this challenge - thank you so much for setting it up and running it, Anita! I’ve read some authors I’d never heard of before and it prompted me to read others who have been on the long TBR. Still lots on the list to cover, though, so I will carry on quietly.

I keep thinking I should reread Mansfield Park because it's the only one I haven't read multiple times. I think I read it right after Emma (my favorite) in an English lit course almost 50 years ago (yikes!) and was disappointed that it wasn't funny. I assume I would find other things in it now. I'll see if I can fit it in with other things I want to read this month.

Excellent choice!!!!

As I expected as Jane survived round after round, though did not guess initially. Why I assumed in January that someone like our beloved Jane would not be nominated....pandemic brain. I blame pandemic brain.

I held off rereading Austen to see if she ended in the finals as I've read all her books more than once and just prior to 2022 had reread several. I was going to reread Mansfield Park which I have always liked, but timing wasn't good. Instead, I did a reread of my absolute fave, Persuasion, whose audio-length perfectly fit the driving I was doing at Thanksgiving. I really did pick according to audio length.

Like others, I enjoyed being introduced to new authors -- Ilona Andrews! -- but also being pushed to read favorite authors I'd fallen behind reading such as Ishiguro and Kingsolver, and renewing acquaintance with authors I'd left by the wayside and disovering and loving books of theirs from a different stage in their writing career -- both Margaret Atwood and Alice Hoffman fall into that category. Of course, there are authors who will remain left behind - I did not develop a sudden love for Stephen King. LOL.

I absolutely loved this challenge. I was terrible at predicting but read many new authors and revisited some old favorites. Congratulations, Admins, on another memorable PBT Challenge.

That being said, I'm overloaded on literary fiction. My final Subdue Shelf will mostly be composed of mysteries, romance, and K9 fiction. Maybe a couple of studly firemen. I'm saving my quality reading for Happy Birthday PBT.

Congratulations to those who picked Jane Austen!

I read some great "new to me" authors for this challenge and also got to read some books by my own favorite authors.

Olivermagnus wrote: "I absolutely loved this challenge. I was terrible at predicting but read many new authors and revisited some old favorites. Congratulations, Admins, on another memorable PBT Challenge.

That being ..."

I am with you, OM. Mysteries and romance and an occasional hunky dog abound on my StS list.

I should have gone with my instinct and voted for her. But I thought nobody would choose her.

I am so glad everyone enjoyed this challenge! I definitely enjoyed watching it. Thank you so much to everyone who participated and voted!

Maybe sometime we can try it again with a narrower field i.e. authors in translation, or authors of mysteries . . .but for now, onto announcing our winners.

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Kateloves2read wrote: "Jane Austin’s birthday is Dec 16th. I plan on reading Persuasion.

Sadly, I love the movies but have never read her books. Perfect time to change that.

Every year on her birthday I br..."

The image that immediately sprang to mind as I read of your annual tradition is Emma Thompson with that soothing cup of tea meant for her mother or sisters sitting on the stairs after they all slammed their doors on her!

I’m very happy that Jane Austen won. I read many of her novels this year, plus two related books. The Jane Austen Project is a time travel book about historical researchers who spend time getting to know her in person. I recommend it to her fans.