Aussie Readers discussion

Challenge #1

My favourite sub-genre of crime fiction is in the private detective realm, the more hardboiled and noir, the better. Over the years I have been going through the list of Shamus Award winners and finalists and reading as many as I can. It tends to be a slowish process because, when I find an author I like, I simply must read all of the books in the series and, in some cases, there are some loooong series.

Anyhoo, my aim for 2023 is to knock off at least 24 books from the list that I have not yet read (2 per month). That's across Best PI Novel, Best First PI Novel and Best PBO (around 428 books to choose from).

Challenge #2

It's time to complete a few series this year or, at the very least, knock off 12 from the longer series:

The Amos Walker series by Loren D Estleman starting at #9 of 31 - Silent Thunder
The Rizzoli & Isles series by Tess Gerritsen starting at #3 of 13 - The Sinner
The Sharon McCone series by Marcia Muller starting at #16 of 34 - The Broken Promise Land

Spring Challenge
A-Z Follow the Clues
A-Z Titles
Aussie Lovers A-Z Authors Challenge
Aussie Lovers A-Z Characters Challenge
Calendar of Books
Opposites
October Challenge
Summer 2023

Challenge #3

Not reading related, but hey, it's my thread so bear with me.

In 2023 I will aim to run 5000km. This will make it 3 years in a row.

I run every day (except when I had Covid mid-2022) and 5000km works out to be around 14km per day (just under).

Wow good work Damo! All your challenges sound excellent, and I completely admire you for your last challenge....

Good luck Damo. Three great challenges.

Great challenges, good luck

Good luck with all your challenges Damo!
(Do you listen to audiobooks when you run? You’d get through a few doing 5000km….)

Carolyn wrote: "Good luck with all your challenges Damo!
(Do you listen to audiobooks when you run? You’d get through a few doing 5000km….)"

I haven't yet, although I've considered it - I found Fox Creek by William Kent Krueger on Spotify yesterday. I do listen to French lessons, though, just in case I ever get to the Tour de France

Good luck!

Admirable. Especially the running.

Damo wrote: "Carolyn wrote: "Good luck with all your challenges Damo!
(Do you listen to audiobooks when you run? You’d get through a few doing 5000km….)"

I haven't yet, although I've considered it - I found F..."

I can recommend the audiobooks of Stuart MacBride's Logan MacRae series read by Steve Worsley - very entertaining!

Thanks Carolyn, I'll check them out.

Since you've made the suggestion I've started listening to Audiobooks on my runs...and I'm bloody well running for longer than before! (Not complaining mind you - I've just finished a 16km run around Cronulla, further than expected because Jacaranda Blue by Joy Dettman was getting to the good bit, ha!)

Haha! Good job Damo!!

Damo wrote: "Thanks Carolyn, I'll check them out.

Since you've made the suggestion I've started listening to Audiobooks on my runs...and I'm bloody well running for longer than before! (Not complaining mind yo..."

It’s addictive! 😆

Oh wow, Damo! An interesting genre, and a very good running committment. I have been running every second day, aim for 60 minutes and hoping to improve my times. Just hard avoiding the day time heat at times. Good luck with all your plans. I can't do audiobooks, though, I need my running list on Spotifiy for a fast pace!

Excellent challenges, good luck with the reading, listening and running.
Yes I also enjoy audiobooks to help with lots of driving and often while gardening too. you do tend to keep going just to keep listening.

Damo wrote: "Thanks Carolyn, I'll check them out.

Since you've made the suggestion I've started listening to Audiobooks on my runs...and I'm bloody well running for longer than before! (Not complaining mind yo..."

That’s great Damo! I always enjoy my walks more if I have a book or a podcast to listen to (and a stop for coffee on the route!)

With January out of the way, I'll just check in on my progress to confirm that I'm on track.

PC #1: The Shamus Awards

The books I read this month were:

1. Embrace the Wolf by Benjamin M. Schutz
2. The Naked Liar by Harold Adams
3. A Visible Darkness by Jonathon King

So that's 3 finished. And I'm already 1 ahead of the game.

The planned Shamus Award nominees to read in February are:

- In La La Land We Trust by Robert Wright Campbell
- The Do-Right by Lisa Sandlin
- The Wrong Kind of Blood by Declan Hughes

PC #2: The series progress:

The Amos Walker series: Silent Thunder by Loren D. Estleman
The Rizzoli and Isles series: The Sinner by Tess Gerritsen
The Sharon McCone series: The Broken Promise Land by Marcia Muller

So far, so good and all on track.

February will hopefully look like this

Rizzoli & Isles #4: - Body Double
Sharon McCone #17: - Both Ends of the Night

PC #3: Running for 2023

I've covered 433km in January which puts me around 8km ahead of schedule.

Legend

Good job Damo!!

At the 2/3 mark of the year, so a quick update to remind myself how I've gone in meeting my Challenge goal. Answer: could be better, but that could mean I need to think a little longer about my goals.

After a strong start with a few of my personal challenges, my focus has shifted and series that I thought I might enjoy have become, well, a little unbearable.

My first priority was to try to read as many private detective books from the Shamus Awards winners and finalists. This was going fine for the first few months, I was charging through them. Then I had a run of decidedly underwhelming entries and I thought, ach time for a break! And since then I've moved back to arrowing in on Australian authors and I've kind of stuck at it for the past 6 months.

Challenge #2 was attempting to complete some series. And I'm happy to say, Tess Gerritsen's Rizzoli and Isles series is getting knocked off quite nicely. Really enjoying this one.

I can't say the same for Marcia Muller's Sharon McCone series. I reached April and came to the realisation that I was forcing myself to struggle through uninspiring stories filled with unlikable characters that I didn't care for at all. So it was time to ditch MM and fill my boots with Steve Cavanagh, Craig Johnson, Paul Doiron and the like.

As for running, I'm way ahead of schedule (3,494km run so far this year). To be honest, this is by far the easiest challenge for me, it's my relaxation each day. When I'm not listening to an Audiobook I've got Green Day, Foo Fighters (concert in December, woohoo!), Kings of Leon or the Arctic Monkeys and the like lined up ready to entertain me around my chosen course.

Congrats. So far you've run the equivalent to 10% of the Australian coastline, (but you probably knew that) and the reading effort also. With my limited attention span series tend to pall quickly, and can understand the need to switch. Keep up the good work.

Damo wrote: "At the 2/3 mark of the year, so a quick update to remind myself how I've gone in meeting my Challenge goal. Answer: could be better, but that could mean I need to think a little longer about my goa..."

Brilliant Damo! For your reading (and the courage to step away when not enjoying as well - life is too short!) And your running! Blows me away! Fantastic effort! Keep up the great work in both...

I'll just say this here and then I won't mention it again (I promise).

GO PIES!!!

I swear I'm 10 years older after yesterday afternoon's game!

Haha! It was a great game, so close all the way through. They did well, as did the Lions.

Alright, time to close 2023 off.

I'm a little late because the house lost the NBN connection back on 9 December when a tree decided to fall on it while I was at the Foo Fighters concert. Very dramatic! It's still not connected(!) but we've managed to move to a backup arrangement that allows me to jump onto the computer more frequently. Can't do it from my phone. I can't! I won't!

Anyway, my attempted series reading was a bit of a bust. I managed to finish 5 books from Loren Estleman's Amos Walker series, 6 from Tess Gerritsen's Rizzoli and Isles series and 5 from Marcia Muller's Sharon McCone series. Oh well, at least I've whittled them down a bit and learned that I don't enjoy the series as much as I thought I would.

As for my attempted reading of Shamus Award nominees, gack, complete fail. This requires a total rethink or, at least, a bit more care required when making my selections. Never have I strung together so many 2 and 3 star ratings. And I think I'm a pretty lenient judge.

Of course, running-wise it was a slam-dunk success. I ran every day in 2023 for a total of 5181 km. My running streak currently stands at 556 days in a row. (Well short of my longest streak of 1315 days in a row).

Now I'll have a think about what I hope to do in 2024.

Wow Damo, I think you've done exceptionally well under the circumstances. I noticed there were a couple of challenges (annuals maybe?) that you hadn't marked off, so you're welcome to do that if you want.

As for your running!!! Well done! Astronomical effort! Just for interests sake, where do you run? Designated tracks, up and down mountains...?

Ah yes, I'd better see to those annual challenges. I'm very much in "catching up on things" mode at the moment.

For the most part I run around city streets, although I'm in the Sutherland Shire so I also do a bit of trail running through the Royal National Park.

Damo wrote: "Ah yes, I'd better see to those annual challenges. I'm very much in "catching up on things" mode at the moment.

For the most part I run around city streets, although I'm in the Sutherland Shire so..."

Legend!

Damo wrote: "Ah yes, I'd better see to those annual challenges. I'm very much in "catching up on things" mode at the moment.

For the most part I run around city streets, although I'm in the Sutherland Shire so..."

Amazing Damo! That's something for you to be proud of!

Nah...anyone can live in the Sutherland Shire 😁

Lol!!!