Nothing But Reading Challenges discussion
Tower Teams XI
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Team Obelisk of Axum
Welcome to Tower Teams XI: Around the World!
In this year's edition of TT, we're travelling around the globe – so get ready to explore countries from all over the world!
Start: Saturday, 17 May, 9am UTC
End: Sunday, 17 August, 9am UTC
Countdown to start: https://www.timeanddate.com/countdown...
Points
- less than 100 pages = 0 points
- 100 to 1000 pages = 0.1 points/page
- over 1000 pages = 100 points
- for audio only books, the page count will be set as 100, no matter how long the audio is
Rules
- books must be over 100 pages
- audiobooks are allowed. use the "default" GR book page numbers. if there is no print/ebook, then the audio book must be longer than 3 hours
- books with MPGs Childrens / Kids / Poetry / Play / Graphic Novel / Illustrated / Photography / Art / Cookbook (or which have "Illustrated" in the title or an "Illustrator" contributor in the metadata) must have at least 30,000 words. if the audio is over 3 hours, the book will be long enough.
- boxed sets can't be used for one book; the books have to be shelved individually
- any book in any language is fine
- rereads are fine if it's been over 6 months since you read the book
Helpful links
- All About TTXI: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
- Planning spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
- Check word count: https://www.arbookfind.com/
- Check cover color: https://labs.tineye.com/color/
Shelves- Judy: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Christina: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Kelly: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Diane: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Jax: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Brittany: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Heli: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Trinia: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Cindy: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Gemma: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Erin: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Frida: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
- Kat: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
MINI CHALLENGES
MINI 1: Novels Around the World
- create a travel itinerary of 11 different countries.
- once an itinerary has been finished, we can start a new one. the next itinerary can only be started once the previous itinerary has been completely finished.
- countries can only be used twice.
- requirements: max. 6 easy, min. 3 midlevel, min. 2 hard
- Levels: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
- there are more point for harder countries
- each book read must be set for 50% or more in the selected country, verifiable that the author was born there, or clear that the country is the primary subject matter of the nonfiction book
- fantasy settings of real countries are allowed (i.e. Korean-inspired fantasy would work for South Korea)
- contemporary borders are what counts to determine in which country the book takes place
- books cannot be banked
- if you're reading travel guides, do make sure the guide hits the minimum word count (30k)!
MINI 2: Travelling Around the World
- 100 tasks, we only see 10 at a time
- once a task has been completed, a new one will appear on our spreadsheet
- we can use any book that the team has read since the beginning of the challenge (i.e. books CAN be banked)
- specific settings: books with an alternate universe/reality are allowed
- series substitutions for shelves/lists are allowed
MINI 3: World Wheel
- 24 countries placed on a wheel, each has a set of tasks assigned
- we have two active countries at a time
- once a set of country tasks is completed, we get a new wheel spin for a new country (and set of tasks)
- books cannot be banked
BONUS: Say Cheese!
- spell out the cheese randomly thrown at our team
- unknown deadline (but might be soon!)
- books can be banked, but must be finished after the first cheese was thrown (= 20 May)
- this is an additional bonus challenge -> books can be used for this in addition to the regular 3 minis!
BOM / Book of the Month discussion
participating in the BOM discussions is an amazing - and fun! - way to collect bonus points for the team! there are even more bonus points in store for those who write discussion questions, so feel free to volunteer for that if you plan on reading a BOM! if you've never written DQs before and are nervous about it, don't worry - just give a shout in the team thread and we can help brainstorm questions
Points
- writing a day's worth of discussion questions = 40 points
- participating in a current BOM (participating in discussion) = 20 points
- for your participation to count, you must answer at least 3 sets of DQs
- you must finish the book after the start of Tower Teams, and within one month of the BOM starting
May
starts 18 May: What the River Knows by Isabel Ibañez - discussion thread: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
June
starts 2 June: Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry - discussion thread
starts 16 June: The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters - discussion thread
July
starts 2 July: My Friends by Fredrik Backman - discussion thread
starts 16 July: The Sword of Kaigen by M.L. Wang - discussion thread
August
starts 2 August:
CURRENT TASKS
Mini 1
Easy countries:
(view spoiler)
Midlevel countries
(view spoiler)
Hard countries
(view spoiler)
Planning/Tracking Spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...Helpful links for countries (please always double check a suggested book actually works for this challenge):
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
https://www.travelbybooks.com/countries
https://www.tripfiction.com/
https://readaroundtheworldchallenge.c...
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/group...
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Hi hello and welcome to Tower Teams XI! I’m Judy (she/her), from Germany, and I’m excited to be your captain for this round of TT! The mini challenges this year are some of my favorite formats and I’m super excited to start unveiling more tasks and spin that wheel. There’s a tl;dr on the rules above in the pinned posts, but it’s always worth checking out the official rules here: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/... (pay special attention to the individual reading cap rule!)I see we have some familiar faces - lovely to see you again! - and also some people I haven’t played with before - it’s so nice to meet you! If you have any questions about how the challenge works (it can look a bit intimidating, especially as we’re starting with 3 mini challenges all at once), just ask here in the team thread and we’ll do our best to answer!
A few things about me: I have two cats who are sooooo cute but they live at my parents’ (luckily just around the corner from where I live), I’m super into sports (and work in football so I’ve got a busy few months ahead with finals, the club world cup, and the women’s European championship), and I love to sew and knit, and unfortunately the knitting has really cut into my reading time over the past few months (though I have at this point figured out how to read while knitting).
And since this is a challenge about traveling the world: What’s the last place you went? What’s the next place you’ll go? Any dream trips? I’m actually heading to Madrid for the week tomorrow morning - if you have any recommendations, I’d love to hear them!
Please say hi, introduce yourselves and share a link to your challenge shelf!
My shelf: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Hi everyone! Judy's in Madrid and Christina will be gone a couple of days, but she'll be here most of the time and we'll all be back in time to start I think. I'll be here all along and will try to answer any questions you have. You can call me Kelly and my pronouns are she/her. I live in the Pacific Northwest, specifically in Seattle. I love dogs, books, sewing and my friends and family, in particular my granddaughter. I take care of her once every 4 to 6 weeks for around 4 to 5 days. I'll still check in every day, just probably only once or twice. I'll let you know well in advance when I'll be less accessible. (The next time will be the week of June 15th.)
The last place I traveled to was Spokane, WA, but the last international was Canada which is only a couple of hours away and before that was India. I recommend southern Africa, though. My dream trip is to the Galapagos. My next big trip with probably be to Melbourne to visit my sister. I just renewed my passport, yay!
My favorite book is The Jesus Incident by Frank Herbert. I mostly read M/M Romance right now and my favorite M/M book is Zero at the Bone.
I would love to hear your favorites and any you recommend, particularly ones that take place outside of the main English-speaking countries.
Here is my Tower shelf.
Hello everyone,I'm Jax and it looks like I live in a small town just north of Kelly. I have 4 dogs and 2 cats and spend a ridiculous amount of my spare time vacuuming. I just got back from a trip to San Diego for work. I try to go camping every other week somewhere in Washington and Oregon so if I'm gone on a weekend that's probably the explanation.
My dream trip is such a reflection of the last thing I read. I think it's Australia at the moment, but honestly if you handed me a ticket to almost anywhere I'd go.
My favorite book is probably A Confederacy of Dunces. Lately I've been reading a lot of history, memoir, cozy thriller and sci fi.
I recently read a couple of mysteries set in Thailand The Axe Factor is the first in the series.
My tower shelf: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Hi team :) I'm Christina (she/her) and I live in Austria. I'm one of your co-captains for this challenge and as I work as a waitress I'm online at random hours throughout the day (although weekends are the busiest times for me obviously).As Kelly said I will be gone for a couple of days this week as well - going to London for two concerts of one of my all time favourite artists, and I also have at least one musical planned already for only two days that I will be there lol. It's going to be busy and I'm not going to lie, I've also struggled with feeling quite anxious about this trip the last couple of hours (hadn't even booked my hotel yet oops!) but realistically speaking I know that everything will be alright in the end. Unfortunately anxiety is just something that I have to deal with on occasion, especially before travelling which is a shame because I actually do love to travel and explore new places!
My dream trip would be to New York or to Norway, and obviously they're quite different from each other, but I've always had a fascination with NYC (and Australia too, but it's so just so frickin far away!!!!), and my great grandma was actually Norwegian + I love the nature and little houses there so I would love to see it all for myself one day :)
Going back to London- I'll have almost 12 hours to kill on Day 1 (if I don't end up going to another show like The Devil Wears Prada perhaps), does anybody have any recs on what I could do?
My shelf: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Kelly (Maybedog) wrote: "I would love to hear your favorites and any you recommend, particularly ones that take place outside of the main English-speaking countries."Most books I consume are set in the western world, but last month I actually read one that was mainly set in Brazil, Ghana and Nigeria. The author was born in Accra, Ghana so if I had known this TT would be set on exploring various countries I would have waited to read it :P The Deep Blue Between
Howdy y’all! I’m Trinia and I’ve played before but can’t tell you how many times 🤪 I live in Texas, nearby Dallas but am currently visiting my parents in Florida. So there’s my travels, hanging with my 80 yr old folks. No other trips planned but my dream trip is to return to Italy for 2-3 weeks to stay in a village or square and really absorb the culture. (And wine!). My reading has been less lately due to work, such a drag so I’m hoping to get sparked by this challenge. Haven’t looked over the mini’s yet but will have time tomorrow… and maybe finish a book.
I look forward to hearing about everyone else’s adventures these next few weeks.
Ciao! For now 🤠
Hi all! I'm Diane and I also live in TX. I'm not much of a traveler IRL or in books so I'm a little concerned about the mini challenge.I do work M-F so often can't check GoodReads until the end of the day. I have done this challenge almost every time.
My shelf is tt11
Hello everyone! My name is Cindy and I live in Colorado with my Husband and 2 little girls. I work in a hospital pharmacy. I pretty much read anything and everything except horror, that being my least favorite. I do read more romance than anything. I don’t really travel IRL or in books too. Last place I went was Las Vegas, New Mexico to visit family and get Hatch green chili. I would love to travel all over the world at some point in the future, hopefully.
My shelf: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Hi everyone, thanks for checking in so quickly! Only 3 more people missing :)🚩 Here's our planning/tracking sheet where Judy and I already logged two books that we plan on reading as an example https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
There's the main tab called "Books" in which we're asking you to enter the books you're planning to read soon-ish, with as much information as you can give us at that point. Once you finish the book, you add the read date, and go over the mini options again and update with everything else the book works for - especially what's currently needed since there's no banking books this time round which makes TTXI a bit harder in my opinion.
If you're planning to participate in the BOM, please add the books to the "BOM" tab too, where we're also asking for the links to your discussion participations.
New BOMs will always be shared in the team thread, + Judy will keep her msg 7 post updated as well. (Reminder that we also get points for participating in BOM discussions!)
🚩 Page counts:
- BOMs have official page counts.
- Apart from BOMs you have to use the page count of the edition of the book you're reading (‼️and make sure that that's the edition you're adding to your Goodreads shelf!)
- If you're listening to the audiobook (or reading a large print version), use the default edition page count.
- If you're reading a children's book/cookbook/anything else that needs a verified word count (see Rules or msg 4), add that info in column O (e.g.: "arbookfind: 39945 words" or "audible: 5:30h")
The tracking sheet should be pretty self-explanatory, but if you still have questions don't hesitate to ask, and if anything doesn't work for some reason please let us know, we're only human too :') You hould all have editing access, but sometimes Google is weird so do let us know if it doesn't work.
Luckily there's only one mini challenge (Mini 1 - Novels Around the World) which actually requires us to read for specific countries (except for a few other tasks in the other minis), and not everyone has to contribute to each mini challenge, but I personally think it's nice to have minis like these ones to give us a little push to read outside of our comfort zone and broaden our horizons. It's always fun to go on the hunt for books that might work and you possibly have never even heard of! I personally like snooping in other team's threads or spreadsheets if looking for inspiration or something new to read ;)... and look what I found by randomly opening up just one other team thread -
websites to help us find books for our travels around the globe! (thx Three Pagodas ;D)
https://www.travelbybooks.com/countries
https://www.tripfiction.com/
Hi guys! I'm Heli and live in Finland with my husband and two adult sons. I'm a practical nurse and work in shifts, so I don't have regular working hours.I mostly prefer domestic travel. We have a lot of beautiful nature resorts to visit. The last time I was abroad was in Gdansk, Poland a couple of years ago. Sweden and Norway will be our next destinations, when we get to have our vacation at the same time. not this year, though. I don't care for beach vacations. I like sightseeing and visiting interesting museums. Museum of the Second World War in Gdans was amazing.
My shelf: tt25
Welcome everyone! :) Lovely to meet you all - and greetings from Madrid!
I'll actually be heading to Switzerland for at least two weeks later during this challenge (for work) and then I'm trying to plan a trip in early August (to recover from working straight through June and July) - a couple of years ago I went to Denmark with a friend and we've talked about doing that again...
Jax wrote: "My dream trip is such a reflection of the last thing I read. I think it's Australia at the moment, but honestly if you handed me a ticket to almost anywhere I'd go."Hahaha I totally feel you - I once read a book set in (on?) Tobago and spent the next few weeks trying to figure out a trip there! (Might have to think about that again at some point...)
Trinia wrote: "No other trips planned but my dream trip is to return to Italy for 2-3 weeks to stay in a village or square and really absorb the culture. (And wine!). "That used to be our family summer vactions... we were in this tiny village in the middle of nowhere that wasn't touristy at all and we were just hanging out, eating so much good food, going to all the little local (mostly food) festivals in the summer... ah I miss it so much 🥲
Hi everyone, I've played with many of you, or had you play in my own challenges over in FLOAB group. I'm Brittany, single mother of 1 skin child and 4 furchildren. My son is graduating 8th grade this week, and already enrolled in Summer basketball and M-Th Football camps plus all of the college computer camps. I have 2 rescue cats, a long-bodied floofer with minor brain damage names Mrs. Clawdia Nesbitt. And a slinky black cat that walked into my house one day named Stevie Nyx. My doggos are also both currently rando rescue dogs. A miniature dachshund min/pin mix names Comet and a Plott Hound/Staffie Mix named Maya.
I work with computers for my day job but I also do sports, concert, and event photography for the local area. I am hoping to open an Etsy shop soon with my son. Life has been a bit hectic with all of the government stuff going on and my contract is about to lose pay so I am job hunting right now.
I read all of the genres, but my favorites are Speculative Fiction, Psych Thrillers, realistic Fiction, True Crime, Historical Fiction that is evenly paced, and Biography/Memoirs.
The last place I traveled I am sure was somewhere for sports. I drive a LOT with sports. I think it was the District Track Meet in Jim Ned, another city in Texas.
My next out of state trip will be to visit my mom in Oregon in July. I currently live in west central Texas desert but am originally from Montana.
Link to my shelf: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Here's another link to look for books tagged (in this case) North Korea (which is a country in the 'Hard' category in Mini 1): https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...To search for other countries, just edit the URL and change 'north-korea' to the country you're looking for.
Does anyone else here read M/M? I have links for that genre but I won't but them here if no one is interested.
Hi everyone!I'm Gemma, I'm from Essex in the UK.
Really looking forward to starting this and hoping it gives me a bit of a push to get back to reading more! I love thrillers and horror, massive Stephen King fan BUT I'll give most genres a try :)
Shelf: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...
Welcome everyone! I'm very excited to get to know all of you! I'm very accessible as a person and on here. Message me any time about anything. I'm happy to help with anything. I'm a Goodreads librarian so if you see a problem with a book, let me know.
I went through the list for the mini 1 itinerary and I came up with 10 level medium books and 8 level hard books I can use. Most of them aren't that many pages, though, like 200-250. But some have a lot more. I haven't gone through the easy ones yet.
Kelly (Maybedog) wrote: "Does anyone else here read M/M? I have links for that genre but I won't but them here if no one is interested."I've read one romance and a few urban fantasy M/M
I read pretty much anything, but I don't seek out any specific sexuality.
Currently in the coach in London and since they have free WiFi here I think this is the perfect time to ask if you've already thought about what you're going to read this TT, or at least figured out what your first read is gonna be? :)I've got both The Inheritance and Alex and Eliza (can't link because I'm on the app unfortunately) out from the library - already added both to the planning sheet (linked above) - and Inside Out by Demi Moore should be coming through any day now as well.
I can't plan that far in advance, I read 99% library books using Libby (digital and audio) and some physical library books.
Hello from the café of the Prado! We spent the past couple of hours looking at SO much art and are now taking a well-deserved break.I’ll be picking the BOM up at the start of the challenge and I’m not quite sure about what else yet - I’ve got a couple of library books out which are options, and I also bought two books earlier today at the Secret Kingdoms, the English bookstore in Madrid
ohh that reminds me, I got a notification from my library that the BOM is available somewhere between two WiFi spots haha
aw naurr I just saw days for DQs have already been allocated :(
Christina wrote: "aw naurr I just saw days for DQs have already been allocated :("yeah :( felt like really early... I really gotta use some tokens in June, I saw I had more than I thought
Hi all, sorry for the quiet over here. I had some family issues to clear up but things are okay right now so I'm back.I've got my harness on, my ropes checked, my carabiners and pitons handy and even a helmet in case I fall which is very probable. My backpack full of books is on my back. I'm all set for our ascent! How about you?
I'm trying to finish the books I already have going so I'll be ready. And I finally got around to reading the instructions for the mini and now I have questions:1-Generally, do you want us to reserve tasks or would you prefer we only record them once done? Or will it vary depending on the mini? Especially for the Travelling mini, would it make sense to reserve?
2-Books can not be banked for World Wheel, but can be for the Travelling mini, what about Novels around the world?
3-For Novels Around the World. If an author is from a given country (say India) and the book is set in a different country (say England), can it be used for either? (I'm reading this: set in a different country, written by an author born in the country, or a nonfiction book where events in the country are the primary subject of the book.)
Excellent questions (not that there are any bad ones--all questions are good)! 1. I'm going to let the other mods answer this one since it can vary per game and group.
2. Books cannot be banked for Mini 1, novels around the world.
3. Either. It must be set for 50% or more in the selected country, or the author was born there, or the country is the primary subject matter of the nonfiction book.
Excellent. I'm not generally into the BOTM so it's really great when other players on our team are. Great points.
I had it on my TBR already usually I don't get any haha
Jax wrote: "1-Generally, do you want us to reserve tasks or would you prefer we only record them once done? Or will it vary depending on the mini? Especially for the Travelling mini, would it make sense to reserve?"It's very helpful to know which books are being read that fit for which tasks. So we would appreciate if you could add books you know you're going to read to the spreadsheet - the earlier the better - and which tasks they work for (obviously, these can be added to later!)
While claiming tasks is much appreciated, it's not really necessary for most spell-out letters (except for X, Z, Q, U, O, and maybe I). We probably don’t have to make much of an effort to actively plan out spell-outs and claim those, so no need to read books specifically "for" letters!
Mini 1 will require concrete planning ahead. There are more points for the harder countries, so while we only "must" read 2 of those for each itinerary (3 for midlevel), there's a lot to be gained if we go the extra mile. Also there are way more hard countries than easy so at some point we'll have only hard ones left anyway ;)
I'm sure we'll have more thoughts on this eventually but this is what I've got right now
How have 13 hours passed? I've just been reading, catching up on email, made some phones calls...wow can I be oblivious or what! So should we talk about Mini1 right now, here? Or should we just enter books in the spreadsheet? I can read for more countries than I put myself in for, but I don't want to take them all if other people can do some.
But in the genre I mostly read, the books tend to be comparatively short, under 300 pages (with the notable exception of T.J. Klune). So I'm willing to take more difficult tasks like the medium and hard levels of countries.
Just under a day and a half: One day, eleven hours, 25 minutes... 24...
Nothing But Reading Challenges
Books mentioned in this topic
The Grandest Game (other topics)The Grandest Game (other topics)
Wrapped In Rain (other topics)
Wrapped In Rain (other topics)
Wrapped In Rain (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Walter Wangerin Jr. (other topics)Jane Smiley (other topics)
Fredrik Backman (other topics)
M.L. Wang (other topics)
Bill Bryson (other topics)
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Team Members
• Judy Captain
• Christina Co-Captain
• Kelly Co-Captain
• Diane
• Jax
• Brittany
• Heli
• Trinia
• Cindy
• Gemma Hazle
• Erin
• Frida
• Kat
Team Spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
Challenge Status: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...