Take It or Leave It Challenge - November 2011 - Page 1

Continued from here.

For those new to this challenge: More info and monthly index can be found in post #1 of this thread or this TIOLI FAQS wiki.

Simple directions for posting to the wiki can be found at the bottom of each month's wiki page.


...logo by cyderry
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After last month challenging challenge to myself, I needed a frivoulous challenge for a change. Here's what I want you to do in November. Your challenge is to read a book with at least one animal mentioned on page 50 of your book. Why page 50? A bit of numerology here: a=1, n=14, i=9, m=13, a=1, l=12.

Check to see what you can find, and list your chosen book(s) like this:

Cherry (cockroach/crow/snake) – Mary Karr - kidzdoc
Lizard (eel/lizard)– Banana Yoshimoto – SqueakyChu
The Tattooed Girl (bee) – Joyce Carol Oates - lyzard

You may use embedded words, even those that include more than one word in your book’s narrative. Some examples:
(1) “He was playing the piano…” = wasp
(2) “…and with calmer asperity added…” = asp
(3) “to the bathroom on the upstairs floor” = bat

You may add a shared read at any time even if your edition has no animal on page 50. Just use the animals from the book you’re matching.

Try to find as many hidden/embedded animals as you can on page 50 and list them all! Be on the lookout for short animal words, such as ant, bee, cat, cow, dog, ewe, fly, pug, rat, sow, etc.

Look for some non-traditional animals. For example, the human names Robin and Martin are both birds. Hey! Even an ass is an animal. :) See how many animals you can find on that one page!

I’ll start a separate thread so you can tell us a bit about how you detected the names of animals on page 50. Some will be elusive! Surprise us with your stories…and have fun.

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Other Fun Stuff (not part of the TIOLI challenge):

1. The November 2011 TIOLI Meter - Some challengers use this page to track which challenges they're doing.
2. I Know I'm a TIOLI Addict When... - Frog Logo is on this page!

Wiki Index:

Challenges #1-6
1. Read a book with at least one animal mentioned on page 50 - thread
2. Read a book written by a Native American author for Native American Heritage Month - thread
3. Read a book found by mashing 2 tags (one seldom-used tag; one much-used tag) from any 75er's tag page. - thread
4. Read a book where the author's name is a profession - thread
5. Read a book about friendship
6. Read a book that someone has written in - thread

Challenges #7-12
7. Read a book with a musical instrument in the title
8. Read a book by an author from whom you have previously read EXACTLY one other book
9. Read a book Reviewed and Recommended by a Fellow 75er during the month of October 2011
10. Read a book originally written in a language that is NOT a lingua franca
11. Read a book with a flower in the title
12. Read a mystery published before you were born

Challenges #13-18
13. Read a book in a series that's next in number to the book above
14. Read a book, fiction or non-fiction about a journalist or about journalism
15. Read a book with a piece of jewellery in the title
16. Read a novel or novella with titled chapters
17. Read a book with a celestial body in the title
18. Read a book by an author who is a member of LibraryThing

No more new challenges unil the December challenges arrive. Thanks!

Ooh, I'm first to find the new thread! Off to check page 50 of lots of books!

:)

I knew Madeline would create this thread today!

My challenge is to Read a book written by a Native American author for Native American Heritage Month. The book can be fiction, nonfiction, poetry, etc., and written by a living or deceased author. Books about Native Americans written by non-Native Americans do not count. I'll create a thread, with some suggestions of authors to read, but I would encourage everyone, whether they are participating in this challenge or not, to list recommended books written by Native American authors.

Animal on page 50...off to check.

TagMash Challenge:

Short and simple instructions:

Read a book found by doing a TagMash using tags from your own or another member's tag page. Choose one infrequently used tag and one tag with very frequent uses. Quantity is not specified since tag frequencies vary member to member. Note the tags. (PS: If you've chosen someone's tag page who uses prefixes/codes attached to their tags: On the challenge wiki, when you note the tags, you may note the simple version of the tag.)

Recap: TagMash Challenge: Mash 2 tags (one seldom-used tag; one much-used tag) from any 75er's tag page. (Note the tags.)

Thread (and more detailed instructions, should you need them) here.

> 5

I knew Madeline would create this thread today!

LOL! Mind-reader!!

> 5

I *so* recommend any book by Sherman Alexie for Darryl's challenge. _Zoe_ and I had the good fortune to be entertained by this absolutely hilarious author at the National Book Festival here in DC last month. I have Alexie's book, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian wishlisted. If I get hold of a copy before the end of the month, this one is gfor sure oing into Darryl's challenge.

> 6

Wow, Cindy, have you been doing your homework! (See her separate thread, folks.)

What if I never put up a November, 2011 TIOLI challenge page at all?! ;)

#4 Read a book where the author's name is a profession

Embedded or compound is fine as are titles (King, President, Captain.) Check here if you have any questions.

Some possibles for me:

Ghost Story by Jim BUTCHER
Four Past Midnight by Stephen KING
Ragtime by E. L. DOCTORow
Prospero in Hell by L. Jagi LAMPLIGHTER

And the thread for questions:
http://www.librarything.com/topic/125836

Hi Morphidae - For challenge 4 (Read a book where the author's name is a profession), may I use Philip K. Dick, as in Dick = slang for a detective? I won't be hurt if this is not allowed.

Sure! Slang terms are fine.

Yahoo, great way to start my morning! Since November is the start of 2 months of holidays in the US my challenge #5 Read a book about friendship. I'm including even not so nice friendships, so I go from Let's Take the Long Way Home to Mystic River to Elizabeth and Hazel. These are my planned reads:

All Is Vanity - Christina Schwarz
Annie Freeman's Fabulous Traveling Funeral - Kris Radish
The Ball and the Cross G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Country of the Pointed Firs - Sarah Orne Jewett
Crossing to Safety - Wallace Earle Stegner
Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock - David Margolick
Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind - Paula Kamen
In the Fold - Rachel Cusk
Let's Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship - Gail Caldwell
Mystic River - Dennis Lehane
The Wednesday Sisters - Meg Waite Clayton

#12 - Great - thanks!

My challenge is to read a book that someone has written in - it can be margin notes, a dedication, their name in the front, or even some underlining.

How do you feel about writing in your books? I know some people think it's pure vandalism... I like it when I pick up a book which someone has written in because I like to imagine the book passing through other hands than mine.

> 15

I was annoyed about receiving a used copy of Emma with writing in it...until now that it fits your challenge...and I'll know I'll never finish it for my own challenge of October. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

In answer to your question, I like personal writing in the front of the book (especially the author's signature!!), but I don't like writing within the text of a book.

Since I'm a Bookcrosser, others think I deface too many books intentionally by pasting labels in them or on them, but my feeling is that, if the book is my own, I can do what I want to it. I rarely write in a book, though, other than to write down a Bookcrossing ID number.

A total exception to my own rule is cookbooks. I write all over them. If I never wrote in them, how would I know which recipes work and which don't ... or what tweaks they need?!

15: Does it have to be someone else? What I need to do for this one is try to find some of my signed books - perhaps the anthology inspired by a Bruce Springsteen song which has at least 3 signatures. Though some are a bit chunky to carry around.

13: I like this challenge!

As for Madeline's challenge, I'm going to be busy later examining my library books etc.

In honor of my 10-year old niece starting violin lessons, my challenge (#7) is to read a book with a musical instrument in the title.

Madeline, at the moment there are pages for #1-5 and #7-12. How about #6?

#19 Oops, I thought I saw a challenge #6 posted already. I'll try to move my #7 back to #6.

Sorry for skipping.

ETA: Oops, there is a challenge #6 already. As Emily Litella used to say: Never mind.

I like to write in books. I underline things and write in the margins. I like to read the notes other people have made. When I read I and Thou I found it very difficult and enjoyed the notes the previous owner had made. I kind of had a conversation with him through his writing and my thoughts.

#13 I LOVE that challenge on friendship. I was thinking of doing some topical reading on friendship after I finish my 11 in 11 challenge (probably by mid-November) so this'll give me plenty of ideas.

Thanks Linda. I'm a bit of a hermit, but this is the season I can kind of feel that joy of associating with others.

> 15

wandering_star, I moved your challenge to page #1 of the wiki (in case you're looking for it!). :)

> 19

at the moment there are pages for #1-5 and #7-12. How about #6?

I must have numbered something wrong. I'll go take a look at it! Thanks.

> 20

Oops, there is a challenge #6 already. :)

Beat ya! :)

#16 - always happy to be of help!

I agree with you about cookbooks although a couple of times I have accidentally written in other peoples', and it turned out they didn't like it so much.

I suspect that 80% of my comments are either 'try adding cumin next time' or 'needs lemon juice'.

A friend of mine says that the one kind of book she never buys secondhand is a cookbook, because if it's good, it'll be full of splattered food and scrawled comments, and if it's pristine it can't be any good!

#17 - signed books are fine

#20 - sorry, that was me, I moved my challenge because I thought I had put it on the wrong page

#21 - sometimes the comments/underlining can tell their own story - particularly if someone has done a LOT of underlining for the first 30 pages and then clearly given up on the book. But my favourite example was once reading a book that was really terrible, and finding a previous reader had written a short, sharp negative comment (which I will leave to your imaginations) on the last page. I had to add, "I agree"!

> 27

I suspect that 80% of my comments are either 'try adding cumin next time' or 'needs lemon juice'.

:)

finding a previous reader had written a short, sharp negative comment (which I will leave to your imaginations) on the last page

Love it!

A few years ago, I bought a copy of a book in Cambridge Oxfam written by my grandfather, Closing Times by Dan Davin, which was his reminiscences of other writers. I lent it to someone who was reading about one of the writers in the book, Julian Maclaren-Ross, and when she gave it back she pointed out that someone had got very irate about the first piece in the book, about Enid Starkie, and written cross little notes all over it. I will look them up tonight for some quotes if I can find the book, they're funny even if you know nothing about Ms Starkie.

> 29

That would be fun...to share the writing in a book. I'll go back and look in my own book for anything worthwhile to share.

In addition, if an author signs a book , it would also be fun to share what the author wrote in the book!

Could we have a separate thread for this?

Writing in a book?!? Eek. I do have some autographed books though.

I am loving looking for books under the tagmash challenge. I never knew you could do this. I enjoy learning about new (to me) LT features.

> 31

I enjoy learning about new (to me) LT features.

Excellent!

I love the friendship challenge! I did a lot of reading about this about 15-20 years ago when I was writing a dissertation about it, and have bought a few books on related themes since but not got round to reading them. The perfect incentive!

I tend not to write in fiction books, but I enjoy finding comments from previous readers, especially if they are intelligent ones! And I love to find dedications and other inscriptions in the front cover. I don't like finding heavy underlining in ballpoint though. With non-fiction books that I'm reading for professional purposes, I often use pencil to mark in the margins something significant - normally just a vertical line alongside the relevant passage.

#30, Madeline, your wish is my command... thread for 'things written in books' is here.

> 34

your wish is my command...

Thanks!

A lot of fun challenges up already.

Madeline, now you must KNOW how pleased I am by your challenge this month. Since I listen to a lot of audiobooks though, I'd like to suggest something:

Since the general consensus seems to be that 2 mins audio = 1 printed page, how would you feel if we allowed to search from minutes 25-27 100-102 for animal names? Of course, this would make it a lot harder to find embedded words, but it would at least open up the challenge to that format too. Completely up to you of course!

#6 Oh Cindy, I LOVE LOVE LOVE your challenge. Especially since I'm positively mad about tagging, and had been thinking of using tag mashing as a theme for my 12/12 challenge, just didn't know that's what it was called! I'll be off search through LTers tags today for sure. :-)

By the way, kudos on your step-by-step explanations, couldn't be any clearer!

#15 I like it when I pick up a book which someone has written in because I like to imagine the book passing through other hands than mine.

That's precisely the reason why I don't like to see any writing in my books. It took me a long time to come around to buying used books and using the public library because I was grossed out thinking about all the germs that could be passed on with books. For that reason, I'm not sure if I'll find anything to fit this challenge. There was a time when I used to write my name on the front page, before I knew better (i.e. I often pass on my books to 2nd hand booksellers who pay better for unmarked books). Would that count too?

#16 Madeline, looks like I nave no excuse NOT to read Emma along with you in November after all! ;-)

I'm a lot more keen on it now that I know I've got Liz's wonderful comments to base myself on as I read along with your annotated threads!

#21 Good point Joyce, I never thought of it that way before.




I'm sure I'll want to come up with a challenge of my own to fit in whatever book(s) don't match up with those challenges already posted, but I'll wait and see!

eta: oops, brain freeze up there with the maths!

I just posted a challenge that was inspired by the "favorite living authors" meme:

Read a book by an author from whom you have previously read EXACTLY one other book. Include the name of the previously read other book.

I'm hoping this will give me a chance to pursue some authors with whom my first experience was wonderful, but that I've never pursued further.

#37 I like that challenge. Oftentimes, I read books in one series by a mystery author but not those in his/her other series.

This'll give me incentive to give the other series a try, too.

>37 AnneDC: Good idea, Anne! Does the author have to be currently alive?

>39 kidzdoc: Nope--for this purpose, any author, dead or alive, is fine.

>40 AnneDC: Thanks; off to check...

#37 Oooohh, how perfect Anne! I've just reserved a copy of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt's latest novel La femme au miroir and was wondering what challenge I'd have to come up with to make it a TIOLI read! He's published in English too of course and is definitely worth looking up!

Challenge #9 Read a book Reviewed and Recommended by a Fellow 75r in October 2011.

I have raised this challenge because one of the best things about LT for me is sharing and receiving information on the books we are all reading. If the recommendation is not to read the book at all costs this wouldn't count!

I'll read Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes for Anne's challenge, after reading The Sense of an Ending earlier this year. If I have time I'll consider reading Broken Verses by Kamila Shamsie (I loved her most recent novel Burnt Shadows), or Cheating at Canasta by William Trevor (I read his novel Love and Summer a couple of years ago).

> 36

Since the general consensus seems to be that 2 mins audio = 1 printed page, how would you feel if we allowed to search from minutes 25-27 100-102 for animal names? Of course, this would make it a lot harder to find embedded words, but it would at least open up the challenge to that format too.

I thought about it and much prefer to limit my challenge to printed books. Half the fun is scouring page 50 for embedded words. As long as real printed books are still not that hard to find, let's just go with that. Eventually we might have to make to make adjustments.Additionally, I don't know that everyone would "know" what constitutes page 50 on audio.

Some e-readers give page numbers, I believe, but others don't. Let's limit this challenge to e-readers that give a clear page number. If you can set page numbers on your e-readers (to adjust font size, for example), set your font size before you view page 50. No cheating! :)

Ooh, the November thread.

I've added American Gods by Neil Gaiman to countrylife's tagmash challenge - was there going to be a group read this month? Neil in November? I can't remember where it was discussed...

And I think calm should get a special mention for finding so many animals on p50 of her choice for Madeline's challenge with The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart.

> 36

I was grossed out thinking about all the germs that could be passed on with books.

Well, with all the used books I already own, I'm either soon going to come down with a severe illness, or I have already developed antibodies against all those germs. :)

> 37

Read a book by an author from whom you have previously read EXACTLY one other book.

Heh! Recently I was thinking about your exact same challenge. You beat me to it, of course!

> 36

I'm a lot more keen on it now that I know I've got Liz's wonderful comments to base myself on as I read along with your annotated threads!

Liz's comments and instruction are so wonderful. I'm enjoying them more than the book, in fact! :)

> 43

If the recommendation is not to read the book at al costs this wouldn't count!

LOL!!

> 46

And I think calm should get a special mention for finding so many animals on p50 of her choice for Madeline's challenge with The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart.

Think other challenger can find even more in another book? :D

For those who'll be participating in the group read this month, I've added The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern to challenge #1.

Challenge #10! Read a book that was originally written in a language that is NOT a lingua franca.

Here are the guidelines. I’m defining a lingua franca as one that has spread widely beyond its country of origin, even if (like Portuguese) it doesn’t always serve as a means of communication between people who don’t speak each other’s native language. Colonialization could have made it a lingua franca; so could the existence of a large diaspora.The following is a list of languages I consider to fall into this category:
English
French
Spanish
Portuguese
German
Russian
Chinese
Arabic
Latin
Ancient Greek
Creole
Malay

Some languages that qualify for this challenge:
Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, Icelandic, Finnish (Time to read all that Scandi-crime!)
Hungarian
Czech
Vietnamese
Japanese
Farsi
Thai
Polish
Tagalog
Afrikaans
Dutch
Catalan
Turkish
Romanian
Modern Greek
Korean
Albanian
Serbo-Croat
Lithuanian
Latvian
Indian/Pakistani languages (eg Urdu, Tamil, Hindi, rather than English)
Bulgarian
Ukrainian

I’m undecided about Hebrew. As a religious language, it’s a lingua franca, but it’s not used in daily life much outside Israel.

An amusing factoid: 94% of the world’s thousands of languages are spoken by a mere 6% of the population.
Bonus points for the most obscure languages – if you can find someone who was originally writing in Tibetan, Irish Gaelic, an African dialect (instead of English, French, Portuguese), Laotian, Armenian, Mongolian, Khmer, Basque, Romansch

Be careful: some authors have switched the language in which they write. For instance, after Kundera left Czechoslovakia, he began writing his novels in French.

#53 Love and Garbage by Ivan Klima will probably be my selection here Suzanne.

Paul (@43): When you say reviewed and recommended, are you referring to reviews posted on the Review pages and recommendations given through the Recommendations links? Or can any reviews / recommendations mentioned in these threads work for this challenge? Also, need it be BOTH recommended and reviewed?

> 53

My suggestion would be to use Hebrew for your challenge. Very few people (relatively) read Israeli authors. Very few people (again, relatively) speak Hebrew.

We are asking people to read literature, not religious text.

I'm guessing, that of all the TIOLI challengers, possibly only Smiler69 and myself speak Hebrew.

I patiently await your decision! :)

To me, it seems there is a *vast* amount of literature translated from Japanese (although I know of no one personally who speaks Japanese here where I live).

We're Hot Topic #1 on LT now! :)

Suz, I'll move Scenes from Village Life by Amos Oz to your challenge if Hebrew is permitted.

Yes, Hebrew is fine; that is kind of what I was leaning toward. If anyone vehemently objects, and has a case to make...

I'm also going to allow Italian. Aside from a few tiny pockets in places in the Alps, and the Italian-American community here that speaks it at home, it really isn't a lingua franca. I'll probably read something by Carmine Abate for that.

Hope you like Love and Garbage, Paul -- I read it early this year after it had been sitting on my shelf for decades...!

Oh, wait; Kerry is joining me in reading Scenes from Village Life on Madeline's thread. Never mind.

> 59

If anyone vehemently objects, and has a case to make...

To the contrary. I lament the fact that Hebrew literature is not more widely read by the general (that is to say, non-Jewish) public.

> 61

You did it perfectly, Samantha_kathy!

Welcome to the world of TIOLI challenge hosts! I'm so happy you jumped right in.

>62 SqueakyChu: I lament the fact that Hebrew literature is not more widely read by the general (that is to say, non-Jewish) public.

This sounds like a good topic for a future challenge. I have several books by Israeli authors, particularly Amos Oz, David Grossman and A.B. Yehoshua, that I'd like to read soon.

> 64

Amos Oz, David Grossman and A.B. Yehoshua

Those are some of my favorite authors, but, as you know, I favor modern Israeli writing.

Does David Grossman write in Hebrew originally? Not that I need to add yet another book to this challenge, which is a neat way of tidying up my galley/ARC obligations, reading some library books and finishing up some 11 in 11 categories...

>65 SqueakyChu: BTW, did you see the Charlie Rose Show last night, or this afternoon? He interviewed Amos Oz for the first 35+ minutes, and it was excellent. I saw the re-broadcast earlier this afternoon, and posted some comments about the segment and a link to it on my thread.

I'd love to join Darryl for 1Q84 this month, but I want to fit in a re-read of 1984 first, since Murakami meant his book to be a tribute to the Orwell novel (hence the title of course). Adding the latter to the tag mash challenge. Wasn't really hard to find... showed up first under fiction/dystopia, as expected :-)

eta: I'll gladly join in to read an Israeli contemporary author or two when that challenge shows up. Just hopefully it won't be THIS month, as I'm trying NOT overbooking myself, for once.

I pulled out the three books by David Grossman that I own, To the End of the Land, The Yellow Wind, and Writing in the Dark; each one was translated from Hebrew.

ETA: Writing in the Dark is only 131 pages long, so I'll add it to your challenge.

Oy, I really put my foot in my mouth. I meant to say I'd join in based on your suggestion Darryl, that we should have a TIOI challenge specifically to encourage us to read contemporary Israeli authors (which would presumable be in another month), as I really really want to try limiting my planned reads in November and see how it feels not to put all that pressure on myself!

> 66

Does David Grossman write in Hebrew originally?

I see that, here on LibraryThing, some of his book sare listed as being originally in Hebrew and others are listed under English. My suggestion for would-be readers of Grossman's books to just check to see if the book you want to read has been translated from Hebrew.

> 67

did you see the Charlie Rose Show last night

I don't watch TV (can't hear well, hubby hates closed captioning), but I'll be sure to check out the link on your thread, Darryl.

>70 Smiler69: I was thinking about an Israeli author challenge for another month, as well. I also want to limit the number of books I post for TIOLI challenges to 10, as 1Q84 is a monster of a book and because I'll have a busy month at work.

Here are my proposed 10 books for November:

1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (challenge #1)
In Red by Magdalena Tulli (challenge #1)
The Good Muslim by Tahmima Anam (challenge #1)
Everything You Know About Indians Is Wrong by Paul Chaat Smith (challenge #2)
In Mad Love and War by Joy Harjo (challenge #2)
The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich (challenge #2)
Soul Talk, Song Language: Conversations with Joy Harjo by Joy Harjo and Tanaya Winder (challenge #2)
Flaubert's Parrot by Julian Barnes (challenge #8)
Scenes from Village Life by Amos Oz (challenge #10)
Writing in the Dark: Essays on Literature and Politics by David Grossman (challenge #10)

Ah, the sweet panicky feeling that comes with finding that (i) the new TIOLI is up, and (ii) you're already 73 messages and 11 challenges behind!

After last month's convolutions, my challenge this time is pretty straightforward:

Challenge #12: Read a mystery published before you were born.

No real rules. The novel should feature a situation (not necessarily a crime) that is "solved", rather than general crime-fighting or espionage. And while I'm not going to ask anyone to put their birthdate on the wiki - we're on the honour system here - I would like people to list the original publication date of their work. I'm curious to see who gets the "youngest" book. So we can all hate them. :)

#74 Liz, would a gothic novel like The Mysteries of Udolpho count?

Oh, and by the way:

Just so happens I spent all last night dreaming about TIOLI. Horrible dreams, where I posted the wrong challenge and then couldn't get access to a computer to fix it.

This is getting out of hand...

>#75 You've caught me in a broadminded mood, so yes. Things get found out in Gothic novels, if not perhaps "solved" in the usual sense.

Challenge #13 Read a book in a series that's next in number to the book above
In other words, if the book above is the first in the series, the next book would have to be the second in a series, not necessarily the same series, just the next number. If the book is the last in the series, then the next book can be first;
Example: Murder in Miniature is the First in a series by Margaret Grace - if that is the last book in the list, then the next reader could enter A Light in the Window by Jan Karon because it is the second in the Mitford series. The next book would need to be third in any series. Be sure to indicate the series and the number (verification can be made at http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/)

Shared reads are always allowed but consecutive entries are not.

#78 -- how do you deal with open-ended series? The most recently-published book would be "last", then?

#46 - Heather, I think it was on my thread that we discussed a "Neil In November". I have added American Gods as a joint read with you, and I will bring it up on my thread again to see if anybody else is interested in reading a Neil Gaiman book in November. If there is a enough interest, I will start a separate thread.

Ah, the rewards of virtue!

I made a promise to myself over at my thread (Madeline can back me up on this) to clear my book pile without worrying so much about TIOLI...only to find that all of them are likely to fit a challenge this month... Good times!

The majority of my bought books are second-hand, and I can't say it's ever occurred to me to worry about previous owners - beyond a vague, "They're book owners, they're cool". I find lots of notes in my non-fiction, but for the fiction works it's usually confined to names and personal messages like, To John from Grandma, Christmas 1925.

I have a couple of favourite bits of book writing - one when I read The Perplex'd Prince, a political roman à clef from 1682, in electronic form from the British Library: it has the owner's name written in it (Nar. Luttrell his book 1682) and his notes all through, cracking the code of the story. Another was when I read Bestseller: The Books Everyone Read by Claude Cockburn earlier this year: where the author had written that, in order to write a bestseller, a MAN has to do this and a MAN has to do that, someone scribbled in the margin, ...or indeed a woman! :)

81>> Samantha
It doesn't matter how low the number is if it's the last in a series - for instance if you are reading a trilogy and on the last one - it is the last book in the series as well as #3 so it could follow #2 and be followed by #1. Does that make sense? I guess I better put something in there to make sure that Last in the series is noted.

>#83 So it's really a game of the cycle being broken? The numbers can continue to rise or it can start over (back to #1 in a series), by someone posting a last book?

Meaning that posting a "last book" gives two options for progression.

Sorry, just thinking out loud. :)

No, if it is the last book, the next book has to be a first book, even if it is #3 in the trilogy, #4 is not valid.
Do you think I need a separate thread?

Not necessarily, I think that clarifies it - thanks!

Liz, I just went to add to your challenge wiki, but then got to wondering instead. Perhaps it might help clarify for the person following if the one posting could mark their book as say #1/3, or something like that, so the follower doesn't have to investigate unfamiliar territory?

Uh, Cheli's challenge - I just keep butting in a lot. :)

Yes, that's a good suggestion.

whoops! Should've looked closer before jumping in with my question. Thanks!

Cheli, so, if I grab the "just out" latest book in the series and include it, it counts as the last book?

However, if I read book #24 (out of 30, say) in the Hamish MacBeth series and it's not the last one, then someone needs to include book #25 in another series?

I would think that the number's not going to get too high before someone reads the most recent one in the series.

I'm sure it's not going to be a very "flowery" book, but I added Columbine to Challenge 11 as it is the state flower of Colarado.

My challenge is Read a book about a journalist (or a group of journalists).

Books can be fiction or non-fiction - I plan to read Rachel Johnson's account of taking over as editor of The Lady magazine, and perhaps a crime novel in which the investigator is a journalist - I think I still have the final book in Jim Kelly's Philip Dryden series among my library piles

My priorities this month will be review books, shared reads and library books, especially ones that I've had out for a very long time. Some of the challenges here offer good possibilities for the last of those.

#60: Darryl - I'm happy to move the Amos Oz book to Suzanne's challenge. I'll move both our entries now.

Wow I have 5 hours sleep and there are 40 posts!

#55 Cindy - threads are certainly allowed, more interested in the recommended than the reviewed so reviewed, even in brief, on the thread is OK.

#56 Madeline if Hebrew is ok what about Yiddish - then I could look at IB Singer etc?

#61 If not a specific flower? Flowers for Algernon would be OK?

#74 Thanks lyzard now am completely spoiled for choice!

#78 If I can understand the challenge I'll definitely try. The one above means the one above on the challenge wiki?

#93 Might look at Scoop by Evelyn Waugh which I have neglected for years

>#95 It was pure self-indulgence, Paul, but I'm glad someone else is cashing in!

Before Cheli's rolling challenge goes any further, I think there's a mistake - a #3 listed after a #2 which is also "latest" - should the next one be a #1?

Lyz, you are right so I inserted a 2 but someone needs to insert a first in a series.

I also cleaned it up a bit.

If you have the latest /last in the series so far just put the number and last (#/last) so we know that first needs to come next. Yes, it may be the latest but for right now it is the last.

I think I messed up challenge #13 Rolling Series challenge

I forgot to note that it was the last/latest in the series and members after me have carried on.

I'm sorry!! I was speaking to my mum on the phone at the same time and not paying full attention *hangs head in shame*

Lisa,

Don't worry, we all have distracting mothers. Moms are more important. Besides we haven't started yet so we'll just fix it.

I have an audio version of Swan Thieves so no pages numbers. For the main challenge, does anyone have a copy and can they tell me if there is a mention of swans on page 50?

#99, I added a possible alternative #4 in an ongoing series (#5 due out shortly in the UK), if what you meant was for someone else to replace the Willis book with an alternate #4. I wasn't completely clear that was your intent, however, so will leave it up to you to fix the wiki and either remove yours or mine. If the latter, then I suppose those who posted after it will have to pause until some other people leap in and fill the gap of 1-4.

We can fix this! - I have a #1 and a #3, if anyone has a #2? :)

# I was able to get an Adobe e-pub download, and checked out page #50. No swan, there, alas, or any other obvious animals.

Unfortunately, I can't cut & paste the content, but it's the last bit of chapter 7, beginning with the words "departure from a great museum..." I'm fairly bad at detecting hidden/embedded words, but will give it a shot.

wiki is now right in line and we are waiting a #1!

#102 -- nope, just a bunch of #3s! and the #4 that I tentatively posted.

#103 -- following up, using search didn't throw up anything obvious.

> 95

About Yiddish, ask Suz (Chatterbox). That's her challenge!

> 100

Cheli, for my challenge re page 50, audiobooks cannot be accepted because they don't have pages. Stick to a real book for my challenge. Thanks!

fantastic thanks everyone for sorting it out :)

If anybody wants that #1 slot, go ahead - it's really the #3 I'm desperate to list!

I have a #2, #3 (I'll let you go first) and #9 to get in there.

If you do 1 I'll do 2 and you can have 3

I just put in a #1 on Cheli's challenge.

Go with the #2!! :)

Thanks Kidzdoc for pointing out the Charlie Rose interview with Amos Oz. I'd never heard of him. What a reasonable man, I'll be joining in the read of Scenes From Village Life if it comes from the library soon enough.

sorry lyz, I only have a 3 and 9. I used the 2 to get things straightened out.

I've just ordered Scenes From Village Life from the library. They only have the French translation, but same difference, since I doubt I could get through the original Hebrew version and understand much. Hopefully I'll be able to fit it in this month.

>#114 That's cool - Anne took care of it! :)

Sorry -- Yiddish I see very much as a lingua franca; it was the common language among the Jewish diaspora for generations, and definitely transcended national boundaries. Indeed, it's perhaps unique in being a lingua franca and NOT a national language.

Those Jews, they're so clever. Hebrew is a national language but not lingua franca while Yiddish is just the opposite.

> 118

Those Jews, they're so clever. Hebrew is a national language but not lingua franca while Yiddish is just the opposite.

Joyce, you're too funny!

I remember that, when traveling with a friend of mine through Europe, no one could ever guess what language we were speaking to each other (except for Israelis, of course). Perhaps it was our American accents mutilating our Hebrew? :)

After working 21 years in a county hospital in the southwest US I decided there are only 2 languages in the world, English and Spanish. We had a new unit clerk who spoke a language not English so I asked if she would translate some Spanish for me. She looked at me like I was crazy and told me she couldn't do that because she spoke Russian not Spanish.

> 120

Joyce, something similar happened to me as well! I worked as a visiting nurse years ago at the same home health agency for which I do quality auditing now. Whenever a phone call came into our office, someone would inevitably call me to speak Spanish with the patient on the phone. You know the rest. It was any language but Spanish, which I spoke fairly well at the time.

Once I had the good fortune, though, to receive a call from someone who spoke Hebrew! Not Spanish, but at least we were able to converse.

Now I can't even understand spoken English on the phone. :(

I can still read English text on the phone, though. :)

I'm envious of anyone who can speak/read/write a second language.

I can figure out, more or less, what the language is if it's European. Not sure I could distinguish Czech from Slovak, or Bulgarian from Serbo-Croat, though, much less Norwegian/Swedish/Danish, unless I heard one of the few Swedish words or phrases I know. With everything else, accents/the sound of the language is all that helps. Mandarin is very distinctive, but I'm not sure if I confuse Cantonese with Fujianese, for instance. And the intonation of Korean is surprisingly similar to Japanese.

I added The Big Sleep (Raymond Chandler) to the mystery novel category. I've always heard it described as "hardboiled detective fiction," but it's also tagged as a mystery, so I hope it's appropriate for the challenge. If not, feel free to let me know and I'll take it down.

For the 'number in a series' challenge, did you know you can quickly see all the books in your library that are listed as being part of a series? It's not infallible, since some 'themed collections' (eg the Canongate myths series) are also included, but it's a good quick way to check whether any of your books happen to be the 5th/7th/23rd in a series!

This is the link, just insert your LT name in the right place:
http://www.librarything.com/profile/YOURNAME/stats/series

I didn't know that, wandering_star. I've always just looked at my catalogue in a view that shows series, when I need to find something like this.

Reminder:

If you host a separate TIOLI thread, please place a link to the main TIOLI thread and to the wiki page of your own challenge in message #1 of your separate thread. This is extremely helpful for those of us trying to navigate the pages of LT more easily. Thanks in advance!

Challenge no.15: Read a book with a piece of jewellery in the title

The title has to contain a piece of jewellery - ring, necklace, brooch etc.
No embedded words for this challenge, please.

(I just noticed how many books on my TBR pile have the word "ring" in the title!)

I just added Challenge #16: Read a novel or novella with titled chapters (as opposed to just numbered chapters, or no chapters at all). I think it's pretty straight-forward.

> 128

Here's my story to go along with your challenge, Athabasca:

I was just about to edit the spelling of your challenge to say: "Read a book with a piece of jewelry in the title" when I learned that "jewellery" is the British spelling of "jewelry". As my husband just said when I told him, "You speak American and Athabasca speaks English". Ha!

>130 SqueakyChu: SqueakyChu - I did think of that when I was changing the wiki - but decided I would never remember to be consistent if I adopted the US spelling. So I just stuck with my own version! :o)

> 131

I'm glad you did. I learned something new*.

Somewhere in my house I have an English-English dictionary that I bought in London many years ago. If I find it, I'll have to check to see if jewellery/jewelry is listed in there.

*This week it seems that I've learned so many new things just from being on LT and participating in various threads. Hey! This might even be better than reading! Oh, wait... It is reading. :)

Just to add the the conversation. The last 2 classics I read have spelled "tire" as "tyre". I'm thinking they are the same things, but was curious since I've never seen that spelling before!

I didn't even know that Americans spell jewellery wrong! (sorry Madeline)

Adding a request to be careful when you are editing the wiki...

Somehow, someone has signed me up to read American Gods in the tag mash challenge, and deleted the book I had planned to read (meaning that I have to go back and dig out the tags, etc.) I have roughly zero interest in reading Gaiman right now, for the record... Off the top of my head, I can't even recall the book I had chosen to read (that's what a migraine will do for you) so this is a bit annoying, even if it's accidental. I'm mentioning it because I've had to restore books to the wiki that were accidentally deleted in recent months, and even had to change the reading status a few times.

> 135

Not to worry, Suz. I found the book on the history and replaced it. It was The Distant Hours by Kate Morton. All is replaced as it originally was. No need to go back looking for more tags, etc.

Just a note to others who notice something similar. If you report it right away here on the main thread, it's very simple to go back and retrieve any information which was accidentally deleted. Just don't wait too long as it becomes harder to search through a huge backlog of entries.

Hope this helps!

Thanks Madeline! That must have been my fault. :/

Very sorry Suz if I caused you more of a headache! I wanted to do share read of The Distant Hours with you but then ended up cutting and pasting American Gods by mistake and didn't even realize that I had added the book twice.

Thanks, Madeline... I have such a massive TBR, and was combing through it looking for a book that was in the C/D spectrum that might have been on other peoples' lists & tagged to meet the challenge... Serves me right for not immediately listing all my planned reads in a Word file.

No problem, Valerie. This can happen, by mistake, of course.

The most important thing is for it to be reported here immediately so it can be fixed. Try not to get upset, anyone - unless, of course, we can't fix it! ;)

Hint: Another thing to try to do, when making entries on the wiki, is to always preview your entries before saving them. In that way you can catch any mistakes before they are saved.

> 138

Serves me right for not immediately listing all my planned reads in a Word file.

...which is not a bad idea, either, if the list is long...which yours usually is!

Problem solved! Enjoy the day, everyone.

Sad addendum note on loss of information:

This is the beauty of a wiki. I only wish that the shared spread sheet at my own work were more like a wiki. Yesterday, I made entries all day long only to have a colleague in a different room save her entries on that spread sheet on top of my own. Mine were not retrievable. :(

P.S. I keep fairly good notes during the day, so I think I was able to recreate my own information on that spread sheet back to where it was originally. At least, I hope so! :)

Nasty, that. We generally don't have that problem where I work, as only one person is allowed update at a time, as a rule. But we're moving toward more 'sophisticated' sharing - I'm sure we'll have this problem eventually. Sorry you lost your work.

In the interest of not forgetting what I've planned for the month, these are the books I've listed:

#5 All Is Vanity - Christina Schwarz
#5 Annie Freeman's Fabulous Traveling Funeral - Kris Radish
#8 Being Light - Helen Smith
#3 Catch 22- Joseph Heller Audiobook
#5 Country of the Pointed Firs - Sarah Orne Jewett Nook
#5 Crossing to Safety - Wallace Earle Stegner
#1 Disobedience - Naomi Alderman Orange Prize
#5 Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock - David Margolick library
#5 Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind - Paula Kamen
#2 Flight - Sherman Alexie audiobook
#5 Let's Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship - Gail Caldwell Nook
#2 The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven - Sherman Alexie
#1 Monty Python Live! - Eric Idle
#5 Mystic River - Dennis Lehane
#10 Scenes from Village Life - Amos Oz
#1 Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafón - Book club
#5 The Wednesday Sisters - Meg Waite Clayton Nook

I'm pretty sure this is not going to happen

> 142

If truth be told, it was my own fault. We have separate entry lines on our shared spread sheet, but I moved the "dividing line" down a few rows because I didn't know my colleague was working on the same spread sheet as I was that day. That problem will never happen again. Trust me!

> 143

In the interest of not forgetting what I've planned for the month

If others find this tactic helpful, feel free to post your reading lists on this thread as well. The upside to this is that such a list makes it more convenient for those looking to select "shared reads".

Hmmm. Now I really want to read Scenes From a Village Life, but I already have more reads than I want "listed" at this time. :(

Hey! I just noticed that, with my creation of TIOLI, I have changed the bunch of you into eclectic readers! ;)

#143 I needed to pop in my eyes after viewing your TIOLI list CJ. Good luck, I know you can do it!

I was glad to see that two of my TBRs fit into challenges this month - Sherman Alexie's The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven for the Native American challenge, and Ann Patchett's Truth and Beauty for a book about a friendship.

But, I'm scheduled to read Frankenstein for one of my f2f reading groups, and I happen to have THREE different editions of this book, and I can't find an animal on page fifty in any of them! Maybe I can find one hidden within the words. But really, to have THREE changes and have not even a birdie mentioned just doesn't seem fair.

If anyone is waiting to post a book #7 in the series challenge, let me know. I'm holding a library book that's a #8. But I suspect I'll have to keep constant watch on the list to slip it in.

> 148

1. Look for a "hen" in "when".
2. Look for a "ling" (a fish) in "smiling".
3. Look for a "sow" in "also was".
4. Look for a "bee" in "been".
5. Look for a (an?) "ewe" in "where we"

That's just in paragraph 1 and 2 of Chapter 8 (which I googled online). Is that also page 50 of one of your editions?

Remember that "embedded" animals also count toward challenge #1.

> 149 I have a #7 book to slip in--but it requires someone to get to #6

>#124 From what I know about The Big Sleep, it qualifies, Kerri.

> 150 Embedded animals: I have also found "ant"s in all kinds of words.

wow - generous help, Madeline. I'm almost sure to find one of those, or similar embedded animals in one of those editions.

124: The Big Sleep definitely counts as a mystery novel, and was published in 1939, so would qualify for anyone under 72.

#152 and 155 -Thanks for confirming that The Big Sleep is a mystery!

I've added Laura Restrepo's Leopard in the Sun to challenge #8 (something went wrong with the format of that page, I think, but I couldn't figure out what.) I read Restrepo's novel Delerium a year before I joined LT, and it's not in my library, so I must have given it away. But I recall liking it, so I'll give this a try.

>157 ffortsa: - I fixed it! An entry just got split onto two different lines.

There are shared read asterisks in challenge #3 but only one book listed for The Distant Hours and Catch 22.

Thanks for setting my straight, Suzanne. I guess I want to read this particular Archipelago book so much I tried to slip it in. My bad!

Wait a second, as I look at page 50 I have an embedded animal, tit! ah, that's a bird as everyone knows, right?

Absolutely, Lynda !!! Glad you were able to squeeze that in.

Kerry, I think someone else (kiwiflora) was going to add The Distant Hours -- see previous messages above related to that confusion. I'll try to delete the asterisk when my head stops trying to kill me and I can read the numbers, etc.

> 159

Fixed. No need to worry about asterisks, though. I fix them all the time. Do, however, report any books which have disappeared for no reason from the wiki.

nope not me :)

Sorry, I shall just apply a gag to myself. The combination of a migraine and TIOLI stuff obviously is a bad one. I think it was Jolerie who was going to join me in that and then changed her mind. Meanwhile I think we were trying to sort out the ordering of the series challenge in #13.

Here's my (over-ambitious) list. The good part is that about two-thirds of it is either from the library or an ARC on which I owe a review, and a few others are from Paperbackswap.

1
Hand me Down World – Lloyd Jones - LIB
I’m Gone – Jean Echenoz - LIB
Smuggled – Christina Shea - LIB
The Time in Between – Maria Duenas - ARC
Waiting for Robert Capa – Susana Fortes - LIB
2
Rez Life by David Teuer - ARC
3
The Distant Hours by Kate Morton
4
The American Leonardo by John Brewer - LIB
The Roots of Betrayal by James Forrester
The Wandering Gene and the Indian Princess by Jeff Wheelwright - ARC
7
Mr. Langshaw’s Square Piano by Madeline Goold
Second Violin by John Lawton
8.
Dante in Love by A.N. Wilson
A Golden Age by Tahmima Anam - LIB
9.
The Monk Downstairs by Tim Farrington - LIB
Reamde by Neal Stephenson - LIB
10.
The Accident by Ismail Kadare - LIB
Arriving in Avignon by Daniel Robberechts
Between Two Seas by Carmine Abate - LIB
The Emperor of Lies by Steve Sem-Sandberg - ARC
The Hidden Child by Camilla Lackberg
The Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen - LIB
Minotaur by Benjamin Tammuz - LIB
Misterioso by Arne Dahl - ARC
Swell by Ioanna Karystiani - LIB
Tun-huang by Yasushi Inoue - LIB
11.
My Dog Tulip by JR Ackerly - LIB
Sunflowers by Sheramy Bundrick
12.
Blood and Judgment by Michael Gilbert
13.
The Measby Murder Enquiry by Ann Purser
An Evil Eye by Jason Goodwin - LIB
A Murder in Tuscany by Christobel Kent - LIB
The Rhetoric of Death by Judith Rock
Silent Voices by Ann Cleeves
Dead Man’s Grip by Peter James - ARC
The Fourth Assassin by Matt Beynon Rees
Breaking Silence by Linda Castillo
The Dogs of Rome by Conor Fitzgerald
Lasting Damage by Sophie Hannah
14
Is Journalism Worth Dying For? By Anna Politkovskaya - ARC
Radio Shangri-La by Lisa Napoli
The Warlord’s Son by Dan Fesperman - LIB

I had added The cat's table by Michael Ondaatje to Challenge #1. However, I've gone and finished it today, so I'm transferring it back to October's challenge #18. It was a great read with tons of atmosphere and a lyrical quality.

ETA: There were tons of animals on p50, if anyone else wants to read it this month.

Wouldn't be surprised if Suzanne gets close to polishing off her list, but here is my fairly achievable list (preliminary with more challenges to come)

#1 Hemlock and After by Angus Wilson
#3 The Man Who Went Up in Smoke by Maj Sjowall and Per Waloo
#4 Snowdrops: A Novel by AD Miller
#7 Summoned by Bells by John Betjeman
#8 A Patchwork Planet by Anne Tyler
#9 The Twin by Gerbrand Bakker
#10 Love and Garbage by Ivan Klima
#11 Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
#12 The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M Cain
#13 Punishment by Anne Holt (Vik & Stubo 1st - USA has different title)
#14 Scoop by Evelyn Waugh
#15 The Jewel in the Crown by Paul Scott
#16 Eucalyptus by Murray Bail

Suzanne, I noticed you'll be reading Kate Morton in November. I did not know that she had a new one out. So thanks for the heads up. I think she is a marvelous young author.

Here is my TIOLI wishlist for November:

#1
A Dream in Polar Fog Yazhbin Chavasse
The Snows of Kilimanjaro and Other Stories Hemingway
Twilight in Italy D H Lawrence

#2
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian Sherman Alexie

#6
Palestinian Walks: Forays into a Vanishing Landscape Raja Shehadeh

#8
Wonderstruck Brian Selznick - Reading
Catching Fire Suzanne Collins

#10
The Mabinogion Anonymous

#12
And Then There Were None Christie

It is so mean of y'all to have such good TIOLI for NaNoWriMo month! Sheesh.

#166 Paul, I adored the Jewel in the Crown series. Hope you enjoy it.

>166 PaulCranswick:: Paul, I'll join you in reading The Jewel in the Crown for Challenge 15. I recently bought the series at our library's book sale and can't wait to get started.

I'll decide on the other TIOLI books I'll be reading next month after I finish October's Challenges. I'm reading as fast as I can!

Here's my potential booklist for the month. I'm also trying to finish up all my 11 in 11 categories, so many of these books are filling up one of my uncompleted categories:

#1 Small Wonder – Barbara Kingsolver (shorts)
#1 The Best of Poe - Edgar Allan Poe (shorts)
#1 King Leopold’s Ghost – Adam Hochschild (history)
#1 The Cookbook Collector – Allegra Goodman (new)
#1 Tess of the d’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy (heroines)
#2 The Plague of Doves – Louise Erdrich
#3 Disgrace – J. M. Coetzee (Nobel)
#5 Truth and Beauty – Ann Patchett
#8 How to Read the Air - Dinaw Mengestu (new)
#8 The Mystic Masseur - V.S. Naipaul (Nobel)
#8 My Antonia (heroines)
#8 Flaubert’s Parrot - Julian Barnes
#9 Olive Kitteredge (shorts)
#9 Bossypants - Tina Fey (new)
#10 The True Deceiver - Tove Jansson (translated)
#10 Agaat - Marlene van Niekerk
#10 If On a Winters Night a Traveler - Italo Calvino
#11 Columbine - Dave Cullen
#12 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins (heroines)
#13 Sovereign C.J. Sansom
#13 Anne of Green Gables - L.M. Montgomery (heroines)
#16 The Tenant of Wildfell Hall – Anne Bronte (heroines)

Jean - I got half way through it before and dropped it into Bridlington harbour in northern England trying to catch hold of Hani, my wife who had stumbled whilst eating dressed crab and not paying attention to her surroundings. Replaced it quickly along with the other parts of the series in an Everyman's edition but not got round to restarting it until now. btw My tribe and I are extremely accident prone.
Also had a peek at your profile page, lovely beach and how good is it to have a favourite library in Niceville!

Donna it will be nice to have you along in the sunset of the British Empire!

Anne - 22 books! Good luck!

Your wife should feel wonderful knowing that a LibraryThing member sacrificed a book in order to save her a dunk in a harbor! :)

Lynda -- actually, The Distant Hours came out about a year ago -- I bought it at Strand and it's been sitting on my shelves ever since. Rather shameful, as I bought a hardcover edition. Oh well....

Ann, Truth and Beauty is a wonderful book, but then, if you haven't done so, you have to read Lucy Grealy's Autobiography of a Face. They show such separate sides of the friendship it almost seems that they're not talking about the same people.

Interesting idea. I have the first, not the second. I'll have to fill in that gap.

These are my planned reads this month:

#1 Sweet Thursday - John Steinbeck
#2 Fools Crow - James Welch
#3 Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman
#8 Quartet in Autumn - Barbara Pym
#12 Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
#13 Blackout - Connie Willis
#13 All Clear - Connie Willis
#16 The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of her Own Making Cetherynne M. Valente

Normally I couldn't read 8 books in a month but Sweet Thursday and Sherlock Holmes are carry overs from October and I'm halfway through both. And The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of her Own Making (what a mouthful) is a kids book so it should be a quick read.

I fell asleep for a bit around midnight, with 8 pages to go of a YA book about infectious disease, however, it's also very much about friendships, an old friendship and a new one among three survivors of an epidemic which wipes out all their families and almost everyone else around. So I'm the first to finish a book this month, Jean Ure's Plague 99 aka Plague - I assume the change in title was because the first one dated quickly after the book was first published in 1991.

By the way, the link back to this thread on the TIOLI meter needs correction.

> 177

By the way, the link back to this thread on the TIOLI meter needs correction.

Fixed. Thanks!

Just added my challenge number 17- read a book with a celestial body in the title. Suns, stars, moons, planets, all good. Man-made is fine too, so satellite works.

Heavens (pun fully intentional), I was wondering whether we'd get up to #20 this month, or whether we're all exhausted after dreaming up challenges for nearly two years!!

#173 - Wow Suz, The Distant Hours came out quietly. I hope it turns out to be a good read for you. Have you read her other books?

Yes, Lynda -- quite liked them in a "comfort read" kinda way.

I'm starting my month by re-reading a couple of old favorites from my shelves of mysteries, including two by Patricia Wentworth. I think I was buying/reading them about 20 years ago -- some carry prices (for paperbacks) as low as $3.95!

I haven't done a Big List of TIOLI Books for myself this month, yet, but Suz I am delighted that my first two books both happen to fit the 2 borderline cases in your challenge - the first is translated from Italian (Pereira Declares) and the second from Hebrew (Homesick by Eshkol Nevo).

This month I'm not doing any TIOLI challenge planning. It's getting to the end of the year and I have several personal challenges I want to get completed. Therefore, as I read books I'll try to stick them in a challenge. I created my TIOLI challenge on some books I know I'll be reading shortly!

The Spookiest Book Cover Contest is now open!

Send your three nominations as a private message to SqueakyChu from now through midnight November 5th. The only books eligible to win are those that have been COMPLETED - so you might want to check out the wiki before voting in order to make your vote count.

The nominees and the rules are on this thread Vote for the spookiest!

I finished We Have Always Lived in the Castle tonight for Paul's challenge #9, and honestly don't know what to think about it. I was thinking all along that it was bringing me somewhere, but then it didn't. So I guess instead of just enjoying the ride, I kept asking 'are we there yet?'. So... yeah.

I'm about to start listening to my recently acquired The Snack Thief by Andrea Camilleri. FYI, most (all?) of his books can be found when doing a tag mash for 'crime' and 'Sicily' for challenge #3.

I've just finished (and reviewed) my first TIOLI book of the month, Scenes from Village Life by Amos Oz, a superb collection of short stories set in a historical village in Israel, which is one of my favorite books of the year so far.

I just finished my first, On Beauty for the tagmash challenge (it was a mash of fiction and beauty, go figure).

I hope Scenes from Village Life will be in for me at the library tomorrow. I've finished my first two books for the month, the audio of Catch 22 - the movie is waiting for me now at the library. Tomorrow's going to be a good day. I also finished Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock. There's so much to think about and talk about here. It's an excellent book. I've started The Country of Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett. I fell so in love with Willa Cather when I read her a couple of months ago that I wanted to read something by her mentor. Unfortunately the copy I downloaded to my Nook is a free one from Google books and very bad. I might have to spring for a few dollars and get a good copy that doesn't spoil her prose.

ETA in the morning I'm going to start an audiobook of Flight by Sherman Alexie for the Native American challenge.

I finished Flight and loved it, though it's a pretty disturbing book without Alexie's usual humor. Now I start another audiobook for my firendship challenge, Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind.

Finished 13 Little Blue Envelopes by Maureen Johnson for challenge #16. Now I really want to grab my passport and go to Europe for a bit.

I am reading Columbine for Challenge 11, and I am surprised at the number of things I didn't know about this event. Sad read, though.

I have also started The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian for Challenge 2, a book that I have been really looking forward to.

I finished and reviewed Amitav Ghosh's new novel River of Smoke for the challenge to read a book with an animal on page 50.

Late check-in; we're taking the kids to Disneyland.

Finished my first November TIOLI for Challenge #8 Wonderstruck

I finished The Snack Thief, a fun read, for challenge #3 and have joined Madeline with Emma. So far, have enjoyed the first 4 chapters, much to my surprise.

I'll go back to your 'old' thread Madeline, to follow along with your tutorial.

> 196

Hooray! I'm looking forward to your comments, Ilana. Feel free to refer back to old messages on my thread(s) as you read Emma. I'm reading that book soooooo slowly that it seems as if I all of its characters live in my house! :)

Er, make that lyzard's tutorial! :D

By the way, I'd never have made it this far in the book if I hadn't allowed myself to read it so slowly. Thanks, Nickelini, for suggesting that I read it this way.

Madeline and Liz are doing such a good job on Madeline's thread explaining almost word-for-word the travails of Emma Woodhouse that I might well include it in my list of reading for the year simply by virtue of having carefully perused the said thread. This an audio version of Emma which I haven't read yet is a splendid idea.

I finished (as in swallowed whole in one gulp) The Turkish Gambit by Boris Akunin, which fit into that tricky challenge #1 - lice and bear on page 50!

Challenge #18 Read a Book by an author who is a member of LibraryThing.

Click on the Zeitgeist tab of your page for a full list of authors who Librarything.

>200 jacqueline065: Oh, shoot. I love that challenge. I have several books for it, but no time to fit anything else in.

ETA, this is one I wanted to add: Chasing Goldman Sachs: How the Masters of the Universe Melted Wall Street Down . . . And Why They'll Take Us to the Brink Again by Suzanne McGee.
It would fit in very well with what's going on today.

Good choice Jacqueline!

LOL, Joyce -- oddly enuf, I have an entire box of those sitting in my office... :-)

I just brought home Crimson Warning by Tasha Alexander from the library; it will fit perfectly!

I just finished The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian for Daryl's challenge. What a great book!

I've just finished The absolutely true diary of a part-time Indian for challenge #2 and highly recommend it - a great book with a lot of humour and pathos.

I've also finished New York to Dallas for challenge #1 - a fine addition to the Eve Dallas series, a lot more emotional than many in the series as Dallas follows a paedophile back to the city where it all began.

I've also read The man with the golden torc for challenge #15 which was an amusing urban fantasy.

Last night I finished my first book for the November TIOLI challenge #1. I finished Certain Prey by John Sandford. I started reading A Change in Altitude by Anita Shreve and will be putting it in challenge #3. So far I am enjoying the book.

I finished Scenes From Village Life by Amos Oz and have to say I am not the audience for this book. I think these stories cry for someone who enjoys symbolic poetry, but I prefer my stories to make a little more literal sense. I also finished a wonderful graphic memoir by Marian Henley, The Shiniest Jewel about her attempts at an international adoption at the age of 50, her apparent resistance to commitment and the decline in health of her father. Let me tell you, tears rolled down my cheeks for the whole last half of the book. Now I'm on to The Shadow of the Wind for Madeline's challenge #1 and my real life book club.

I just finished Bringing Down the House for Challenge #1 (cat). It was a lot of fun but it was heavily fictionalized.

I just finished my first book for this month's TIOLI. Challenge 1 - The Crystal Cave. Next up The Grass Dancer for Darryl's challenge.

I'm sorry that you didn't enjoy "Scenes from Village Life", Joyce. It is rich with symbolism and is surreal at times, which is absolutely right up my alley. Claire Messud has a superb review of it in today's New York Times, which reminded me of how much I loved the book and encouraged me to bump up my rating to a full 5 stars.

I'll be curious to see what Kerry and the others think of it. I'm floundering with my fiction reads at the moment, mainly because I would prefer to continue reading more about the characters in Scenes from Village Life.

Late last night I finished Soul Talk, Song Language: Conversations with Joy Harjo for my Native American Heritage Month challenge, which is a collection of interviews with the Native American "poet-healer-philosopher-saxophonist", which were a bit stilted and pedestrian, along with several articles she wrote for the Muscogee Nation News and a few miscellaneous other works of hers, which were much more enjoyable.

I'm reading In Mad Love and War by Joy Harjo for the Native American Heritage Month challenge. I started my review even though I haven't finished the collection of poems. I like some of the poems more than others, of course, but overall this is a great reading experience for me.

I've also started The Elephant's Journey by Jose Saramago and I'm completely enchanted!

#210: Darryl,
I'm a bit slow to get back on my impressions as we had an LT meetup yesterday. @arubabookwoman from Seattle was visiting Auckland, so @kiwinyx, @kiwiflowa and myself spent a lovely afternoon with her. We talked books, LT, and everything else under the sun and had a mini book swap.

I finished Scenes from village life yesterday morning, and found it to be a beautifully haunting read, rich in hidden depths of meaning. I love being left on the edge of further 'knowing' in a short story and thought Oz used this to particular finesse. The tensions he created for each character were so well done, especially with the doctor as she worries about her nephew. I loved the walk around the big old house with the land agent and the daughter. I need to think more about the last story, it was very bleak. I will want to follow this up with a happier read in a similar setting, I have Meir Shalev's memoir My Russian grandmother and her American vacuum cleaner and think I might just push it up the pile.

I've finished the delicious black comedy A Five Year Sentence by Bernice Rubens and as the main character is Miss Hawkins, and is mentioned on pg50, I was able to slot the book into challenge #1. This was on the Booker Prize shortlist in 1978. I'm reading rather slowly and from a lot of different books at present, my main read is The Songlines which will also fit challenge #1.

I wonder why it is that I can recognize the quality of Amos Oz's writing in Scenes From Village Life yet remain completely unmoved by it. Maybe he's just not the author for me at this time.

Eeeeeek!

Anouncing...

the results of the Spookiest Book Cover contest!

I'll be announcing the top books in reverse order on this thread - with the #1 book spookiest cover's reader winning a small prize.

In fifth place for the spookiest book cover...



The Grotesque - by Patrick Mcgrath - read by SqueakyChu.

#214 -- Joyce, I have exactly the same reaction to a number of novels. Sometimes it's the plot; on other occasions it has been the characters. And sometimes the reason proves elusive. Nothing is more frustrating than feeling that I "should" love something -- not because others do, but because I recognize the caliber of the writing and the intricate plots -- but not loving it. Sometimes, it's the writer being simply too clever, which leads to what I call -- for want of a better phrase -- "self conscious" writing, that makes me as a reader hear the author's voice and strong hand behind the narrative and characters. That was the problem I had with The Tiger's Wife; I could never get past feeling Obreht in the back of my mind almost directing my attention to things I prefer to discover on my own when I read.

But re Oz in particular -- I adored How to Cure a Fanatic, and really want to read his memoir about his parents. In fact, I think I'll amble off to the library website and track it down.

In fourth place for Spookiest Book Cover...



Cobweb House - by Elizabeth Hughes Holloway - read by lyzard

Whoo! I'd just like to thank all the arachnophobes out there! (Amongst whom I know I don't number you, Madeline!)

Amongst whom I know I don't number you, Madeline!

You're right! :)

In third place for Spookiest Book Cover...



Cargo of Eagles - by Margery Allingham - read by lahochstetler

In second place for Spookiest Book Cover...



Whitechapel Gods - by S.M. Peters - read by majkia

Finally, in 1st place for Spookiest Book Cover...



I Am Legend - by Richard Matheson - read by calm.

Congratulations!!

Calm, please private message me your mailing address, and I'll get your very small prize in the mail soon.

Spook-ey. Heh heh.

I finished the decidedly UN-spooky Emma today and was moved to give it a 4.5 star rating, surprising myself with the fact that I'd enjoyed it so much.

And now, I'd like to thank my agent, my mother and father who created me during a phantasmagoric acid trip, my four-legged children who keep me real every day, my psychologist who helps me stay out of the psychiatric ward, and mostly, Madeline, a fellow Jane Austen non-believer, who asked all the wrong questions at the right time... and ESPECIALLY Liz, who answered all her questions with infinite patience, and made the novel seem like one that truly deserves to be appreciated in all it's minute, precious details, even by philistines and barbarians such as myself.

LibraryThing: I come for the books; I stay for the philistines and barbarians. :)

Wow - I wasn't expecting that. Thanks to everyone who voted - it was a pretty spooky cover though:)

congrats calm!

Congratulations, calm! Well deserved!!!


glitter-graphics.com

LOL!

Think that there can be little argument that Calm deserved the prize. Can't see me getting much sleep - finally my high school chemistry teacher has been captured on a book cover!
Lynda your applause graphic is mesmerising.

Congratulations, Calm, that cover looks to be a nightmare guarantee! (But it also makes me want to read I Am Legend so it's doing it's job as well.)

I am trying this challenge for the first time this month, carefully reading over the rules. Mostly, I'm looking for books that are already listed that I hope to/plan to read and hoping I'm not messing anything up. I've added a couple already.

My question is with a shared read vs the category. For example, the category "read exactly one other book by the author". What if there is a book listed that I want to read, but I've read more than one book by that author already, ie Julian Barnes? Can I add to that category, if it matches an already listed book? I gather if I'm adding a new book to the list, it has to be a book I've read one by the author.
thanks!

#233 raidergirl3: from what I understand if the book is already listed by another member then you can add it as a match unless specifically stated not to by the person who set the challenge - this hardly ever happens.

I started on Parnassus on Wheels yesterday for challenge #9 yesterday, as it was strongly recommended in October by Donna828. I'm about halfway through and it's a lot of fun if you like books about books combined with adventure.

thanks kiwiflowa. I just wanted to make sure. And I misread the book I saw for that category anyway. I want to read The Sense of an Ending but have read a few of Barnes' books already. But The Sense of an Ending was the book listed as the one they had already read. Oh, well!

If my LTER arrives, I can match the Dava Sobel book about Copernicus.

#236 raidergirl3 that's fine it's a lot of information to take in at once if you are new to TIOLI. Check page 50 for an animal... including embedded animals in words such as 'hen' in when, then etc then it will fit into challenge #1 :)

> 233

Welcome to the TIOLI challenges, raidergirl3!

Mostly, I'm looking for books that are already listed that I hope to/plan to read and hoping I'm not messing anything up. I've added a couple already.

You're absolutely *not* messing anything up by adding books that you plan to read during the month of November. Later this month you will mark those books - first with Reading, then later with COMPLETED. If you don't finish them by the end of the month, you'll simply delete them. That's it.

Can I add to that category, if it matches an already listed book?

That's up to the host of that challenge, who in this case is AnneDC. If no answer is forthcoming, assume that any book can be matched (as kiwiflowa said in message #234).

AnneDC, are you there? What's your verdict?

>233 raidergirl3: raidergirl3--that's my challenge and yes, you would have to match the actual book being read, in this case Flaubert's Parrot, and you could do it as a shared read even if you've already read multiple Barnes books.

But kiwiflowa's suggestion of Challenge 1 is a good one for The Sense of an Ending--with just a quick skim of page 50 I was able to find the embedded animals cat (complication), bat (debating), moth (mother) and hen (when). And if you list it there, someone else may well join you.

>235 Smiler69:: I'm glad you're liking Parnassus, Madeline.

Congratulations to all the spooky book cover winners. It would give me the creeps to read any of those books. *averting eyes* I hope the "insides" were good!

> 240

Er, #235 is Ilana, not me!

I finished Parnassus on Wheels and it was indeed good fun.

eta: Starting on Brat Farrar by Josephine Tey which I've put in challenge #3.

Oooops, I'll blame that faux pas on tired eyes and reading on the iPad.

I'm off to a slow start on the reading side this month. Only two books completed thus far, but I'm making headway in the mesmerizing The Jewel in the Crown which is a chunkster that requires slow, thoughtful reading.

I finished my 100th TIOLI challenge book for the year!

>244 cyderry: That's incredible. Congratulations!!!!

> 244

I finished my 100th TIOLI challenge book for the year!

Amazing! Such devotion!! :)

That made me go look. 121 TIOLI challenge books completed for me. Out of 201 read.

I finished March by Geraldine Brooks for challenge #1 today.

I finished two today - The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin for Madeline's animal on pg50 challenge and Laurie Lee's A Rose in Winter for the flower in the title challenge.

#244 Congrats, Cheli.

I wish I'd kept track this year but I didn't.

#250 You must have forgotten about our STAT QUEEN! She tracked everyone whoever read book for a challenge.

I finished The secret history of the pink carnation for the flower challenge - a sparkling romance set in Bonaparte's Paris, which didn't really engross me.

I've also finished Ring of Lightning by Jane S. Fancher for the jewellery challenge - this was a re-read for me. It's a fun fantasy romp with three very diffferent brothers trying to upset the political machinations of their mad aunt.

ETA: I've removed Revelation Space from challenge #13 - I just couldn't get into it.

I've just completed The Absolutely true diary of a part time indian. A surprisingly good read.

#252: I just finished listening to Revelation Space and liked it. I started this series with book 2, Chasm City, as I read that the first 2 did not need to be read in order.

I can send a list of books you've read for all TIOLI challenges through June 2011 or if you want to wait a couple weeks, I'll have the stats ready through September 2011. Just send me a private message with your email address and what format you'd like it in.

Completed The Elephant's Journey and In Mad Love and War. Highly recommend both. Next up: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian.

Add me to the list of those who have finished The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie for challenge #2. Just as good as I'd anticipated.

I'm about half way through Reamde and love it. I can't tell you how much I adore Sokolov. His dry humor makes Brit humor look wet! Love it. Not at all what I'd expected but then that's a good thing!

I've finished Sorcerer's Ward for challenge #1; a re-read, as it's one of my favourites.

I finished and reviewed Erin Morgenstern's debut novel The Night Circus. That was for the Animal on Page 50 challenge.

Ran into an impossible-to-like book with The Accident by Ismail Kadare. I finished it, but am still bemused by it. It appears to be the tedious relationship ins and outs of a tortured couple who torture each other and then die in a car accident, as put together post mortem by an anonymous researcher. Utterly unconvincing on every level. Unless, that is, it's some kind of giant metaphor for the Balkans. But I don't care enough to try and unravel it. There were points where I found my nose wrinkling in distaste.

I finished A Trick of the Light, the latest by Louise Penny, for Challenge #9 - Read a book Reviewed and Recommended by a Fellow 75er during the month of October 2011. This one was recommended by Tina (tututhefirst) and lots of others!

I also finished Let's Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship by Gail Caldwell for Challenge #5 - Read a book about friendship.

I finished Brat Farrar for the tagmash challenge, and started Artists in Crime, my first Ngaio Marsh murder mystery, which I'll be listing in challenge #12.

260: Don't forget to mark it COMPLETED on the Wiki - I think I will end up with lots of shared reads eventually this month but have only been able to put down one so far, and will enjoy putting in this one too.

I finished the wonderful Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of an Extraordinary Mind and the revelations continued to the very end. I'm so impressed by Paula Kamen and Iris Chang, who tried to maintain the appearance of perfection to the end of her life. The book is about mental illness, the immigrant experience, writing, research, infertility, motherhood, friendship, secrecy and the need to confront your imperfections and work through them. I'm so glad I accidently found this book.

Joyce, Finding Iris Chang: Friendship, Ambition, and the Loss of Extraordinary Mind sounds like a terrific read. As a mental health professional committed to social justice issues, it sounds like one I need to investigate -- and I had never heard of it before your discovery. Yay for good accidents!

EBT I can't recommend the book highly enough. Kamen sites statistics on Asians and mental illness and suicide and the relationship between hormonal fluctuations and bipolar disorder that were a revelation to me. Add to that the fact that Chang spent years immersed in research about very dark subjects, and it's amazing that almost everyone saw her life as perfect.

>267 Citizenjoyce: I'll be seeking this one out. Thanks for the recommendation.

I've finished my second book in category 12 - read a mystery published before you were born. First I read Detection Unlimited, my first Georgette Heyer mystery, and I've just re-read Strong Poison, next in line in my re-read of Sayers' series. I'd remembered 'whodunnit' and more or less how, so this time I was just enjoying the writing - the courtroom descriptions, the escapades of Wimsey's team of spinster lady assistants, and of course the conversations between Peter and Harriet.

Also enjoying Mill on the Floss which I initially thought would go under challenge 1 (there is a Pullet on page 50, one of the characters' names) but in the end have added to challenge 16 (titled chapters) because it's such fun and quite a rare thing to have those title headings to chapters, acting like a little trailer for what is to come, sometimes very plain and descriptive, sometimes more teasing - 'Maggie behaves worse than she expected' - so that you know something is up but you are not sure what it is going to be...

This thread is being eyed by the thread police. Quietly follow me to Page 2. :D