Saturday, October 17, 2015

Readathon: October 2015

A fuzzy grey poodle, Murchie, sits with his front paws crossed and his face raised to catch a sunbeam. His eyes are closed and his mouth forms a smile.

Hello, fellow Readathonners and random bystanders alike! Murchie and I welcome you to the October 2015 edition of Dewey's 24-Hour Readathon--ie, what he and I are doing with our day.

I plan to update this master post every two or three hours, with the most recent update at the top.

Hour Nineteen

Friends, this will be my last update. I'm still gonna read, and I'm sure I'll pop onto Twitter every now and again, but my left leg informs me it does not wish to sit in any more chairs today, thank you very much. I'll finish the Readathon from the comfort of my bed, where my knee won't have to bend.

I've almost finished my latest hundred pages of THE SHINING COURT. My two favourite storylines just converged, so I'm excited to see where things go from here--after I've gulped down a comic or two and finished another, shorter, book.

The comics will happen tonight. The other, shorter book, probably not.

I'm sure I'll tell you all about it on next week's edition of Murchie Plus Books.

Currently Reading

  • THE SHINING COURT by Michelle West

Previously Read

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear
  • REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson
  • THE INVASION OF THE TEARLING by Erika Johansen (audiobook; still ongoing)
  • PRICELESS by Kieron Gillen and Phil Jimenez

Food and Drink Consumed

  • three cups of coffee, two with vanilla gunk and one with straight cream
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • eleven million glasses of water (I lost count, but it's a lot)
  • three miniature Snickers bars
  • dried mangos
  • one pepperoni pizza pop
  • black pepper & lime chips
  • one cup of chai latte with cream
  • roasted potatoes and cauliflower
  • one O Henry bar
  • four Double Stuf Oreos
  • fried rice

Albums Listened To

  • Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels OST
  • Funhouse - P!nk
  • Pioneer - The Band Perry
  • The Music Of Nashville, Season One, Volume One

Other Activities

  • breakfast
  • 50 minutes of biking, with book
  • mini challenge monitoring/intense grinning over everyone's entries
  • lunch
  • walk, with visits to the library and the grocery store
  • blank staring
  • zen-like feelings

Mini Challenges Completed


Hour Seventeen

I'd probably have read more during my last session if I hadn't spent a solid forty-five minutes spacing out while I stared at Twitter.

As it stands, I got through about fifty pages of THE SHINING COURT and I think I'm gonna stick with it until I've read the full hundred. After that, it's entirely possible I'll just read comics until I pass out instead of starting another novel as planned. With the way my brain's operating, I'll probably have more luck with something visual.

I'm starting to get tiiiiiiiiiired. Everything's kind of hazy and zen-like. Maybe I should drink more coffee, or eat the leftover fried rice in my fridge. I was gonna make tacos, but tacos may require the sort of construction of which I am currently incapable. It's tough to, like, layer cabbage and protein and cheese atop one another when you're all zen-like.

Zen-like is probably the wrong way to put it. It's like, you know how stoners look on screen, like they're kind of there but also floating off in some other dimension? I feel the way they look.

Trust me, that makes sense if you're zen-like and/or the sort of person who currently feels like a stoner in a movie looks.

Currently Reading

  • THE SHINING COURT by Michelle West

Previously Read

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear
  • REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson
  • THE INVASION OF THE TEARLING by Erika Johansen (audiobook; still ongoing)
  • PRICELESS by Kieron Gillen and Phil Jimenez

Food and Drink Consumed

  • three cups of coffee, two with vanilla gunk and one with straight cream
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • eleven million glasses of water (I lost count, but it's a lot)
  • three miniature Snickers bars
  • dried mangos
  • one pepperoni pizza pop
  • black pepper & lime chips
  • one cup of chai latte with cream
  • roasted potatoes and cauliflower
  • one O Henry bar
  • two Double Stuf Oreos

Albums Listened To

  • Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels OST
  • Funhouse - P!nk
  • Pioneer - The Band Perry
  • The Music Of Nashville, Season One, Volume One

Other Activities

  • breakfast
  • 50 minutes of biking, with book
  • mini challenge monitoring/intense grinning over everyone's entries
  • lunch
  • walk, with visits to the library and the grocery store
  • blank staring
  • zen-like feelings

Mini Challenges Completed


Hour Fifteen

Well, Kieron Gillen punched me in the gut again. Thanks, Kieron Gillen. Thanks.

(That's a good sort of post-gut-punch thanks. I'm glad he did it. I hope he does it again.)

The first arc of ANGELA: ASGARD'S ASSASSIN didn't just punch me in the gut. It also introduced me to an awesome new character in Sera (who's a trans woman of colour! And snarky! And able to shoot fiery bolts out of her fingers!) and let me gaze upon Freya's chariot pulled by cats.

I've always been exceedingly fond of Freya's chariot pulled by cats.

Now that I've finished ANGELA, I'm going to read a little bit more of my in-between book: THE SHINING COURT by Michelle West. I normally read a hundred pages of it in between each of the shorter novels I tackle, but this time I think I'm gonna pause at the fifty-page mark so's I can read another comic. We'll see how I feel when I get there.

Currently Reading

  • THE SHINING COURT by Michelle West

Previously Read

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear
  • REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson
  • THE INVASION OF THE TEARLING by Erika Johansen (audiobook; still ongoing)
  • PRICELESS by Kieron Gillen and Phil Jimenez

Food and Drink Consumed

  • three cups of coffee, two with vanilla gunk and one with straight cream
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • eleven million glasses of water (I lost count)
  • three miniature Snickers bars
  • dried mangos
  • one pepperoni pizza pop
  • black pepper & lime chips
  • one cup of chai latte with cream
  • roasted potatoes and cauliflower
  • one O Henry bar
  • two Double Stuf Oreos

Albums Listened To

  • Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels OST
  • Funhouse - P!nk
  • Pioneer - The Band Perry

Other Activities

  • breakfast
  • 50 minutes of biking, with book
  • mini challenge monitoring/intense grinning over everyone's entries
  • lunch
  • walk, with visits to the library and the grocery store

Mini Challenges Completed


Hour Thirteen

I'm back! I'm back! In the hours since my last update, I walked to the library, carried on to the grocery store, and ate some delectable roasted potatoes and cauliflower. Life, she is good.

I also finished REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT, which I highly recommend. Hopkinson touches on diversity issues both within and without the SFF genre. It's important stuff.

Now, here's the mid-event survey:

1. What are you reading right now?

The first volume of ANGELA: ASGARD'S ASSASSIN by Kieron Gillen and Phil Jimenez.

2. How many books have you read so far?

I've finished two and read (or listened to) portions of two more.

3. What book are you most looking forward to for the second half of the Read-a-thon?

I'm really excited to start AN APPRENTICE TO ELVES by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear. I'm sure I won't finish it tonight, seeing as how I'm a slow reader who also plans to tackle some comics and another hundred pages of my in-between book, but I'll wallow in it for as long as possible.

4. Have you had many interruptions? How did you deal with those?

Ugh, yes. Well, not ugh, since my main distraction was the super-awesome mini challenge Cass and I cohosted, but definitely yes. I basically just accepted I wasn't gonna read much beyond challenge entries until we were far enough along that I didn't have to monitor it as closely. And a snuck a few pages of my book here and there, when there was a lull.

5. What surprises you most about the Read-a-thon, so far?

This is my fifteenth readathon (unless I counted wrong). Nothing surprises me anymore.

Except I am a little surprised at my endurance. I usually get, um, loopy right about now. Maybe it's the relative lack of literature I've managed to cram into my brain this 'thon.

And now, back to my regularly scheduled personal update meme thing:

Currently Reading

  • PRICELESS by Kieron Gillen and Phil Jimenez

Previously Read

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear
  • REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson
  • THE INVASION OF THE TEARLING by Erika Johansen (audiobook; still ongoing)

Food and Drink Consumed

  • one cup coffee with vanilla gunk
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • eleven million glasses of water (I lost count)
  • three miniature Snickers bars
  • dried mangos
  • one pepperoni pizza pop
  • black pepper & lime chips
  • one cup of chai latte with cream
  • roasted potatoes and cauliflower

Albums Listened To

  • Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels OST
  • Funhouse - P!nk

Other Activities

  • breakfast
  • 50 minutes of biking, with book
  • mini challenge monitoring/intense grinning over everyone's entries
  • lunch
  • walk, with visits to the library and the grocery store

Mini Challenges Completed


Hour Nine

Alas, my pace has slowed right down and I don't think I'll manage to regain my momentum for a couple hours yet. I'm most of the way through REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT, and I've gotta toddle off to the library soon as I finish it. I'll stick my audiobook (THE INVASION OF THE TEARLING) on as I go, of course, and I'll sink into some more prose fiction when I get back.

It'll be good to have a walk. I tried to bike a bit more during this last reading session, but while my legs were up for it my arse wasn't. Sigh. I've been fighting to regain my endurance after a summer of walking instead of biking, and it looks like I've got a ways to go yet. It'll happen.

Currently Reading

  • REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson

Previously Read

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear

Food and Drink Consumed

  • one cup coffee with vanilla gunk
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • eight glasses of water
  • three miniature Snickers bars
  • dried mangos
  • one pepperoni pizza pop
  • black pepper & lime chips
  • one cup of chai latte with cream

Albums Listened To

  • Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels OST
  • Funhouse - P!nk

Other Activities

  • breakfast
  • 50 minutes of biking, with book
  • mini challenge monitoring/intense grinning over everyone's entries
  • lunch

Mini Challenges Completed


Hour Seven

Well, that was a hectic reading session! I spent the first hour or so refreshing the mini challenge I'm cohosting with Cass so I could read everyone's brilliant entries and compose a nice, orderly participants list for the prize drawing. Them's the perils of running a challenge on multiple fronts. You've gotta pay close attention so everything stays fair.

This was a hell of a lot of fun, but it did leave me with less time to read. Still, I managed to power through the last little chunk of THE TEMPERING OF MEN, leaving me poised to begin REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson. I also snuck in about ten minutes of biking and baked a pizza pop, which I'm eating right now.

Currently Reading

  • REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson

Previously Read

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear

Food and Drink Consumed

  • one cup coffee with vanilla gunk
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • eight glasses of water
  • three miniature Snickers bars
  • dried mangos
  • one pepperoni pizza pop

Albums Listened To

  • Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels OST
  • Funhouse - P!nk

Other Activities

  • breakfast
  • 45 minutes of biking, with book
  • mini challenge monitoring/intense grinning over everyone's entries

Mini Challenges Completed


Hour Five

My last reading session was great, y'all. I ate some tasty mangos, biked for thirty-five minutes (with book in hand, of course), and got within twenty-five pages of the end of THE TEMPERING OF MEN. I'll finish it this session, then start REPORT FROM PLANET MIDNIGHT by Nalo Hopkinson.

Starting this hour, Cass and I are hosting a fabulous and exciting mini challenge all about road trips, because we have epic plans to go on a taco road trip someday. You can participate on Goodreads or right here if you, like me, are not a Goodreads person. Come road trip it up with us, please!

Currently Reading

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear

Previously Read

  • none so far

Food and Drink Consumed

  • one cup coffee with vanilla gunk
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • six glasses of water
  • three miniature Snickers bars
  • dried mangos

Albums Listened To

  • Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels OST

Other Activities

  • breakfast
  • 35 minutes of biking, with book

Mini Challenges Completed


Hour Three

Friends, I'm having a marvelous time with THE TEMPERING OF MEN. This is the sort of fantasy that excites me, all rich with interpersonal stuff and toothsome worldbuilding that sprawls like nobody's business. The pseudo-Norse angle doesn't hurt, either, given my decades-old affection for Norse mythology.

The book is also a reread, and I'm surprised at how much of it I've forgotten. I do try to forget broader details between rereads, but I don't usually lose this much. It's probably because I really liked, but didn't love, the story the first time through; another thing that surprises me now, since I'm so hard into it.

I'll probably finish it during the reading session after this one, my glacial pace being what it is. Forever envious of people who can read 100+ pages per hour.

Currently Reading

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear

Previously Read

  • none so far

Food and Drink Consumed

  • one cup coffee with vanilla gunk
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes
  • two cups of ginger mint tea
  • three glasses of water
  • one miniature Snickers bar

Albums Listened To

  • none so far

Other Activities

  • breakfast

Mini Challenges Completed

  • Intro Meme


Hour One

And so it begins.

I'm either awake and poised to start reading or still asleep and relying on this scheduled post to represent me. Nobody knows.

(Nah; it's the former. I intended to wake up forty-five minutes early, but actually jolted awake an hour and forty-five minutes early and found myself unable to fall back asleep. Sigh.)

My viable reading pool is kind of scant this time around because I've stripped la TBR of all shorter works and am unwilling to add lots of random library books after my maddening three-month reading slump, but I hope to finish at least two books and make some progress through a few others.

Right now, these titles are calling me the loudest:

  • The Tempering of Men by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear (already started)
  • An Apprentice To Elves by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear
  • The Shining Court by Michelle West (already started)
  • The Langston Hughes Reader (already started)
  • Report From Planet Midnight by Nalo Hopkinson (due back today; eek! Thank goodness it's tiny)
  • Hand of Isis by Jo Graham
  • Witch Hunter by Virginia Boeker
  • In the Woods by Tana French
  • The Invasion of the Tearling by Erika Johansen (my audiobook; already started)

I may substitute some other titles from la TBR, and y'all know I'll also read some comics depending on what strikes my fancy on Marvel Unlimited or in my file full of Image titles I've been saving for I-dunno-what. Maybe I'll even feel brave enough to undertake a SAGA reread/catch-up.

I never track pages read because I'm a hell of a lot slower than the rest of y'all and my final stats just depress me if I know 'em, but I'll be monitoring these other all-important details throughout the day:

Currently Reading

  • THE TEMPERING OF MEN by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear

Previously Read

  • none so far

Food and Drink Consumed

  • one cup coffee with vanilla gunk
  • two sesame & flax flatbreads
  • grapes

Albums Listened To

  • none so far

Other Activities

  • none so far

Mini Challenges Completed

  • you guessed it--none so far

Except wait! Here's the intro meme!

1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?

Winnipeg, in the very middle of Canada.

2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?

I'm really excited to finish THE TEMPERING OF MEN. I wanted to stay up and binge read it last night, but I reminded myself I could spend the entire morning with it today.

3) Which snack are you most looking forward to?

Dried mango! I almost never have it, but Superstore had it on sale yesterday so I grabbed a pack.

4) Tell us a little something about yourself!

I have violently red hair and violently purple lips. The latter require constant renewal, with help from MAC's lipglass in Magnetique.

5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? If this is your first read-a-thon, what are you most looking forward to?

I chatted with a lot of people on Twitter last time, but I didn't manage to visit very many blogs. I hope I can leave more comments this time around.

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