nomadreader

Happy Fall Read-a-thon! It's a day to take 24 hours (or if you're like me, no more than 12-18 are physically possible) to read, participate in mini-challenges and win prizes. I'll be in and out this morning, but I hope to spend my afternoon reading. To the left are my stack of possible books. I have three guidelines for picking readathon books: variety, brevity, and variety. My stack has a mix of nonfiction, graphic narratives, historical fiction, short stories, novellas, contemporary fiction, and science fiction. I also have all four in Lois Lowry's   Giver  series on my Kindle and am currently devouring Tracy Chevalier's forthcoming novel about the Underground Railroad, The Last Runaway ,  which won't be out until February. If you want to see what I'm up to during the read-a-thon, please visit my tumblr . I'll be back with a Sunday Salon post tomorrow to catch you up on my day and what's to come next week. As an affiliate, I receive a small c...

Happy morning after read-a-thon, everyone! I had a wonderful time reading and tweeting yesterday. Of my giant pile of 26 books , I managed to read three of them. I started with Bryan Lee O'Malley's graphic novel Lost at Sea . I tend to begin a read-a-thon with a graphic novel because it brings such joy and accomplishment early on. When I finished it, I also noticed #readathon was trending on Twitter, which is awesome. Before the second hour, I was onto book number two: I Was Amelia Earhart  by Jane Mendelsohn. I spent about three hours reading it, and it was fascinating. Plus, it brought me my favorite moment of the read-a-thon: Cheer Bear as Amelia Earhart The mini-challenge was to take a photograph of something that represents a character in the book you're reading. Yes, in only hour two, I was loopy enough to make flying goggles out of an index card (why an index card? I'm still not sure) for a Cheer Bear and  stand on my dining room table to get maximum clou...

Remember a few weeks ago when I mentioned I was already stocking up on books for the read-a-thon ? Well last night when I sat down to collect them all in one place, I realized I had gone overboard. Way, way overboard. Counting only the print books I've amassed from the libraries and my shelves, I discovered I had 26 books . More books than hours? Seriously, Carrie. Still, as I looked at the shelf, I really liked the variety. I have a couple of non-fiction options (one a graphic novel and one a teen photo-heavy option), a few other graphic novels, a Newbery medal book, a couple of short story collections, a plethora of novellas, a couple of mysteries, and a veritable grip of short novels. The novels are mostly literary fiction, but there's a nice mix of authors, locations and time periods. Two check in over 300 pages, but only barely (316 and 322 respectively.) And I haven't even gotten to the choices on my Kindle ( Zone One , I'm staring most longingly at you...) ...

I participated in my first 24-hour Dewey's Read- athon (or almost 18-hour read-a- thon in my case) yesterday, and I loved it. Going into it, I wanted to have a variety of books to choose from, achievable goals, and I wanted to have fun. The biggest surprise for me during the read-a- thon was how much fun I had interacting with people. I also understand why many veterans abandoned mini-challenges, limited time on Twitter and blogging and focused on reading. Strategy: My strategy fluctuated throughout the day, but around 6 p.m., I found the strategy that worked best for me: at the top of the hour, check in with the blog to see if I'd won any prizes (maybe next time!) and what the next mini-challenge was, check my email to see all of the comments on my blog (thanks cheerleaders, I had so much fun discovering new blogs, and I hope you'll revisit this one too!), check and update Twitter with my progress, pop in on a few other blogs, and check the football scores. I tried to...