It started with an email, a link and a question.
The email was from Angie, the link lead to a reading challenge (hosted by a blogspot person neither of us knew), and the question was: "Wanna do this?" I followed the link, perused the description of the challenge, and replied, "I'm in!"
Being the busy people that we are, her moreso than me, we let the subject lapse for a couple of weeks. When we got around to looking at the challenge again, together this time, we realized there were a few aspects of the challenge we just weren't interested in. Damn it.
But did we give up? Of course not! This was a CHALLENGE, after all! So we did what any pair of raging control freaks would've proudly done in our places: we took the bits that we did like, and made up stuff to replace the stuff we didn't. I mean, when it comes to uninteresting subjects, there's only so much challenge we can handle. At this point, it evolved from a reading 'challenge' to a cooperative reading effort. Once we read our book, we'll write our thoughts about the book before moving on to the next one.
These are the topics we picked, and how we selected our material (bear in mind, some of the topic selection methods were not our idea). We limited our selections to things that neither of us has read before:
1. Random Book Selection. Go to the library. Position yourself in a section such as Fiction, Non-Fiction, Mystery, Children (whatever section you want). Then write down random directions for yourself (for example, third row, second shelf, fifth book from right). Follow your directions and see what book you find. Check that book out of the library, read it and then write about it. (If you prefer, you can do the same at a bookstore and buy the book!)
Selecting this book was my task. I decided before i went into the store that i would walk straight to the back wall, and pick out the last book on the bottom shelf. This is what i found there:
2. Random Word. Go to this random word generator and generate a random word. Find a book with this word in the title. Read the book and write about it.
Angie and i both followed a link to a random word generator and generated a word. We agreed to decide on who got the cooler word, and use that to determine what book we read. I got 'anthology', and she got 'bowl'. The book we ultimately decided on has neither word in the title (cheaters!)
but it IS an anthology, so we figured it was applicable. Angie picked this one.
3. Classic Girl. Choose a sexy classic, read it, and write about it.
Classic literature is, in my opinion, forced on people too young to appreciate it. I HATED classic literature when i was required to read it, but now i like it rather a lot. I chose Madame Bovary as our sexy classic, because i've always wanted to read it.
4. Judge A Book By Its Cover. Pick out a book based SOLELY on the cover. First, write about what you expect the book to be about based on the cover art. Then read the book and write about how the book was different from and/or similar to what the cover art led you to expect.
Again, this was my task. I wandered around a bookstore, just looking at covers. You have no idea how tempting it is to pick up a book and read the back cover before deciding to read it! I caught myself going to do just that several times, but when i saw this beauty, i knew i had to read it regardless of what the back cover said:
Seriously. How can you turn down a book with a cut-out disguise as a cover?! You can't!
5. Phoning An Author. Pick a random last name out of the phone book. Find an author with the same last name and read a book by them. Write about it.
Angie and i picked up our respective phone books, which was cool, because we got two towns' worth of names to select from. We flipped open to a random White Page, closed our eyes, and poked our fingers down at a spot on the page. I got Huff, she got Mayfield. We ended up going with her name, and this is the book she picked:
6. Random Bestseller. Go to Random.org and, using the True Random Number Generator, enter the number 1950 for the min. and 2008 for the max. and then hit generate. Then go to this site and find the year that Random.org generated for you and click on it. Then find the bestseller list for the week that would contain your birthday for that year. Choose one of the bestsellers from the list that comes up, read it and write about it.
We both went to the site and entered in the parameters specified. I got 1955, and she got 1993. Her list had a better selection, so we combined the requirements and chose her list year, and my birthday week. We ended up picking
7. A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words. Go to the picture book/art book section of the library or a book store. Select a picture (or several) from an art book, and write a story about what's happening in the picture.
Angie picked this one. She didn't say how she picked it, but i'm dying to read it!
8. Help Yourself! Read a self-help book, and write about how it helped you.
Initially, we picked something entirely different. It was a spiritual book that looked incredibly interesting, but then we saw this
We're both feminist literature fans, and clearly we didn't already have enough on the list, so we added another. What's better than self-help? Feminist self-help, of course!
9. Story Book Ending. Watch a movie based on a book, and then read the book it's based on. Write about how it's similar and different, and which you liked better.
It was hard to pick something we'd both never seen or read. I ended up picking a short story and a movie based on the short story.
It's got Vinnie Jones :D
10. Public Spying. Find someone who is reading a book in public. Find out what book they are reading and then read the same book. Write about it.
Angie picked this one. One of the parents at her daughters' softball games was reading this book
Her daughter has already read it, and gives it a shining endorsement.
And that's our reading list! We'll blog about them as we read them; we don't have any particular time frame we're aiming for. I think Angie picked The Language of Fear as our starting point. See something you're interested in? Feel free to join us as we broaden our literary horizons :) I'll start as soon as Amazon.com sends The Postal Fairy to visit me!
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