Hour 15 – Laughing with the Spoopy

I’m not a fan of scary stuff. There, I said it. I was the kid who had to leave the theater during Jurassic Park! I don’t handle scary stuff well.

Over the past several years my SO has been working with me on being able to watch scary stuff. I’ve learned that I can handle scary stuff better when there’s a strong sense of humor with it. John Carpenter’s “The Thing” was the first scary movie I watched the whole way through because there were a lot of opportunities to laugh off the fear and paranoia. I can’t play scary games but I sure can watch them being played by funny people.

Awesome Games Done Quick 2018

When I read scary books, it’s the same deal. World War Z left me with nightmares for a long time, but Tales From the Gas Station was so enjoyable I want to read the rest of the series. Basically, if you’re gonna scare me, let me laugh some of it off!

How about you? What’s your relationship to the spooky and scary? Not your for (which is perfectly fine)? Your lifeblood (which is perfectly fine)? Somewhere in between (also perfectly fine)?

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Hour 14 – Get up and Stretch

The past couple of years I’ve really been experiencing the importance of regular physical activity (i.e. I’m old!). This Readathon I’ve got a bunch of stretches from physical and occupational therapy to regularly work through to make sure I don’t cramp up mid-‘thon.

Yeah, I know, sitting around for 24 hours just reading sounds like a dream! But reality does still have a say in these things. So take this opportunity to get up, walk around, stretch, whatever you need to remind your circulation system to keep going strong.

Mid Event Survey

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Hour 13 – Non-Book Hobbies

Do you have non-bookish hobbies that you incorporate into your readathon plans? I love to crochet, so when I assemble my TBR and snacks for a readathon I also choose a project or two to work on during audiobooks. If I manage to complete all 24 hours of the readathon, which I have done for the past couple years, I usually spend about 5-6 of those hours on audiobooks, sometimes more. In that much time I can finish several hats, or a scarf, or even a basic shawl. Realistically, I am also doing admin stuff and social media for some of that time while listening to my books, but it’s still a great opportunity to get some serious stitching done. Eventually the cats get annoyed at my not going to bed and they wander off to sleep without me, and I can actually finish an hour of crocheting without even once having to take a ball of yarn away from one of my furry helpers. I have been getting into cooking a bit, too, lately, so I also picked up ingredients to make a quiche and some baked Brussels sprouts, and in an hour or so I might make some healthy food while enjoying my audiobook. I could see this becoming a habit too, picking a recipe or two to try during the readathon. After all, while you are waiting for the oven timer to ring, that’s a great time for a short reading sprint. Mid Event Survey Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here! Cheer your fellow readers! Join our Goodreads or Facebook or Reddit groups! Watch for posts and stories on our Instagram! Tag your posts with #Readathon on all your social channels 

Hour 12 – Reading Games

It’s the halfway point (yay!) and if you’ve been with us since the beginning of this readathon, your eyes may be getting tired, your brain may feel a bit overstuffed, and even the occasional break for stretches and snacks may not be helping much. What do you do to keep going? One of my favorite ways to boost my reading is with a sort of reading game I worked out a few years ago (probably for a Dewey’s readathon). I pick out 5-10 books, set them up in some sort of order, and then challenge myself to read the next 20/50 pages, the next chapter, etc. of each one, in un-timed reading sprints. By breaking up my reading into smaller chunks rather than tackling whole books, and changing books at each increment, I find I don’t start tuning out while reading so much. If I find a particular book really tedious, I can adjust the amount I aim to read of it so that I don’t run out of steam before the end of the allotted segment. The game I have chosen to play with my reading during this readathon is another way to keep myself reading. I can get bogged down easily deciding which book to pick up next. So, I have my TBR in 3 stacks, with the top-priority books on top of each stack. Each hour of the readathon I can switch books once, but only to another book on the top of a stack. As I finish books, new ones become the top for each stack. This way I get a lot of variety, but without the paralyzing situation of having too much to choose from. I also have audiobooks lined up, so that if none of the books on top appeal to me enough I can listen to an audiobook and work on a crochet project for an hour. What are some games, tricks, or strategies you find helpful to help you stick to reading during readathons? While you are here, don’t forget to post your answers on your social media site/blog for the Mid-Event Survey. If you chose to do the Hour 12 Sprint, you can of course post your survey answers at the end of the hour or whenever you get to it, but do let us know your answers.  🙂 Mid Event Survey 1. What are you reading right now? 2. How many books have you read so far? 3. What book are you most looking forward to for the second half of the Read-a-thon? 4. Have you had many interruptions? How did you deal with those? 5. What surprises you most about the Read-a-thon, so far? Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here! Cheer your fellow readers! Join our Goodreads or Facebook or Reddit groups! Watch for posts and stories on our Instagram! Tag your posts with #Readathon on all your social channels 

Hour 11 – Simultaneous Reads

My little literary cuties! You’ve reached hour 11. Almost to halfway! A reintroduction for those who missed last hour’s post: My name is Steph and I’m a writer, journalist, and editor who loves to gobble up books in my spare time. Twitter is my main home on the Internet, feel free to say hi (I’m @steph_coelho over there). I always used to think that people who read multiple books at once were on another level of consciousness. How!? But when I started to get serious about meeting some ambitious yearly reading goals I needed to up my game. In my humble opinion, the readathon is a perfect time to flip between different books—especially if you plan to read for the full 24 hours. Switching things up keeps you from getting bored. Here are a few simultaneous reading strategies for ya:

• Mix up forms. Reading an ebook, audiobook, and paperback is a lot easier than trying to juggle three different mass markets. When you’re doing chores and can’t hold a physical book or e-reader, switch to the audiobook. And when you get tired of holding that heavy hardcover? It’s time to go digital.
• Mix up genres. If you try to switch between 3 different mystery books, you’re going to end up being really confused. I find reading a non-fiction book, fiction novel, and short story collection is the perfect combo.
• DNF (did not finish). The beauty of juggling multiple books at once is that you’ll quickly notice if you’re picking one up less than the others. And if you decide to DNF, you’re already into a few other reads. I’ve gotten way more comfy with the idea of DNF-ing recently and it means I end up spending more time on books I want to read.

So, do any of you lovely readers read different book simultaneously? Tell me your tips and tricks for doing so! Share your prefs and habits in the comments. It might just help another reader broaden their horizons! Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here! Cheer your fellow readers! Join our Goodreads or Facebook or Reddit groups! Watch for posts and stories on our Instagram! Tag your posts with #Readathon on all your social channels 

Hour 10 – Reading Weather

Hey there, book babes! It’s hour 10 and you’re freaking rocking it. A reintroduction for those who missed last hour’s post: My name is Steph and I’m a writer, journalist, and editor who loves to gobble up books in my spare time. Twitter is my main home on the Internet, feel free to say hi (I’m @steph_coelho over there). When I find out the date of the October readathon, I immediately cancel anything already on my calendar. If I was a big wig CEO I’d be shouting “cancel all my meetings!” the minute the date gets posted. Instead, I just check my agenda, realize I was never busy in the first place and continue to remind everyone around me that the readathon is coming up and not to bother me. Why does the October event mean so much to me? It’s because I strongly believe that fall is the ultimate season for reading. The cool weather, snuggly blankets, comfy sweaters. Fall vibes put me on another level mentally speaking. In the summer, I generally feel irritable and melancholy (having depression doesn’t help, obvi) but by the time fall (and winter) roll around, I have a little bit of a spring in my step. It helps that I love everything spooky, too. When the leaves start to drop from trees and the days get shorter, it sparks something in me and I read more voraciously than before. What about you, dear reader? What’s your favorite reading season? (If you say summer, you’re wrong, but I forgive you ;)) Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here! Cheer your fellow readers! Join our Goodreads or Facebook or Reddit groups! Watch for posts and stories on our Instagram! Tag your posts with #Readathon on all your social channels 

Hour 9 – An Intro to The StoryGraph

Welcome to hour 9 ‘lil book babies! My name is Steph and I’m a writer, journalist, and editor who loves to gobble up books in my spare time. Twitter is my main home on the Internet, feel free to say hi (I’m @steph_coelho over there). I’ve been doing this readathon for a longgggggg time and I love it so much that I usually make it a point to schedule nothing on a readathon weekend. It’s a sacred event for me! If you’re anything like me, you’ve got a reading goal for the year. Maybe it’s just in your mind or maybe you’re a list and spreadsheet maker who writes and plans it all. Personally, I need an extra boost of motivation sometimes and tracking helps me stay focused. I used to use Goodreads to track my yearly reading goal. This year, though, I switched over to The StoryGraph and put GR behind me for good. I wanted to introduce you all to the website and app because it’s independently owned and created and has the cozy vibes that GR used to have back in the day. It’s also got a slew of really neat features. And new ones are coming out all the time. Some cool things include:

• the ability to discover books by mood
• personal recs (they’re way better than GR’s)
• tracking with stats and pie charts (so you can see how many LGBTQIA+ books you read, for example)
• reading challenge tracking (yay!)
• the ability to custom tag books
• content warnings (you can also add them yourself when reviewing a book)

The friending feature is still in the works but you can find my profile over here. If this sounds cool, I encourage you to sign up! The platform is free to use and it’s a great way to keep track of your readathon progress 🙂 Do you track your reading? What’s your favorite way to keep tabs on your book collection or reading progress? Do you have any pics of a cool reading journal? Post them to Instagram with the hashtag #readathontracking Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here! Cheer your fellow readers! Join our Goodreads or Facebook or Reddit groups! Watch for posts and stories on our Instagram! Tag your posts with #Readathon on all your social channels 

Hour 8 – Halloween

Welcome to hour 8! This is my final hour with you all! I hope you’ve enjoyed it! We are a week away from Halloween! Are you excited? I try my best to read as much spooky and horrifying books during this month. Does anybody else do this as well? Have any spooky books on your TBR list for this readathon? Please do feel free to share!

Back to reading! I’ll be listening to audiobook while hanging out on Twitter if you’d like to join me! It’s been really fun. Please feel free to follow me. All my links are right here. Thank you for joining me!

Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here!

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Hour 7 – Reading Buddies!

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A post shared by Nikkie Dunton (@starsbooksandtea)

We are back for hour 7!!!!! Who’s excited?! Now’s the time to talk about our reading buddies! Here’s mine!!!! His name is Quil. He loves reading with mommy as long as mommy isn’t reading out loud. He LOVES listening to audiobooks as long as there’s no not safe for work or work material or scary parts! He will promptly leave the room until the scene is done. The weird thing is he loves the Sword of Truth series! He listens actively to the story. For those of you who read the series, you get why this miffs me. I’d love to see your reading buddies!

Let’s get back to reading!!!!! I’ll be listening to audiobook while hanging out on Twitter! Come join me!

Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here!

Cheer your fellow readers!

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Tag your posts with #Readathon on all your social channels 

Hour 6 – Audiobooks

Hope everybody is having a great time reading so far! Can you believe we are six hours into reading already? I’m just amazed! How is your reading going? Fantastic I’m sure! I like to switch up my hours so I don’t get burned out. I read for a few hours and then I switch to audiobooks. I mean I’m still reading either way, but you get me! Anybody else do this as well? If so, what do you do when listen? Me personally, I either scroll the computer, clean, color, or play games. I try to avoid anything that takes concentration away from the audiobook too much. It definitely helps maximize reading time! I usually don’t like to listen to audio on headphone though, so I usually stick in my room when I listen. But I do have headphones. I’d love to hear your audiobook routine!

Back to reading! I’ll be listening to audiobook and hanging out with you all on Twitter! Happy reading!

Enter your finished books into the DATABASE here!

Cheer your fellow readers!

Join our Goodreads or Facebook or Reddit groups!

Watch for posts and stories on our Instagram!

Tag your posts with #Readathon on all your social channels