The Great Read-a-Thon 2014

It's our third, glorious year of The Great Read-a-Thon! Hooray!

2013 Read-a-Thon Winner: Ariana

2012 Read-a-Thon Winner: Kristen

Want to read about the birth of the Great-a-Thon Challenge? Click here!

Ariana says: 

I've been using Goodreads a lot to track books and get suggestions for new ones. They have a great way to track the books you've read. It's basically social reading media if you haven't used it before. What I like about it is the recommendations and the fact that they let you set a yearly book challenge to keep you on track. My book challenge this year is 50 books. That's basically one book a week for the entire year. It sounds hard, doesn't it? Good. It's supposed to be. 

I'm working at a public middle/high school right now and trying to get into Grad school. This means that I am constantly being asked, "Miss. Have you read _______? You should - it's good!" The book they're asking me to read isn't that challenging, but if I'm caught up on what they're reading, it means it's much easier to help them draw connections between what they're learning and the subject material. That's all fine and good, but I can't just read Young Adult fiction. Thus, I'm imposing the stipulation on myself that I have to read more non-fiction and classics this year to make up for the abundance of YA that will appear on my list. 

Kristen says:

As you can see from my numbers in 2014, I didn't get a whole lot of reading done, mostly because I don't have a lot of time for reading for pleasure. I am in the process of switching from my Masters to my PhD, so what free time I had will likely disappear even more as the year wears on. The upside is that I have a fair bit of travel planned, which is when I tend to read the most.

I love having the Great-Read-A-Thon to help motivate me to read more, even if I wasn't able to keep up with Ariana last year. My goal for this year is to just keep reading. I don't have a specific genre or anything that I want to focus on; the goal is just to read. I am hoping to get more read than last year...but that's a pretty easy goal to accomplish (or so I'd like to think...).

We've mutually decided to change the rules a little bit this year. Read ahead!

RULE NUMBER ONE: We have to have read the ENTIRE book. Example: I was assigned to read Ulysses by James Joyce for class but then our teacher had us read the last third and segments from Dubliners. I don’t get credit for either book because I didn’t actually read them in their entirety. 

RULE NUMBER TWO: We've been reading new books for the past two years and that means some of our re-readable favorites have been getting pretty lonely. This year, we are allowed to reread books we've read and it counts toward our total. WHAT.
RULE NUMBER THREE: Academic papers, single short stories (an entire collection/book is OK) and plays don't count.


**Last Updated: 12/25/14**
Ariana's List: 16
1/1/2014 - City of Glass - Cassandra Clare - Young Adult Fantasy
1/4/2014 - Divergent - Veronica Roth - Young Adult 
1/25/2014 - Insurgent - Veronica Roth - Young Adult 
1/26/2014 - Allegiant - Veronica Roth - Young Adult 
1/28/2014 - Nickled and Dimed: The Art of Not Getting By in America - Barbara Ehrenreich - Non-Fiction
1/31/2014 - Fangirl - Rainbow Rowell - Fiction
2/16/2014 - So Say the Waiters - Justin Sirois - Fiction
2/27/2014 - Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter S. Thompson - Fiction
3/25/2014 - American Gods - Neil Gaiman - Fiction
3/29/2014 - The Tipping Point - Malcolm Gladwell - Non-Fiction
4/19/2014 - The Magicians -  Lev Grossman - Fiction
5/12/2014 - Sushi for Beginners -Marian Keyes - Fiction
6/6/2014 - In Defense of Food - Micheal Pollan - Non-Fiction
8/15/2014 - Love, Rosie - Cecelia Ahern - Fiction
12/05/2014 - The Curse of Lono - Hunter S. Thompson - Fiction
12/25/2014 - On The Road - Jack Kerouac - Fiction

**Last Updated: 8.10.2014**
Kristen's List: 24
1.07.2014 - The Yacoubian Building - Alaa Al Aswany
1.26.2014 - Divergent - Veronica Roth
1.28.2014 - Insurgent - Veronica Roth
2.3.2014 - Allegiant - Veronica Roth
3.3.2014 - The Deep End of the Ocean - Jacquelyn Mitchard
3.29.2014 - The Samurai's Garden - Gail Tsukiyama (My first re-read for 2014!)
4.4.2014 - Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman
4.28.2014 - The Emperor's Children - Claire Messud
5.10.2014 - Ferdydurke - Witold Gombrowicz
5.19.2014 - A Disobedient Girl - Ru Freeman
5.24.2014 - Little Princes - Conor Grennan
5.25.2014 - The Other Wind - Ursula K. LeGuin
6.10.2014 - The Magicians - Lev Grossman
6.18.2014 - The Folk of the Fringe - Orson Scott Card
6.24.2014 - Broken Harbor - Tana French
7.01.2014 - The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
7.23.2014 - The Power of One - Bryce Courtnay
8.10.2014 - The Kitchen God's Wife - Amy Tan
8.19.2014 - The Man Who Ate the 747 - Ben Sherwood
8.30.2014 - The Valley of Amazement - Amy Tan
9.09.2014 - The Senator's Wife - Sue Miller
10.30.2014 - The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks - Rebecca Skloot
11.02.2014 - The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle - Avi
11.04.2014 - A Long Way Gone - Ishmael Beah

Check back frequently to see our lists! Do you have a recommendation for a book? Leave it in the comments down below!