Christian Fiction Bloggers discussion

Team Esther
Monique
Maria
Davina
Lanelle
A.

Chat:
Review:

*

PLEASE POST AS FOLLOWS:

Book read: Head in the Clouds by Karen Witemeyer
Complete word or letters: Letters H, I, T, W
Started: 2/6/2020
Finished: 2/6/2020
Pages read during challenge: 366
Rating: 5 stars

Hello team, I'm so excited for this challenge!

Has anyone thought about a strategy? Does anyone want to be our organizer?

Hello, Team Esther! I'm excited to be participating in this challenge with you all! I would absolutely love to be our team's organizer! :)

With our first puzzle being Philippians 2:14's...

"DO ALL THINGS WITHOUT GRUMBLING OR DISPUTING.”

...we will need to complete books that spell out this verse, letter by letter (using the first letters of the title words and author name) or word by word.

Today I will be finishing "The Graveyard Book" by Neil Gaiman, which works for letters T, G, B, & N.✔️

What books are you all currently reading or plan to finish reading within the next day or two?

Also, by the end of tomorrow (Friday) I'll start and finish reading...

Book: "Imagine: The Great Flood" by Matt Koceich✔️ -POSTING FOR VERSE #3
Works for: The title & author words above & letters T, G, F, M, & K

Book: "Imagine: The Ten Plagues" by Matt Koceich✔️
Works for: The title & author words above & letters I, T, P, M, & K

And I'll be starting and finishing these books within the next few days...

Book: "Imagine: The Fall of Jericho" by Matt Koceich
Works for: The title & author words above & letters T, F, O, J, M, & K

Book: "Imagine: The Giant's Fall" by Matt Koceich
Works for: The title & author words above & letters I, T, G, F, M, & K

Book: "Imagine: The Miracles of Jesus" by Matt Koceich
Works for: The title & author words above & letters I, T, M, O, J, & K

Book: "You'll Think of Me" by Robin Lee Hatcher✔️ - POSTED FOR VERSE #2
Works for: The title & author words above & letters Y, T, O, M, R, L, & H

Monique, you may want to read the comments Melanie and I made in the sign-up thread last night. I was thinking the same way you are about how the letters work, but Melanie cleared this up for me.

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Thank you, Andrea! That did help clarify things and I modified my original post in this thread. :)

Glad to help!

Book: Still: 7 Ways to Find Calm in the Chaos
Works for: The words above and letters "S"


Does this work for "A" and "B"?
Book: Beauty for Ashes

I found a book with 'grumbling' in the title: Darkness and Decadence: The Grumbling of a Gargoyle. I'll read it within the next day or so.

I will try to find books with the entire word in the title or subtitle for this challenge.

A. Kaylee...

“Still: 7 Ways to Find Calm in the Chaos” by Jenny L. Donnelly works for the title & author words/names, as well as the letters S, W, T, F, C, I, J, L, and D.

“Beauty for Ashes" by Kathleen Neely works for the title & author words/names, as well as the letters B, F, A, K, and N.

When might you finish reading these books? :)

This challenge is like a game of hangman, where every instance of letters or words our books qualify for gets filled in for the puzzle/verse in progress.

The beginning letters of every word in the book title and author's name will work for this challenge, OR, when you have a word in your book title or author's name that matches a word in the current puzzle/verse, the entire word can be filled in instead.

I've posted for "The Graveyard Book" by Neil Gaiman in our team review thread, which fulfilled the letters T, G, B, & N.

So our current progress is...

PUZZLE/VERSE #1 - Team Esther - Philippians 2:14

"DO ALL THINGS WITHOUT GRUMBLING OR DISPUTING.”

“_ _ * _ _ _ * T _ _ N G _ * _ _ T _ _ _ T *
G _ _ _ B _ _ N G * _ _ * _ _ _ _ _ T _ N G.”

Letters claimed: T, G, B, N
Letters still needed: D, O, A, L, H, I, S, W, U, R, M, P

I hope this helps. :)

Lanelle - It would be great if you could fill in the rest of the word “GRUMBLING” with the book you mentioned. Fulfilling whole words, when we can, is an excellent plan! :)

Hi guys, sorry I live in a different time zone, so I just woke up :). I will be finishing "The Cruel Prince" by Holly Black today.

Thanks Monique for volunteering. SO happy about the new challenge!

Wonderful to see you here, Davina! Thank you for the update! "The Cruel Prince" by Holly Black will fulfill the P & H still needed in our current puzzle. :)

UPDATE: P has been fulfilled, however this book can still fulfill the H for our current puzzle, or be saved for an upcoming puzzle. Our next verse, once we finish the current one, is Psalm 121:2's "My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth."

I've finished and reported the book I started yesterday morning. It's Moon Called by Patricia Briggs. The letters are M, C, P and B.

I'll begin reading my 'grumbling' book now :)

Great job, Lanelle! C isn't in our current puzzle, and B was fulfilled yesterday, however your post fulfills the M & P. :)

Our current verse progress:

"DO ALL THINGS WITHOUT GRUMBLING OR DISPUTING.”

“_ _ * _ _ _ * T _ _ N G _ * _ _ T _ _ _ T *
G _ _ M B _ _ N G * _ _ * _ _ _ P _ T _ N G.”

Letters claimed: T, G, B, N, M, P
Letters still needed: D, O, A, L, H, I, S, W, U, R

I thought I'd let you all know that I am in communication with our teammate Maria. We became friends last year when we were teamed up in another reading challenge. She is incredibly nice, is from Australia, and will definitely be reading books for this challenge. Also, she is blind, so I will be assisting her in any way that I can with this, including posting for her in our team review thread. 🙂

I hope you all are enjoying your reads! 🙂

Oh wonderful, thank you Monique!

I was wondering - should I save The cruel Prince for the next verse, since we only need the H?

I'm also about to finish a german book by the title: "Der Schrei des Löwen" by Ortwin Ramadan. Do german titles count too? We could use a lot of letters there.

I woke up way too early this morning. I quickly read my 'grumbling' book and then found another short book that had 'without' in the title. It was a super cute story. I have reported them both.

I promise the next book I read will have plenty of pages so we get points as well.

I have a couple of books planned for our next scripture. They are Lord Mumford's Minx and Heaven is Gentle.

Davina - Yes, books of any language will work for this challenge, and “Der Schrei des Löwen” by Ortwin Ramadan will work great to fulfill the letters S, O, & R in our current verse/puzzle, which are all still needed. Are you finished with this book? Let me know if you have any trouble posting in our team’s review thread. To save you time and trouble, you can copy and paste this for your review post (filling in your start & finish dates, # of pages read, and rating):

TEAM ESTHER - VERSE #1
*Book read: “Der Schrei des Löwen” by Ortwin Ramadan
*Works for: letters S, O, R
*Started:
*Finished:
*Pages read during challenge:
*Rating:

“The Cruel Prince" by Holly Black would likely fit an upcoming verse better than the current one. So it might benefit our team to save that one for later. :)

Thank you for completing "WITHOUT" and "GRUMBLING," Lanelle! Great job! Also, your planned reads that you mentioned fit our next verse very well! :)

I woke up to a winter storm and several hours of snow this morning, which is very rare for the area I live in, just north of Atlanta. This has made it a great day to relax with warm beverages and get some reading done. :)

I’ll be saving the books I mentioned in message 6 of this thread for upcoming verses, which they'll fit better than the current verse.

I read Beauty for Ashes by Kathleen Neely yesterday -- which works for A, correct?
I also read Hidden Agenda by Lisa Harris which works for H, I believe.

I'm reading but also busy so I haven't been on much lately, I'll do better about that soon.

A. - You can fulfill H, A, and L with "Hidden Agenda" by Lisa Harris, then I can modify my last two posts a bit. :)

To save you time and trouble, A., you can copy and paste this into our team’s review thread (filling in your start & finish dates, # of pages read, and rating):

TEAM ESTHER - VERSE #1
*Book read: "Hidden Agenda" by Lisa Harris
*Works for: letters H, A, L
*Started:
*Finished:
*Pages read during challenge:
*Rating:

It would be great if you could save "Ashes" by Kathleen Neely for an upcoming verse/puzzle. :)

Monique wrote: "A. - You can fulfill H, A, and L with "Hidden Agenda" by Lisa Harris, then I can modify my last two posts a bit. :)

To save you time and trouble, A., you can copy and paste this in..."

Okiedokey, will do ... I'm catching up on blogging right now and will work on this too. Thanks!

Tonight I found, read, and posted for a book that fulfilled the letters I, D, & U. So our current verse/puzzle progress is now:

"DO ALL THINGS WITHOUT GRUMBLING OR DISPUTING.”

“D _ * _ _ _ * T _ I N G _ * W I T H O U T *
G R U M B L I N G * _ _ * D I _ P U T I N G.”

Letters still needed: O, A, L, H, S, & R

This means that after Davina's (S, O, R) and A.’s (H, A, L) review posts are made, our first verse will be complete and we'll be on to the next.

Great work, team! :)

Hey team,

I'm sorry, my weekend was busy and I still have such a huge workload to go through today, but I hope I will be able to finish the book tonight or tomorrow. I will have more reading time next week <3.

Yay, I finished it!

Davina wrote: "Yay, I finished it!"


: D

I'm starting Heaven is Gentle.

Yay! We are done with round/puzzle/verse #1, so onto our second verse, which according to Melanie's message #6 in our review thread, is Psalm 121:2. :)

"MY HELP COMES FROM THE LORD, WHO MADE HEAVEN AND EARTH."

Great work, Team Esther! :)

I haven't finished “Still: 7 Ways to Find Calm in the Chaos” by Jenny L. Donnelly yet but am reading it this week.

Fatal Exchange by Lisa Harris works for F, E, L, H. (Read it the 6th.)

Murphy Lawson by P.D. Atkerson works for M, L, D, and A. (Read the 6th.) Since it has a M it can wait...

And lastly The Traitor's Pawn by Lisa Harris works for T, but can wait if we need.

Great job, guys, on finishing the first verse! I'll go update all the threads. :D

Ok, I'm posting the cruel prince now!

By the way, I'm currently reading . It has a loooong subtitle, so it will bring us a lot of letters :) - maybe for the next verse? (Present Over Perfect: Leaving Behind Frantic for a Simpler, More Soulful Way of Living)

I've finished and reported my 'heaven' book.

I was planning on reading a 'lord' book next, but I think those letters are pretty much filled. I'll look through my books and see if I can find a title with N, R, and/or Y in it.

Thank you so much for your recent review posts, A., Davina and Lanelle, and for the updates! :)

And thank you, Melanie! :)

I just posted review posts for a book read by Maria and 2 books I read, so this is now our progress on our second verse (Psalm 121:2):

"MY HELP COMES FROM THE LORD, WHO MADE HEAVEN AND EARTH."

“M Y * H _ L P * C O M _ S * F R O M * T H _ * L O R D ,*
W H O * M A D _ * H E A V E N * A _ D * _ A R T H.”

Letters still needed: E, N

With how close we are to finishing this verse (just two letters left), we should now stick to fulfilling letters instead of words. The words "MY," "FROM," "LORD," "WHO," and HEAVEN" are now complete, and the other words are close to being complete. :)

I'll start reading The Earl Next Door for letters E and N. After that, I'll read The Devil in Beauty for the next scripture.

I just reported The Earl Next Door. That finishes this scripture, right?

Yay! Yep, your post completed our second verse! Thank you, Lanelle! :)

Great job overall, team! :)

Now we'll just need to wait to make any more review posts until Melanie posts our totals and signals the start of our next verse, which is “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you” from James 4:7.

Based on our chats, here are some Verse #3 (James 4:7) plans, which I'll update as we work on this...

“SUBMIT YOURSELVES THEREFORE TO GOD. RESIST THE DEVIL AND HE WILL FLEE FROM YOU.”

“S U B M I T * Y O U R S E L V E S * T H E R E F O R E *
T O * G O D . * R E S I S T * T H E * D E V I L * A N D *
H E * W I L L * F L E E * F R O M * Y O U .”✔️

Monique:
*“The Great Flood” by Matt Koceich - Letters T, G, F, M - POSTED✔️
*“A Very Big Bunny” by Marisabina Russo - Letters A, V, B, R - POSTED✔️
*“Be Your Own Hero” by Lisa King - Y, O - POSTED✔️
*“Up the Creek” by Nicholas Oldland - U, N - POSTED✔️

Lanelle:
*“The Devil in Beauty” by Heidi Ashworth - Letters D, I, H - POSTED✔️
*“Wild Honey” by Veronica Sattler - W, S - POSTED✔️

A. - “Fatal Exchange” by Lisa Harris - Letters E, L - POSTED✔️

Because each book we read can fulfill multiple letters, and the letters that are in each verse/puzzle word are most often in several other words as well, it seems we can complete these verses a lot faster fulfilling letters rather than words. Also, in doing this, we all can read whatever we'd like and find a way to make it work for this challenge. :)

thank you for the awesome planning, Monique!

It’s my pleasure, Davina. :)

Our 3rd verse has officially begun, and I've posted my planned books for this verse. :)

To save you time and trouble, A., since you have finished reading this book, you can copy and paste this into our team’s review thread (filling in your rating):

TEAM ESTHER - VERSE #3 - JAMES 4:7
*Book read: “Fatal Exchange” by Lisa Harris
*Works for: letters E, L
*Started: 2/6/20
*Finished: 2/6/20
*Pages read during challenge: 320
*Rating: Undetermined

Happy reading, everyone! :)

I just posted my review for The Devil in Beauty.

Thank you so much, Lanelle! :)

Monique wrote: "Our 3rd verse has officially begun, and I've posted my planned books for this verse. :)

To save you time and trouble, A., since you have finished reading this book, you can copy and paste this int..."

I've been meaning to post it, I just haven't figured out a rating yet.

Hey guys, I'm sorry, I had a crazy busy work week - almost no reading time, but I have the next week off and hopefully I will be able to read much more then!