2025 Reading Challenge discussion

READATHON CENTRAL
2023 Reading Rainbow: Team Readathon
Duration: June 9 to June 18, 2023
Sign-up deadline: June 1
Team announcements: June 2


Once our team readathon goes live, here’s the thread where you can find FAQs and where the team leaders/assistants can post questions on behalf of their teams.

Reading Rainbow

Welcome to 2023 Reading Challenge’s Summer Readathon! This summer we will be hosting a 10-day long team readathon that we hope you will all enjoy just as much as last time! Didn’t participate in last year’s readathons? That’s totally cool! We will work to create teams with an even mix of seasoned and first-time “readathon-ers” as well as folks who read at different paces.

This theme was suggested by SarahKat. Thank you so much for the amazing idea!

General Information

❤️ June 9 to June 18, 2023
🧡 Begins and ends at midnight in your own time zone
💛 One prompt, one bonus points prompt
💚 Participants will be fairly divided into teams of up to 11 readers
💙 Qualifying book formats include print, ebook, large print, and audiobooks (graphic novels, comics, and books under 100 pages will not count)
💜 FAQs can be found in the comment below

Point System

Although teams may have varying amounts of members, you have all been divided fairly based on the number of books pledged. The point breakdown is as follows:
Regular Prompt: 50 POINTS EACH
Bonus Point Prompt: 100 POINTS EACH
Pages Read: 1 POINT PER PAGE
Audiobook Hours Listened: 15 hours = 1,000 pages

For audio hours, please be sure to track the time you spend listening and not the length of the audiobook if you listen at a speed greater than 1x

FAQs

I'm a Team Leader, what exactly are my responsibilities?
As Team Leader (TL), your responsibilities are to double check that the team is updating your team spreadsheet correctly, moving books that could fit other prompts if needed, and being the designated question-asker for your team in this thread.
As TL, please create a post for your team in the Team Progress thread to report how your team’s doing.
An Assistant supports the TL as the TL requires (assistance), or when the TL's not around. When agreed upon between the two, an Assistant may permanently assume one or more of the TL's duties or temporarily during the TL's absence.

*I’d planned to read a book for a specific prompt, but when I finished the book, that prompt was already filled by a teammate. What should I do?
Make sure that you’ve checked off all the prompts that your book will fill. As the readathon progresses, your team captain can look at which books can be moved around to optimize prompt coverage.

*I don’t feel like reading today. Will my team hate me?
No, of course not. Read what you want when you can and, most importantly, have fun.

*How do we fill in our team’s spreadsheet?
Each team member is responsible for typing in their reading plans (not all of them, only what they're currently reading) as well as their daily progress in reading or listening.
Be sure to also report on the spreadsheet when a book you finish completes a prompt.

*What about audiobooks? Graphic novels/comics?
Audiobook hours can be used for our readathon! The formula is 15 hrs = 1,000 pages read.
Unfortunately, graphic novels/comics will not count for this readathon. In an effort to make things fair for everyone, we have decided that graphic novels/comics and books under 100 pages will not count.

*Some of my teammates haven't shown up yet to discuss reading plans. What should I do?
Send me a message letting me know which members you are missing from your discussion thread. I will work to contact them as quickly as possible to let them know they have been assigned to your team. Unfortunately, we cannot ensure that all group members will show up, however, in the event of the majority of your teammates missing we will work to relocate you so you can still enjoy the readathon.

PROMPTS

1. Read a book with a cover the color that matches your team. Any shade of your color is acceptable.
2. Bonus Points Prompt: Read a book with the color of your team in the title. (Ex. The Bluest Eye). Any shade of your color is acceptable.

Please refer to this website for examples of color shades: https://digitalsynopsis.com/design/co...

Incidental finds for the bonus prompt will not be accepted. Examples such as Redeeming Love, Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, etc. These would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to find for teams other than red. So to keep things fair we will not include titles that are not explicitly about the color.

Just to be clear, we can use any shade of our color in the title. For example if we were Team Brown, we could use a book with "coffee" in the title?

My second question is if even if a book doesn't have a brown cover or shade of brown in the title, we still get points for listening or reading?

KSMary wrote: "Just to be clear, we can use any shade of our color in the title. For example if we were Team Brown, we could use a book with "coffee" in the title?

My second question is if even if a book doesn't..."

For your first question, yes any shade of your color can be used in the title. Another example would be "Golden" for team yellow or "Lilac" for team purple. I hope this helps!

For your second question, books that don't fit the prompts can be used for page/audio points but not for prompt points.

One last question, what percentage of the cover has to be the chosen color to qualify for the first prompt? Do you suggest we use Tineye to verify?
https://labs.tineye.com/color/4fc868e...

KSMary wrote: "One last question, what percentage of the cover has to be the chosen color to qualify for the first prompt? Do you suggest we use Tineye to verify?
https://labs.tineye.com/color/4fc868e......"

The mods have discussed and decided we will leave it up to the participants to decide if their cover matches their team's color. So long as you look at the cover and it is immediately apparent that your team's color is prominent then it should be okay!

TinEye looks like a great resource for books that people are unsure about, though, thank you for putting the link in here! Just be aware that it can interpret colors differently than the human eye sometimes. Mostly with darker colors it will lump them all into either black or brown.
For example,

it says this cover is 79.5% black whereas I would interpret that color as purple.


Baseline: Use your best judgment! :)

Thanks for answering my questions!

Is there a protocol for DNF'd books during a readathon? If a mood reader starts one book, then switches to another without finishing the first, will any pages/hours count for the incomplete book? I know it's early, but I'm trying to be proactive.

TerryJane wrote: "Is there a protocol for DNF'd books during a readathon? If a mood reader starts one book, then switches to another without finishing the first, will any pages/hours count for the incomplete book? I..."

Ooh good question! Obviously bailey needs to answer this, but I would assume pages read would/should still count ?

Just making sure I understand the point system correctly - If I read a book that is 352 pages, with "blue" in the title - does that then mean I've accumulated 100 points + 352 points?

Can I count a book as color on the cover if the edition I chose doesn’t have the color? There is at least one edition of the book with the color (as shown on looking at all editions), just not the one I happen to have.

I have a few books in mind that fall in this situation. Thanks!

TerryJane wrote: "Is there a protocol for DNF'd books during a readathon? If a mood reader starts one book, then switches to another without finishing the first, will any pages/hours count for the incomplete book? I..."

This time around we're going to count all pages read/hours listened even if it's for a book that doesn't match a prompt or is DNF'd!

Lisa wrote: "Just making sure I understand the point system correctly - If I read a book that is 352 pages, with "blue" in the title - does that then mean I've accumulated 100 points + 352 points?"

Yes, that's correct! The spreadsheets should have formulas that help calculate your scores, too, but it's always good to double check just in case.

Beth wrote: "Can I count a book as color on the cover if the edition I chose doesn’t have the color? There is at least one edition of the book with the color (as shown on looking at all editions), just not the ..."

I would say yes. It might be even more difficult for e-readers and audio listeners to find the exact edition that matches and I don't want to limit people's choices too much!

Thanks, bailey!

Fantastic! - Thanks bailey :)

bailey, can two members of a team read the same book?

Ilona wrote: "bailey, can two members of a team read the same book?"

Yes! It's perfectly fine to have multiple team members read the same book.

bailey, can we continue to earn points for both prompts? I think I saw somewhere that we can repeat the bonus prompt as much as we'd like for additional points, is that true for the main prompt as well?

Lisa wrote: "bailey, can we continue to earn points for both prompts? I think I saw somewhere that we can repeat the bonus prompt as much as we'd like for additional points, is that true for the main prompt as ..."

Yes! Both prompts are repeatable as many times as you like.

😊Thanks :)

bailey wrote: "Ilona wrote: "bailey, can two members of a team read the same book?"

Yes! It's perfectly fine to have multiple team members read the same book."

Great! Thank you :)

A member of my team asked about mixed format reading.

Which leads me to a follow up question of my own :
How does tracking work if someone reads and listens to the book simultaneously ?
Like if you read a book a certain amount, and then listen a certain amount on the same day, we track and count both. But what if I read the book while listening to the audio? Do I then have to choose either or option ?

I hope that made sense, thanks in advance, bailey :)

Lisa wrote: "A member of my team asked about mixed format reading.

Which leads me to a follow up question of my own :
How does tracking work if someone reads and listens to the book simultaneously ?
Like if..."

Yes, that absolutely makes sense! I would say choose whichever format you'd like (either audio or pages) and only count one for points.

So if it's easier to just track pages, then I'd track pages. Or if you'd rather calculate how many points you'd get for time spent listening, then count audio.

bailey wrote: "Lisa wrote: "A member of my team asked about mixed format reading.

Which leads me to a follow up question of my own :
How does tracking work if someone reads and listens to the book simultaneous..."

Great! Thanks :)

A couple of questions:

We are all supposed to read a book with the color?
Do all books have to be the color/colored name?

I only have two orange books physical and a couple ebooks I don’t fancy 😅

I’m also reading Oliver Twist. I’m not very far in the story, do I count it if I finish?

Also.. I’m reading a bunch of other books that I know I’m not going to finish .. Mansfield Park, Moby Dick.. do I count the pages knowing they are planned to end after the readathon?

Winter wrote: "A couple of questions:

We are all supposed to read a book with the color?
Do all books have to be the color/colored name?

I only have two orange books physical and a couple ebooks I don’t fanc..."

Participants are welcome to read books that do not have their team's color on the cover or in the title. However, those books will only accumulate points for pages read/hours listened.

Which means that, yes, this time around we are going to count all of our pages read/hours listened no matter if we finish the book (or not) or count it for a prompt (or not). I hope that helps!

wait, what?
so if someone reads Moby Dick as part of the group read, they can count the 800 pages (I have no idea how long it actually is, obviously), but not the 50 or 100 challenge points? Is that correct?

Lisa wrote: "wait, what?
so if someone reads Moby Dick as part of the group read, they can count the 800 pages (I have no idea how long it actually is, obviously), but not the 50 or 100 challenge points? Is th..."

Yes, but only the pages/hours that are read during the readathon.

(I may rework this idea for future readathons if it doesn't turn out right. I'm still learning as I go 😌)

Haha, it'll be fine bailey! It's a great readathon :)
I was so locked on finding color appropriate books, that option completely went over my head!

And everyone are supposed to be reading at least one color book?

Winter wrote: "And everyone are supposed to be reading at least one color book?"

I suppose not necessarily. But I hope that everyone is able to find at least one book that matches their team's color!

Will start Little Women probably then. Aesops Fable are quicker, but I don’t really want to re-read it this month I think. They were the books I found.

Clarification re points, please. Does a book with color on cover and in title count for 150 plus page count? Or can only one prompt be used per book?

I interpreted the former but am seeing others saying it’s the latter. Thanks!

it's either or, Beth. Either it counts for the cover, or for the word in the title. To that you then add the pages you've read of said book.

Lisa is correct on this! So you’d probably want to take the bonus points (100) for the title rather than regular points (50) for the cover.

We have some questions on Team Orange lol

1) Do you count books that are not orange covers? (aka the 1 pt. per page)

2) Should we count our pages that have orange covers or orange titles do they fall under the regular and bonus prompts category?

Please help! TY!

D.L. wrote: "We have some questions on Team Orange lol

1) Do you count books that are not orange covers? (aka the 1 pt. per page)

2) Should we count our pages that have orange covers or orange titles do they ..."

1) Yes, please feel free to count pages/hours for books that don't have orange on the cover!
2) I'm working on going through and updating the spreadsheets so they have a section for books that don't fit the prompts. It may take me a little bit but I will get to everyone's spreadsheet soon!

bailey wrote: 2) I'm working on going through and updating the spreadsheets so they have a section for books that don't fit the prompts...."

Oh thanks bailey, I was just about to do it myself for Team Blue! But in that case, I shall not interfere :D *goes back to reading*

All spreadsheets have been updated!

But please let me know if anything looks wonky or formulas aren't adding correctly. Or feel free to edit your team's spreadsheet differently if you prefer a different way to track!

bailey wrote: "D.L. wrote: "We have some questions on Team Orange lol

1) Do you count books that are not orange covers? (aka the 1 pt. per page)

2) Should we count our pages that have orange covers or orange ti..."

Thank you for answering, Bailey :)

bailey wrote: "All spreadsheets have been updated!

But please let me know if anything looks wonky or formulas aren't adding correctly. Or feel free to edit your team's spreadsheet differently if you prefer a dif..."

Our purple team showed "Non-red book, DNF, or <100 pages." I changed it to purple myself. I hope that's okay. You may want to double check other teams that are not red. 😊

Theresa wrote: "bailey wrote: "All spreadsheets have been updated!

But please let me know if anything looks wonky or formulas aren't adding correctly. Or feel free to edit your team's spreadsheet differently if y..."

Oh my gosh I definitely did that for all the spreadsheets, lol! Thank you for letting me know!!

I wanted to get clarification on group reads/buddy reads/tbr twin reads.

If you are on team blue and you happen to be reading something that has a blue cover in a group read/buddy read/tbr twin read, it sounds like you can count the number of pages or audiobook hours. However, if you finish said book during the readathon, can you count it as finished (and earn the 50 points)?

Caterina wrote: "...it sounds like you can count the number of pages or audiobook hours. However, if you finish said book during the readathon, can you count it as finished (and earn the 50 points)? "

Please check the red team thread because I asked this exact same question. I was told, you can only count those pages that were read AFTER the challenge started (after midnight Friday 9 June Local time) and only if it is more than 100 pages, and if the cover is the right colour - then you can claim the 50 points for the cover colour and also the page count for those pages read (again - as long as they were read after the start of the challenge and as long as it was more than 100 pages.)

All pages read (or listened to) BEFORE the challenge started cannot be counted.

I had planned to start reading Scarlett early, before the challenge began, but was told that only those pages I read after the challenge started would be counted. So I changed my mind about that book. LOL

Caterina wrote: "I wanted to get clarification on group reads/buddy reads/tbr twin reads.

If you are on team blue and you happen to be reading something that has a blue cover in a group read/buddy read/tbr twin re..."

Yes, Robynne is correct about this. If you have 100 pages left in the buddy read when the readathon started then you can count it for the prompt points (50 or 100).

Thank you both for the clarification!

I finished a book that doesn't fit any orange prompt, am I supposed to add it somehwere except the pages?

Winter, there is a section in the tracking part of your team sheets called 'PAGE POINTS ONLY (one per row)' (it's at the bottom, right above the total scores), where you can enter books that do not fit the prompts and track their pages there. Additionally, add them to the pages read count each day :)