EVERYONE Has Read This but Me - The Catch-Up Book Club discussion

Welcome to the 9th annual House Cup Challenge! This year's theme is....Precious Gemstones (Diamond, Emerald, Ruby, and Saphire)


HOW THE CHALLENGE WORKS
- Everyone who wants to play joins a house and all the houses compete to read the most over the three months. The scores are based on an average and there will be an overall winner as well as 2 winners each month when you will go head-to-head with another team.
- The Challenge will run from October 1 through December 31. All books started & finished during this time will count toward the challenge.
- Post in YOUR HOUSE’S THREAD ran by your house’s prefect. contribute with the BOOK TITLE and DATE FINISHED and NUMBER OF PAGES.
- If you would like you can make one post, or one per month, and update them to keep everything in one place, but I do ask that you make another comment letting your team prefect know that you updated it.

Each house has its own thread:

DIAMOND - Prefect: Jessica P
EMERALD - Prefect: Laura
RUBY - Prefect: Tr1sha
SAPHIRE - Prefect: Cynthia

RULES AND SCORING
We will use an average score to balance the different house sizes. We will use a tiered scoring system based on the number of pages in a book. Essentially, it's 1 point for every 250 pages read within a book. Here's the breakdown:
1-249 pages = 1 point
250-499 pages = 2 points
500-749 = 3 points
and so on...

- If its a graphic novel, heavily pictured book or sparsely worded (i.e. poetry), half points will be awarded, so it will be 0.5 points for every 250 pages. The points will be awarded per book and not per cumulative pages read.
- Easy point-getters are limited to 10 per month per participant. These will be books with less than 50 pages.
- A book cannot be counted more than one time in a month, so a maximum of three times over the course of a challenge.
- If you read one of the group's selected group reads for October, November or December, you get to add a bonus 0.5 point. (This must be read in the month that the book is our BOTM pick)
- For a book to count, it must be started and finished during the challenge timeframe.
- Use the page number of the most popular edition when you search on Goodreads for every book read. This includes audiobooks, ebooks, and physical books.

- Number of participants per house will be counted based on contributions, so if a member signs up and does not contribute, they are not used in average calculations.

- This challenge will feature a ROUND ROBIN TOURNAMENT with each month featuring a matchup with a different house. To count for a matchup, the book must be read within that month and posted no later than one day after the end of the month. We will not do late term adjustments, but books read in an earlier month (no earlier than October) can still count toward your house’s overall total. The winner of the tournament will be featured in EHRTBM Hall of Fame.

- There will also be an Overall winner featured in the EHRTBM Hall of Fame.

- Participants must log their book in Goodreads as read to count them in the challenge.


Since this competition can get intense, please note that we do expect good sportsmanship from participants and failure to demonstrate good sportsmanship will result in warnings. Multiple warnings or extremely offensive remarks may result in a participants removal from the challenge.

Happy reading everyone!

ROUND ROBIN SCHEDULE

OCTOBER
Sapphire vs. Diamond
Emerald vs. Ruby

NOVEMBER
Diamond vs. Ruby
Emerald vs. Sapphire

DECEMBER
Emerald vs. Diamond
Sapphire vs. Ruby

OVERALL COMPETITION:
Total Average Points:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Last year I started a list of short stories under 50 pages for recommendations for the easy point getters. Here is that list:

Short Stories Under 50 Pages List

Please feel free to add your own recommendations!

- Keep in mind that this list is public to everyone on Goodreads. please make sure to check that these books are actually under 50 pages.

Please use this thread to talk about the challenge and ask any questions!

You Can sign up in your house thread starting the last week of September, feel free to join in anytime!

I’d love to be prefect for Sapphire

I’d love to prefect team Emerald

I'd like to join Sapphire (it's my birthstone)

id like to prefect team diamond, it would be my first time so totally okay for someone else with experience to do it!

I'd like to join team Sapphire please.

I'd like to join Sapphire, thank you.

I’d like to join team emerald please

Please could I join team sapphire?

So excited for the House Cup Challenge!!!! I’ll join Emerald 💚

Welcome to team Emerald Catherine and Rebecca (lovely to have you with me again this year!)

I'd like to join team Sapphire please. I would love to be on Cynthia's team again.

Hello!

I'd like to join team emerald please.

I like to join team Sapphire !!

I'd like to join team Ruby, but please don't make me a prefect, I wouldn't even know how to do it.

I’ve been part of some of these challenges in previous years, but not as a prefect. If you need a prefect for team Ruby I’d like to do it, but will understand if you choose someone who has been a prefect before. Whatever you decide, please add me to team Ruby.

Tr1sha wrote: "I’ve been part of some of these challenges in previous years, but not as a prefect. If you need a prefect for team Ruby I’d like to do it, but will understand if you choose someone who has been a p..."

Tr1sha, I'm happy to have you as a prefect!

Thank you to all of our prefects for helping to run this challenge! I appreciate your help and hard work! I will message you all with instructions on Friday.

House threads will start going up on the 21st!

Tori wrote: "Tr1sha wrote: "I’ve been part of some of these challenges in previous years, but not as a prefect. If you need a prefect for team Ruby I’d like to do it, but will understand if you choose someone w..."

Thank you, Tori. I’m looking forward to the challenge.

I like to join team Ruby!!

I’ll join diamond! 💎

Ali & Sandra, welcome to team Ruby.

I’ll join Team Ruby!

John is in for Diamond

Team Emerald Please!

Marina, welcome to team Ruby.

I'll like to join Ruby!

Hi everyone! Excited to join on team Sapphire! 💙 love this time of year 📚

I'm so excited to have so many familiar faces on my team again this year :) October 1st can't come soon enough lol

If you have already signed up in this thread, please feel free to head on over to Sapphire's team page here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

If you are joining team Ruby, the team page is at

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

I'd like to join team diamond!

I‘ve been waiting for this all year!!! You can sign me up for team Ruby! :)

Miriam, you can claim your spaces on the Ruby House discussion thread. (See message #35 above.) Welcome to the team.

if you're joining the Diamond House thread is below :)
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Hi, I'd like to join Team Emerald :) I'm new to goodreads so I'm kinda confused how this group thing works, so feel free to tell me if I do something wrong 🤭😂

Hi Jasmin, welcome to the team! Please post your sign up message and books in our house cup thread

Link to the Emerald House can be found here

Emerald House

I‘m currently planning my tbr are for this challenge, and I’ve got a little question:
I have this big collection of short stories by Edgar Allan Poe. I’m not planning to read the entire book and I was wondering if I can count the stories I read as seperate books?
For example if I just read The Fall of The House of Usher, would it be okay if I take the most popular version of the book on Goodreads and count it as one book (an easy point getter in this case)? Or if I read three short stories I count them as three? Because most of these short stories exist as separate books on Goodreads.

Miriam wrote: "I‘m currently planning my tbr are for this challenge, and I’ve got a little question:
I have this big collection of short stories by Edgar Allan Poe. I’m not planning to read the entire book and I ..."

The rules above say “Use the page number of the most popular edition when you search on Goodreads…”. It doesn’t matter whether you read a short book or the same book in part of a large collection. The number of books you read is irrelevant, your point score for a book/story is for the number of pages. Just make sure that each story is published separately otherwise it won’t count for the challenge.

So excited for this year's challenge! I would like to join team Sapphire please!

Current Participant Lists 😊

Sapphire
Cynthia
Alex
Britt
Melissa
Kathy
Hannah
Colette
Gemma
Michelle
Saar The Book owl
Jan

Ruby
Trisha
Ali
Sandra
Miriam
Elle

Diamond
Jessica:
Lauren:
John:
Rebecca:

Emerald
Tori
Fannie
Laura
Lyndsay
Rebecca
Catherine
Jessie
Jasmin

Thank you Laura!

Tori wrote: "Thank you Laura!"

You're welcome!!

I absolutely loved this challenge for the last two years I’ve participated! Can I join Team Sapphire or is it too full at this point?

TomintheSnow wrote: "I absolutely loved this challenge for the last two years I’ve participated! Can I join Team Sapphire or is it too full at this point?"

Hi Tom! Glad to see you participating again this year :) Please feel free to join whichever team you want. Team size usually factors into people's choice at this point but there's no limit to team sizes. If you want to join a team with fewer members to help even it out, Ruby and Diamond look like they have the fewest members at this point.

Hope this helps! :)

Thanks for this, Cynthia, that’s generous of you. I think everyone should choose the team they want to join, especially if they have loyalty to friends from previous challenges. I assume that using average scores will even out the differences between team sizes.