Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

Team Cimorene - Special Category 11
1. (CAPTAIN) Chara
2. (SUB-CAPTAIN) Khushi
3. Ilsen
4. Jaxcap
5. Gale
6. Capn
7. EdenB15
8. Georgann

(Each person’s name is linked to their challenge bookshelf and the book listed beside their name is their mg book recommendation)

The spreadsheet containing all the tasks will be shared with every team member via email invite on 1st September: (countdown: )

2 important things to note:
1. REFER TO THE RULES
- You can find them here: /topic/show/...
- They list every detail from how the points are calculated to information on the bonus tasks.
- If you have a questions, please check it against the rules and if you’re still looking for an answer please put it to your team captain who will ask me in the Captain's Chat and refer back to you.

2. MAKE SURE YOUR BOOKS COUNT
Please always check your book counts towards our challenge before starting to read it!
Refer to the rules below to remind yourself of what counts as an mg book for the challenge:

WHAT COUNTS AS A MIDDLE GRADE BOOK:
- Must be more than 100 pages long.
*For audio books*: The print edition must be more than 100 pages long.
*For graphic novels*: must be more than 150 pages long.
- Must be categorised as MG+ or MG on this website:
If it says LG or UG on the website it DOESN’T COUNT.
OR
Must be categorised as MY+ or MY on this website:
If it says LY or UY on the website it DOESN’T COUNT.
- Only books started on/after 1st September count!

Ice-breaker:
1. Introduce yourself! Tell your fellow team members what your favourite genres to read are and some things you like to do besides reading.

2. Decide on a team name! Choose the name of a protagonist (or main character) from a middle grade book/series. This challenge has been hosted four times in the past and here are what past teams have chosen: Coraline, Alice Queensmeadow, Logan Sweet, Lucy Pevensie, Sirius Black, Merlin, Charlotte, Morrigan Crow, Mary Poppins, Amari Peters, Matilda Wormwood, Wolf, Zenobia, Diana Barry, Remus Lupin, and Anthony Lockwood, so please don’t choose those!

3. Decide on a special category to be revealed! The categories are numbered 1 to 20, so pick a number as a team and that category will be one of the special categories revealed on either the 2nd, 3rd or 4th week and the tasks of this special category will be work more points!

Greetings team! This is your Captain Chara speaking

Is this your first year? If not how many? This is my third.

For team names, pick your top three, then well vote on our name.
To stop people from picking their own names you can only vote for any name except the ones you pick. Name with the most votes win.

My top three picks are:
Arthur Spiderwick The Field Guide
Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III or Hiccup for short How to Train Your Dragon
Cimorene: (Pronounced Sim O reen) Dealing with Dragons

The number that I pick is 11.

Hello Captain Chara and fellow teammates!

This is my second year doing the challenge (missed 2023's).

I like "Cimorene"! Can I vote for it? (Just here, right? Or did I miss a spreadsheet or something?).

Quick question for the Captain's chat - page numbers. If Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ has the WRONG number of pages recorded for a particular edition of a book (happens quite often), do we go by what GR has or what our physical copy has? Just wondering if Kadi has an established discrepancy protocol, because it's certain to come up. :p

I currently have 3 books on my shelf that GR registers as "ZERO" pages for those particular editions. I don't want zero points! What should we do? (Two of them are Scholastic UK ed. of the Aru Shah series, etc.)

I've checked that all of my books are listed on arbookfind as MG/MG+ and/or MY/MY+ already. :) I have sadly had to remove The Road to Inconceivable because it is listed as a graphic novel, but it has less than the required 150 pages. Boo.

TIP: Please double-check your ineligible books against BOTH arbookfind.com and arbookfind.co.uk, because sometimes a book listed at UY/UG on one is alright (MG/MG+/MY/MY+) on the other. ;) So, for example, the The Amulet of Samarkand series by Jonathan Stroud is an MG+ on the U.S. site, but doesn't make the cut on the UK one. ;)

Next step for me is to check for page numbers and prioritize 5's towards the Golden Tasks extra points. ;)

I've got reduced ambitions from last time, as real life is going to interfere with my reading output this September, but I'm very much looking forward to this and have a huge pile of books to draw from! Hopefully we can score high this time!

Also, and apologies for putting you to work already, I have this book in my stash:


Famous Five Collection.
Not only "Five" in the title, but 576 total pages, and it contains the books:
"Five on a Treasure Island"
"Five Go Adventuring Again"
"Five Run Away Together".

I just wanted to ask how we can best make use of this book. It's technically 3 books in 1, but it's a single ISBN. It's chunky at 576 pages, and I'm not sure it scores TWICE (once for Five in title, once for 500+ pages)... or does it?

AND, the exact same issues, with:

Five Children and It, The Phoenix and the Carpet, and The Story of the Amulet. 562 page whopper, Five in the title, three books within.

I also have these contenders for the "5" Golden Task category:

Fifth in a series:
An Acceptable Time
The Dolphins of Laurentum

Author name begins with V:
The Monster Garden

And I won't link the right editions here (see my list!), but I have these guys with page counts (according to GR, anyway) with the numeral 5 in them:
Room 13 (158)
The Peculiar Peggs of Riddling Woods (352)
Eragon (503)
The Sirens of Surrentum (259)
Aru Shah and the End of Time (355)
The Twistrose Key (354)
Egg & Spoon (475)
Golem's Eye (570)
Ptolemy's Gate (515)
The Thing About Jellyfish (352)
Many Waters (359)
Jacob Have I Loved (256)

Excited to simply get reading! :D Welcome to Khushi and other newbies - I think you'll have fun!

No spreadsheet. You can just put what name, number and what you vote for her. XD

I'll ask Kadi about the numbers. I'm also a librarian, so I can add the correct page count to GR. Let me know what they are in this chat.

I think that as long as one book has an MG or MY grade on one of the sites it still counts. I'll double check with Kadi

If a book counts for more than one task then we'll just put it towards a task that has not books. What I mean is hypothetically say a book counts for task 1 & 2 then you or somebody else reads a book that good for task 2. Then we'll just put the first book for the first task. In fact we made need to do a bit of shuffling when it comes to the books and what tasks they might represent. Here's what we'll do about it.

When we get the google sheets I want you to put all the tasks that you think that book might count for. Then we can put it towards a task that doesn't have a book. 🙂

Hey guys so excited for the challenge! I also rlly like Cimorene so ig I’ll vote for that

@Chara - perfect! Good plan. :)

So my votes for team name (ranked) are:
1. Cimorene
2. Arthur Spiderwick
3. HHHIII

The books that I have with messed up page counts are:
Aru Shah and the Tree of Wishes - 386 numbered pages (incl.. glossary)
City of Gold - 389 numbered pages (incl. glossary)
Bone Music - 199 numbered pages

Thank you, O Captain, My Captain! <3

Kadi said: "...but if it shows as MG on one of the AR websites and is also tagged as mg on the goodreads book page, then it should be ok."

The entire Bartimaeus series (/series/4083...) is one example:
The Amulet of Samarkand:

On GR: Fantasy Young Adult Fiction Magic Middle Grade Childrens Adventure
MG+ in the USA:
UY in the UK:
(same as for The Golem's Eye and Ptolemy's Gate)


Eragon is also contentious.

GR has: Fantasy Young Adult Fiction Dragons Adventure Magic High Fantasy Young Adult Fantasy Childrens Science Fiction Fantasy... and if you click the "all", it shows that 343 people have shelved it as Middle Grade, 161 for 'middle school', and more (400s) for children / childrens / kids, etc.
UG in the USA:
MY in the UK: (and that's not even MY+, just a nice safe MY!)

There may be others in the future - I'll let you know ASAP as I find them.

Kadi update: She thinks that you have good questions, Capn. :)

for page numbers. She said that It’s fine to go off the physical copy or the Amazon page. She can’t remember if the AR websites show page numbers but if they do you can go off that as well.
She also said that it was fine for me (a librarian) to edit the GR page

As for the rating: It depends on the book. she said, share the book on the captain's chat (I'll do it) so she can double check, but if it shows as MG on one of the AR websites and is also tagged as mg on the goodreads book page, then it should be ok.

Hehe. Team name number 3 loos like HHHIII!

Yeah, Europe has a completely different way of rating things. Inkheart is considered to be children's while its YA over in NA.

Hi Captain and team. Glad to be here. I'm Georgann and this is my third challenge. The first year I gave myself a headache trying to read too much, so I've cut back, but still look forward to the challenge.

Welcome aboard Georgann. It's my third year as well. You have a lot more team members to count on this year.

Capn: Kadi says that the The Amulet of Samarkand and Eragon both count as MG

"Sometimes there are discrepancies between the UK and US website but for both of them at least one of the websites shows it as MG or MG+ so it’s ok. If it’s shown as MG or MG+ on at least one of the websites then it’s fine."

If you come across any books that aren’t MG or MG+ on either AR website and you think they should be MG then please share it here and I can confirm with Kadi if they can count.

Hi, I'm Jaxcap aka Michelle, I was going to put forth Morrigan Crow as my team name pick but I see she was already used before. So I'll vote for Cimorene as well since I love Dealing with Dragons!

This is my 1st year so just have a quick question- do the books we read have to be new to us or can they be re-reads?

New or re-reads is fine. Sometimes there is even a task for something you have re-read.

Hi Team! I'm Gale and this is my 3rd challenge. I am a school librarian and school will resume soon, so I had to scale back my read goals. That being said, I have a stack of MG that I have been waiting to read for the challenge, so I hope to contribute a ton.

Cimorene works for me.

I'm excited to start.

Welcome Gale. I'm just happy that you're reading at all. One year only 3 out 5 and I'm including myself in the 3 read any books at all. The other two even refused to books that they read instead on their shelf so that it could count.

We just need Ilsen to chime in but, it's looking like Cimorene might be our team name.

CraftyChara wrote: "Welcome aboard Georgann. It's my third year as well. You have a lot more team members to count on this year.
Capn: Kadi says that the The Amulet of Samarkand and Eragon both count as MG
"Sometime..."

Thanks, Captain Chara! I was hoping there would be no trouble so long as ONE of the arbookfind's say the magic MG/MY/MG+/MY+. ;) I had already pre-sorted all my books to be listed on one of the two, so we should be good.

Yeay team! :) Stacks at the ready! I'm also a quality not quantity reader this year, but with careful strategy, we should do well!

Hi everyone! I’m so sorry for checking in so late! I’ve been so busy at work that I haven’t been catching up to my Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ notifications.

This is my fifth year of Middle Grade Madness and I always love participating. I don’t know if I’m going to read a lot because I will be adjusting to my sorta new job but I want to try! My favorite genres are fantasy, contemporary and mystery! I’m really open to reading all genres though. I’ve been reading more adult lately but I still want to make time for my middle grade so I’m excited for the challenge giving me the push to read some middle grade books. My other hobbies other than reading is very few but I like baking, singing, playing video games, and listening to a lot of music. I listen to a lot of artists but my favorites are Taylor Swift, Blackpink, Little Mix, and 5 Seconds of Summer.

I know a lot of people like Cimorene and I agree. Sounds like a good name. I do also like Hiccup though. I was going to suggest Wendell from Sheets or Ivy Lovely from The Crowns of Croswald as a name as well. But whatever the people want! Also I suggest for the category number either 3 or 13. I love the number 3.

Can’t wait for the challenge to start!

3 is also my favourite number. Not too much, not too little, just right. I picked 11 because I/we picked 3 last year. Do want to compromise and do 8 or 14? 🤣

What ever you read Ilsen will be greatly appreciated.

Looking like Cimorene will be our team name. Any objections?

Nope

I’m so excited to start tomorrow

I should remember, but is it midnight LOCAL time, or are we doing a set time zone, GMT, UTC+1, etc.? (I guess Kadi's local time, and when she gives us access?!) XD

End time, though? Might go to the wire for me this month...

Looking forward to tomorrow! I just finished reading my current book and I'm hungry for some middle grade.

Kadi will share the spreadsheets with all team members around/after midnight UK time, but she wants us to only start reading books for the challenge once it is midnight in each individual teammates location.

Thanks, Chara!

Cool, I'm just adding a few more pre-approved MG reads to my shelves (arbookfind.com and/or arbookfind.co.uk, in which case MY). :) Found a couple more at home that work! :D

edit: 92 95 on deck and counting :) Going to strategize for maximum points once Kadi shows her cards!

So exciting I’ve already a few lined up

Hi Team Cimorene!

The spreadsheet has been shared with you all, so please check your email and you should see an invite link. If you are having issues accessing the spreadsheet, please let me know. Send me a private message if you would like me to try sharing the spreadsheet with you on a different email address than the one you put on the sign up form, please do not share your email address on this page.

Please remember to read the rules on what books count: /topic/show/...
Please only start reading your books when it becomes 1st September for you in your time zone! You can use the extra hours to see the tasks and plan.

If you have any questions, please ask your team captains and they will relay it to me. Please also check the task guidance tab on the spreadsheet for help.

Our Special Categories are number 4, 11, & 19.
The first Special Category to be revealed will be selected by a random picker on the night of 7th September and will be revealed on midnight 8th September (UK time).
I've left the Special Category titles visible so you can have some fun guessing what the tasks might be!

Happy first of September! I can’t view the spreadsheet yet for some reason maybe because it’s not a goo email I have access but abut to start my first book which is finally seen by Kelly yang

Clarification questions:

Re: Task 89
"A book that was published in the 1900s"
Is this 1900-1909, or 1900-1999, (i.e. published before 1910, or the year 2000; a ten year span or 100 years?)

Re: Task 87
"A book with a character who is 70 years old or older"
Is that in reference to an age of a character within the book (ancient old dude, 80 year old woman, etc.), or
a character who would be more than 70 years old as of today, 2024? The first one, right?

Also Task 11
"A book published by two or more different publishers".
Does that INCLUDE foreign language editions? Or are we only counting English reprints?

Also, fwiw, spanner is the UK term for a wrench (crescent wrench, for example). Someone's bound to ask! ;)

Here we go, here we go, here we goooooooo! XD

@Chara - I think the yellow highlights are the Golden Tasks (extra points, right? They are multiples of 5, you see... I put those in bold below) EDIT: ah, poops. None of mine qualify for the special Golden Tasks (5 in the page number, title beginning with F, author beginning with V, the letters f-i-v-e in the protag name, 5th in a series). POOP.

I've sorted through my piles and come up with these books of mine that I think should score well/be useful:

for tasks 7, 24, 67, 80, 84

for 24, 25, 46, 84

for 41, 49, 58, 60, 78, 84

for 23, 24, 47, 49, 50, 78, 84

And then, as usual, I've got a bunch for the Ye Olde Story category:
The Trumpeter of Krakow and Smith for 86, 88, 89,
The December Rose for 50, 86 and 89
...but I'll save these for later, as we start to fill up the sheet. :)

As I said, I have literally loads of books on hand (hoard, much?), so let me know where specific gaps occur and I'll see if I can fill them.

Hooray! Have fun, everyone! :D

Ahh yay how exciting.! We got this team

Woot woot! :D

Also, and this is an embarrassing admission, but here we go - I have never read Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Probably everyone else in this group has read it. XD

So I have that 'card' up my sleeve for tasks 1 (maybe?), 3, 8, 22, 23 (prob.?), 24, does he get punched in a fight? 35?, .... I guess the list is long. If anyone wants to lend their knowledge to which tasks this book covers, please do! :) It should cover a lot, right?

Aha, now that I understand the criteria for those 'golden tasks', I only have one book that qualifies:
The Twistrose Key - 354 pages (qualifies), for task number 60, because it has mountains (backlit) on the cover. (Also qualifies for tasks 57, 58 and 66, as there is a quest (with map) to find a missing prince)


So I will prioritize this as well.

@Kadi explain the golden tasks to me 😅

Aw. A Harry Potter virgin. That's nothing to be ashamed of

Oh, UK terms.

@Chara - sorry to be a pain today, but I was wondering - how do we know which books were read in last year's challenge? Did Kadi give a list somewhere?

Task 1 "A book read by anyone (except anyone in your current team) in the 2023 August MG Reading Challenge"

Just finished my first book! It fits into category 59 just am i ok to put it in

Ill put it in tracking sheet i mean

EdenB15 wrote: "Just finished my first book! It fits into category 59 just am i ok to put it in"

Holy sh.....! :O

YOU ARE AWESOME! :D

TYSM

Hello! Yay! I just saw the spreadsheet. I'm in the US, so a little bit of a time difference.
I'll look over the categories and start reading. I have a bunch of books lined up.
Happy reading everyone!

Amazing Eden!

Kushi can't seem to log into her Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ account and will add her books via the spreadsheet.

Here are some of the books that were read Capn
/topic/show/...
/topic/show/...
/topic/show/...

Thanks, Chara!

Here are the books mentioned above in list format (please ignore the 'other topics' bit!):

Call of the Wraith (other topics)
Flyte (other topics)
Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians (other topics)
The Whispering Skull (other topics)
The Longest Night of Charlie Noon (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
The Land of Roar (other topics)
I Want to Go Home! (other topics)
Dark Life (other topics)
Bridge to Terabithia (other topics)
Sheets (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
The Last Council (other topics)
Escape from Lucien (other topics)
The One and Only Ivan (other topics)
The Mozart Girl (other topics)
Rainbow Grey (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
Measuring Up (other topics)
Sugar and Spite (other topics)
Me and Sam-Sam Handle the Apocalypse (other topics)
Wink (other topics)
The Unforgettable Logan Foster (other topics)
The Splintered Light (other topics)
My Little Pony: Beyond Equestria: Rainbow Dash Rights the Ship (other topics)
The Last Kids on Earth (other topics)
Nimona (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
It Ain't So Awful, Falafel (other topics)
Candlelight for Rebecca (other topics)
The Little Book of Hanukkah (other topics)
Once Upon a Midnight Eerie (other topics)
Magyk (other topics)
How I Saved Hanukkah (other topics)
Penina Levine Is a Potato Pancake (other topics)
The Christmas Revolution (other topics)
The Last Kids on Earth (other topics)
Escape From Wolfhaven Castle (other topics)
Amari and the Night Brothers (other topics)
Dragon Ops (other topics)
Ronia, the Robber's Daughter (other topics)
The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips (other topics)
The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
Holes (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
The Longest Con (other topics)
The Ordinary Princess (other topics)
The Color of My Words (other topics)
Betty Before X (other topics)
The Comeback (other topics)
Because of Winn-Dixie (other topics)
Get a Grip, Vivy Cohen! (other topics)
Real (other topics)
Can You See Me? (other topics)
Winterhouse (other topics)
The Explorer's Code (other topics)
A Guide to the Other Side (other topics)
The Unteachables (other topics)
Con Quest! (other topics)
Lola Benko, Treasure Hunter (other topics)
Dead City (other topics)
Framed! (other topics)
Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
The Mystery of Black Hollow Lane (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
The Secret of White Stone Gate (other topics)
Amari and the Night Brothers (mentioned 2 times) (other topics)
Fall of Hades (other topics)
The Girl Is Murder (other topics)
Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo (other topics)
The Girl Who Could Not Dream (other topics)
A Dash of Trouble (other topics)
A Sprinkle of Spirits (other topics)
Out of My Mind (other topics)
The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise (other topics)
Lalani of the Distant Sea (other topics)
Inkheart (other topics)

If any match up, we'll have to double-check who read them and when - some are books that weren't read during the challenge, for example. :p

So Chara, just to confirm: when I finish my book, I should put it in for ALL of the tasks it fulfills on the spreadsheet? And then you will later prune each to make sure it isn't counted twice?

Or?

So for The Two Wrong Halves of Ruby Taylor, I think it satisfies tasks #7, 80 (but not the Golden criteria as well), 24, 67, 84. Should I add this book to all of those places?

You will put your info in the tracking sheet section. Bottom left.
Once there you can see how Eden and I filled out our sections.

I will add the books to main section later.

CraftyChara wrote: "You will put your info in the tracking sheet section. Bottom left.
Once there you can see how Eden and I filled out our sections.

I will add the books to main section later."

Ah, sorry - I completely missed that!! Thanks - will do!
(feels embarrassed) XD

Will probs start my 2nd book tomorrow

Capn wrote: "Clarification questions:

Re: Task 89
"A book that was published in the 1900s"
Is this 1900-1909, or 1900-1999, (i.e. published before 1910, or the year 2000; a ten year span or 100 years?)

Re: T..."

@Chara - I saw Kadi's responses already. ;) In short:

Task 89 = published in the 20th century (1900-1999)
Task 87 = an elderly person (>/=70 years old) as a character in the book
Task 11 = other publishers incl. all editions, incl. foreign language ed.s

:)

I’ll let Kadi know

Just now, i placed 5 books and 1 BOCD on hold from the library, which may be all I get to for the month. So I hope they all count somewhere or other! Plus it's a holiday today so I won't get any of them until later in the week. But it will be fun to read these.

Finished book2 wohoo