Challenge Completed – Dymocks Reading Challenge

The idea with this challenge was to read one book every two weeks – I managed to knock most of the categories out within a few months, and when going over the lists for each one Dymocks had on their website, I found out I could finish them with stuff I had already read. So like with other challenges, there may be some doubling up but when you’re doing multiple challenges, some with similar categories, and others with highly specific categories, this is bound to happen and I felt I just had to go along with it. It also helped in trying to find the books or even find time to read the books amidst all the other reviewing and writing I do. Next year, given I am planning on reducing the number of challenges and tackling ones that are not specific or prescriptive (which, yes, is the point of many of these challenges but when they’re like that it makes it hard work and you don’t get to read what YOU want because you’re too focused on ticking off those categories, even though it is a great sense of achievement).

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In an already stressful year, finishing as many challenges as I could felt achievable. I felt as though I was doing something whilst stuck inside, unable to do much else. This was one of my favourite challenges of the year, perhaps because I had such scope to interpret the categories – it is always fun when you can do that as it opens up so many more possibilities rather than a prescriptive list that dictates what areas you can read in. As a reviewer, I have my preferred areas, yet at times get things I might not request and do like to give these a shot. Therefore, I like my challenges to be fairly open so I can see if these review titles fit in with what I have to read. I will be interested to see what kind of reading challenge Dymocks provides next year!

Dymocks Reading Challenge

1. A book by an Australian author: Pippa’s Island: Puppy Pandemonium by Belinda Murrell
2. A book by an Indigenous author: On A Barbarous Coast by Craig Cormick and Harold Ludwick, Meet Sam by the Mangrove Creek by Paul Seden and Brenton McKenna
3. A book from our Top 101: Trials of Apollo: The Hidden Oracle by Rick Riordan
4. A book from our Kids’ Top 51:  Withering-by-Sea (A Stella Montgomery Intrigue) by Judith Rossell, Friday Barnes: Girl Detective by R.A. Spratt
5. A Dymocks ‘Book of the Month’: The Left-Handed Booksellers of London
6. Re-read your favourite book of all time: The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
7. Ask a friend for a recommendation: Any Ordinary Day by Leigh Sales
8. A book featuring your favourite country: The Good Turn by Dervla McTiernan (Ireland)
9. A book from your TBR pile: Josephine’s Garden by Stephanie Parkyn
10. An award-winning book: Dragonfly Song by Wendy Orr – CBCA Honour Book, Prime Minister’s Literary Award 2017 – WINNER: 2017 Prime Minister’s Literary Award, Children’s Fiction
    WINNER: 2018 Adelaide Festival Awards for Literature, Children’s Literature
    HONOUR BOOK: CBCA Book of the Year, Younger Readers, 2017
11. A Mystery/Thriller: The Soldier’s Curse by Meg and Tom Keneally (Monsarrat Series Book One), A Testament of Character by Sulari Gentill
12. A memoir: Any Ordinary Day by Leigh Sales
13. A book outside your usual genre:  The God Child by Nana Oforiatta Ayim
14. A book of short stories: Snow White and Rose Red: And Other Tales of Kind Young Women by Kate Forsyth and Lorena Carrington
15.  A self-help/motivation: Elephant Me by Giles Andreae and Guy Parker-Rees
16. A fairytale/fable adaptation: Esme’s Gift by Elizabeth Foster
17. Book one in a fantasy series: Trials of Apollo – The Hidden Oracle by Rick Riordan
18. A book that teaches you something new: The Paris Secret by Natasha Lester
19. A book with a red cover: Elementals: Battle Born by Amie Kaufman
20. A book with a colour in the title: Snow White and Rose Red: And Other Tales of Kind Young Women by Kate Forsyth and Lorena Carrington
21. A book you can read in a day: Pippa’s Island: Puppy Pandemonium by Belinda Murrell, Ella at Eden: New Girl by Laura Sieveking
22. A book about books: Jane in Love by Rachel Givney
23. A book that made you laugh: Puppy Diary: The Great Toy Rescue by Yvette Poshoglian, The Power of Positive Pranking by Nat Amoore
24. A book published this year: The Nine Hundred: The Extraordinary Young Women of the First Official Jewish Transport to Auschwitz by Heather Dune McAdam, The Vanishing Deep by Astrid Scholte
25. A book you said you’ve read but haven’t: Emma by Jane Austen