Jennifer's Books

Door 1: Día de los Muertos (Task 2) - Share your favorite gravestone epitaph (you know you have one).

Door 1: Día de los Muertos (Book) - Re-read an old favorite from a now-deceased author, a book from a finished (dead) series, or a book set in Mexico.

 

Door 2: Guy Fawkes Night (Task 1) - Burn a book in effigy.  Not that anyone of us would do such a thing, but if you HAD to, which book would be the one you’d sacrifice to the flames (gleefully or not)?

Door 2: Guy Fawkes Night (Task 2) - List your top 3 treasonous crimes against books.  Not ones you’ve committed, but the ones you think are the worst.

 

Door 3: Melbourne Cup Day (Task 1) - Pick your ponies!  MbD has posted the horses scheduled to race; everyone picks the three they think will finish (in any order).

 

Door 4: Diwali (Task 1) - Share a picture of your favorite light display.

Door 4: Diwali (Task 4) - During Diwali, people pray to the goddess Lakhshmi, who is typically depicted as a beautiful young woman holding a lotus flower. Find 5 books on your shelves (either physical or virtual) whose covers show a young woman holding a flower and share their cover images.

Door 4: Diwali (Book) - Read a book with candles on the cover or the word “candle” or “light” in the title; OR a book that is the latest in a series; OR set in India; OR any non-fiction book that is ‘illuminating’ (Diwali is Sanskrit for light/knowledge and row, line or series)

 

Door 5: Armistice Day/Veteran's Day (Task 1) - Using book covers (real or virtual), create a close approximation of your country’s flag (either of residence or birth), OR a close approximation of a poppy.  Take a pic of your efforts and post. 

Door 5: Armistice/Veteran's Day (Task 3) - Tell us: What author’s books would you consider yourself a veteran of (i.e., by which author have you read particularly many books – or maybe even all of them)?

 

Door 6: International Day for Tolerance (Task 1) - Find some redeeming quality in the book you liked least this year and post about it.

Door 6: International Day for Tolerance (Task 2) - Tell us: What are the tropes (up to 5) that you are not willing to live with in any book (i.e., which are absolutely beyond your capacity for tolerance) and which make that book an automatic DNF for you? (Insta-love? Love triangles? First person present narrative voice? Talking animals? The dog dies? What else?)

Door 6: International Day of Tolerance (Book) - Read any fiction/non-fiction about tolerance or a book that’s outside your normal comfort zone.  (Tolerance can encompass anything you generally struggle with, be it sentient or not.) OR Read a book set in Paris.

 

Door 7: Mawlid (Task 1) - Make two “prophesies” you think will come to fruition in 2019 in your personal or reading life.

Door 7: Mawlid (Task 2) - The Five Pillars of Islam include almsgiving and the pilgrimage to Mekka. Tell us: Have you ever donated books or rescued them from (horror of horrors) being trashed? Alternatively: Is there a book-related place that is a place of pilgrimage to you?

Door 7: Mawlid (Book) - If you can find a copy, read Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet.  Or read any book about a leader of a movement, nation, religion or large group, OR read a book with a green cover OR with a half moon on the cover.

 

Door 8: Penance Day (Task 1) - “Confess” your book habits.  Dog-earring?  Laying books face down?  Bending back the spines? Skimming?  OR: Confess your guilty reading pleasure, or comfort reads

Door 8: Penance Day (Task 2) - It’s “Pennants” day according to MbD’s husband: post a picture of your favorite team’s logo / mascot and the last time they’ve won a championship (or not).

Door 8: Penance Day (Task 3) - In centuries gone by, penance would often end up in what might be described as a very extended bad hair day (complete with sackcloth and ashes). Tell us: What’s a bad hair day to you – and what (if anything) do you do about it?

Door 8: Penance Day (Task 4) - Early Christian spiritualists would sometimes do penance by spending time in the desert. If you’ve ever visited a desert region (or even live there), post a picture and tell us about it. Alternatively, post a picture of sand dunes (NOT with water in the background!).

 

Door 9: Thanksgiving (Task 1) - List the 3 books you’ve read this year you’re most “thankful” for (your favs) or the one book you’ve ever read that changed your life for the better.

Door 9: Thanksgiving (Task 2) - Describe your perfect meal.  What would you cook for the perfect celebration, or, what would you have your imaginary personal chef cook for you?

Door 9: Thanksgiving (Task 4) - Show us your 2018 book “harvest” – the books you newly acquired this year, regardless whether bought, received as gift or in whichever other way.

 

Door 10: Bon Om Touk (Task 1) - Make a paper boat and post a picture of it.   Instructions, if needed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiAWx8odStA

Door 10: Bon Om Touk (Task 3) - Bon Om Touk celebrates the end of the rainy season. Tell us: What’s your favorite type of rainy day book – and do you have a favorite drink or snack to go with your rainy day reading? Photos welcome!

Door 10: Bon Om Touk (Book) - Read a book that takes place at sea or on a river OR with water on the cover OR where the plot involves a festival or the moon plays a pivotal role in the plot.

 

Door 11: Russian Mother's Day (Task 1) - Tell us: What is the mother of all writerly sins in your book (tropes, grammar mistakes, telling instead of showing, etc.)?

Door 11: Russian Mother's Day (Task 3) - Perhaps the best-known scene in the James Bond novel and film From Russia With Love is 007 being poisoned by Russian agent Rosa Klebb with a venom-laced blade hidden in her shoe. Tell us: Have you ever owned any particular / outrageous / funny / best-beloved or otherwise special pair of shoes? Post a photo if you should still own them.

 

Door 12: St. Andrew's Day (Book) - Andrew was the first apostle; read the first book in a series. OR:  Andrew and Peter were brothers; read a book about brothers. OR: Read books about or set in Scotland or by a Scottish author, or set in Charleston, South Carolina (which is where the celebrations as we know them today began - by a group of Scottish expats - according to scotland.org).

 

Door 13: Advent (Book) - Advent also means “second coming”: Read a pastiche, or a book written by an “authorised author” by the deceased author’s estate. OR: There are four Sundays in Advent. Read the fourth book of a series or a book with the word “four” in the title.

 

Door 14: Hanukkah (Task 1) -  Have you had any miracles in your life?  (Kids are a given.)  Just enough change for tolls?  Just enough gas to get you to the station?  Been tragically late for a flight only to find the flight was even more tragically delayed? Nothing is too small - share your miracles with us!

 

Door 15: Sinterklaas/St. Nicholas Day (Task 1) - Write a book wish list to St. Nick.

Door 15: Sinterklaas/St. Nicholas Day (Task 4) - List your 3 favorite books involving children being rescued from serious peril.

 

Door 16: Human Rights Day (Task 2) - This year is the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Find 3 books on your shelves with protagonists or other key characters who are -- or can reasonably be assumed to be -- 70 years or older.

 

Door 17: St. Lucia's Day (Task 1) - In honor of the Icelandic Jólabókaflóðið / Yule Book Flood tradition, create a (virtual or physical) “book flood” and post a picture of it.

Door 17: St. Lucia's Day (Task 3) - Create a “crown of light” from book covers prominently featuring a lighted candle.

Door 17: St. Lucia's Day (Task 4) - Guess (scout’s honor, NO GOOGLING!): Did the Gävle Goat survive this year? This works like the Melbourne Cup Pick Your Ponies task:  You get one point for guessing, and an extra point if you've guessed correctly -- which we'll reveal after Christmas (as this is how long the goat is *supposed* to survive).

Door 17: St. Lucia's Day (Task 4 *bonus point*) - Guess (scout’s honor, NO GOOGLING!): Did the Gävle Goat survive this year? This works like the Melbourne Cup Pick Your Ponies task:  You get one point for guessing, and an extra point if you've guessed correctly -- which we'll reveal after Christmas (as this is how long the goat is *supposed* to survive).

 

Door 18: Yule/Solstice (Task 1) - Bibliomancy: Grab one of your larger books and flip to the indicated page and line number to answer the following questions - then post those answers for us: A. Will I read all the books on my TBR?  (page 378, line 29) B. Will any of my 2019 reads be 5 stars? (page 227, line 31) C. Will I discover a new favorite book / author / series? (page 309, line 23) D. Will I discover that a major twist (hopefully, for the [even] better) has occurred in one of my favorite series? (page 459, line 16) E. Will I finish all of my reading challenges in 2019? (page 69, line 7) F. Will I stay within my book budget in 2019? (page 98, line 5)

Door 18: Yule/Solstice (Task 2) - Tell us: What book did you read this year that felt like it was never going to end?

 

Door 19: Festivus (Task 1) - It’s the annual airing of grievances!  Time to list the top 5 books that disappointed you the most this year and let us know why!

Door 19: Festivus (Task 4) - Google the word “Festivus” and tell us or take a screenshot of what you see at the left border of the results page

 

Door 20: Christmas (Task 3) - Watch a favorite Christmas movie.

Door 20: Christmas (Book) - Um, Christmas books …

 

Door 21: Kwanzaa (Task 2) - In Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, the “Finis Africae” is the hidden center of the labyrinth which constitutes the monastery’s library, protected by a number of intricate, misdirecting devices. Tell us: Where have you recently encountered clever misdirection or a labyrinthine plot in a book?

 

Door 22: New Year's Day (Task 1) - Your 2019 Book Goals:  what are they?

Door 22: New Year's Day (Task 2) - 2018 Reading Year in Review.  Tell us about your year in books:  happy? disappointed?

Door 22: New Year's Day (Task 3) - New Year’s Book Lottery: Write the names of the first 5 books you’re planning to read in 2019 onto identical pieces of paper, fold them, place them in a bowl (or bucket, jar, box, etc.), and draw one to determine the very first book you’re going to start in the new year.

 

Door 23: Hogswatch (Task 1) - glingleglingleglingle – if you could wish any kind of god(dess) into existence, what would they be in charge of?  Dusting?  Weeding?  We’re not aiming high here… tell us!

 

Door 24: Epiphany (Task 1) - Tell us: What’s your favorite trilogy?

Door 24: Epiphany (Book) - Read a book with three main characters; books about traveling on a journey to a faraway place, a book that’s part of a trilogy, with a star on the cover, with the word “twelve” or “night” in the title, or concerning kings or spices.

 

Total points: 51