Sunday, June 29, 2008

Read-a-thon post-event survey

Sorry, all! I just could not wake up enough this morning to get any more reading done during the read-a-thon. My bed was way too comfy! However, when I did get up, I grabbed My Lady of Cleves and have already read two more chapters. I may just finish it today and will post a review within a few days.

I'm a bit disappointed in my paltry page count, which averages about 28 pages per hour for 10 hours. I knew I was a slower reader, but not THAT slow! How will I ever scale Mount TBR reading that slowly? In my defense, I tore through the 120 pages of The Uncommon Reader in a bit more than 2 hours and dealt with many more distractions while reading My Lady of Cleves (including the refrigerator mishap). I also tend to get slower and slower at reading the more tired I get. I should have switched to a lighter book with larger, brighter type after I got about one-third of the way into Cleves. I'm enjoying the story, but it's just not a quick read (at least for me).

Here are my answers to the post-event survey:

1. Which hour was most daunting for you? The haiku hour (Hour 16). Arranging words in my head and counting out syllables on my fingers was the only thing that kept me awake at that point (but I crashed soon after).
2. Could you list a few high-interest books that you think could keep a Reader engaged for next year? I would highly recommend The Uncommon Reader. It was a great starter book. I also wish I had switched to some manga or graphic novels midway through: More pictures, fewer words!
3. Do you have any suggestions for how to improve the Read-a-thon next year? Has anyone ever considered doing a Read-a-thon weekend? Readers could challenge themselves to read as many hours as they could while still getting a full night's sleep. A weekend would give participants more time to visit other blogs and to participate in mini-challenges, plus a little more leeway to deal with distractions
4. What do you think worked really well in this year’s Read-a-thon? The mini-challenges and prize drawings seemed to go very smoothly.
5. How many books did you read? One and a half
6. What were the names of the books you read? The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett and My Lady of Cleves by Margaret Campbell Barnes
7. Which book did you enjoy most?
8. Which did you enjoy least?
Since I haven't finished Cleves, I can't answer these questions yet. I think Cleves will probably end up getting an A or A- from me, so it ranks up there with The Uncommon Reader.
9. If you were a Cheerleader, do you have any advice for next year’s Cheerleaders? I wasn't.
10. How likely are you to participate in the Read-a-thon again? What role would you be likely to take next time? I definitely want to do this again as a reader.

Thank you to Dewey and all the readers and cheerleaders for making this such a fun event! I will be spending more time at all of your blogs in the weeks to come.

2 comments:

1morechapter said...

A readathon weekend is a great idea!

I really liked The Uncommon Reader as well when I read it last year. That was a great choice.

1morechapter.com

Vasilly said...

Congrats on finishing! I like your idea of doing a Read-a-thon weekend. You did a great job!