Working in a library means that I get to hear about all these fascinating little events. And not so little events as well, as we try and promote learning and reading and a bunch of other stuff to the staff and students in college.
In that vein, this week is the start of the Six Book Challenge.
Ta da!
This challenge is all about getting people who don’t normally read for whatever reason, too busy, not confident, English as a second language, learning difficulty, don’t enjoy it, whatever the reason. This is all about getting them to read.
The challenge is to read six books. Or newspapers, magazines, jokes, poems, whatever takes your fancy really. Read six different things, jot them down in the little diary you get for signing up physically, or online on their website, and then if you manage to read six things by the end of June, you get a big shiny certificate and can be entered in for some prizes.
The theme of this year is ‘Read Anything. Read anywhere.’ hence why they are encouraging you to read not just books, but anything. Recent studies have shown that reading for just six minutes a day can help improve you general mental health. The website: http://www.time-to-read.co.uk/read/collection/just6minutes : also has a list of books specifically chosen as feel good reads, to help further improve this. (I meant it when I said that in a library we’re hear a lot about reading in all it’s forms)
Now the only problem with this challenge is that it is aimed at people who aren’t good readers. As I call myself a voracious reader, it doesn’t really cover me. Although that is hardly going to stop me. If someone who is a good reader comes up to us, asking to sign up, we’ll absolutely let them, but we also give them the task to find a friend of theirs who isn’t such a good reader and try to get them to sign up as well. But I think those of us who do love reading also love sticking our teeth into a good challenge.
So with all my friends being as good a reader as me, what have I done? I’ve shortened the time frame. I’m going to try and read six books in a week. Mainly because that actually feels like a challenge. Six books until June? Far too easy. A month? Again, rather easy. A week? Now with everything else I do, that might be a challenge. And I’m not picking short books either. 
Oh no, these are books I would normally read, plucked straight off my too-read bookshelf. And borrowed from the library of course. We are trying to advertise that we have a very good, if small, selection of fiction books for pupils to borrow.
It’s going pretty well so far. I started yesterday, making Monday Day 1, and I read an entire book, start to finish. I was even able to start book two, so now, Tuesday morning aka Morning of Day 2, I’m halfway through book two. Just in case anyone is interested book one was Crown of Midnight and book two is Heir of Fire, which are books 2 & 3 in the Throne of Glass series. Excellent series, I would recommend a read.
So if anyone else feels like joining in, avid reader, voracious reader, non-reader, slow reader, sign up to the website http://sixbookchallenge.org.uk/ and start jotting down what you read. They give you shiny badges for milestones, and I know I get motivated by a badge 🙂
Princess of Dragons 
Hi Princess and I apologise for my lengthy absence from your cave. I am absolutely delighted to see how you have continued to apply yourself, and getting through the NaNoWriMo is good for the confidence. It was the NaNo a couple of years ago that saw my so far best performing novel becoming a single piece of work. ‘Beyond The Law’ was a series of poems. I’ve now got four novels and short story anthologies out there, but BTL sells more than any of them.
I like your reading challenge. Apart from working on my latest novel I’m constantly reading and reviewing on two Facebook groups, so not a spare minute.
Are we likely to see a collection of short stories from you ? mmmm
Take care my friend. 😀
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I do love NaNo. Every year I take part without fail, and it always get the enthusiasm levels back up 🙂 It’s great to talk to other author’s, whether through NaNo or right here on our blogs. I’ve been keeping up with your blog, I liked your post on editing. That first picture had me cracking up. And however often you manage to make it over here it is always lovely to hear from you.
There will be a finishing post on the reading challenge to say how I got on with that, probably later today. At the moment I have spare time (which I should devote more of to editing) but I keep getting distracted by friends and social gatherings. All that jazz.
I don’t have many short stories at the moment, so if I were to do a collection I would need some more ideas, and then to write them down, and then to look at publishing. But having said that, there is a word document on my memory stick that is something along those lines. All I’m saying is that it won’t be in the imminent future 😛
So glad to hear from you again, good luck with the novel!
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