Books, General

Friday Reads does Tome Topple 4: Sign Up, and TBR

I love me a good readathon, and folks, there’s a curling one coming up.  It’s time for Tome Topple, the readathon when bibliophiles like myself get all of our biggest books and attempt to read/weight lift these tomes together. It’s my second Tome Topple readathon, and last time (click here to view my posts from last time) I managed to read a couple of long books that I’d been meaning to for a while, so I’ve eyed up some longer books to go on my Tome Topple TBR. 

So, what is it? Well, Tome Topple is a two week readathon created by Sam aka Thoughts on Tomes and this time the readathon is taking place from midnight in your timezone on 4th August until 11:59pm on 17th August. The aim of this readathon is to read big books, aka books over 500 pages aka “tomes”, so unlike many readathon, it’s about the number of pages in a book rather than the quantity of books you manage to finish over the fortnight. Want more information, you can watch Sam’s announcement video or check out the readathon Twitter page and/or the Goodreads group.

What makes this such a great readathon I pretend to hear you cry? Well, everyone teams up in one big, friendly, book loving community to embark on reading and tackling some of the more scary books on our shelves, and finally manage to read some of our longest, and often most intimidating books. I like reading a variety of books, but there is something about teaming up to battle these books together that makes some of them seem more possible to finish. And more than anything, everyone cheers each other on and posts GIF combinations to make you smile, and of course, keep reading. 

And, to help us along, there are some challenges to tackle too! They are as follows:

  1. Read more than 1 tome – I think I should be able to manage this changed challenge. I’ve got 4 or 5 books on my TBR, so y’know, just have to read two of them.
  2. Read a graphic novel (still over 500 pages) – I don’t know of any graphic novels over 500 pages never mind own one.  I see buying one for the sake of completing a challenge both pointless and counter-intuitive, because I’m trying to read tomes on my existing TBR, so I won’t be doing this one.  Sorry, not sorry.
  3. Read a tome that is part of a series – A little like the first challenge, I should be able to manage this.  Why? Because every tome on my TBR this time round is part of a series, so I just need to finish a book and BOOM.
  4. Buddy read a tome – My friend and housemate Emma is also taking part, and we’ve been reading the A Song of Ice and Fire series for about a year.  We’re both up to A Dance with Dragons so we’re both planning to read the first book for the readathon. Ahh, why not buddy read?!
  5. Read an adult novel – There’s some debate as to whether the Shades of Magic series is adult or young adult fantasy, but the other books on my TBR are definitely adult books, so I think I’ll be good.

So, I’ve been looking at my shelves and planning what I might like to read for Tome Topple. I’ve gone for variety in genre, variety in audience, in the hopes I actually manage to read a couple of tomes over the two weeks.  I’ve technically cheated because I’ve included a book I started before the readathon began but it’s long so who cares?

So my TBR:

  1. Stalker Lars Kepler (581 pages) – This is the book I started pre-readathon and is carrying over.  I’ve not read much and it’s easy over 500 pages.  It’s a Scandinavian crime novel, 5th in a series, and although entertaining and quite to read, I don’t like reading it before bed.  It fits challenges 1, 3, and 5.
  2. A Gathering of Shadows V E Schwab (508 pages) – I’ve just read the first in the series A Darker Shade of Magic ready for the readathon. I’ve meant to read them for a while, the hype is huge around them, and they’re lighter reads than my other choices so I’ll use this as a lighter option. Not much lighter as it’s fantasy, but it’s not stalking serial killers.  It also fits challenges 1, 3, and 5
  3. A Conjuring of Light V E Schwab (666 pages) – OK, common sense says this is on here in case I finish the book above, so we’ll see how I get on. Again, it fits challenges 1, 3, and 5.
  4. A Dance with Dragons: Part I: Dreams and Dust George R R Martin (687 pages) – As mentioned above, I’m buddy reading this with my friend Emma. I’ve been reading A Song of Ice and Fire for around a year. I don’t want to leave it too long to read the next part or I’ll forget the earlier instalments, but, they’re long ass books. I may be enjoying them, but a little readathon community support is definitely pleasant. Bonus, it fits challenges 1, 3, 4, and 5
  5.  A Dance with Dragons: Part II, : After the Feast George R R Martin (557 pages) – I’m optimistically putting this on here in case I finish part I and have a huge urge to progress straight on to part II. Probably won’t get round to it, but if I do, I’ll have finished the published books in the series and of course, it fits challenges 1, 3, 4, and 5 too.
  6. The Chemist Stephanie Meyer (518 pages) – This was a very late entry to my TBR, because I was very aware that some of the books above are quite content heavy. I loved The Host so I promise I am not dissing Meyer or her writing, it’s just she definitely writes YA, and it will be a welcome break from parallel London’s, Stalkers, and Westeros. It only actually fits challenge 1 so it’s going to be my backup read I think.

So that’s my fortnight planned. Lots of reading planned. Lots of moaning about tomes being heavy I am sure. I always try my best to blog with daily updates and challenge progress but I often forget or struggle to maintain those. So, in the spirit of trying to update and get more involved in the Tome Topple community, please follow me on Instagram and Twitter where I plan to post pictures throughout and maintain a Tome Topple Twitter progress thread. I also religiously update my Goodreads, so check out my progress on there too.

And as it’s a readathon that starts on a Friday – a Friday that for once leads into a weekend off with no plans at all – I plan to relax and start making headway with the readathon. I’m using Stalker and A Dance with Dragons as train reads (they’re paperbacks so are lighter in my bag, and aren’t Emma’s signed Shades of Magic tomes) because the commute is enforced time to read that is otherwise wasted. I can’t do anything else and I anticipate these being the most problematic to keep going with, so having captive time to read these is perfect. I took Stalker to work today – it gets weirder and creepier the more I read – so I’m hoping to continue reading that over the weekend. Ideally I will have finished it this weekend and have made a start on reading A Dance with Dragons ready for Monday’s train ride. I’ll probably waiver and read one of the others, but that’s the plan.


Are you taking part in this round of Tome Topple?

What are you planning to read this weekend and this readathon?

 

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