RMFAO October’20 Buddy Read Book Selection

19/09/202010/10/2020RMFAOLeave a Comment

So we are planning to have a buddy-read over at RMFAO, my Goodreads Book Club.

It will be a month-long buddy read and we have some really great book options to select from. For the month of October, we’ve picked books released in 2020 that’ve been garnering the attention of the online book community. For this list of books, please see below. We have a poll on RMFAO’s homepage and anyone who is a member fo the group can vote there.

We will select the book with maximum votes and in case of a tie, we will have both the books with maximum votes as our BOOK OF THE MONTH and will read it (or them) in the month of October. As it is a month-long buddy read, you can join us anytime throughout October, the only requirement is to finish the book before the end of October.

We will be discussing the Book Of The Month throughout the month of October on a separate dedicated thread in the group itself but will be maintaining a spoiler-free policy till at least we reach the ‘more than half the month’ mark. After that even spoilers would be welcome as most of the readers tend to finish the book by then.

Here are the options to choose from:

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennet
The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin
Sisters by Daisy Johnson
Such A Fun Age by Kiley Reid
A Long Petal Of The Sea by Isabel Allende
The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel
Things In Jars by Jess Kidd
If It Bleeds by Stephen King
My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell

And here’s the RMFAO Goodreads Poll:

Poll

Which book would you like to read for the month of October?
(Please vote only if you plan to join the Buddy Read. Don’t worry about the book, we’ll be more than happy to provide you the ebook if you really want to participate in the read with us.)

The Vanishing Half If It Bleeds Things in Jars My Dark Vanessa The Glass Hotel Such a Fun Age A Long Petal of the Sea The City We Became Sisters

comments and details · show results · invite friends

https://www.goodreads.com/poll/widget/207332-which-book-would-you-like-to-read-for-the-month-of-october-please-vot

Everyone is welcome to join and anyone can participate at any time during the month of October.

Happy Reading!

RMFAO Buddy Read: Strange Weather by Joe Hill

26/09/2018RMFAOLeave a Comment

First off, I’d like to share a good news that we’ve crossed first 500 members at RMFAO! For those of you who don’t know what RMFAO is, it is a book club/group on Goodreads where book lovers from all over the world share their latest reads and reviews and participate in exciting year-long challenges and buddy reads.

Coming back to the topic, for the month of October this year, we’re hosting a buddy read for Strange Weather by Joe Hill at RMFAO. The buddy read would be lead by Cheryl, one of the moderators at RMFAO.

I’ve been waiting to read this book since its release last year! I got the hardback copy of it as a birthday gift from Vishal in December itself, but then we planned to have a buddy read for this book in October, so I saved it for later and finally, after a long and arduous wait, October is here and I’m super thrilled to read this book! The best part is that this book fits in the Horror genre so it makes it easy for all of us who are participating in RMFAO 2017 Genre Challenge (October – Horror) challenge to count it in.

If you want to read this book or like horror fiction or want to explore it then come along and join us. This is a month-long buddy read so you can join in anytime as long as you finish the book by the end of the month.

You can find the main discussion thread for Stange Weather buddy read here.

If you want to know more about RMFAO then you can check out this page: RMFAO

Ciao ❤

RMFAO 2018 Classics Catchup

08/01/2018RMFAOLeave a Comment

Want to read more classics? Re-read an old favourite? A book you missed by a favourite author? Or just browse and discover a forgotten author? This year we are moving the general guideline up to pre-1950, but there are quite a few later books (mainly from the 1960s) that are also acceptable.

A wonderful bonus advantage for this Challenge is that it is easy on the budget since so many are available free in numerous formats (including audio!) from such sites as Project Gutenberg, ManyBooks and LibriVox. You do not need to choose your books ahead of time, you’ve got all year. Late-comers are welcome.

Please note that Classics Catchup was created and is run by RMFAO’s first moderator, Dagny. You can find here on Goodreads here or at her amazingly bookish blog, Vauquer Boarding House

We have different yearly levels for which you can go for. These are listed below.

Levels:

Level 1: Casual Reader: 2 books
Level 2: Frequent Reader: 3 – 5 books
Level 3: Bookworm: 6 – 8 books
Level 4: Scholar: 9 – 11 books
Level 5: Professor: 12 or more books

Who’s joining? All you have to do is post here saying you plan to participate. You can choose the Level you hope to achieve now, or wait and see how it goes. Don’t know what to read and need suggestions? Just ask!

RMFAO 2018 Classics Catchup Thread

Other challenges that you can participate in are:

If you’re as crazy about reading and books as we are then go wild combining all or any challenges to spice up your reading lists!

One of the coolest things about this challenge is that the mods are so awesome that they even tell you the sources and links to obtain free books available online legally. What else can a bookworm ask for!?

Join RMFAO

In order to participate, simply announce your participation on the main board of RMFAO 2018 Genre Challenge. Or if you have a blog just do a simple post announcing your participation and sharing details of the challenge (you can freely copy and paste from here with a due credit or reblog this post.) Don’t forget to leave a link back here.

RMFAO 2018 Genre Challenge

18/12/2017Challenges & Lists, RMFAO6 Comments

We are here with the 4th instalment of the most amazing reading challenge on this planet *drumroll* – RMFAO 2018 Genre Challenge.

For those who are new to this challenge, for Genre Challenge, we read one genre (sometimes even two when we have the alternate-genre month) every month. We post the genre list in advance (for this year’s genre list see below) so that we can plan our reads in advance. The focus of this challenge is not only to read more books in the genre you love but also to give you a chance to explore new, unfamiliar or lesser known genres. Not to mention the joy of reading with other book lovers and exploring new titles that they love and adore.

We don’t want to burden or restrict the participants by specifying sub-genres because that creates a set of problems that comes in between the actual reading. You can pick the sub-genres as per your convenience.

Another perk of this challenge is that don’t have to buy new books to participate in this challenge; all you have to do is go through your own books and organise your TBR-list as per the genres for this challenge. Simple!

[button size=”” color=”primary” url=”https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/147920-rmfao-reading-my-frigging-a-off?ref=nav_bar_discussions_pane_group” text=”Join RMFAO”]

[button size=”” color=”primary” url=”https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/19118345-rmfao-2018-genre-challenge” text=”RMFAO 2018 Genre Challenge Thread”]

And now it’s time to unveil the Genre List!

RMFAO 2018 Genre-List:

‣ January – Science-Fiction
‣ February – Mystery-Thriller
‣ March* – Women’s Fiction or Westerns
‣ April* – YA or Graphic Novels
‣ May – Classics/Literary
‣ June – Non-Fiction
‣ July – Dystopian/Apocalyptic
‣ August – Contemporary Fiction
‣ September – Humour
‣ October – Horror
‣ November* – Historical or Steampunk
‣ December – Adventure/Fantasy

*Alternate-Genre Month - For these months, we have 2 genre options. You can pick and do either of the two or both!

Monthly Levels:

Level 1: Casual Reader: 1 book (easy)
Level 2: Frequent Reader: 2 books (moderate)
Level 3: Bookworm: 3 books (mildly strenuous)
Level 4: Bibliophile: 4 books (strenuous)
Level 5: Bookiopath: 5 books or more (challenging)

You can announce the level you’d be going for each month on the respective discussion threads.

Also, don’t forget to mention what type of books you’d be reading:

HB: Hardbacks
PB: Paperbacks
EB: E-Books
AB: Audio Books

PLEASE READ (especially for new members):

You can read any number of books for the respective genre each month in one particular month.
Take your time and go through your entire TBR-list before deciding the books to read.
You can join the challenge at any stage (in any month.)
You can drop out of the challenge any time you like.
You can select different levels every month.
Use this discussion board to share your reads with other members of the group.
Please be active and don’t hesitate to ask questions or recommend books.
We encourage social shares, so if you’d be sharing or mentioning this challenge on your social media, don’t forget to tag – #RMFAO and @thereadingbud

Other challenges at RMFAO:

RMFAO Classics Catchup (link will be up soon!)
RMFAO NetGalley Challenge
RMFAO Series Challenge
RMFAO Audiobooks Challenge (link will be up soon!)
RMFAO Bonus Challenge (link will be up soon!)

If you’re as crazy about reading and books as we are then go wild combining all or any challenges to spice up your reading lists!

For any queries, you can post a comment below or send a message to the group or the mods on Goodreads any time. We’d love to hear from you!

Ciao ❤

RMFAO Buddy Read: On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers

07/12/2017RMFAO2 Comments

This month for RMFAO we’re having a buddy read for On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers. So far we have 4 people reading the book and the reading is going great. I’m presently halfway through the book and enjoying it so far.

One of the main reasons why I was so eager to start reading this book was that it is the inspiration behind the 4th instalment of Pirates Of The Caribbean movie series – Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. The other reason was that I have never read any book with pirates at the heart of it, so I was quite intrigued when a fellow member and one of the RMFAO’s moderators, Cheryl, suggested this book for December’s buddy read. Also, this book fits in the adventure-fantasy genre so it makes it easy for all who are participating in RMFAO 2017 Genre Challenge – December – Adventure/Fantasy to count it in.

If you like pirate novels or want to explore one then come along and join us. This is a month-long buddy read so you can join in anytime as long as you finish the book by the end of the month.

Here’s the discussion thread for On Stranger Tides buddy read: Buddy Read: On Stranger Tides

My next reads are going to be Beneath the Skin (The Witchbreed Series #2) by R.L. Martinez and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms by George R.R. Martin.

What are you reading for this month?

Hope you guys are having a great bookish festive season!

Ciao

Book Review: From The Earth To The Moon by Jules Verne

07/01/201706/01/2017Classics, Jules Verne, Scottish-Fiction1 Comment

Author: Jules Verne
Release Date: 1865
Series:
Genre: Classic Science Fiction
Edition: Paperback (part of The Collector’s Book Of Science Fiction)
Pages: 136
Publisher: Aegypan

Rating: ★★

Blurb:

Verne’s 1865 tale of a trip to the moon is (as you’d expect from Verne) great fun, even if bits of it now seem, in retrospect, a little strange. Our rocket ship gets shot out of a cannon? To the moon? Goodness! But in other ways it’s full of eerie bits of business that turned out to be very near reality: he had the cost, when you adjust for inflation, almost exactly right. There are other similarities, too. Verne’s cannon was named the Columbiad; the Apollo 11 command module was named Columbia. Apollo 11 had a three-person crew, just as Verne’s did; and both blasted off from the American state of Florida. Even the return to earth happened in more-or-less the same place. Coincidence — or fact!? We say you’ll have to read this story yourself to judge.

Review

I’m not a fan of Jules Verne’s writing, hence it was a bit difficult for me to complete this book. I’m just glad that somehow I did. Though there was a fair bit of skimming involved (like pages at times.)

There are a lot of good things I can say about this book like the entire concept of the Gun Club and the mission to send a projectile to Moon, some really sharp sarcastic observations that made me giggle every time I recalled them later on, a decent story overall and the feel-good factor. But there was the inescapable Verne writing that I have now come to dread that literally haunted me through the entire book, the excruciatingly slow pace of the story progression and the crazy level of Science involved for such a short read. Though the Science bit was actually quite impressive, I did not enjoy it at all.

I was hoping to finish this book in a few hours, but it took me more than 3 days to finish it. So you can guess why I gave this book a 2-star rating.

I’d recommend this book only to the hardcore fans of author Jules Verne and to no one else.

Goodreads

RMFAO Buddy-Read #1: Pet Sematary

27/10/2014Uncategorized6 Comments

Hi guys!

I hope you all had a great weekend!

As most of you know that I’ve created a group on Goodreads, RMFAO (if not, then read about it here or visit the group on Goodreads here.) In November we’ll be having our first buddy-read. Being a huge Stephen King’s fan I wanted to begin the buddy-reads with one of his books and the book that got selected through poll is Pet Sematary. If you are interested in reading this book with us in our buddy-read then you are most welcome! There are total 10 people so far who’ll be reading in this buddy-read. You just have to let me know and obviously be prepared with the book by 1st Nov’14.

As everyone already has tons and tons of books to read, we’ve planned to read a single book in the entire month (this way you can participate in this buddy-read without affecting your schedule.) We’ll discuss the pages we read everyday, so feel free to drop by anytime (even if you aren’t participating.)

You can also participate in the discussions if you’ve already read the book.

Lemme know if you have any queries (lol! like this is an exam notice….psssttt…), still lemme know if there’s anything! Visit the discussion board of Buddy-Read#1: Pet Sematary here.

PS: Currently I’m running a poll at RMFAO for deciding the genre for Buddy-Read #2 (Dec’14). If you wish to participate in that then drop by and vote for your favourite genre! Vote here.

Have a great week ahead!

Keep blogging ❤

RMFAO (Reading My Frigging A** Off)

13/10/201413/10/2014Miscellaneous13 Comments

Hi friends!

I’ve created my first group on Goodreads: RMFAO (Reading My Frigging A** Off). Isn’t the name amazeballs!

I’m really, really excited and would love to invite you all to join it. I’m planning to have a lot of buddy-reads and a hell loads of Read-a-Thons! I’ll be posting about them here, on The Reading Bud as well so that whoever is not on Goodreads (which I highly doubt!) won’t miss out on anything fun.

Please feel free to share with me any ideas you have that can the RMFAO more fun. I’m really happy and would love it if you can be a part of my group 🙂

Have a a great day 😀