Orbis Terrarum Earns its own BLOG!!
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The Orbis Terrarum Challenge just earned itself its very own blog! Yes, it was mostly that I sat down to work on links tonight to get all of your reviews in order by country and guess what!?! Mr. Linky is down. I decided since it was on my mind, why not do OT stuff anyway. So you have to head over!!! I will have Mr. Linkys up there soon.
Oh, and I need help....if any of you who did the challenge this year want to step on over and see what you think of the new mini-challenges that would be so cool. I would love advice on those. On everything really!! Head over and make sure to leave a comment or two.
You can get to it from now on by clicking on the Orbis Terrarum Tab above or going here. enjoy!
prizes for everyone!!!
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Yes, but not just anyone....but yes everyone who has completed the Orbis Terrarum Challenge and does their wrap up post!!
Beastmomma, the insanely-cool-supa-woman from life from the belly of the beast has offered to help really make this conclusion a blast! She is offering to supplement my prizes, and had the idea to send a bookie prize to every single one of you who has completed the challenge and who does the wrap up post.
You still have time! If you need to finish a book, do it! If you need to write answers to my silly survey...do it! You have until midnight on the 15th, which is tomorrow to complete the challenge, the wrap up post, and adding your link to Mr. linky. You can do it! 
Good luck folks.
The bookie prizes will consist of books (of course), bookends, baskets for books, cookbooks...keep in mind that some items will be in gently used condition, and if that bugs you you don't need to participate if you don't want to.
Here is what your wrap up post needs to include
Here is where you can see some of the prizes I am offering
You must put the link to your wrap up post on my sweet Mr. Linky to be included in this prize fest!!!
PS if anyone else is feeling generous and wants to add in some prizes to winners...send me an email and you are certainly welcome to help!!
edit:
raidergirl has added to the prize loot:
"In the Country of Men" by Hisham Matar, set in Libya!
Tricia has added PS I Love You by Cecelia Ahern and Charity Girl by Georgette Heyer to the prize bucket as well!!!
orbis terrarum final deadline and prizes
The deadline for getting your lists of links and reviews to me is going to be the 15th, that gives you a week. I would love the survey answered, but more than anything I would like you to do a wrap up post with the links to all your OT reviews and paste your post link to the MR. linky here.
Then I will be able to compile a list of all the books that we jointly read and link to all of your reviews!!! Wouldn't that be cool!? Even if you didn't finish the challenge you are welcome to get me your links of the reviews you did complete.
Here are the three prize books:
I just thought of this, since some of you mentioned helping with prizes for next year...if you are interested (no pressure) you could send a well loved book or two on as well this time around. You could just let me know about it and I will post your titles as well, then either you could select your winner or I could and you'd send them out directly to the winner.
Anyone?
Happy reading!!
Orbis Terrarum Ended for 2008
Hey all you OT Challengers!!!
The Orbis Terrarum challenge ended on the 20th, (three days ago) I am not going to be too particular with the date, I just wanted people to not have to mess with finishing it up during the holidays. If you are really close, finish on up!
Here is what I am going to do, for those of you who have finished, I am going to add a MR. Linky below. And you will get an extra 5 entries for the final giveaway, which will be 3 books (as always slightly used, and I will have to get back to you with the titles, sorry but it is Christmas!).
Orbis Terrarum 2008 Challenge survey:
1.) What did you like about the challenge?
2.) What would you like to see change for next year?
3.) About the rules, or the non-existent rules...did you like that?
4.) Are you going to join us next year?
5.) Pretty please give me any suggestions for changes, the betterment of the challenge, or just anything that you would like to see changed for next year.
6.) Would you like the challenge to be more involved? What if we read books together sometimes? Would that interest you?
7.) would you be interested in helping somehow next year? How would you like to help?
Here is the low-down on how to enter yourself:
1.) each link to a book review you have on the give us a link to your travels mr. linky will count as one entry.
2.)A Wrap up post!!! each wrap up post that includes links to all your reviews,AND answers to the survey questions above, is worth additional 5 entries.
For the links to count you must include this information along with your link: book title, book author, country.
(wondering why it is worth so many??...because it will make my life so much easier if you do this, because I wanted to do a conglomerate of all the books that were read and links to all the bloggers that read them and their reviews.!!!)
Orbis Terrarum for 2009
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Hey OT peeps!
We are going to be finishing up the time for the first Orbis Terrarum Challenge next month!! I know many of you have finished already. If you have a couple left, there is still plenty of time. Keep-a-readin'.
I am going to be hosting this challenge again next year for sure and I would like any suggestions you have. After the 20th of December, when the OT challenge is officially over I will have the last giveaway. All links to book reivews or thoguhts on the Mr. linky
will count as an entry, and at the end of the challenge I will ask you all some questions for the improvement of next year's challenge. You will also get an entry for giving me some answers and helping me make some great changes for next year. You can make suggestions now if you'd like, just comment below! I 'd love to hear what you think!!!!
Here is a glimpse at 2009's Orbis Terrarum challenge button, if you want to snag it already
I will start sign ups the month before we start reading, in March.
Orbis Terrarum Completed Countries Updated Map
Excellent reading OT challengers!!! There are still many countries to read, but we have made some huge progress!
Happy reading!
The God of Small Things
The God of Small Things
by Arundhati Roy
322 Pages
International Fiction
Winner of the Booker Prize
Set in India, where fate journeys amongst a family, and a set of twins. Roy using poetry-like prose takes the reader to a place of mystery and magic, superstition and pain. The storyline is not straightforward, but weaves and hops and jumps around complicating the impact of its plot. Good, okay...but nothing near great.
My take on this? I didn't like it. I wanted to, I like liking international fiction but this was too dark, to sad, too much to handle. Not even that much bad happened in the book, but nothing good ever did take place.
I can see that her writing is amazing, but Roy seems to go too far to show that she can write at the expense of plot and depth of character. It is not personable at all. I didn't connect to a single character. I think Roy should write poetry instead. I wish I had a better review to give. This is an award winning book, but I don't really see how.
Sorry guys!
Give me your thoughts, did you like it? When did you read it? Did you feel you connected with the characters and followed the plot? I had to do so much re-reading because either my mind would wander, or I would just not understand what was going on....not a book for me.
Orbis Terrarum Completed Books
I am going to update the map of completed countries for the Orbis Terrarum Challenge.
Make sure you add any of the books that you have read and are not currently up, onto the Links page.
YAY!!! You all are doing so great. Keep up the reading. We have two months to go!!! I am going to host this again next year. Be sure to let me know if you have any suggestions.
Book Review: Beasts of No Nation
Author Photo by Seth Wening
Title: Beasts of No Nation
Author: Uzodinma Iweala
Pages: 176
Yearly Count: 70
Awards:
- The Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction
- Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters
- First-Place Winner of the 2005 2005 Discover Award, Fiction
- The Best Book of the Year by Time, People and Slate Entertainment Weekly New York Magazine
A boy soldier, Agu, a child of a nondescript age (between 9 and 12) and from an unnamed West African Nation, speaks forth of the reality of child soldiers everywhere. Written as a novel, Iweala has taken bits and pieces of child solders worldwide, and formed a conglomerate child soldier in his character Agu. Beasts of No Nation is filled with their inner thoughts, their heartbreaks, and what they are asked to do. Agu's own morals, ethics and survival take a backseat to the desires of his leaders, who all in all are only different degrees of jaded and violent in this war of confusion.
I read this during the read-a-thon, and I was impressed with the writing, the detail and the thoughts it stirred, but it was really hard to read about. I have become even more impressed with this novel after I read it and it settled in and I realized that the author wrote it when he was 23 years old. Inner war of the conscience plays a large part in Beasts of No Nation, of what Agu was taught, and what he is now forced to live. He was brought up going to church, reading the Bible, and now he feels nothing could be further from the beast he has become. This approach of conscience that Iweala used brought me inside Agu, to the thoughts and debates going on inside this child soldier, and really helped me feel a connection to him. Despite his outward actions of war and savage acts forced upon him, inside the war was just as strong, a battle of will, conscience and ultimately survival.
Commandant is shouting, but I am hearing him like he is speaking through one big bag of cotton. He is saying, let us pray, let us pray and then he is asking the Lord to be guiding us in everything we are about to be doing. I am thinking that we should not even be asking God for anything because it is like he is forgetting us. I am trying to forget Him anyway even if my mother would not be happying with me. She is always saying to fear God and to always be going to church on Sunday, but now I am not even knowing what day is Sunday (p. 44).
Author information I found interesting:
Stop Trying to 'Save' Africa article in the Washington Post by Uzodinma Iweala
Uzodinma Iweala Article in The Morning News
Galley Girl Catches up With Uzodinma Iweala Article in Time
I Don't Ever Want to Sit Back, Michelle Pauli, of Guardian interviews Uzodinma Iweala
Memories of My Melancholy Whores
Title: Memories of My Melancholy Whores
Author: Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Pages: 109
Yearly Count: 69
When one old man turned ninety he decided to surround himself in the young love virgin. Gabriel Garcia Marquez takes the reader on a journey, a well written but somewhat naive journey into the realm of aging, virginity and what it all could cost.
To be quite frank I don't know why I read this book , other than that it was the only one of Gabriel Garcia Marquez there to choose from that I hadn't read. I didn't like it. However I could still see glimpses of the man who won the Nobel prize for Literature. This was his first book in ten years! It seems to me he would have had much more to say than what he said.
That is about as good as my review gets for this one, sorry folks...not a book for me.
Other blogger reviews of this book:
Fresh Ink Books
Have you read and reviewed this? What were your thoughts? Give me your link and I will add it here.
