readathon

A little last minute readathon: Pondathon II signup

Yeah so I’m not always Au Fait of what’s going on in the bookblogging world, as I’m mostly doing my own thing. So today I found out it’s the start of Pondathon II (created by The Quiet Pond, a great blog with lots of great content!) and decided to join.

What is the Pondathon?

Pondathon II is a story-driven and gardening-themed readathon hosted and run by CW from The Quiet Pond. The aim of the Pondathon II readathon is to read books to earn plants and decorate your own little garden so that we can restore the forest together. More information about the readathon can be found here.

Information about Joining the Pondathon

  • You can sign-up to the Pondathon II readathon here. The readathon starts on January 10th 2022 and ends on December 11th 2022; sign-ups are open across the duration of the readathon.
  • You also get to create your own Pond animal character for the Pondathon, and create your own character card!
  • If you’d like, create a blog post, bookstagram post, booktube video, Twitter thread, or whatever medium you wish, with ‘#PondathonII’ in the title or your tweet. Share the character you have created and your character card!
  • Link back to this post so that new friends can find the readathon and join in as well.

My Pond Character

Character card design by @artfromafriend, for The Pondathon only. A dark purple background with green leaves and golden stars. In the centre, a lighter square with info that reads: Aurelie @ Ghosthermione Reads, in teal. Then under a line, Wrangler of Frogs. Twitter: @Ghosthermione.
On top of the light purple square, there is a brown and teal trowel on the left, and a teal watering can on the right. Both are covered in green vines with leaves. In the middle, a drawing of a beige cat with stripey tail, standing on her back legs like a human. She's wearing a green leaf as a hat, a red apron, red boots, and a necklace of pink flowers. She holds a cane with a vine twining around it, and wears a bisexual pride and rainbow pride badges on the right side of her apron.
character sheet made using the Pond’s resources and @artfromafriend’s gorgeous background. I got inspired for the title by the Swan wranglers of

We get to use this shiny sheet to track extra quests and bonuses! and with that also comes a shiny (for now empty) garden, in which you can plant all your rewards from reading books!

Now, let me just say this – I’m not the best at keeping track of things. This Readathon requires to send in a form for books you read and I’m already filling my reading journal AND The Storygraph, so there’s a good chance I’ll drop the ball on this, or not submit forms in time, etc. etc. But the concept was so neat and the design so shiny, I just have to try my hand at filling my own terrarium with shiny plants earned from reading!

Looking forward to a very green reading year!

A life update (and mini readathon)

I’ve been unusually silent the last couple of weeks, mainly because i’ve struggled to read pretty much anything. I’ve started half a dozen books, and only finished one audiobook (The Truth, by Terry Pratchett, which I’d feel odd reviewing considering. you know. It’s been published for years and years.

On the why side, there’s not really a reason, I was not really busier than usual, I’ve just been dropping things on account of how tiring the first 5 months of this year (and the whole of last year) have been. And we can go out again, which means I do, sometimes, plan to do stuff other than reading during the weekends. And then my health hasn’t been the best, sometimes the chronic pain is not just “can’t hold a paper book” but “can’t focus on an audio because pain” so I’m learning to deal with that and cut myself some slack

But! I’ve got the next week off work, and while I’ve got Plans, I also want to make the most of this weekend where I’ve nothing to do. So I decided to do a readathon, 5pm today (Friday) to 5pm Monday. You can also join in this storygraph challenge if you’re tempted to do the same.

I’ve a few ebooks lined up (2 ARCs, manly) but this is mostly it:

  • finish Stormsong audiobook (5 hours left give or take)
  • Jasmine Throne ARC (70% in!)
  • Best SFF of 2018 (I’m 1/3rd through?)
  • A Desolation Called Peace (barely started)
  • Pyramids (read or DNF, I’ll decide once I get started)

Then the “I’m not likely to get here but I’ll try” ones:

  • HEartbreak Inc, another ARC I’m really excited about
  • Either The Galaxy and the Ground Within, by Becky Chambers, or Ancestral Night, by Elizabeth Bear, as the mood strikes me

I’ll be talking about this on Twitter, and hopefully updating you here on Monday night!