Sunday Salon - getting myself better organised with challenges

Plans, plans, plans

I've realised this week, that I've got a few challenges on my plate, and if I don't get myself a little more organised, then in a few months time I will be just as far from completing them as I am today.

One challenge I have finished is the Aussie Author Challenge being run by Book Lover Book Reviews.

That one required me to read 8 books by at least 5 different Australia authors. My special requirement was that my books need to be crime fiction.

As I read one or two Australian crime fiction books a month, that wasn't hard for me to finish. Check here for what I read.

In the 2010 Global Challenge I've now read 11 books out of the 14 I have decided to read.

I have imposed a couple of conditions on my reading here:
* all my books must be crime fiction/thriller
* as far as possible each book will be set in a different country.
You can see what I've read so far here.
I actually only have 3 more to read and review: one each from New Zealand (doing that now), one from South America, and one from Canada/Central America.

So here is my reading list:

• CONTAINMENT, Vanda Symon (New Zealand)
• WINTER OF SECRETS, Vicki Delany (Canada)
• THURSDAY NIGHT WIDOWS, Claudia Pineiro (Argentina) OR
• THE SILENCE OF THE RAIN, Luiz Alfredo Garcia-Roza (Brazil)

In the Agatha Christie Reading Challenge, my aim is to read a book a month, in order of publication. Last month I didn't get around to doing this. So far I have read 23 out of an estimated 87 books.

This is my list for the next few months

1934, The Listerdale Mystery - 12 short stories
1935, DEATH IN THE CLOUDS (aka DEATH IN THE AIR)
1936, THE A.B.C. MURDERS (aka THE ALPHABET MURDERS)
1936, MURDER IN MESOPOTAMIA
1936, CARDS ON THE TABLE

I have a couple of other challenges on my plate but am progressing fairly well with them:

Audio Book Challenge is hosted at Royal Reviews.

I listen to books to and from work every day so hopefully this will be relatively easy to achieve.

I'm trying for Addicted: 12 books 
So far I have listened to 7 and am on my 8th:
MARCH VIOLETS, Philip Kerr

 100+ ReadingChallenge is hosted by J. Kaye

I'm doing pretty well so far with 43 books on my list - about 4 books ahead of where I was last year when I read 104 books.

You can follow my progress on Smik's Reviews.


I've decided to take part also in the Scandinavian Reading Challenge - being run by The Black Sheep Dances. For this you have to read 6 books set in Scandinavia. Mine will all be crime fiction and so far I have read 2. I'll do an update post later this week.