book news, Challenges

Worlds Without End Grand Master Reading Challenge

41 Comments

Hot on the heels of the announcement that author Connie Willis was just named the winner of the 2011 Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award I wanted to mention the other science fiction reading challenge that I am participating in this year in the hopes that you will consider joining in.

Worlds Without End has long been a very nice SF/F/H related site with really good content and great genre resources. They recently announced their year long reading challenge:

From the WWE website:

The goal of the WWEnd Grand Master Reading Challenge is to read 12 books ā€” 1 each by 12 Grand Master authors ā€” in 12 months and write 6 reviews. Post your reviews here on WWEnd, or post an extract here then link back to your blog for the full review; you’ll get credit either way. We’ll cherry pick the best reviews to feature in the WWEnd blog.

There will be monthly prizes for the best reviews, based on member votes, and other incentives throughout the year like T-Shirts, buttons, books and bookmarks. You must be a WWEnd member to participate and have a chance to win prizes. Join now for free!

The Damon Knight Grand Masters are:

Connie Willis
Joe Haldeman
Harry Harrison
Michael Moorcock
James E. Gunn
Harlan Ellison
Anne McCaffrey
Robert Silverberg
Ursula K. Le Guin
Philip Jose Farmer
Brian Aldiss
Hal Clement
Poul Anderson
Jack Vance
A.E. Van Vogt
Damon Knight
Frederik Pohl
Lester del Rey
Ray Bradbury
Alfred Bester
Isaac Asimov
Arthur C. Clarke
Andre Norton
Fritz Leiber
L. Sprague de Camp
Clifford D. Simak
Jack Williamson
Robert A. Heinlein.

The bold authors are the ones I am currently planning on reading, though no commitments need be made. And I’ve already read and counted books by Harry Harrison and Robert Silverberg this year.

One of the things I love most about this challenge is the set up over on World’s Without End. They utilize the Booktrackr program and once you sign up you can use their site like Goodreads and others to track your reading. What I find fun about the WWE site is that in your profile (the My World tab) you can check your reading stats against various genre awards lists to see the number and percentages of books you’ve read and have left to read in anything from Hugo and Nebula award winners and nominees to the recent NPR Top 100 Science Fiction and Fantasy list.

For example, I’ve read a whopping 17% of Hugo winners, my largest category by far with the exception of the recently added Locus YA category in which I’ve read 33% of the winners. Which sounds great until you realize it is only 3 out of 9 books. Ha!

It is a really fun feature, as are the pictures that act as placeholders on the challenge page. If you pop over there you can see me, Carl V., and the books I’ve read and the pix of authors just waiting patiently in the queue.

One of the non-recorded goals I had last year was to be more consistent throughout the year in reading SFF, the two genres I love most. This past year I only had 2 months in which I didn’t complete at least one novel or anthology collection in these genres. This challenge will not only help me to keep on track with that goal again for this year but will also help motivate me to check out some authors that I’ve talked about reading for years, like Anne McCaffrey and Andre Norton as well as revisit old favorites like Asimov (which is happening now) and Heinlein.

The folks over at WWE are working hard to create a comprehensive SF/F/H site and they are always open to adding books to their database that they do not currently have. They do so quickly and politely.

I hope you’ll consider giving it a go, or at the very least dropping by Worlds Without End to check out their great site. And you might even see my recent review of The Stainless Steel Rat over on their blog. šŸ™‚

[Update: I wasn’t very clear but wanted everyone to know that you can take advantage of the great BookTrackr program and WWE’s great content WITHOUT having to join this challenge. There’s is a simple sign up process and all the fun functionality comes with the sign up. The challenge is just a fun bonus if you want it]

41 thoughts on “Worlds Without End Grand Master Reading Challenge”

  1. If there was a challenge for just reading a lot of Connie Willis, I would have completed it already this year! I finished Blackout late last night and am now reading All Clear. And I guess they would qualify for the science fiction experience, right? I guess I’ll have to keep that in mind when I write about them. They’re amazing.

    1. Oh most certainly. If/when you do a review, please post the link of the SF Experience Review Site. I’ve been wanting to read both of those books but haven’t gotten to them. I have read her award-winning novelette, Fire Watch, which is set in the same universe as those two novels. Once you get done with these I recommend giving it a read, it is very good. You can read it online for free here:

      http://www.infinityplus.co.uk/stories/firewatch.htm

  2. Sounds like my kind of site. I joined this morning and will start updating my lists tonight.
    Thanks for pointing us their direction.

    1. Yes, I think you would enjoy it very much, Jim. Glad you joined.

  3. ok, now you know I HAVE to ask… which Anne McCaffrey books are you planning on reading?? You DO know the Pern books ARE sci fi right? The fit the “true meaning” of “sci fi/ fantasy” and although I deem them More fantasy then sci fi they are defenitely sci fi.. they came to the planet of pern and they also, thanks to the dragons, “time travel” of sorts so… I gots t’know which books you are hoping to read of hers! lol

    1. I’ll read Dragonflight before I read any other Anne McCaffrey. That is probably the easiest choice of all the authors I am planning on reading for this. And since it doesn’t have to be strictly sf I’m not worried about where it falls in the genre classification, so its a win-win!

      1. let me know when you are going to read it.. if I am not involved in the middle of a book I may read it at the same time so I can totally enjoy your response to it!!

        1. I will do so. Even though I’ve always heard that it is better classified as science fiction I am leaning heavily towards reading it in the spring/summer either during Once Upon a Time or just as an adjunct read.

          1. Count me in for a reread of Dragonflight as well. I’ve still got my paperback copy I read as a teenager with the great Whelan cover. I’ve been wanting to reread it myself and it will fit for the challenge above as well which is a bonus as well. I always think of it as more of fantasy book myself since it involves dragons myself.

          2. just to give you fair warning… once you read Dragonflight..I will be absolutely amazed if you don’t want to immediately read the rest of the trilogy (Dragonquest & The White Dragon)… just sayin’…. :o)

            1. I believe I still have all three of those books from my youth. I read them all about 30 years ago now and I don’t remember anything about them except for the fact that I remember loving them as a teen. I look forward to the reread so I can rediscover while I loved them so much the first time around.

              I think Carl mentioned reading the during his Once Upon a Time challenge in the spring and I think that would be a great idea.

            2. Warning heard and understood!

              And cool Jeff, glad to hear it. At the rate I’m going I’ll soon have my reading planned out for the whole year. Ha!

  4. I’m not officially participating in any challenges this year, but this one does sound awfully tempting. I do plan to read material by Willis, Silverberg, Heinlein, Norton and Asimov anyways, too. Hmm.

    1. I just love the whole tracking against awards and lists function of Worlds Without End, which you do get just by signing up for the site, not the challenge. Its fun in a stats-geeky way.

  5. That looks like a great site, thanks so much for sharing! I don’t know whether I’ll do the challenge (though I might find it difficult to resist…) but I’ll definitely be checking out their site.

    1. I don’t want to repeat again what I just said to Memory, but it does make me think I might not have been clear above that you can get that great functionality out of joining the WWE site without having to participate in the challenge. Might need to update this post tonight.

  6. Cool challenge! thanks for pointing it to us, Carl. I still have All Clear to read by Willis, and some Asimov and Poul Anderson for your challenge, so I might join this one too, just to up my sf reading this year. I’ll definitely go see how I’m doing in my reading on their SF and F lists!! I have some Ray Bradbury I keep meaning to read too…

    1. Happy to do it. I’m so jazzed about the bells and whistles over there and am up for any ol’ excuse to read more classic science fiction throughout the year, so this one was too good not to share. If you sign up and use anything other than “Susan”, let me know so that I can check out your lists over there.

      1. I used ‘bookgirl’ – blame the painkiller I’m on, I just couldn’t come up with any other name! lol I’ve spent all day on there. I’ve realized it’s missing quite a few authors/books, and yet its’ addictive to see where exactly I am on some of those lists. I need to read a lot more old science fiction! lol

        1. Cool, thanks for letting me know. And just shoot dave an email at dave (at) worldswithoutend (dot) com and get him your list and he’ll add whatever needs to be added.

  7. This challenge and website sound GREAT!!! I will defiently sign up soon and we can compare lists. šŸ™‚

    1. I’ve got to go through now and figure out which books they have yet to list on their site and get Dave to add those so that I can add them to my list!

      1. Hey, I was wondering where all the new sign ups were coming from! Thanks, Carl, for the great plug. The GMRC is starting to build some momentum now thanks to you and some other fine folks on the interwebs. Definitely get me your list of missing books! We’re always happy to add more especially if they come with a review šŸ˜‰ Cheers!

        1. My pleasure, truly. And I’ll get you that list slowly but surely.

  8. I will add that I signed up tonight and the website is GREAT!!! I love the all the lists and the covers for all the books. I highly recommend you check it out. I’ve only added a few books so far but I’m going to try and add everything I can remember over time. My handle over there is Jeff S. as well as here.

    1. D’oh! I should have mentioned all the kind words from Jeff and others here about WWEnd! Thanks everyone, we really appreciate the positive feedback.

  10. Hi Carl, I like the look of your Anne McCaffrey book. I’ll keep my eye out for you reading that one – I’m a sucker for the dragons!
    Lynn šŸ˜€

    1. I won’t keep it a secret when it is time to dive in. The more the merrier.

  11. I’ve read 26 of them at some time or other, so in all likelihood anything I were to do with this would be a bunch of (author) re-reads. I have not, however read every book by those authors, so there would be lots to choose from, including many that I read long ago and wouldn’t mind reading again. Thanks for letting me know about this.

    Also you do recall I read several of the McCaffrey Pern books and did reviews on my blog, yes? I read them in the final chronilogical order, not published order, though, so DRAGONDAWN was first.

    1. I’ve read either a novel or a collected set of short stories by 12 of the Grand Masters, so I definitely have several more to experience for the first time. Of the remaining 16 I’ve read short stories by another 6 of them.

  12. Just took three old SF books – two novels and a short story collection – by Arthur C. Clarke off the shelf. I’ve wanted to re-read these for a long time. It was when I was in high school, I think, maybe first year of college, when I first read them and just ate them up. These are somewhat thin paperbacks, so it shouldn’t take long to read each one. First up is The Sands of Mars. Has anyone here read it?

    1. The only Clarke I’ve read are short stories, my favorite being “Rescue Party”. I read props for the novel The City and the Stars earlier today.

  13. When I started the book yesterday, I found a note inside I left there, dated 1959, that said “not his best, but enjoyable. B or maybe B+” How about that? I was doing that for a little while back then (I was a freshman in high school).

    1. That is great! I love finding stuff I left in books. It will be interesting to see if you feel it has improved or not in the last 50 years.

  14. Carl, FYI: my classic SF book review post will go up Thursday night at 8:15 p.m. Pacific time. Both you and Red should get pingbacks.

  16. Hint: 1952. Lets see, Carl…I don’t think you had been born yet when the book came out!

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