Read the World Challenge Month One Recap

Read the World Challenge Month One Recap

The Read the World Challenge officially started in January 2016. However, it's structured so that people can start at any time, not just at the beginning of the calendar year. I started the reading challenge a month early, so that I could anticipate the issues that participants face. It’s difficult to gauge exactly how things are going because most of the people participating in the Read the World Challenge are not a part of the Facebook group. I could moan and groan about not many people being a part of my challenge, but most movements started off small before they gained any kind of traction.

Questions Asked During Month One of the Read the World Challenge

Q: I am looking for recommendations on books by African authors. This was a common question, asked in a variety of ways.

A: I mentioned that I had read Season of Migration to the North, Things Fall Apart, July's People. Ones that I have on my bookshelf to read this year are: If Mayors Ruled the World, A Grain of Wheat, The Burger's Daughter, Arrow of God, and A Sport of Nature. I also direct people to LibraryThing’s website.

Q: Note-taking is a challenge so would love some tips on that! There was a variation on this question, people mentioning that they are only writing summaries.

A: I posted three articles that I wrote about note-taking, and emphasized the importance of detailed notes and extracting the five big ideas.

Q: Where is the Monthly Reading Matrix?

A: In the Facebook group, Read the World, there is a Menu tab – Discussion, Members, Events, Photos and Files – choose the Files option, then download the Monthly Reading Matrix. The Matrix walks you the process of combining the ideas from all the books you read during the month.

Books Read During Month One of the Read the World Challenge

As a reminder, here are the requirements for Month One of the Read the World Challenge:

This month we are visiting the continent of Africa. Although there are 47 countries in Africa, Morocco and coastal islands – Cape Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe, Madagascar, the Comoros, the Seychelles, and Mauritius – are considered African countries as well, which brings the total up to 54.

1. Read a book written by an author, born in an African country.
2. Read a book about your industry/niche that will allow you to develop skills or give you a new understanding about the way the industry works.
3. Read a book that will help you to develop your personal brand, and position you as an expert.
4. Read a book for entertainment.
5. Read a book to improve your writing – written communication is a prized workplace skill.

Library Thing African Literature Reading List

Source: Read the World Challenge

For the active participants in the Read the World Facebook Group, most people read Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. Other books that more than one participant read are Hooked, Contagious and The Misfit Economy.

1. So Long a Letter by Mariama Bá
2. Literacy with an Attitude: Educating Working-Class Children in Their Own Self-Interest by Patrick Finn
3. Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini
4. Bitch Planet Vol. 1: Extraordinary Machine by Kelly Sue DeConnick & Valentine De Landro
5. Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation by Lynne Trusse
6. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
7. The Wife, The Maid and the Mistress by Ariel Lawhorn.
8. Spiritual Care in Practice: Case Studies in Healthcare Chaplaincy edited by George ditched and Steve Nolan.
9. The Secret Life of Pronouns What Our Words Say About Us by James Pennebaker.
10. Final Gifts: Understanding the Special Awareness Needs and communication of the dying by Callahan and Kelly
11. Intimacy by Hanif Kureishi
12. Women Like Us by Suzanne Neild and Rosalind Pearson
13. Crush it by Gary Varnerchuck
14. The Art of Social Media by Guy Kawasaki
15. The liberty series – Leigh James
16. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
17. Contagious: Why Things Catch On by Jonah Berger
18. Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal
19. Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change by William Bridges
20. How to Fly a Horse: The Secret History of Creation, Invention, and Discovery by Kevin Ashton
21. Super Structure: The Key to Unleashing the Power of Story by James Scott Bell
22. Sentences and Paragraphs: Mastering the Two Most Important Units of Writing by Charles Euchner
23. The Golden Rule of Writing by Charles Euchner
24. Characters: Creating Heroes, Villains, Mentors, Sidekicks, and Other Characters for Your Story by Charles Euchner)
25. Skunk Works: A Personal Memoir of My Years of Lockheed
26. Adrift In New York Or, Tom and Florence Braving the World by Horatio Alger, Jr.
27. The Misfit Economy: Lessons in Creativity from Pirates, Hackers, Gangsters and Other Informal Entrepreneurs by Alexa Clay, Kyra Maya Phillips
28. Conquests of Invention by Mary Rosetta Parkman
29. Non-Obvious: How to Think Different, Curate Ideas & Predict The Future by Rohit Bhargava
30. Several Short Sentences About Writing by Verlyn Klinkenborg
31. Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga
32. Creating Fat Content by Dr. Andy Williams
33. The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino

If I am honest, I am disappointed that I do not have more active participants in the Read the World Challenge, but I recognize that I have to start somewhere. The words that prodded me to actually start the Read the World Challenge, are Margaret Mead’s famous quote,

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.”

Now that you've seen Month One Recap of the Read the world Challenge, what are your thoughts? If you’d like to comment on this post, please do so on my Facebook page. You can still join the Read the World Challenge.

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