Back by popular demand, Read Scotland 2015 is here!
Challenge levels:
Just A Keek (a little look): 1-4 books
The Highlander: 5-8 books
The Hebridean: 9-12 books
Ben Nevis: 13-24 books
Back O’ Beyond: 25+ books
Read and review Scottish books -any genre, any form- written by a Scottish author (by birth or immigration) or about or set in Scotland.
Challenge runs January 1 to December 31, 2015
Books you read may count for other challenges.
You don’t have to have a blog to participate. If you have a blog, write a challenge sign-up post and link that post (not your home page) to the links below. Grab a copy of the challenge badge if you want to post it too. If you don’t have a blog let me know in a comment below that you are participating and what level you are aiming for.
Post your review on your blog and link the review to the Read Scotland 2015 Review Page I’ll be putting up the first of the year. If you don’t have a blog and still want to review you can:
1: post a review at any bookseller that allows reviews, and link to it
2: Link up a review on Goodreads, Librarything or other program you review on.
3: leave a short review in the comments on the review page here on the blog.
I’ve also set up this challenge on Goodreads. You can sign up there rather than on the blog. You don’t have to sign up on both though!
Once again here are some sites to help you find books for this challenge…
List of Scottish Writers
100 Best Scottish Books of all Time
Five New Scottish Writers
Just Scottish Women Writers
Fantastic Fiction – Scotland Authors
Books From Scotland – Author List
Find a book set in Scotland @ Book Set In…
and the ultimate search site…
Stop, You’re Killing Me!
Another great resource brought to my attention by one of our challengers, Lizzy…
50 Best Scottish Books of the Last 50 Years
Sign up now!
http://www.simply-linked.com/listwidget.aspx?l=1813BF36-C129-4FAB-8314-32E81BBE04FC
Peggy's Porch 
Having failed miserably this year at this challenge, I'll leave it to those a bit better organised and disciplined than myself. Good luck to all!
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Thanks, Col. Happy reading to you!
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I am signing up for the Back O'Beyond this time since I managed to meet it for the 2014 challenge.
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I'd like to sign up for Back of Beyond, but ….. No, I'll go for it! Back of Beyond! Still got a few weeks to read my last two and a half books for Ben Nevis this year!
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yea!, Glad your back with us!
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I'm signing up for the Just a Keek level – and may move on later!
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Hi Peggy – I'm signing up for the first time this year and will aim for Highlander. I think that 5-8 books about Scotland should be more than manageable !
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Sorry didn't read the instructions first – here's the link to my challenge post !!
http://jaffareadstoo.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/read-scotland-challenge-2015.html
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Heard about the Challenge from jaffareadstoo and have signed up for The Highlander!
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Happy to be a Hebridean again in 2015
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Modest ambitions for me this year but happy to be signing up for The Highlander. Thanks for hosting this again!
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I would like to join in but no promises. I am not sure I have anything suitable though I will have a good look. Lovely challenge.
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Easy Peasy! Happy Reading.
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So thrilled to have you along for the journey, Nicki!
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Thanks, Ali. Its never too late to jump in. We'll be glad to have you.
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Your welcome, Claire. I have way too many Scottish books still to read not too!
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Good thinking, Margaret. I'm hoping I can make it again this year now I've committed full go!
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Here's another list for you to meander through. The 50 Best Scottish Novels of the Past 50 Years proved more than a little controversial when it was published last year.
http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/reading/book-lists/50-best-scottish-books-of-the-last-50-years
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Thanks, Lizzy. I am going to add this up in the body of the post so it doesn't get lost and everyone can see it.
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Think I might join this one… I have loads of Scottish books on my shelves and I am trying desperately to read what I have and not buy anymore! Think I will aim for the highlander.. Dont have a blog but will let you know how I get one.
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Great, Alex! Glad to have you along. You can leave comments or reviews in the comments on the review page! Looking forward to seeing what you read.
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Hi, Peggy Ann- I really enjoyed the 2014 challenge- I read 32 books in combination with a Century of Books and the Golden Age of Mystery Bingo. I read 16 by D. E. Stevenson, four by Val McDermid, two by Ian Rankin and one by each of the following: Dorothy Sayers, Josephine Tey, Arthur Conan Doyle, John Buchan, Michael Innes, Helen MacInnes, JK Rowling, Kate Atkinson, Alexander McCall Smith and James Runcie. I will try again this year! Thanks so much.
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Congratulations on that wonderful amount of books for last year! A great diversity of authors and genres too. Welcome back, Susan
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Crumbs! Almost the end of April and I have read only two books for the challenge, but am well on the way with the third! First one, which was originally three, was Marget Pow by Catherine Poynton Slater, starting with a lovely book of letters to her friends at home in Marget Pow in Foreign Parts as she accompanies her two young ladies on a European tour. She is totally unimpressed with the cities she visits – Scotland and the Scots is good enough for her. In fact she can't understand why anyone needs to go anywhere other than her homeland! The second part is about her return to her employment where she does a fair bit of showing off about her trip, which is very amusing, and the third part finds Marget Pow Looks Back over her life in service. I love her use of vernacular speech throughout, which may not be understood by a non Scot, and therefore the humour in some of the tales lost.
I also read James Oswald's Natural Causes and am now well on with his Book of Souls, both murder mysteries in which there are an awful lot of bodies, both living and deceased. In the first book I got quite lost with all the living characters, mainly policemen in varying roles. The intended first chapter was apparently so shockingly gruesome that it was put to the back o the book as an optional read – and I have to say I didn'y read it! So far Book of Souls is easier. Really enjoyed Natural Causes which was why I turned to Book of Souls next Really enjoying it too! I'll do the hat trick and read his third and fourth Inspector McLean books in due course, though maybe I'll take a break from the smurders for a bit. I bought a couple of O Douglases at the big book sale we have annually in Peebles, as well as another copy of the trilogy, A Scots Quair by Lewis Grassic Gibbon – I lent my last copy and never got it back – and yet another trilogy I enjoyed when I was much much younger – the Jacobite trilogy by DK Broster. I just looked at my to read bookcase, and realise I have started several books, including the one about Billy Connolly by his wife; Scott-land, the man who invented a nation (Sir Walter Scott), by Stuart Kelly; A Big Boy Did it and Ran Away, by Christopher Brookmyre ( haven't really got into it yet), and several more. I have two volumes of Memoirs of a Highland Lady, by Lady Elizabeth Grant of Rothiemurchus, and perhaps three Neil Munro's still to read….. If I can get through all of these this year I'll be doing well!
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Pardon the mistakes! I think my eyes are tired as I thought I had read my original through!
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You'll be pleased to know that, despite my absence from the blogging world, I have been continuing my 2014 challenge throughout this year and at the end of the year will be posting a wrap up. I've got a few more on my list still to read before December.
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Jodi it's so good to see you back!
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