This is the second year Socastee has had a Battle of the Books team – and 2nd is what place it came in at the county competition on March 24. 

Unlike last year, the team’s seven members were able to compete in person, and the team improved a lot, despite having only two people who had competed last year. The team came in second in a field of nine.

“The girls worked really hard and they were definitely hyped when we left,” said Asst. Librarian Ms. Ashley Tindall, the team’s coach.

The competition consists of several rounds. During each round, the Socastee team competed in matches against another team where a moderator asked questions about any of the 10 books on the Battle of the Books book list. The team worked together to answer each question, trying to get as many points as possible. 

Ms. Tindall said the students each did a good job of reading as many books as possible.

“The least amount of books [any one student] read was seven,” she said. 

Freshman Erin Maguire said her favorite books were The Cruel Prince by Holly Black and Scythe by Neal Shusterman. 

“I joined Battle of the books because I enjoy reading and thought it would be fun to be assigned a variety of different genres,” she said.

She said she enjoyed the live competition.

“It was a really fun experience, especially to be able to work together with the other people on the team when figuring out the questions,” she said. 

Junior Jordan Riley also liked reading Scythe the best. She joined because she had friends on the team.

 “I heard some of my friends who also enjoyed reading were doing it and I wanted to join,” she said. 

Jordan said competition day was especially fun. “It’s kind of cool seeing other people competing to see who has the most knowledge over a certain number of books.”

Ms. Tindall said the team is already looking to do even better in the future. 

“We’re hungry for next year, and we are going to do our best to win first place.”