This weekend, James Madison College students turned cramming into a collaborative art form.

The MADhouse at James Madison College sponsored a marathon book reading of Salman Rushdie's "Midnight's Children" on Saturday. The book is required reading for the college's public affairs class and is due today. The book was read aloud by each participant paragraph by paragraph, beginning at 6 a.m. Saturday.

"Not a lot of people have read the book before," said Ryan Particka, a social relations and political theory and constitutional democracy sophomore. "So we're watching it unfold as we go."

Particka, one of the MADhouse coordinators, said the group choose the book not because it was required, but to raise awareness of Rushdie's campus visit March 17.

The MADhouse is a monthly event put together by Madison students to allow people to perform in a small group setting.

"We do a little of everything, from poetry, to music, to interpretive dance," Particka said.

Public affairs Professor David Yamanishi said Rushdie was incorporated into the course work to enrich the case study of India.

"This makes a more compelling introduction to a culture - much better than reading a textbook," Yamanishi said.

Yamanishi said they picked "Midnight's Children" because the department thought it reflected life in India better than Rushdie's more famous work "Satanic Verses."

When "Satanic Verses" was first released in 1988, it caused a shock wave of protest among some Muslim communities. In 1989, Iran's leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, declared the work a blasphemy and condemned Rushdie to death.

Followers of the Ayatollah took his lead and put a price on Rushdie's head, forcing the author to go into hiding. The death sentence has been restated and is still now believed to be in effect.

Particka said he had been told some James Madison faculty had security concerns until the university decided to go ahead and release the day of the Rushdie's visit.

No university officials could be reached for comment about these concerns.

James Madison College freshman Matt Thomas took part in the event to catch up on his reading.

"I didn't get any time to read it before," Thomas said. "To finish it in one day would be sweet."

The event did not go as planned, however, and at about 11 p.m. the group determined it would not finish by 6 a.m. Sunday and decided to would finish the novel as a group today.