Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

A book you think your best friend would like

This is very easy for me now. The two people who are my "bestest" friends are in my book club! :)

Unlikely Animals by Annie Hartnett
The London House by Katherine Reay

This is so personal to each individual, I'm not creating a Listopia for this one...

But it would be interesting to hear what you're planning to fulfill this prompt and why you believe that person will enjoy it!

This book I'm doing a buddy read so I'll end up counting it.

An Afro-Indigenous History of the United States

This is easy. My BFF just discovered one of my favorite authors, Sarah J. Maas. So any of her books. Probably, A ​Court of Silver Flames since I know it was her favorite of that series.

This is easy! I don’t have any friends, let alone a best friend, so I can skip this category.

By bf doesn't like to read. Last time I read Bridget Jones' Diary because she liked the movie.

I'm using my Dad for this one - he liked The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman (which I've already read), so using The Man who Died Twice for this!

Ugh. Did they bring this one back on purpose just to annoy those of us who complained last time? This is just plain demoralizing for people like me. And no, I don't want a bunch of random strangers offering to be my best friend. That only adds to the insult.

Megan wrote: "This is easy! I don’t have any friends, let alone a best friend, so I can skip this category."

I wish I could make my brain dismiss it. Instead it goes into a spiral of unworthiness.

This feels like an awkward category for a lot of us introverted book lovers, but I have a brother who is into a lot of the same sort of science fiction that I am, so he's getting thrown under the best friend bus.

Leech by Hiron Ennes.

Ask a Goodreads friend...

I will be using my mother as my best friend. We tend to read the same type of books.

I always try to be optimistic about the prompts, but I was not too fond of this one the first time and I certainly feel the same now.

I will do the same thing I did the last time: read a cat-related book.

Last time I read: The Sneaking, Hiding, Vibrating Creature
This time I will probably read: A History of Art in 21 Cats

Im going to read Not Alone.

I was thinking this would be a book that I would recommend to a friend...something that I had already read. Then I realized that this prompt is for me to read something my friend would like! I have NO IDEA!

I do belong to a GR group that reads only mysteries...my favorite genre. So, maybe I can count one of the mysteries that I read for a "friend" from that group.

It’s hard to say if my SO would like a book I’d I haven’t read it yet so this going to involve some guess work and good luck lol

Anyone else find this challenging because you have a best friend who does NOT read? (We have a running joke that she doesn't know how to read lol. She does, but I think the last book she finished was Twilight in like 2008!)

Last time we had this challenge I read a coffee table/photography book about dogs, Underwater Dogs, since my bestie feels about dogs the way I feel about books. Guess it's time for another dog book! I might do Shelter Dogs or if I stretch things a bit to be not so photo-heavy, One Hundred Dogs and Counting: One Woman, Ten Thousand Miles, and A Journey into the Heart of Shelters and Rescues or The Possibility Dogs: What a Handful of "Unadoptables" Taught Me About Service, Hope, and Healing.

Megan wrote: "This is easy! I don’t have any friends, let alone a best friend, so I can skip this category."

Same! No BFF either! Do you want to pretend and recommend books anyway?

Just a brief overview of myself as a person to help you think of ideas: I'm almost 30 years old, I'm a huge musical theatre geek, I enjoy singing even though I couldn't go pro, but I do have good days where my voice sounds like I could be a chorus girl on Broadway. At the moment, I don't have a clear career path in mind; just looking for a retail job, but I have a background in culinary arts and most recently, ultrasound (like looking at babies in the uterus, but for other parts of the body as well), just to show you my interests.

I don't really discuss politics, but on the spectrum, I'm definitely more towards the left, but not to the level where I'm a total SJW. I'm pretty woke, just not enough to march the streets or anything. I just stay out of the way and keep to myself and just share a Facebook post or two about the current issues.

If you know anything about the show "Supernatural", there's a climate within the fandom who write fanfics and I'm proud to say that I have over 2.5K followers on Pinterest as someone who posts her own writing prompts. Anything in the paranormal/supernatural realm would also be a topic I'd be interested in. On that same wavelength, I identify as Wiccan in terms of my faith, although more realistically, I rely more on tarot for insight over practicing Witchcraft.

Feel free to send a recommendation my way based on this not-so-brief synopsis of myself, as well as your personal interests, if you'd like to take me up on this pretend-friendship idea for the sake of this one reading prompt :)

Stina wrote: "Megan wrote: "This is easy! I don’t have any friends, let alone a best friend, so I can skip this category."

I wish I could make my brain dismiss it. Instead it goes into a spiral of unworthiness."

If you don't have any friends or family members who like to read, then consider yourself your own best friend! Read any book that you think you're going to like, and it checks off this prompt.

I’ll be reading Secret Project #1 by Brandon Sanderson. My best friend and I are dying to get started, so it’s safe to say I think she’ll like it! I backed the Kickstarter 26 minutes after the video dropped, and immediately sent the link to her.

If Secret Project 1 fits another prompt I need, then I’ll read Secret Project #3 or Secret Project #4. (#2 is my “spring 2023” book, and #3 or #4 will be my “second half of 2023” book.)

It really is the Year of Sanderson for me. I think I’ll have SIX from him this year; maybe eight!

Ginny wrote: "Megan wrote: "This is easy! I don’t have any friends, let alone a best friend, so I can skip this category."

Same! No BFF either! Do you want to pretend and recommend books anyway?

Just a brief ..."
You might like the Greywalker series by Kat Richardson. Urban supernatural fantasy, and one of the important secondary characters is an Irish witch with a great sense of humor. The concept of the Grey is a fun twist on ghosts. No Winchester brothers, though. Sorry! But Harper does have a pet ferret who is a tiny troublemaker.

Ginny wrote: "Megan wrote: "This is easy! I don’t have any friends, let alone a best friend, so I can skip this category."

Same! No BFF either! Do you want to pretend and recommend books anyway?

Just a brief ..."

Yay for people who like Broadway! I don’t know if you’re a Hamilton fan, but Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote Hamilton: The Revolution which is a glimpse into the creation of Hamilton. Even if you don’t like the show, it’s a fascinating glimpse into the creation of a show.

I have two family members who don't read, and one who, on the few occasions they do read, has completely different tastes... like romance, which I generally despise. So this is a skip for me.

'Best friend' makes me feel about 12, but I have a very close friend, who I am sure would enjoy the book I've just read for the ATY Winter Challenge: Mantel Pieces: Royal Bodies and Other Writing from the London Review of Books by Hilary Mantel.

My friend loved the Wolf Hall trilogy, and this collection of reviews by Mantel contains several on Tudor history books. I think that she'd also be interested in the 'Royal Bodies' essay, which caused a lot of silly press controversy at the time, and seems very pertinent at the moment.

The reviews are thoughtful, incisive and sometimes very funny.

My two favorite readers in my life are my mom and sister. My sister loves anything science, nature, etc, so something in that genre would be an easy choice. I bought her a book about beavers on a whim once which she ADORED. And my mom loves period pieces, Jane Austen-type film adaptations, etc, so maybe I'll pick a classic I haven't read yet or reread an Austen I haven't read in years.

Megan wrote: "Ginny wrote: "Megan wrote: "This is easy! I don’t have any friends, let alone a best friend, so I can skip this category."

Same! No BFF either! Do you want to pretend and recommend books anyway?
..."

I LOVE Hamilton!!! I always sing Eliza's parts on karaoke!

I am reading one about best friends: Inseparable by Simone de Beauvoir.

Honeymoons Can Be Hazardous. This was a fun cozy mystery and my friend just starting getting into cozy mysteries and we like similar books, and I really enjoyed this.

This one is pretty tricky for me. First, two of my friends have completely different tastes than I do. We don't read anything in the same ball park. Second, my other two friends I haven't talked to in years (their fault, not mine), so I wouldn't know what to do on that front.

*****

I honestly don't know where to go with this topic. Tips may help.

Ron wrote: "This one is pretty tricky for me. First, two of my friends have completely different tastes than I do. We don't read anything in the same ball park. Second, my other two friends I haven't talked to..."

You could always pick a highly rated book from a GR friend’s shelf. See if there are any books they enjoyed that are also on your TBR.

Heather wrote: You could always pick a highly rated book from a GR friend’s shelf. See if there are any books they enjoyed that are also on your TBR

Oh that's an excellent idea, thanks.

*****

Okay found one:

Group: How One Therapist and a Circle of Strangers Saved My Life

I've had this book on my shelf for a long while so this seems like a good place to start it.

Ron — Glad it worked out for you!

Dea wrote: "I’ll be reading Secret Project #1 by Brandon Sanderson. My best friend and I are dying to get started, so it’s safe to say I think she’ll like it! I backed the Kickst..."

Wow! I didn't know that Brandon Sanderson wrote shorter books!

This is one of the prompts that I haven't yet planned.

I have two friends that I have in mind.

One loaned me a book (On a Street Called Easy, in a Cottage Called Joye), which I am thoroughly enjoying. It is about a house in Aiken, where she lives. (I live close in another small community.) But, I don't know what she likes to read.

The other likes a variety of topics and is a reader. Maybe something along the lines of Downton Abbey? She loved that TV show.

I just realized that I am reading a book on my Kindle that Sharon might like. (She's the one that liked the TV show Downton Abbey.) It is a biography of Allene Tew ~ An American Princess: The Many Lives of Allene Tew.

My best friend would most definitely LOVE to read Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? Big Questions from Tiny Mortals About Death when I'm finished with it! We both have always had fascinations with things that others would think was "weird" or "morbid." Probably what made us become best friends in middle school twenty-some years ago and still friends all these years later!

My best friend would like First Women: The Grace and Power of America's Modern First Ladies.

Wahoo, finally found one!

Women Without Kids: The Revolutionary Rise of an Unsung Sisterhood

I don't have kids and don't want them. My friend is the same way.

My best friends are devout Catholics, but I think they'd like On Repentance And Repair: Making Amends in an Unapologetic World by Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg. It's a thoughtful and timely book on a difficult topic.

When it comes to my best friend, I would recommend the novel titled, "In the Shadow of Time" by author, Kevin Ansbro.

The book is written by author, Kevin Ansbro, which has the perfect mix of friendship, unconditional love, family, humanity, fraternity, triumph-of-good-over-evil, lots-and-lots-of-laughter. It is titled "In the Shadow of Time." This is the first time a novel has filled me with so many happy emotions---I laughed at every page, came to experience the bliss of serendipitous love, art, the steely-grip of friendship, triumph-of-good-over-evil, redemption (you will love reading the part about redemption believe me!). It is a story about time travel into a different world and it plays around all the themes I mentioned above. The one thing that you will not be able to miss is just how many times you will want to break into laughter at many many pages, and cry happy tears in many others.


Basically when I finished reading it, I was shivering with wonder, and admiration for the beauty of the novel and had forgotten all other previous novels that I had fallen for before (like 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' 'Oliver Twist').

Something like this never happened before!

The author's writing is hand-down extraordinary and one-of-a-kind and I am not exaggerating!



Every single friend of mine who has read the book has fallen for it. Everybody has this common verdict---> "Everybody irrespective of their choice of genre must read the novel.


Here is the link of the book---> https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...

This is what I have mentioned in the review---> "If the duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, were suddenly inspired to courier me her Cartier Halo tiara, I would place it not on my head but on Kevin Ansbro’s book “In the Shadow of Time.”

Finished Watching You by Lisa Jewell

My Review:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Both my friend and I have been meaning to read more books written by Indian (or Indian diaspora) authors. Considering that I found a book she might like Don't Let Him Know by Sandip Roy.

I read Killers of a Certain Age for a different prompt, but I decided my bestie would probably like it. I recommended it to her, but I haven't ever followed up to see if she read it.

I read In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner

I got to read Drowning. My IRL BFF loves thrillers, horror, psychological suspense, mysteries of all kinds. I luck out with tis prompt!