Play Book Tag discussion

PBT PLAY HARDER - tracking
List 1 (January - February 2025j
✅ completed, reviewed, shelved 2/20/25

✅1. Read a contemporary romance -
The Simple Wild by K.A. Tucker
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- play harder, Canada

✅2. Read a book that is a love story -
Last Night in Montreal by Emily St. John Mandel (love, obsession)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - play harder, Canada

✅3. Read a travel essay or memoir -
The Last Cold Place: A Field Season Studying Penguins in Antarctica by Naira de Gracia (Travel memoir)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - play harder, Compass

✅4. Re-read the first book you remember reading that you thought was an adult book (as opposed to a childrens book) -
I Never Promised You a Rose Garden by Hanna Green (Joanne Greenberg)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - play harder

✅5. A book that fits “hip, hippy or hipster.” -
Witness to the Revolution: Radicals, Resisters, Vets, <b>Hippies</b>, and the Year America Lost Its Mind and Found Its Soul by Clara Bingham
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- play harder

✅6. Read a book who's author's initials appear in the phrase: PLAY BOOK TAG (letters may be used only as often as they appear in the phrase) - A.L.
The Mechanics of Memory by Audrey Lee
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- play harder, science

✅7. Read a book by a "new to you" author -
Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory by Sarah Polley
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder, Compass, Canada,

✅8. A book that's under 200 pages - Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill. (179 pages)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder

✅9. A translation of a Japanese Detective Story -
The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder, Compass

✅10. An award winning book from 2024 - Orbital by Samantha Harvey (Booker Prize 2024)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - Play harder, science

✅11. Read a book with a cemetery in it -
Family Secrets: Ellie McLellan Genealogy Mystery - Book 1 by Beth Farrar
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder, Canada

✅12. Read a book with an animal as a main character -
Pod by Laline Paull (Dolphins)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - Play harder, science

I think here is just great! I think people will want to see what others are doing as it relates to Play Harder. I'll pin some important threads up to the top.

IDEAS FOR PROMPTS

1. Read a contemporary romance
✅The Collected Regrets of Clover hoopla
✔️The Simple Wild by KA Tucker
The Wedding People Tob- own
The True Love Experiment by Christina Lauren
Happy Place
Love and Other Words

======
2. Read a book that is a love story - (plus something else)
✔️The Collected Regrets of Clover hoopla
✔️The End of Drum-Time by Hanna Pylväinen 🧭 hoopla
✅Last Night in Montreal by Emily St. John Mandel
The Heart in Winter lib
✔️Dept. of Speculation own
A Storm of Infinite Beauty
🔅The Outlaw Noble Salt. Own
The Library of Borrowed Hearts

===
3. Read a travel essay or memoir -
✅The Last Cold Place: A Field Season Studying Penguins in Antarctica by Naira de Gracia
The Puma Years by Coleman own, Peru🧭

===
4. Re-read the first book you remember reading that you thought was an adult book (as opposed to a children’s book).
✅I Never Promised You a Rose Garden by Hannah Green -

======
5. A book that fits “hip, hippy or hipster.” Hippie More below
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...
https://bookriot.com/books-for-hippies/
✅Witness to the Revolution: Radicals, Resisters, Vets, Hippies, and the Year America Lost Its Mind and Found Its Soul by Clara Bingham
🔅Summer of '69 by Todd Strasser
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test - DNF
Arcadia by Lauren Groff - req aud, Arcadia takes place in the 1960s in western New York State at a hippie commune.
All Over Creation by Ruth Ozeki
Howl and Other Poems by Allen Ginsberg hoopla
Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion
Murakami- Norwegian Wood
Summer of love
Devil in a Blue Dress Mosley
Hippie by Paulo Coelho

====

6. Read a book whose author's initials appear in the phrase: PLAY BOOK TAG (letters may be used only as often as they appear in the phrase)[
🔅[book:Prophet Song|158875813] by Paul Lynch ireland 🧭 own
🔅byMartyr! by author:Kaveh Akbar🧭 own
🔅The Book Censor's Library byBothayna Al-Essa own
✅The Simple Wild KA Tucker

=====
7. Read a book by a "new to you" author -
✅Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of

=====
8. A book that's under 200 pages (between 150 and 200)
✅Dept. of Speculation own
Where We Go When All We Were Is Gone

=====
9. A translation of a Japanese Detective Story -
✅The Devotion of Suspect X byKeigo Higashino

=====
10. An award winning book from 2024 -
✅[book:James - National Book award
✅Orbital - Booker
Night Watch
Kairos Erpenbeck. Booker international
Company stories - LA times
I am homeless if this is not my home - lorrie Moore Circle award
Brotherless night - women’s prize
What happened to Ruth Ramirez. Pen
God bless Otis
Held - giller
Prophet Song
My Friends


https://lithub.com/here-are-all-the-a...

=====
11. Read a book with a cemetery in it -
✅Family Secrets: Ellie McLellan Genealogy Mystery - Book 1 by Beth Farrar
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
She visits at least two cemeteries, and mentions that cemeteries are often useful in genealogy work.
====

12. Read a book with an animal as a main character -
✅Pod by Laline Paull

5. A book that fits “hip, hippy, or hipster.” Hippie

https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/hip
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/...
https://bookriot.com/books-for-hippies/
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

🔅Arcadia by Lauren Groff - req aud, Arcadia takes place in the 1960s in western New York State at a hippie commune.
🔅All Over Creation by Ruth Ozeki
🔅One Day lib
Daisy Jones & The Six
🔅Howl and Other Poems by Allen Ginsberg hoopla
🔅Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion
Reckless Daughter: A Portrait of Joni Mitchell by David Yaffe
Anthem by Wiles
The Haight-Ashbury: A History, The Haight-ashbury: a History by Charles Perry
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
High Fidelity, Super Sad True Love Story,
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay own
Miranda July,
Murakami- Norwegian Wood
Franzen - The corrections, others
High Fidelity
Eleanor & Park
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close Foer
Infinite Jest
Summer of love

Summer of 69 - Strasser
Summer of '69
🔅Devil in a Blue Dress Mosley
The Bat

COMPASS CHALLENGE - Trips completed

Spin #1 (12/25/24) = Northwest
Starting Buffalo NY
Destination Toronto Canada, NW -26 degrees from North

✅Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory by Sarah Polley, 4 stars, January 1, 2025
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Location Validation: 47 Canada tags, 5 Toronto tags. Toronto is the author’s home and is mentioned throughout the book 41 times from page 11 to 257, Kindle edition.

Points= 1+2+3=6

From travel math:
The total straight line flight distance from Buffalo, NY to Toronto, Canada is 59 miles.
Your flight direction from Buffalo, NY to Toronto, Canada is Northwest (-26 degrees from North).

Review:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

This was a great choice for my first book of the year. I want to read more meaningful books this year, and this is a great start. This is a memoir composed of well written essays on a variety of topics by the Canadian actress, director and activist, Sarah Polley. I chose the book primarily for the content about concussions and memory, and it was well worth the purchase for those insights. One section brought me to tears, but it inspired me as well. She covered several other interesting topics, including the beginning of the me-too movement, movie making, family experiences, and health care. I first noticed her in The Sweet Hereafter, and I really liked Away from Her (her directing debut) based on an Alice Munro story, I never saw the series Avonlea, or the film Baron Munchausen (which was a harrowing experience for her as a young child). As a follow up to this book, I plan to finish/reread Women Talking [✔️] and watch the film adaptation she directed. I will also look for the Alice Munro story, and follow up on something from the concussion chapter. These topics were very meaningful to me.


=====================

Spin #2 (1/1/25) = Southwest
From Toronto Canada
To Makatea, French Polynesia

✅Playground by Richard Powers, 4,5 stars , 1/8/25? 4.5 stars
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Distance: 5,737.62 mi (9,233.80 km)
The shortest distance (air line) between Toronto, ON, CAN and Makatea, Rangi-roa, Îles-Tuamotu-Gambier, PYF is 5,737.62 mi .
Bearing: 221.21° (SW)
Setting: from the book’s blurb: “They meet on the history-scarred island of Makatea in French Polynesia, whose deposits of phosphorus once helped to feed the world.”


===
Spin #3 (1/8/25) = Southeast
From Makatea French Polynesia
To Livingston Island Antarctica

✅The Last Cold Place: A Field Season Studying Penguins in Antarctica by Naira de Gracia , 3.5 stars , 1/11/25
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

From Distance-to
Distance: 4,693.28 mi (7,553.10 km)
The shortest distance (air line) between Makatea, Tuamotu-Gambier, PYF and Livingston-Island, ATA is 4,693.28 mi (7,553.10 km).
Bearing: 128.08° (SE)
The initial bearing on the course from Makatea, Rangi-roa, Îles-Tuamotu-Gambier, PYF to Cape-Shirreff-Field-Station, Livingston-Island, ATA is 128.08° and the compass direction is SE.

====

Spin #4 (1/15/25) Northwest
From Antarctica
To Japan

( A translation of a Japanese Detective Story )- The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...



======

Spin 5 (1/22/25) = West
From Japan
To Xian, China

✅Mrs. Pollifax on the China Station
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Location : Most of the time was spent near Xi’an China. They saw the Terra-cotta soldiers, drum tower, and the end of the Silk Road.
China tags.
1+2 =3 points

Bearing: 266.94° (W)
The initial bearing on the course from Tokyo, JPN to Xi’an, Shaanxi, CHN is 266.94° and the compass direction is W.
Distance: 1,735.81 mi (2,793.51 km)
The shortest distance (air line) between Tokyo, JPN and Xi’an, Shaanxi, CHN is 1,735.81 mi (2,793.51 km).
========

Spin #6 = SE. I am using a FREE TICKET to go West instead

From Xi’an China
To Istanbul Turkey

✅Cloud Cuckoo Land
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Location: Shown on the GR page setting, and in the blurb. Two of the three linked stories are in Turkey.
“Original title: Cloud Cuckoo Land
Setting: Istanbul (Turkey), Idaho (United States), Turkey, Constantinople (Turkey)”

38 Turkey tags (13 Istanbul tags)
12 science tags

Points= 1+2+3

Bearing: 276.02° (W)
The initial bearing on the course from Xi’an, Shaanxi, CHN to Istanbul, TUR is 276.02° and the compass direction is W.

Distance: 4,242.94 mi (6,828.35 km)
The shortest distance (air line) between Xi’an, Shaanxi, CHN and Istanbul, TUR is 4,242.94 mi (6,828.35 km).
=======
Spin #7 = North
From Istanbul
To Sweden (Garasavvon)

The End of Drum-Time by Hanna Pylväinen


Bearing: 352.62° (N)
The initial bearing on the course from Istanbul, TUR to Gárasavvon, SWE is 352.62° and the compass direction is N.

Distance: 1,910.15 mi (3,074.09 km)
The shortest distance (air line) between Istanbul, TUR and Gárasavvon, SWE is 1,910.15 mi (3,074

====
Spin # 8 = West
From Sweden
To Greenland

Girl in Ice by Erica Ferencik
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...



=====

Spin # 9 = Southwest
From Greenland
To Los Alamos, NM

The Maniac by Benjamin Labatut

Bearing: 224.65° (SW)
The initial bearing on the course from Greenland to Los-Alamos-County, NM, USA is 224.65° and the compass direction is SW.
Distance: 3,376.89 mi (5,434.58 km)
The shortest distance (air line) between Greenland and Los-Alamos-County, NM, USA is 3,376.89 mi (5,434.58 km).


=====
Spin#9= East

#1 NW - Buffalo NW to Toronto, 59 miles, 6 points, meaningful? Yes-4+
#2 SW - Toronto SW to Makatea French Polynesia, 5738 miles, points, yes-5
#3 SE - Makatea to Livingston Island, Antarctica, 4693, points, yes-3+
#4 NW - Antarctica to Japan,
#5 W - Japan to China , 1736
#6 W (free ticket) - Xian China to Istanbul Turkey, 4243
#7 N Istanbul Turkey to Garasavvon Sweden 1910
#8 W Sweden to Greenland
#9 SW Greenland to Los Alamos NM, 3377
#10 E Los Alamos,

Spin 15 (16?) = East - will likely need to use a free ticket
From Bolivia
To

The Music of Bees - Oregon NW, <5 fun tags, bees on cover
Margo - California -NW, fun tags, no bonus
Days at Morisaki - Japan NW, fun?

Miss Bensons - New Caledonia, West (14000 miles West) , fun?! Bugs on cover

My Family and other Animals- Greece NE , fun tags, birds on cover - hoopla.

Ella minnow pea - South Carolina North , fish on cover, fun tags

R

I followed Joanne’s lead and set aside pages for my planning and notes.

I’m very open to suggestions or comments!

A book that has a cemetery in it is The Cross Gardener. It does have religious undertones but I enjoyed it.

Linda wrote: "A book that has a cemetery in it is The Cross Gardener. It does have religious undertones but I enjoyed it."

Thanks Linda. That sounds fine,

PBT PLAY HARDER - tracking, all shelved
List 1 (January 1 - February 20, 2025j

✅1. Read a contemporary romance -
The Simple Wild by K.A. Tucker
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- play harder, Canada

✅2. Read a book that is a love story -
Last Night in Montreal by Emily St. John Mandel (love, obsession)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - play harder, Canada

✅3. Read a travel essay or memoir -
The Last Cold Place: A Field Season Studying Penguins in Antarctica by Naira de Gracia (Travel memoir)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - play harder, Compass

✅4. Re-read the first book you remember reading that you thought was an adult book (as opposed to a childrens book) -
I Never Promised You a Rose Garden by Hanna Green (Joanne Greenberg)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - play harder

✅5. A book that fits “hip, hippy or hipster.” -
Witness to the Revolution: Radicals, Resisters, Vets, <b>Hippies</b>, and the Year America Lost Its Mind and Found Its Soul by Clara Bingham
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- play harder

✅6. Read a book who's author's initials appear in the phrase: PLAY BOOK TAG (letters may be used only as often as they appear in the phrase) - A.L.
The Mechanics of Memory by Audrey Lee
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- play harder, science

✅7. Read a book by a "new to you" author -
Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory by Sarah Polley
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder, Compass, Canada,

✅8. A book that's under 200 pages - Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill. (179 pages)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder

✅9. A translation of a Japanese Detective Story -
The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder, Compass

✅10. An award winning book from 2024 - Orbital by Samantha Harvey (Booker Prize 2024)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - Play harder, science

✅11. Read a book with a cemetery in it -
Family Secrets: Ellie McLellan Genealogy Mystery - Book 1 by Beth Farrar
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play harder, Canada

✅12. Read a book with an animal as a main character -
Pod by Laline Paull (Dolphins)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - Play harder, science

List#2

✅1. Read the first book in a new to you series -Track of the Cat by Nevada Barr
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Thriller, Play Harder

2. A book with less than 1,000 ratings on GoodReads -
Brainscapes: The Warped, Wondrous Maps Written in Your Brain―And How They Guide You by Rebecca Schwarzlose, 396 ratings
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play Harder

✅3. A book with “day” or “night” in the title.
The Night Masquerade by Nnedi Okorafor
Review:https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Thriller, Play Harder

✅4. The cover is black and white only

Head On by John Scalzi, Thriller, Play Harder
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Thriller, Play Harder

✅5. A book incorporating in its format at least one non-prose method of written communication more than 3 times - letters, email, texts, diary or journal entries, lists, newspaper articles, obituaries, recipes, etc.
The Briar Club by Kate Quinn. Recipes in every chapter.
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Thriller, play harder

✅6. A noir novel or collection of noir short stories - The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett, 1934 pub., 367 noir tags.
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags: thriller, Play Harder

✅7. A book related to science or technology - The Maniac by Benjamín Labatut, about John Von Neumann et al.
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Science, Compass, Play Harder.

✅8. A book by an author whose first and last initials are alphabetically consecutive.
Dan Egan - The Devil's Element: Phosphorus and a World Out of Balance
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags - Science, compass?, play harder

✅9. A book featuring a ruler, monarch, or dictator
The Presidents and the People: Five Leaders Who Threatened Democracy and the Citizens Who Fought to Defend It by Corey Brettschneider
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Play Harder

✅10. A book that mentions the sea (in title or in book)
Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Thriller, Compass, Play harder

✅11. Fiction book featuring a religious ritual - can be for a religion created by the author or pagan -
The Wedding People by Allison Espach. The groom’s mother led the party in saying grace before every course of the dinner. (A common religious ritual.)
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Thriller, Compass, Play Harder

✅12. Ask a friend or fellow PBT member to pick a book off your TBR (if you don’t have a TBR, make a list of at least ten books for your friend to pick from). I asked Joy. She suggested 3 books that I didn’t read yet, I read the two that I could obtain first for prompts 11 and 12.
The Light Pirate by Lily Dalton Brooks.
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Tags- Thriller, Compass, Play Harder

List #3 March 31, 3025, completed May 24


✅1. A book with the word "book" in the title
The Book of Essie by Meghan MacLean Weir
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

2. A book with a fruit or vegetable in the title - swap out
NEW:
✅2. 2025 marks the 50th anniversary of the founding of Microsoft. Read a book where a computer or computer-related technology plays a major role in the story. (Artificial Intelligence) Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅3. A book published before 1980
The Summer Book by Tove Jansson
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅4. Read a book about the Civil Rights Movement.
Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America by Gilbert King

✅5. Read a Newberry Award Winning book
From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. NYC by E.L. Konigsburg
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅6. A book where the title references a nursery rhyme or fairy tale.
Geekerella by Ashley Poston
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅7. A book with a nonhuman narrator (animal, alien, monster, AI)
Network Effect by Martha Wells
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅8. An award winner from 2024
A Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan's Plot to Take Over America, and the Woman Who Stopped Them by Timothy Egan -
Anthony Award for Best Critical/Nonfiction Work (2024), Washington State Book Award for General Nonfiction/Biography (2024), Robert F. Kennedy Book Award for Special Recognition (2024)
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅9. A book translated from another language
Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅10. A book set in Jungle
The Puma Years by Laura Coleman, PH, Compass
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅11. A book with a STEM related tag - stem, science, technology, engineering, or math.
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing, by Hank Green , 20 science tags
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

✅12. A book tagged language or linguistics -
Drunk on All Your Strange New Words by Eddie Robson
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

List #4 - 5/25/25 - 7/21/25

✅1. A book written by an author or artist of The Lost Generation
A Movable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
June, summer, Ph

✅2. Read a nonfiction book about or set in the Middle East.
A Hope More Powerful Than the Sea: One Refugee's Incredible Story of Love, Loss, and Survival by melissa Fleming
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
June, Ph

✅3. A book written by an Indigenous author
Swallow the Air by Tara June Winch
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
May, Strong women, Ph, compass

✅4. A book with more vowels than consonants in the title
Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
July, Ph

✅5. Read a book published in the year you joined PBT -2017
Rabbit Cake by Annie Hartnett
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
July, Ph

✅6. Read a book with a kitchen utensil in the title.
The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
July, Speculative, ph

✅7. Read a book with an MPG of Alternate History
The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
May, strong-women, Ph

✅8. Read a book from Goodreads "best of the year" list, any year
https://www.goodreads.com/list/best_b...
My Friends by Fredrick Backman
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
June, summer, Ph, compass

✅9. Read a book with a title containing the letter Z
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Other Jazz Age Stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Review:https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
July, Speculative, ph

✅10. Read a book with the same number of letters in the title as the last book you read. (Last book was Yerba Buena, 10 letters) - Long Island by Colm Toibin
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
June, summer, Ph, compass

✅11. Read a book whose author's first and last initials match your own (N.L.)
Yerba Buena by Nina LaCour
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
June, summer, Ph

✅12. A book that mentions the sea (in title or in book) compass
Summer of '69 by Elin Hilderbrand
Review: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
June, summer, Ph

List #5 7/22/25


1. A memoir
Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss
Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism
The Anthropocene Reviewed: Essays on a Human-Centered Planet


2. The book's title or author's name contains a gemstone (diamond, ruby, sapphire, etc.)
Leaving the Witness: Exiting a Religion and Finding a Life Amber Scorah


✅3. A book that involves a mother--daughter relationship
✔️Beautyland

✅7. Read a book that features at least three generations of a family
✔️The Invisible Life of Euridice Gusmao by Martha Batalha
✔️Real Americans by Rachel Khong



✅4. Read a book found on PBT's Subdue the Shelf shelf
✔️On the Beach. Spec fic

Save for future rec
Double Blind add to tbr
General theory of oblivion
Summer smith
Summer Light, and Then Comes the Night
Disoriental
The wife
Us

✅5. Read a book from the 1001 books you must read before you die list
✔️Waiting for the Barbarians by J.M. Coetzee

SWAPPED 6. Read a collection of any year's best short fiction or stories edited by a favorite author
NEW 6. A book with less than 1,000 ratings on Goodreads
The Original by Nell Stevens

✅8. Read a book that won the Pulitzer Prize.
Middlesex

✅9. Read a book that fits the tag of Contemporary Romance
Sounds Like Love by Ashley Poston - also mother-daughter

10. The title contains the letters P, B, and T
🌱Mrs. Pollifax and the Hong Kong Buddha

Parable of the Talents
Everything Is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection by John Green
Perception - How Our Bodies Shape Our Minds

11. A book you would recommend to your grandmother (or someone of her generation) - She would have liked Mrs Pollifax. I could look for a book with a modern young woman in the 1920’s or 1930’s, (though she might have found these too old fashioned later) Better - an energetic older woman in the 60’s or ‘70’s. Funny, sociable, surprising, garden. Yes Mrs Pollifax.
🌱Mrs. Pollifax and the Hong Kong Buddha
🌱Mrs. Pollifax and the Golden Triangle


✅12. Read a book that celebrates (or mentions) the summer or winter solstice.
✔️The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender

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Sounds Like Love by Ashley Poston
themes: romance, family drama, mother daughter
Family Drama: The protagonist, Joni Lark, is dealing with the difficult news of her mother's early-onset dementia and her parents' decision to close the family's beloved music venue, The Revelry. These events create tension and conflict within the family as Joni struggles to come to terms with these changes and the emotions they bring up, particularly her fears of losing her mother. There's also some drama surrounding the fate of The Revelry.
Mother-Daughter Theme: The relationship between Joni and her mother is a central part of the story. Joni is deeply affected by her mother's illness and fears losing her, while her mother, despite her fading memories, shares stories and wisdom that help Joni navigate her own life. Their relationship evolves as roles shift due to the mother's declining health, highlighting themes of love, grief, and family responsibility. The ending also reveals a deeper connection between Joni and Sebastian's mothers, hinting at a generational theme connected to an unfinished song they both hear.

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Everything Is Tuberculosis: The History and Persistence of Our Deadliest Infection

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IDEAS for Mother-Daughter and 3 generations

NancyJ wrote: "Does anyone have any favorite books involving mother-daughter relationships? I think that’s what I loved best about Tom Lake. I have a play harder prompt for this (which I might have submitted myse..."

Bug Hollow has 3 generations even though it’s a short book. Then there’s the literal A Mother and Two Daughters, though I don’t remember if there’s a third generation in it. Some of Anne Tyler’s books show characters aging.

message 28: by Holly R W (last edited Jul 28, 2025 11:06AM)
Nancy, here are some favorite books that I can recommend:
Mother-Daughter Relationships:
Loved and Missed
Real Americans - this is also a saga with 3 generations
The Correspondent - the mother-daughter relationship is one of several story-lines.

3 Generations' Novels - Sagas
Speak to Me of Home
Real Americans

Funny Grandmothers - Nobody Will Tell You This But Me: A True (as Told to Me) Story - a memoir

message 29: by Joy D Jul 28, 2025 11:05AM
Joy D | 9900 comments Here are a couple off the top of my head that have to do with mother-daughter relationships:
Heartwood by Amity Gaige
Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

And one I haven't read but is on my TBR that sounds like it would fit multigenerational :
Her Mother's Mother's Mother and Her Daughters by Maria Jose Silveira

message 30: by Holly R W (last edited Jul 28, 2025 12:15PM) Jul 28, 2025 11:10AM
Holly R W | 3053 comments I loved Heartwood!

message 31: by Booknblues Jul 28, 2025 12:13PM
Booknblues | 11880 commentsNancyJ wrote: "Does anyone have any favorite books involving mother-daughter relationships? ..."

I went through my families lists and came up with these:
The first two are about mother & daughter taking a trip together After Story made my top 10
After Story
Cold Enough for Snow

Hot Milk
What We Lose
Our Last Days in Barcelona
Maame
How to Say Babylon
The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters
Reproduction
The Nature of Water and Air
Unless
3 generation family saga
A Kind of Freedom