Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

Anita wrote: "It's a natural history, and if you take your time, it is quite interesting, but it isn't a story . . .which can be offputting. ..."

Have you ever known me to find natural history offputting?! lol.

Chesapeake is definitely a strong contender to be the Michener I finally get too, but there is just something about Hawaii that keeps pulling me back toward it. It is such an interesting state with such a diverse culture.

And, while I haven't read Hawaii, I am guessing the first chapter is probably about the volcanic formation of the islands, which I find fascinating! In biology, there is the theory of island biogeography that I have passively studied and find so fascinating! It is about how species composition on islands are a function of their distance from a mainland and time, but I would LOVE if the first chapter of Hawaii touched on that....

Nicole wrote: "Anita wrote: "Oh, I love Michener . . .."

Okay, seriously, I am going to get to Michener this year. I have never read him but have wanted to read Hawaii FOREVER."

I have Texas on my literal bookshelf, albeit in storage. It would be nice to get to it this year.

Regina wrote: "I have Texas on my literal bookshelf, albeit in storage. It would be nice to get to it this year..."

My end-of-the-work-day, eyes-tired "dyslexia" is showing ... I read that second sentence as ... MICE get to it ...

Hello everyone!

I am new to the group (thanks for adding me Anita). Forgive me while I find my feet. All The Light We Cannot See was my equal number one for 2015, along with The Narrow Road to the Deep North and A Constellation of Vital Phenomenon. I have had Night on my to read list for an age so I'm choosing it as my book for this genre.

I have absolutely no idea how to tag a book!

Book Concierge wrote: "Regina wrote: "I have Texas on my literal bookshelf, albeit in storage. It would be nice to get to it this year..."

My end-of-the-work-day, eyes-tired "dyslexia" is showing ... I read that second ..."

Ha! Hopefully, the mice haven't found my storage stash. I've literally had nightmares about that!

Susie wrote: "Night on my to read list for an age so I'm choosing it as my book for this genre. "

What a great choice! Also, All The Light We Cannot See was a huge favorite around here.

Fellow PBTers, Susie is a terrific reader I met on GoodReads who has very similar to taste to me - - so I was excited to introduce her! I guess we need a place to do that!! I'll set something up.

In the meantime, Susie - - on Shelfari, there was a system for "tags" that is essentially equivalent to what Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ calls "shelves". Personally, I find the term shelves to be confusing because there are group shelves and personal shelves and then these category shelves.

So when you read Night, let me know, and I'll help you add it to our Group Shelf and tag it with "World War II" - - basically there will be a check box that says "World War II", and all you have to do is check it off.

So happy to see you here!!!

Susie wrote: "Hello everyone!

All The Light We Cannot See was my equal number one for 2015, along with The Narrow Road to the Deep North and A Constellation of Vital Phenomenon."

I loved all 3 of your suggestions! Night is still lingering on my TBR and I'll hopefully get to it this month, too.

Susie wrote: "Hello everyone! ..."

Welcome, Susie!!

Anita wrote: "on Shelfari, there was a system for "tags" that is essentially equivalent to what Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ calls "shelves". Personally, I find the term shelves to be confusing because there are group shelves and personal shelves and then these category shelves. ."

Agreed! They will always be "tags" to me, and I have found all the different types of "shelves" confusing!

And welcome to Susie!

LibraryCin wrote: "I didn't get around to doing any recommendations before the group went live beyond my top recommendation (I'll post that again!):
The Longest Day

I will add more recommendations to t..."

Cin, I also loved Tall Grass and Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. I wondered if anyone would recommend them.

Have you read it?"

Marti wrote: "Cin, I also loved Tall Grass and Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. I wondered if anyone would recommend them.

Have you read it?"

Have I read Hotel on the Corner...? Yes - 5 stars!

I already had my February reads planned before I knew of the theme. :-(

However, in addition to a few mentioned above, I can recommend:

A Thread of Grace
The Wind Is Not a River

both of which I read last year and to which I gave 5 stars.

EDIT: also highly recommended is Alan Furst's Night Soldiers series. The books do not have to be read in order.

Susie wrote: "Hello everyone!

I am new to the group (thanks for adding me Anita). Forgive me while I find my feet. All The Light We Cannot See was my equal number one for 2015, along with The Narrow Road to th..."

Welcome, Susie!

Tags, shelves, the terms are rather confusing. I preferred tags, but am slowly getting used to shelves.

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "I already had my February reads planned before I knew of the theme. :-(

However, in addition to a few mentioned above, I can recommend:

A Thread of Grace
[book:The Wind Is Not a Rive..."

I just finished The Wind Is Not a River earlier today. It was an enjoyable read.

Charlie wrote: "I am going to try to read three books this month. They are as follows:

- City of Women
- The Blue Star
- City of Thieves
- [b..."

I'm a bit late to the party - but I wondered if you'd started City of Thieves? I really liked that one and hope you will enjoy it too.

Booknblues wrote: "Nicole wrote: "
I also loved Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet ..."

Ditto for me! Looking forward to what you think.

I wish I'd taken time to check out these recommendations but I was (and still am) so busy trying to clean up the mess that is my transition from Shelfari to GRrrrr! Plus the learning curve - its all keeping me from enjoying the way I used to participate. I know it will bet better - its just a frustrating right now.

Barbara wrote: "Charlie wrote: "I am going to try to read three books this month. They are as follows:

- City of Women
- The Blue Star
- City of Thieves
- [b..."

I'm a bit late to the party - but I wondered if ..."

I am finishing up [book:City of Women|13593526] now and then I plan to read City of Thieves. I'll let you know what I think once I read it. Thanks for the recommendation.

An excellent and very readable biography relevant to the period is Turing: Pioneer of the Information Age by Jack Copeland. You may particularly like it if you enjoyed the movie "The Imitation Game". It fills in a lot of details about the development of the computer that ended up deciphering the Enigma messages and the various contributions of the other team members not just Turing himself. Not too much maths!

Most of my recommendations have already been mentioned, so i won't bother with that. I have narrowed my choices so far to Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Lauren Hillenbrand (for the PBT Non-Fiction Top 100 also) and Heart of Oak by Tristan Jones, which was recommended to me by my husband. Jones is one of his favorite authors. I'm hoping I can get through both of them this month.

As a newbie to PBT, I'm not quite sure how central to the story WW II should be. I just finished People of the Book and noticed it is tagged WW II but it certainly wasn't a central theme of the novel. Do I put a review on the other shelf or on the WW II shelf?

It is not the book I was planning to read for the tag.

Denizen wrote: "As a newbie to PBT, I'm not quite sure how central to the story WW II should be..."

Our general rule has been that if it is tagged a certain way on GoodReads then it counts. Even if it is a mistag and you made an honest mistake.

Different members have different personal standards for how integral the tag needs to be to the book for it to count. For me, I think it to be a pretty central theme while others a satisfied with a passing mention.

If People of the Book touches on WWII at all then I think you are safe!

Denizen wrote: "As a newbie to PBT, I'm not quite sure how central to the story WW II should be. I just finished People of the Book and noticed it is tagged WW II but it certainly wasn't a central t..."

So, this is definitely a case of everyone makes their own rules, but for this particular book, when I look at it in detail, I can see here that 17 people shelved it as world war ii. That means seventeen people thought it was relevant to that topic. 46 people shelved it as holocaust - - which certainly is a world war ii related topic. In my mind, I think you can feel comfortable using it for the monthly tag.

I prefer books I select to be a very strong fit, but I'm not quite sure how to yet identify those yet here at Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ. If 35 people shelve it on the world war ii shelf, is that a good fit? 50 people? If it appears in the first four pages of choices on the world war ii shelf (/shelf/show/...) is that the right indicator? The first six pages?

I think as we continue to use GR, we will begin to have a better feel, and then we will provide some guidelines to help our members make good choices. I really like my books to fit the theme strongly, but not everyone does or cares.

Great question, but I think you are certainly safe to review People of the Book on the world war ii topic and to shelve it accordingly.

Anita wrote: "If 35 people shelve it on the world war ii shelf, is that a good fit? 50 people? "

I think it's hard to judge based on numbers of people putting it on a particular shelf. At least for me. Some books have not been read by that many people! I probably run into this more because I have so many Canadian books on my tbr, but I just can't judge by specific numbers.

I think that you might want to also look at how many people read and/or rated it. So if 35 people shelved it as WW2 and only 40 have read/rated it than it's a pretty high percentage.

The trick is that I actually try to categorize before I read it so I can hunt for books more easily. Also, I don't actually have shelves for things so specific like WW2. I think it was the same problem with tags in Shelfari -- you could only tell by the size of the font, but it was people tagging, which they could have done when adding to their TBR.

JoLene wrote: "I think that you might want to also look at how many people read and/or rated it. So if 35 people shelved it as WW2 and only 40 have read/rated it than it's a pretty high percentage.."

Great idea, JoLene - - this ratio is probably the way to go for those of us who want to be more scientific in our approach. I'm not sure I realized that I could see how many people read the book so far - - I'll have to check that out.

On Shelfari, if you went to the book detail page, you could see if the tag appeared in the top 50 tags for that book . . .and that's somehow I would discern if it was a good fit. Also, like here, if you went to the tag, the books were listed from most often tagged to least often tagged. So if a book was in the first several pages of listings, I considered that a good fit.

JoLene wrote: "The trick is that I actually try to categorize before I read it so I can hunt for books more easily."

So another person! I just realized last night that not everybody does that. I try to tag my TBR with obvious themes gained from publishers info and reviews, setting, and time period if it's important, etc.

Looking at the ratio of tag to readers is key in figuring out if it is an outlier or major theme.

I might be a bit confused. For this month, the subject is WWII. Is the point to be reading something that takes place during or is about the war? In my example of how to find whether a book has been tagged such, I used a book that hasn't been shelved much, and only 2 of us have tagged it for wwii. But it fits the criteria. OR, is the point just to read books that a lot of people have tagged as wwii?

Friedrich

I can recommend this book. Not many people have read it...and it is not available via ebook. I read this for work...teaching. This book is very memorable. Originally it was written in German. There is a unique similarity to Rebecca Rebecca. You never learn the main character's name.

I have a copy in my classroom. If you lived by me I could let you use that copy. :)

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "I might be a bit confused. For this month, the subject is WWII. Is the point to be reading something that takes place during or is about the war? In my example of how to find whether a book has bee..."

I think the idea is to select a book with WW II as a major theme. You can read more than 1 book about WW II. I muddied the waters when I asked where to post a book I read for another reason that had WW II as a minor theme. I'm going to post it on the Feb 2016 Other Books thread since I would never suggest it to someone who wanted a book on WW II. Since it's shelved as WW II by some readers, it's a fuzzy area. I think the answer I received was it's my decision.

Denizen wrote: "I muddied the waters when I asked where to post a book I read for another reason that had WW II as a minor theme. "

Oh, I'm really glad you asked the question because it made me better understand about the group and the monthly theme. Clarification can never be a bad thing.

Elizabeth wrote: "Since it's shelved as WW II by some readers, it's a fuzzy area. I think the answer I received was it's my decision. "

Really, it's ok to shelve it with the tag WWII even if you feel the connection is not as strong as you'd like. We have never been strict about the monthly tag, and since each review (up to 5) for the tag gets you a raffle entry for the $15 Amazon GC, you should shelve it under WWII. Don't miss out on possibly winning just because the book is not "about" WWII - even if someone has not already tagged it as such (and I believe you mentioned several had), if you feel it can be tagged as such, you can go ahead and do so, and include it in the reviews for the monthly tag.

If this was a game it would be a different story, the admins are more strict about tags fitting and already having been assigned when we are playing a game.

Anna wrote: "for the tag gets you a raffle entry for the $15 Amazon GC"

Who sponsors these gift cards by the way?

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Anna wrote: "for the tag gets you a raffle entry for the $15 Amazon GC"

Who sponsors these gift cards by the way?"

We used to have an Amazon store, and we would use the proceeds generated from it to purchase prizes. We actually ended up with a nice little surplus. Unfortunately, Amazon way tightened up the way it gives out the commissions so that store wasn't really working anymore. I've been using the surplus funds for the raffles and prizes, but at this point, I'm probably getting close to funding it out of pocket. It's my hobby, and I can afford to put some money toward it each year, and plan to do so to the extent I am able.

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "I might be a bit confused. For this month, the subject is WWII. Is the point to be reading something that takes place during or is about the war? "

The point is definitely to read something that takes place during or is about World War II. That's by and large what the vast majority of people do - - but on occasion, a book that is unknown to us, appears to be a fit, and perhaps is not quite what we expect. That's okay. We aren't strict.

We do have games and other activities here, and when we do those, we are very strict. We will lay down the parameters for book selection, and the parameters must be met for the book to qualify. We always point it out in the game rules.

For the monthly tag, we just encourage people to find a book that fits - - and if you happen to know of a great one that no one on the earth has read - - hey, terrific! We would love to learn about it.

Anita wrote: "We do have games and other activities here, and when we do those, we are very strict. We will lay down the parameters for book selection, and the parameters must be met for the book to qualify. "

Looking forward to games!

Elizabeth (Alaska), I think a good example would be Mudbound

The book has been tagged "world war ii" by 7 people, and that tag appears on the first page of "top shelves" for this book.

But if you've read it, you know it's not about the war and doesn't take place during WW2 ... but right after the war. Still, the events of WW2 were key in setting up what happens in this book, and I could argue that it fits the tag.

(And it's a great book ... just saying ...)

Book Concierge wrote: "(And it's a great book ... just saying ...)
"

Have you seen my review? ;-)

Shuva wrote: "Will it fit the tag?"
Yes

I recommend the following WW II books:
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. ( I am sure everyone has already read this. But, it is one of my all time favorite books of this genre, so how could I leave it out.
I also recommend The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah.
Also, I recently read a little book that was originally published in 1938. I can not even imagine the impact it must have had in 1938. Address Unknown by Kathrine Kressmann Taylor.
I plan to read Mudbound.

Paige wrote: "I recommend the following WW II books:
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. ( I am sure everyone has already read this. But, it is one of my all time favorite books of this g..."

I just got an email newsletter from my local indie book store ... they are hosting Zusak in March for the release of a special 10th anniversary edition of this book! Woo Hoo .... off to go buy a ticket.

Book Concierge wrote: "I just got an email newsletter from my local indie book store ... they are hosting Zusak in March for the release of a special 10th anniversary edition of this book!"

Where are you located?

Anna wrote: "Book Concierge wrote: "I just got an email newsletter from my local indie book store ... they are hosting Zusak in March for the release of a special 10th anniversary edition of this book!"

Where ..."
Wow! How exciting! I live in Michigan. How about you?

Jealous!!!!!

Jealous!!!!!

I am definitely going to have to rethink my choice. I still have quite a ways to go in The Goldfinch and not seeing any way I can classify it as WW II. Out of town company for a week is going to seriously cut into my reading time. I'll be looking at the suggestions again and focusing on short books.

Anna wrote: "Book Concierge wrote: "I just got an email newsletter from my local indie book store ... they are hosting Zusak in March for the release of a special 10th anniversary edition of this book!"

Where are you located ..."

Milwaukee WI .... just across the "pond" from Michigan, Paige

Denizen, if you haven't read Night by Elie Wiesel it might be a good choice. It is extremely short.

Susie wrote: "Denizen, if you haven't read Night by Elie Wiesel it might be a good choice. It is extremely short."

Did you review it yesterday? I read a review that excerpted a passage that was really lovely so pulled it off my shelf last night. I can target 2 Shelfagories categories (unread and on your shelf for years - 20+ - for starters) and WW II. What's not to love?

Who knows, if 21st century wins, I can still work in Life After Life, my first choice for this month, for the next challenge!

Book Concierge wrote: "Anna wrote: "Book Concierge wrote: "I just got an email newsletter from my local indie book store ... they are hosting Zusak in March for the release of a special 10th anniversary edition of this b..."

I love Milwaukee. I am a Badger! Went to school in Madison.