Suspend Your Disbelief

Posts Tagged ‘games’

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Bookish Gift Idea #23: Trivial Pursuit Book Lover's Edition

by Celeste Ng

I am a huge fan of the board game Trivial Pursuit. In fact, my friends tease me because I own six different versions. But I’d never heard of this one and therefore don’t have it–a problem that will soon be rectified. Perhaps you know a book- and trivia-lover who would enjoy it as well? Categories include Children’s, Classics, Non-Fiction, Book Club, Authors, and Grab Bag. Here are some sample questions, courtesy of book blog Necromancy Never Pays: Children’s: What novice Keeper is hailed as Gryffindor’s “king” after winning the Quidditch Cup? Classics: What fearless Prince of the Geats gets munched […]


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Bookish Gift Idea #12: The Storymatic

by Celeste Ng

Here’s a great gift for a young writer, a game buff, or a teacher. The Storymatic provides 500 cards suggesting characters, images, and events to lead players into a story: First, draw two gold cards. Combine the information on the two cards to create your main character. For example, if you draw “surgeon” and “amateur boxer,” your character is a surgeon who is also a boxer. Next, draw one or two copper cards. Let the information on the cards lead you into a story. Wild cards are interspersed throughout, and they prompt you to go in directions you might not […]


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The Games Writers Play

by Celeste Ng

So you’re hanging out with some writer-friends on a Saturday night.  Perhaps you’re gathered your salon sipping absinthe, or–let’s be realistic, here–snuggled up on hand-me-down sofas drinking Yellowtail and arguing about why people don’t read short stories.  (Uh, just me?) Anyway, at some point you call a truce in the debate on whether “chick lit” is a useful term, or  you call a halt to the V.S. Naipaul-bashing.  How to occupy yourselves now? By playing a literary board game, of course. In the New York Times, Dwight Gardner outlines something he calls “the paperback game“: One player, the “picker” for […]



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