Book Bingo for grown ups!

Linda Johns/ June 21, 2018/ Books

Do you ever reminisce about your summer reading days when you were a kid? Maybe trips to the library to load up on books were a regular part of your weekly (or daily) routine? And maybe you loved tracking what you read and seeing the titles stack up? Well, here’s a chance to relive the glory of summer reading by playing Summer Book Bingo (the grown up version).

Print out a card for yourself, and if you work at a library put a stack out for the readers in your community and you’ll have an instant informal adult summer reading activity  Download a PDF to print here. (You can find also find Book Bingo under our “For Book Lovers” tab.)

A book bingo card with 24 reading challenges. the middle square is free. The card reads TOP ROW: recommended by a librarian, fiction, finish a book you started and put down, mystery or thriller, written by an author from another country; SECOND ROW award-winning author, about the environment, by an author of color, recommended by a bookstore, history, THIRD ROW made you cry or laugh out loud, graphic novel, "free," author (or character) has a disability, takes place in the area where you were born, FOURTH ROW memoir or biography, your best friend's favorite book, nonfiction, about travel or read while traeling, outside your bubble, FIFTH ROW Washington author, LGBTQIA author or character, poetry or essays, first in a series, suggested by a young person

In Book Bingo, each square on the bingo card is a challenge — read a book by a Washington author, read a book that covers history (historical fiction counts!), read a mystery or thriller, read a memoir or biography (and so on). Get five in a row horizontally, vertically, or diagonally and you’ve got “bingo.” Meet all 24 bingo square challenges and you’ve got a blackout.

This book bingo card is adapted from one that The Seattle Public Library and Seattle Arts & Lectures put out this year for their city-wide adult summer reading program. Their book bingo program, now in its fourth year, provides a way for readers and library staff to easily talk about books — it’s an excellent opportunity for readers advisory, displays, and book lists. Most of all, this activity gets people talk about books and reading.

We hope you’ll give book bingo a try for your patrons. Print a few and see how it goes!

p.s. The Seattle Public Library’s Shelf Talk blog is a great resource for readers advisory for some of these categories. See their posts under their Book Bingo NW 2018 tag.

 

 

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