I’m not going to bury the lede. I got baked and decided to make a Monopoly-inspired game board to help me tackle my TBR pile. (Also a great lead up to my upcoming gift guide on boardgames!) I have so many books and a very large Goodreads list, which often leaves me paralyzed by choice.
I first came across this idea on Instagram through PrintedPaperTraveler, who designed a board that’s a mix of Monopoly and Snakes & Ladders. She calls it TBR Knockout.
Here’s her video on how to get started:
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I wouldn’t describe myself as a super crafty person, but I do have a Canva account. I also think I prefer the digital nature of my board, as it allows me to easily change squares if I find that things aren’t working as well as I thought.
I went completely bonkers with pastel pink clip art and honestly, it brings me so much joy.
(You can right click on it for a larger version.)
The idea is that you roll two six-sided die and move that number of spaces. Peruse your TBR pile for whatever matches the prompt you landed on.
I have a couple dynamic categories on the board: Color, Read the Alphabet, Least Favorite/Favorite Tropes, and Release Month. These are designed to change as I land on them. Example: Once I land on Read the Alphabet for A, I pick a book with a title, author name, or character name that starts with A. Once I finish, I’ll edit the square to B.
Other explanations:
- Friend Read: Goodreads has a “compare shelves” feature. I’ll compare my shelves with a GR friend and pick a book on my TBR pile that they’ve already read.
- Nightstand Read: Every month, I put about 5-7 books on my nightstand as some sort of aspirational reading list. Land on this square, and I have to choose one of those.
- Chance: I bought some TBR cards! They’re little cards with prompts on how to choose what to read. You can easily design some yourself. Here are the ones I’ve purchased: Romance TBR Card Deck from BookmarkedWithLoveCo, TBR Cards: Romance Edition from FleursOnSunday, TBR Cards: Fantasy Edition from FleursOnSunday.
- Community Chest: I’m starting with a jar with 5 slips of paper with randomly selected titles from my TBR pile. As I pass GO, I get to add more to the jar.
The idea is to read books I already own whether in physical copies or digitally. I also want to make more use of my library. There is one square that allows me to buy a new book, but I have to read it immediately.
Here’s a blank version of the above board if you’d like to make your own. Customize it with whatever categories you want! I kept mine pretty general, but may create some harder, more specific categories in the future once I take this for a test drive.
My first roll was for a total of 4 spaces. I landed on New Series. For this square, I think I’ll finally start Done and Dusted by Lyla Sage ( A | BN | K | AB ), which is book one in the Rebel Blue Ranch series.
What do you think about gamifying your TBR pile? Have you done something similar?
It looks lovely!
For personal use, I would probably have the squares in a numbered grid, like a random encounter chart. 😀
I love the TBR cards and might get myself a set.
Thanks for sharing this idea! I hadn’t heard of ways to gamify a TBR beyond cards and bingos. I may give this a go! I’d be interested to hear how you like it later.
@Nic: Happy to do a debrief after I’ve been at it for a few months!
What a fun approach to picking your next read, Amanda! I, too, will look forward to a future report.
And I am eager to see that upcoming gift guide on boardgames!
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Oooh so fun! I’ll have to try something like this!!
This is such a great idea! I’ve seen something similar with a wheel-spinning format. The clickety clack of the wheel is very satisfying. With the 1000+ choices we make every day, it’s nice to leave some of the little things to fate.
Sometimes I use a random number generator and use the number given to me for my Goodreads list of to be read books.
I’m going to hazard a guess that “A Place for All My Books” will be on your game gift guide, since it’s Barnes & Noble’s “Game of the Year” pick this year.
@HeatherS: Surprisingly, I haven’t played that one yet. Perhaps it’s a little to real for me, haha.
I did origami flowers once. Only ended up pulling a couple because it was a little sad to undo them. I have since left the rest as decoration. I have done some with readathons a couple of times and romance-opoly, but those are more challenges than tbr focused. I will be saving this for guidance when mood reading!
I saw a great documentary about Monopoly on PBS relatively recently and learned that Monopoly started out as a what they called a folk game – where people made their own boards and there was variation in the boards and the rules across groups and regions. And then someone sold one version of the game as an original idea to Parker Brothers, who patented (or trademarked?) it.
So I LOVE this customizable, folk game like version of Monopoly
Oh wow. This sounds a lot like work? Maybe it’s just that I really don’t like games, but the idea of rolling the dice to determine what I’m going to read kind of gives me hives. I want to read something that is inspiring me now, not something that has been forced upon me by fate. Not everything in my TBR list sounds interesting to me at any given moment.
@book_reader_ea01sj71r4: Agree to disagree! I’m happy to give something a DNF grade and move on. I also feel like most of my squares are broad enough that I can find something that grabs my attention.
@Amanda – fair enough!