Good morning PBers! Or should I say, P-BEARS 🐻🐻🐻

The absolute most wonderful time of the year is almost upon us: Fat Bear Week!! Katmai National Park has announced that the official FBW dates this season are Sept 22-29. If you've never heard of FBW before, it's time to get informed and get hyped!!

Fat Bear Week 🔗 is an annual celebration of Katmai National Park's brown bears and their ascent to roundness. As the bears prepare for the winter, they spend the summer and fall months gorging on Brooks River's plentiful salmon population. Each September/October, the general public is invited to vote in a week-long bracket tournament to vote on the park's fattest bear. (There's also Fat Bear Junior, which takes place a few days before FBW begins to determine which of the park's cubs will be competing!)

Fat Bear Week is not only silly and fun, but it is an important reminder of the importance of environmental conservation. If it wasn't for the preservation of Katmai National Park and areas like it, there wouldn't be salmon and there wouldn't be bears. The bears' fatness is a testament to a healthy ecosystem.

Now that we're all good and excited, I have a favor to ask. I'm trying to set up a pop-up display at my library to spread both Fat Bear joy and information about environmental conservation. I am gathering a list of all-ages nonfiction about brown bears, salmon, national parks, and related conservation efforts. (Of course, included on my book list is The Bears of Brooks Falls: Wildlife and Survival on Alaska's Brooks River by Michael Fitz.) If anyone has any recommendations, I would be so grateful and happy to include them! And I will also be compiling these into a Pagebound list for anyone on here to reference, now or for future Fat Bear Weeks. :)

Thank you, and happy bear season!! 🐻

Let me prephrase this by saying that I am not judging these books on pure literary merit. Good writing and accuracy are two different things.

Having said that, it is frankly VEXING to see how our history and stories get treated these days, mostly through a USAmerican lens. Zeus did not walk the earth, and this is a fact; however the people that worshiped him and their ancestors (us) are very much real.

More often than not, these works read like an AU fanfiction, where the names and places remain the same but everything else is repackaged. More often that not, these stories are the first and only engagement most people have with our myths. This creates a false impression! These stories are not a part of some MCUesque multiverse, these were the religious texts of people. I agree that it was a long time ago. However, most retellings have no sensitivity in regards to the people they try to tell the stories of, the architecture, the climate, the habits.

We still exist!!! Our present is shaped by our past, just like every culture on Earth, but for some reason we are treated as a mild annoyance when we try to advocate for our own agency in this. We are given no seat on the table when voicing our concerns, and we certainly don't get any part of the payroll; with non Greek authors and filmmakers continuously profiting off our stories and myths.

Retellings that try to expand their reach into modern times more often than not treat Greece as non-existent, or wildly mischaracterise its modern history. From the top of my head I can think of Percy Jackson making Greek demigods responsible for WWII when Greece was one of the countries that suffered the most from it.

Especially romance stories come off as incredibly tone deaf, trying to apply modern standards in ancient times with no prior research done. Hades and Persephone retellings are notoriously guilty of this (why is Demeter the villain?) as well as Patroclus and Achilles stories (why is Patroclus not fighting?).

There are brilliant books writren by Greek authors that are retellings, and it's honestly a shame to see people gravitate again and again towards the same three books that are written by anglosaxon authors.

(Our removal from our stories is also deeeeeply tied to colonialism but this is frankly another post)

Does anyone have any recs for romance books with characters who have endometriosis or adenomyosis?

I read Ellie Hayes and The Himbos as well as Pot Shot and really enjoyed seeing the couples navigate the FMCs health issues, and I’d like to read more books like that.

What are some books that helped you escape whatever situation you were in? Books so immersive everything blurs in comparison to it. Be it the fast paced plot, great characters that you care about deeply etc. Books that you couldn't stop reading and got frustrated when forced to do something other than reading. The last one that sucked me in like that ( book ofc) was Daisy jones and the six. The plot just kept moving and moving. No genre preference, recommend whatever is good.

What book(s) inspired you, or had a role in catalyzing you, to make a big life change? Whether that be embracing a part of your identity, validating an experience that allowed you to share it with others for the first time, led you to studying something in university or going into a particular career, that made you realize that something was possible and that you wanted it 💖

Here are some of mine:

All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven (2015): my name change to Violet is partially due to the character in this book. It meant a lot to me when I read it at 15. It also illustrated to me the impact of suicide loss on loved ones and helped me see why I could not make permanent choices while experiencing SI as a young mentally ill traumatized person.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky (1999): made me appreciate the importance of asking for help.

Exile and Pride: Disability, Queerness, and Liberation by Eli Clare (1999) and Sins Invalid’s Skin Tooth & Bone a Disability Justice Primer (2019): read for a disability studies course my freshman year of university and knew I was going to be studying Critical Disability Studies.

Tender Points by Amy Berkowitz (2015): made me realize that I had fibromyalgia and helped me ask the right questions to my doctor to get the care I need.

I Have The Right To by Chessy Prout & Jenn Abelson (2018) and If My Body Could Speak by Blythe Baird (2019): made me feel very seen as a survivor and feminist and made me a better activist and advocate.

The Turnaway Study by Diana Greene Foster (2020), You or Someone You Love: Reflections from an Abortion Doula by Hannah Matthews (2023) and Liberating Abortion: Claiming Our History, Sharing Our Stories, and Building the Reproductive Future We Deserve byRenee Bracey Sherman & Regina Mahone (2024): helped cement my certainty that I want to work in the field of sexual and reproductive healthcare.

Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity by Devon Price (2022): helped adult me understand my neurodivergence so much better and the ways I was failed as a child because I was gendered as a girl. I recommended it to my mom (who had similar experiences to me) and it brought us closer.

What are people’s favorite nonfiction reads of 2026 so far? One I’m reading now is There Is No Place for Us which is about the working homeless crisis focusing on 5 Atlanta families as they struggle to obtain and maintain housing in the frankly awful conditions and bureaucracy the US has created by not maintaining affordable housing.

Did you ever really enjoy a piece of media, but the fanbase turned you off of it completely?

Media: books, movies , games , anything you can read , hear, or watch really

I have one that might get a lot of hate because it's so popular

Heated rivalry for me sadly. The fan base suck at times with their RPFs, AI slop, etc . I own the second book and haven't read it due to the fandom . I would rather stick with my chelsea curto ,emily rath, Rina Kent, Kate Crew , and Brittanèe Nicole. Thank you very much

I am obsessed with Pagebound 🫛🐝 quests! But I tend to join a bunch and forget about them in true ADHD style 😂 But I do work toward the ones I really resonate with!

So tell me what your quest strategy is!

Do you join them all and let fate take its course? Do you join one at a time and work toward specific badges? Somewhere in between?

I am in a dilema... school has restarted and I am SWAMPED in work like the only way that I can actually read is listening to audiobooks while doing chores or at the gym along with the fact I am in the BIGGEST READING SLUMP EVER.

I have genuinely gone from reading 1 book a day to 1 book a week or even 2 weeks which is CRAZY (yes I am a very fast reader) also recently like a month ago I had this feeling that reading was starting to feel like a chore and that scared the shit out of me.. I honestly think its like the pressure of a reading goal and like I feel the need to always fulfill something if you understand.. In the beginning of the year my reading goal was at 275 and then I dropped it to 250, 250 became 230 and 230 has become 215. As the year goes on I will probably get busier and I am TERRIFIED that Im gonna have to give up reading like all together...

WHAT DO I DO?!? SOMEONE HELP ME!! (dont mind grammer and spelling errors im too distressed to proofread😔)

edit : everyones so kind im genuinely tearing up❤️

I am currently reading Homeseeking by Karissa Chen and it is so wonderful. I also read Atmosphere earlier this year and loved that as well. I have joined many lists/ways to earn badges on PB but are there any specific to romantic loves that don't focus only on sex (which I don't mind) I just enjoy more depth to a story. Perhaps historical romance is where I could find more books? I just don't know. Thank you in advance if you have any books in this vein to recommend

Hi! Idk if this is where to come for recommendations but I’m looking for some for my cousin who normally only reads nonfiction but wants to start reading fiction. A lot of my reading preferences are much darker than what he would prefer since he can’t handle horror or thrillers or anything like that so I’m struggling to come up with something for him. He doesn’t read romance either. I brought up the Great Gatsby to him because I did love that one and he said that sounded good so he decided to buy that and try it. He hasn’t finished it though so I’m not sure if he’ll enjoy it or not. So, I guess I’m trying to make a list of books that are a bit lighter but no romance? Unsure if anyone has that and I know it’s kind of specific but this would be a huge help if anyone can give me some recommendations! Thank you so much ☺️

A few months ago I was searching a community to belong in without being judged, finally after a lot of research, I found Pagebound. I started by marking my reading progress only, but it wasn't (entirely) the point I joined, I wanted also to talk with people with same interests(books) and finally today I decided to do my first post. I would like to continue being active in the future (reviews, opinions about books) and overcome the fear of expressing my opinion.

What it says on the tin: What is the worst book you have ever read and finished? What about the worst book you ever read and DNFed?

(Remember this is all in fun, to meet people with similar tastes, and because I'm curious, not to shame anyone for liking or disliking books you liked or disliked!!)

What are your favorite autumn or fall type books that are on your tbr ? Are you going to get around to them this year? Are there any you 1000% reccomend?

I can only think of two right now from my tbr. They are the pumpkin spice café and a book called kindling . Oh and Bonfire and Bliss Bookstore but I have to read book 1 first apparently