Literary Fiction · Free kit
Remarkably Bright Creatures
In the coastal town of Sowell Bay, seventy-year-old widow Tova Sullivan cleans the aquarium after hours — partly for the paycheck, mostly to keep grief from swallowing the nights. There she forms an unlikely friendship with Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus who sees far more than his captors realize. When a lost young man arrives searching for the father who abandoned him, three lonely lives begin to braid together — and an old mystery about Tova’s missing son starts to surface.
“We are all of us a little remarkable, if only we look closely enough.”
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Remarkably Bright Creatures Icebreakers
Answer in under 30 seconds. These connect to the book’s themes without spoiling the story.
Personality Reveal
1. Are you more likely to busy yourself with chores when something hurts, or sit still and feel it?
Personality Reveal
2. When someone offers help you didn’t ask for, do you feel cared for — or slightly invaded?
Personality Reveal
3. Are you the friend who notices everything and says nothing, or the friend who notices everything and immediately reports it?
Funny & Light
4. What’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever “kept busy with” to avoid a hard conversation?
Funny & Light
5. If your personality were an aquarium exhibit, what would the plaque under your tank say?
Funny & Light
6. What’s one small-town habit you have even if you don’t live in a small town?
Would You Rather
7. Would you rather live somewhere everyone knows your business, or somewhere nobody knows your name?
Would You Rather
8. Would you rather have one person who truly understands you, or a whole community that cheerfully accepts you?
Would You Rather
9. Would you rather know a painful family secret tomorrow, or never know it and keep wondering forever?
Hot Take
10. Hot take: keeping busy is just socially acceptable avoidance. Agree or disagree?
Hot Take
11. Hot take: found family matters more than blood family for most adults. Defend your side in one sentence.
Hot Take
12. Hot take: animals understand people better than people understand people. Yes or absolutely not?
Personal Connection
13. What’s a place that makes you feel most at peace — and do you actually go there enough?
Personal Connection
14. Who in your life showed up for you in a small, practical way that meant more than a big speech?
Personal Connection
15. What’s one second chance you either gave someone — or wish someone had given you?