Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

This immediately brings to mind my massive Norton Anthology from college that's sitting on my shelf. Since I have no intentions of reading that from cover to cover I'm hoping you all have better suggestions!

What do you think constitutes an anthology? Does the collection need to be complete (i.e. an author's complete short stories) or can a partial collection still qualify?

Listopia link: https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/1...

So this is the Merriam Webster's definition of "anthology"--a collection of selected literary pieces or passages or works of art or music.

Sara, in answer to your question then, no, it doesn't need to be a complete body of work of one author. Many times, it's a book of essay/poems/short stories by a variety of authors. Tons to put in here. I recommend Nasty Women: Feminism, Resistance, and Revolution in Trump's America which I read for the challenge in 2018.

I'm probably going to read The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2019, but any of the Best American series would be good for this.

I find anthology is more often applied to a collection by different authors.

I'd been hoping to find a way to fit the Spoon River Anthology into next year's challenge, so I'm happy with this prompt!

Can I use one of these books for this prompt?
Like a Charm or Stories: All-New Tales

Inger wrote: "Can I use one of these books for this prompt?
Like a Charm or Stories: All-New Tales"

I think that those would work. I'm going to use Burn It Down: Women Writing about Anger.

I have a bad habit of buying anthologies and not reading them, so I have a ton to choose from on my shelves! Personally, I would define an anthology as any collection of works not originally published together.

The Unreal and the Real: The Selected Short Stories of Ursula K. Le Guin
Exhalation: Stories
I Sing the Body Electric! & Other Stories
Unnatural Creatures
The Best Horror of the Year Volume Three
Skeleton Crew
Four Past Midnight
Full Dark, No Stars
Frost & Fire
Different Seasons
Just After Sunset
Steampunk
Steampunk II: Steampunk Reloaded
Looking for Jake
Songs of Love and Death: All-Original Tales of Star-Crossed Love
Unfettered
Rogues
The October Country

So are all those "Chicken Soup for the ______ Soul" books anthologies?

I am so annoyed that this category is back. It was really controversial the last time.

I'm going for The Anthology of Scottish Folk Tales

I was having a hard time with this one because I don't consider short stories by one author to be an anthology (others may disagree with this definition). But then I realized that the Amazon Original Stories (free with Prime) would be consider an anthology. The newest is a Dean Koontz series but I've been wanting to read the Forward stories. There are several collections, and they include Audible narration.

https://www.amazon.com/b?node=1750652...

I've had A Treasury of Favorite Poems sitting on my bookshelf. I think it should work for this prompt?

I'm someone who prefers short story anthologies to collected works of one author. These are some I've read before. Most of them are YA.

Welcome to Bordertown
Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd
Zombies Vs. Unicorns
Summer Days and Summer Nights: Twelve Love Stories
My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories
Let it Snow
Rip-Off!
Steampunk
Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories

Rags & Bones: New Twists on Timeless Tales Gonna read this :D It has one of my fave authors, Neil Gaiman, as a writer too.

Here are 2 of many anthologies put together by my all-time favorite author, Lawrence Block:


These are collections of stories inspired by paintings.

Does a collection of short stories by one author count? Or does an anthology imply multiple authors? Just trying to parse out what is an anthology versus a collection, or if there's even a difference. Am I over-thinking this?

I'm looking at either one of my many fairy tale collections or Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories (the stories were gathered by Roald Dahl, not written by Roald Dahl).

I really think this prompt should be an anthology/short story collection...I really wanted to use the new Zadie Smith short story collection for this prompt.

That being said, RF Kuang tweeted about an anthology of dragon stories she's included in: The Book of Dragons: An Anthology

joe hill's Full Throttle

Here's one that is free if you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited:

Lyrical Darkness: 11 Dark Fiction Stories Inspired by the Music that Rocks Your Soul

Jackie wrote: "Does a collection of short stories by one author count? Or does an anthology imply multiple authors? Just trying to parse out what is an anthology versus a collection, or if there's even a differen..."

I've always understood an anthology to be various authors rather than a single author... but as with everything Pop Sugar.. use your best judgement? Googling the definition seems to leave it open to either option.

Flight or Fright: 17 Turbulent Tales edited by Stephen King
Love Beyond Body, Space, and Time edited by Hope Nicholson
Urban Enemies edited by Joseph Nassise

Collections:
Difficult Women by Roxane Gay
The Imago Sequence and Other Stories by Laird Barron
How Long 'til Black Future Month? by N.K. Jemisin
Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

I am using The Book of Dragons mentioned earlier in the thread. Star Wars has a fair number of anthology books. The most recent is From a Certain Point of View. There is also Canto Bight. Both are currently $4.99 on Kindle if you are purchasing for your challenge.

Johanna wrote: "So are all those "Chicken Soup for the ______ Soul" books anthologies?"

Yes those would count

I have these two on my shelf that I'll choose from for this prompt: The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks about Race and Radical Hope: Letters of Love and Dissent in Dangerous Times.

I read Banthology: Stories From Banned Nations and recommend it!

This one is on my bookshelves, and it is a short read.

since Full Throttle doesn't qualify I might use one of the collections that Sookie Stackhouse short stories appear in, like Death's Excellent Vacation

I'm going with Yuletide: A Jane Austen-Inspired Collection of Stories (The Quill

I'm going to go with The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives

I might go with Slasher Girls & Monster Boys. It's been on my maybe-TBR for a while because I love the title (!) and the cover is striking:

If you enjoy Star Trek, any of the books from the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds series would be a good choice for this prompt. There are at least ten books in the series, and they include a lot of great stories.

I picked up The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice at Target and was just about to read it but decided to hold off b/c it is a "collection" of short novels of 3 different authors.

Jojo Moyes has Paris for One and Other Stories which is a collection of short stories

This I am going to read:
Because You Love to Hate Me: 13 Tales of Villainy

However, these 2 are also on my list:
Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark

So I am not too familiar with what anthologies are so I am wondering if Emily Dickinson Letters would be considered one?

I'm going with the definition of "anthology" that just means "a selection of works," not necessarily ALL of said works. Going with The Green Man: Tales from the Mythic Forest.

I am thinking about The Beatles Anthology by The Beatles. Because it says anthology in the title, I figure it will work.

I have numerous options (mostly sci-fi) on my bookshelves. Goodreads came up with another SF recommendation for me yesterday, which I may need to check out. Crystal Express by Bruce Sterling

Wait.

An anthology does not have to be a collection of stories or poems by different authors? (I thought by definition that is what an anthology was.) Short story collections by a single author/poet would count?

:confused:

dalex wrote: "Wait.

An anthology does not have to be a collection of stories or poems by different authors? (I thought by definition that is what an anthology was.) Short story collections by a single author/p..."

The Merriam-Webster definition of anthology is "a collection of selected literary pieces or passages or works of art or music." That's good enough for me!

The Cambridge dictionary even uses a one-artist example in their definition: "This Bob Dylan anthology includes some rare recordings of his best songs."

Obviously it's up to each person to choose how they want to interpret, but for me one-author collections would count.

I suspect a single author anthology is when the works have been collected together after the fact. If they set out to write a coherent short story collection to be published as one book, it's less anthologyish.

Here's the etymology:
literally "flower-gathering," from anthos "a flower" (see anther) + logia "collection, collecting," from legein "gather," from PIE root *leg- (1) "to collect, gather," with derivatives meaning "to speak (to 'pick out words')." Modern sense (which emerged in Late Greek) is metaphoric: "flowers" of verse, small poems by various writers gathered together.

Ellie makes a good point. An anthology is a curated collection, so it’s either a collection of various authors OR a sort of “greatest hits” from one author.

I'm thinking of reading It's Not OK to Feel Blue

Sarah wrote: "The Merriam-Webster definition of anthology is "a collection of selected literary pieces or passages or works of art or music." That's good enough for me!"

Hrm, that's interesting. I've never thought of an anthology this way before but it works for me. I have a lot of short story collections on my TBR List.

I think The Complete Stories and Poems would count, so I'll go with that.

PS Anthology mystery options including ~

Finding Ever After: four fairytale-ish novellas

12 Days at Bleakly Manor
Free* 12 Days at Bleakly Manor, SAMPLE

Ladies of Intrigue: 3 Tales of 19th-Century Romance with a Dash of Mystery

Birder Murder Mysteries 6-Book Bundle: A Dance of Cranes / A Tiding of Magpies / A Shimmer of Hummingbirds / and 3 more

Miss Marple: The Complete Short Stories: A Miss Marple Collection

The Complete Miss Marple Collection

Miss Marple

The Complete Miss Marple Radio Dramas

The Regatta Mystery And Other Stories Poirot

All Out: The No-Longer-Secret Stories of Queer Teens Throughout the Ages was one of my top reads from last year. Just saw that there is a follow up to that one - Out Now: Queer We Go Again - being released next year and I'm so excited to get my hands on it.

Other anthologies on my tbr
His Hideous Heart
Hungry Hearts: 13 Tales of Food & Love
Love Beyond Body, Space, and Time
Meanwhile, Elsewhere: Science Fiction and Fantasy from Transgender Writers

A few poetry anthologies I'm considering:

The Star By My Head: Poets from Sweden
Poetry of Arab Women: A Contemporary Anthology
Against Forgetting: Twentieth-Century Poetry of Witness

I just bought (on sale now) a kindle copy of The Short Novels of John Steinbeck that I am going to use for this prompt

If we're going for short stories written by the same author but collected together after the fact, then I suggest

Across the Wall: A Tale of the Abhorsen and Other Stories by Garth Nix; or

Fragile Things: Short Fictions and Wonders by Neil Gaiman

I think I will finally read Watchlist: 32 Stories by Persons of Interest