Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

A book that has fewer than 1000 reviews on Goodreads or Amazon.

Back when we struggled with the "more than one million reviews" category two years ago, I learned that you can sort your TBR list by number of reviews ratings. In My Books > Settings > choose "num ratings" and voila! you can sort by number of ratings! It turns out that a lot of books I want to read have fewer than 1000 ratings, so my only difficulty here is choosing ONE.

Listopia for A book with fewer than 1000 reviews

The lowest number of ratings for a book that I am pretty sure I can find this year is Murder with Honey Ham Biscuits by A.L. Herbert.

The main character owns and operates a restaurant, so you could potentially use the book for the restaurant setting, too, depending how strict you go.

Blood Sugar Canto--a poetry collection
The Faith Healer of Olive Avenue--short story collection; all stories are interconnected
I'm Not Missing--YA/teen

I'm reading Richard Beban's book of poetry, What the Heart Weighs. Just 4 reviews on Goodreads.

Are ratings and reviews different things?

SadieReadsAgain wrote: "Are ratings and reviews different things?"

They are not exactly the same thing on either site, but it should be easy enough to find a book where both are under 1,000.

On Amazon, in particular, most books I see have less than 1,000 reviews. 100 is even on the high side for most of the ones I look at.

If anyone has trouble with this one, try placing a hold on or pre-ordering a 2021 release or getting an Advanced Reader Copy somewhere. If you are one of the first to get a book, the chances are high that there will not be 1,000 reviews already.

I tend to read a lot of books that don't get much Goodreads attention so this should be a nice easy one.

SadieReadsAgain wrote: "Are ratings and reviews different things?"


Good point. As Brandon says, they are not actually the same thing on this site, so I shouldn't treat them as synonymous. Many people on GR will rate a book without reviewing it, and sometimes people will review a book without rating it. But it looks like GR only sorts by number of ratings, and it's a safe bet than if the book has fewer than 1000 ratings, it also has fewer than 1000 reviews.

SadieReadsAgain wrote: "Are ratings and reviews different things?"

I tend to be very literal, so I am treating them as different because Goodreads has listed both for each book. It also opens things up to a greater number of possible books since, on GR, books generally have far fewer reviews than ratings.

Ellie wrote: "I tend to read a lot of books that don't get much Goodreads attention so this should be a nice easy one."

Same. I've got a whole swath of books on my list with fewer than 50 reviews. It seems like anthologies don't get reviewed as often as other types of books. Tangleweed and Brine will likely be my pick here unless something else catches my eye.

I am doing Autumn Poem by Louis Macneice for this challenge.

I have a few books that I've preordered from Amazon to arrive the day they are released. Hopefully, when I start reading them they won't have 1,000 reviews yet!

My book Darkness Is As Light! Just released this year. Gothic Christian Women's devotional. If you're religious and want something real and gritty (as opposed to the pretty bows on top stories you find in most Christian devos), check this out. These are real, deep stories. Part of the proceeds go to support a local domestic shelter.

I review Danish language children's books as a side job. You can imagine the amount of ratings children's books in a language with 5.5 mil speakers get, so this is easy for me.

It's my prompt!! I suggested this one, and I'm so happy it got chosen. I hated the "more than one million ratings" prompt. There are so many more books with fewer than 1,000 than more than 1,000,000. I'm glad we'll be able to share lesser known books with this prompt.

A Father’s Gift—Sherrika Evans

Thanks for all who replied to my ravings/reviews question. I sorted my shelf by number of ratings and then checked to make sure the book I picked also had under 1,000 reviews!

I'm going with Read Hard: Five Years of Great Writing from the Believer.

Heather wrote: "It's my prompt!! I suggested this one, and I'm so happy it got chosen. I hated the "more than one million ratings" prompt. There are so many more books with fewer than 1,000 than more than 1,000,00..."



I'm really liking this prompt. I had SUCH a hard time with the >1,000,000 ratings book. But THIS one, I have so many great options!!!!

Some I found on my shelf:

The Forgotten Letters of Esther Durrant - about 335 reviews on GR.

A Kind of Spark - YA/MG book, 148 reviews [I believe it was an indie book]

A Cheesemonger's History of The British Isles - nonfiction food history book, 32 reviews

Clothing Poverty: The Hidden World of Fast Fashion and Second-hand Clothes - nonfiction, could also work for social justice prompt, 14 reviews

Toffee - YA, could also work for a book about forgetting, 454 reviews

The Dollmaker of Krakow - YA/MG, historical fiction, 776 reviews

Pine - mystery, crime, memory great atmosphere novel, could also fit the prompt about forgetting, 648 reviews

Well, I'm French Canadian, and a lot of books from Quebec have less than 1000 reviews on here.
if you read french, i would suggest anything by Matthieu Simard (my favorites being La tendresse attendra or Échecs amoureux et autres niaiseries)

I would also recommend one of my good friend's book, L’ère de l’Expansion. It won a few prices, and it's really really good. The sequel is planned for summer 2021.

My short list so far for this is :
No Ordinary Star
Venturess (sequel to Mechanica, a Cinderella retelling)
and Toffee

I’m reading Mirror, mirror, by Patricia Scanlan, less than 1000 on Goodreads :)

If you’d like to support a fellow popsugar reader who also happens to be an author, my book Just Down the Street, Across the Ocean has less the 1000 reviews. It could also fit into the different format category if you don’t normally use Kindle 😊
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4...

Heather wrote: "It's my prompt!! I suggested this one, and I'm so happy it got chosen. I hated the "more than one million ratings" prompt. There are so many more books with fewer than 1,000 than more than 1,000,00..."

Good one! And congratulations on your suggestion being chosen!

One that I'm reading now for my 2020 list has less than 1000 reviews!

It's an incredibly thought-provoking memoir.
Becoming a Man: The Story of a Transition

The Midnight Bargain, one of my favorite books from last year, only has 631 reviews on GR. If you like fantasy and Regency inspired worldbuilding and are ok thinking about the horrifying reproductive implications to inherited magic, I highly recommend it.

I read for this one. It only has 8 reviews.

I used Bag Man: The Wild Crimes, Audacious Cover-Up & Spectacular Downfall Of A Brazen Crook In The White House by Rachel Maddow & Michael Yarvitz for this prompt. It has 132 reviews on Goodreads. I doubled dipped and also used it for A book by a blogger,vlogger, YouTube video creator or other online personality. The book is based on a hit podcast.

I'm reading The Adventures of Maya the Bee by Waldemar Bonsels out loud to my kiddo at bedtime. It's a lesser-known German children's classic with only 52 reviews on GR as of today. I plan to add one more when we're done in a few weeks!

I read The Brilliant Life of Eudora Honeysett by Annie Lyons because someone in this group made it sound so good. And it is! I wasn't sure what category I would use it for, but it fits in this one for both the Goodreads and Amazon reviews. Word needs to get out about this gem of a book!

I really appreciated Love Is the Higher Law. I was really surprised to find that it had only 600+ reviews. I don't get too close to a lot of mainstream choices, so this was a happy accident.

I have now read The Autism Puzzle: Connecting the Dots Between Environmental Toxins and Rising Autism Rates which had only 3 reviews before I had reviewed it...so now it has 4 reviews. This book is mostly about the dangers of chemicals and toxic things in our environment. I found it very eye-opening.

A Tiger in the Kitchen: A Memoir of Food and Family

any of Sarah Sutton's books would fit.

the book I chose has 500 on Amazon but 1500 on goodreads, does that count or is it both less than 1000?

Alexandra wrote: "the book I chose has 500 on Amazon but 1500 on goodreads, does that count or is it both less than 1000?"

It says 'or' in the prompt, not 'and', so I'd say it counts. I am one of those people who does an awful lot of interpretation to try and get books from my TBR to count, so the prompts do come down to how strict you're being

I assume most people will be trying to use books from their TBRs for this, but if anyone would like a recommendation, Fallen Angel by Andrew Taylor is worth a read. It's a mystery/thriller

I just finished this book and was going to use this for 36 since it only has 972 reviews. It does not say how many reviews on Amazon. Trace

I just finished The Bread Maker for this prompt. It was fantastic!

I read The Shadow Society by Marie Rutkoski before I realised it had 600 something ratings. Guess that’s gonna be my book 🤷‍♀️

I read The Office of Historical Corrections: A Novella and Stories, which was fantastic! It has only been out 2 months, so I assume it will quickly surpass 1000 reviews if it hasn’t yet!

I read A Midwinter's Tail for this prompt. I love this series and this is #6.

I did Ursula, Under for this one. If you double dip, it could also be

-A book featuring three generations (grandparent, parent, child)
-A book set in multiple countries
-A book where the main character works at your current or dream job (one is a librarian)

And if you ever wanted to visit China, Finland, Sweden, California, or Michigan, it would tick that prompt, too.

I simply chose a book I had on hand that fit this category and no others, as I rarely read the popular best-sellers so this was among the easiest topics to fulfill. The winning book was Above the Paw, part of a cozy series featuring a female cop and her reluctant partnership with a K-9 officer.

I find myself reading lots of books that have few reviews, in this case I'm using:
If We Make It Home: A Novel of Faith and Survival in the Oregon Wilderness by Christina Suzann Nelson
(251 ratings, 74 reviews on Goodreads)

Just finished Trouble the Saints. It's a good read for this month- has a lot to say about issues of racism and justice.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I used a cozy mystery for this one, Steamed Open by Barbara Ross.

I happen to have just bought Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver which is perfect!

I read Good Morning Comrades for this prompt as it also fit in my around the world challenge for Angola. I really enjoyed it.

As of right now it has 284 reviews, and I'm a data nerd. So.