Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

A Book of Interconnected Short Stories

I adore Before the Coffee Gets Cold (Before the Coffee Gets Cold #1) by Toshikazu Kawaguchi, translated by Geoffrey Trousselot
Any of the books in this series would work, though I highly recommend reading them in order.

What else?

Listopia is HERE

Sideways Stories from Wayside School is short and oh so sweet for this prompt.

Blackout and Whiteout are interconnected short story anthologies I read last year, and both would work. I also think they'd work for POC joy, as both anthologies feature romance stories centering Black teens.

Julia Alvarez has How the García Girls Lost Their Accents and its sequel, Yo!

How High We Go in the Dark is a heavy one (content warning for pandemic trauma and all that comes with it), but very good.

Let It Snow was a book of three stories. And it was mediocre.

Under the Eye of the Big Bird: A Novel by Hiromi Kawakami was excellent

Going to throw both of Jennifer Egan's short story collections in here - I enjoyed A Visit from the Goon Squad more than The Candy House but they both qualify as interconnected short stories. I believe Anthony Marra's The Tsar of Love and Techno also qualifies, though it's been a few years since I read it.

Dying with Her Cheer Pants On by Seanan McGuire is an excellent book for this prompt. Eat My Martian Dust: Finding God Among Aliens, Droids, And Mega Moons is a more YA sci-fi religious take on the prompt, although that one is more about short stories within a larger story

I'd highly recommend Disappearing Earth.

I don’t love the book but Olive Kitteridge seemed to fit this bill. I read it last year for multiple points of view.

DeeRae wrote: "I don’t love the book but Olive Kitteridge seemed to fit this bill. I read it last year for multiple points of view."

I did not like Olive, but loved Lucy Barton -- Anything Is Possible is the second book in the "Lucy" sequence and is related short stories.

I'm reading Reader, I Married Him: Stories Inspired by Jane Eyre. Some very good authors. Some of the stories were Jane Eyre related, others just took the theme of marriage.

I am currently reading You Are Here: Connecting Flights. It's a middle grade collection of short stories that all intertwine as kids stuck at the airport cross paths and experiences of being Asian in a post-Covid world. It's really good and showcases so many different cultures and backgrounds. As one of the characters points out, they are not a monolith.

Do essays count as short stories? If they do, then the two I love are:

Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on The Decision Not To Have Kids
Humor Us: America's Funniest Humorists on the Power of Laughter

Also, The Red Pony seems to fit this prompt.

The Faith Healer of Olive Avenue

I, Robot
The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven

I absolutely loved Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury. It really takes you back to Childhood summers. If you prefer a fall setting, next in the series is Something Wicked This Way Comes.

The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

My most anticipated book of 2025 is the new collection of stories from Stephen King’s The Stand edited by Brian Keene and Christopher Golden full of stories written by a wide variety of today’s top horror writers. This is the easiest prompt of 2025 for me!
So excited to read this!

The end of the world as we know it.
The End of the World As We Know It: New Tales of Stephen King's The Stand

Olive Kitteridge and Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout

They lovely The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman.

Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck - I believe other books by her fit as well.

TWO of the books on the Tournament of Books short list are interconnecting short stories!!

Rejection

The History of Sound

Kristina wrote: "Going to throw both of Jennifer Egan's short story collections in here - I enjoyed A Visit from the Goon Squad more than The Candy House but they both qualify as inte..."

The Tsar of Love and Techno does count, it was the first thing I thought of when I saw the prompt :) Excellent book.

I'm going to read A Visit from the Goon Squad

Another one that I recommend is The Beggar's Garden, which I read for the 2019 PS challenge.

Tales of Two Planets: Stories of Climate Change and Inequality in a Divided World

This is a collection of essays but it's central theme is on climate change so in that sense they interconnect.

I have these that I feel fit this prompt:

*Girl in Hyacinth Blue by Susan Vreeland
*The Red Garden by Alice Hoffman
*Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
*Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
*Blackbird House by Alice Hoffman

Not sure which one I am going to read yet

HAPPY READING!!

I'm gonna have to find a different book for this prompt.

I was reading Tales of Two Planets: Stories of Climate Change and Inequality in a Divided World . I got 11% in it but I've had to DNF.

Given that the world is actually on fire on one end and in freezing cold and snow on the other of the US I can't handle books about climate change or natural disasters at the moment. Natural disaster movies are my favorite genre of all time and I love reading about climate change, but it's overwhelming so I need a break.

I just found The Dew Breaker that sounds like it will work. I think I will give it a try.

Just finished. Intense, but I really liked it!

I'm reading Ford County, I think it should work since the stories all take place in the same universe of John Grisham.

For this one, I figure essays can count as interconnected.

So I'll be reading this book for this prompt when it's released in April:

Why We Love (and Hate) Twilight: The Highs and Lows of the Twilight Saga

I just finished An Elderly Lady Is Up to No Good

it was a delightful read and short with only 171 pages, but has 5 short stories centering on the main character's way of dealing with bothersome people.

I gave it 4 stars

Baroness Ekat wrote: "I just finished An Elderly Lady Is Up to No Good

it was a delightful read and short with only 171 pages, but has 5 short stori..."

There is a sequel that is also quite amusing, An Elderly Lady Must Not Be Crossed

I read Five-Carat Soul

I'm reading Changewar by Fritz Leiber, and I think it counts. So far no two stories have the same characters, but all of the characters are drawn into the same time war, and their stories explore similar themes about what it means to be on one side rather than the other. Each story reveals a different aspect of the worldbuilding. It's in the same universe as The Big Time, which I read for a dystopian book with a happy ending. All the different perspectives make the world feel very real and interesting; I'm really enjoying it.

Hi all. A question for the group. How do we feel about Fourteen Days for this? It's not traditionally interconnected short stories but it does have a lot of stories in it and the collaboration angle.

I think it would be fine.

I read by Lauren Groff.

I read The Healing Hippo of Hinode Park

Working for Bigfoot by Jim Butcher was a fun addition to the Harry Dresden universe.

Finished The History of Sound by Ben Shattuck

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

FantasticLand by Mike Bockoven was an enjoyable read, told from many different characters' perspective.

I read Before We Forget Kindness Toshikazu Kawaguchi

ACK!

I wanted to read a novel-in-short-stories, something I've actually tried to write. Tonight I sat down with Jimtown Road, which was supposed to be my 49th book in the challenge. The first story was so creepy & violent that I slammed the book shut.

The blurb said something about "characters who feel like your own neighbors and friends." I thought: I don't know where TF you live, but I don't want to go there. Ever.

Anyway, off to peruse the thread and listopia to download something else in a hurry.

Went with An Elderly Lady Is Up to No Good by Helen Tursten - ironically, another serial killer story, but this one was a dark comedy.

http://www.lauraruthloomis.com/whats-...