Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion

Sneak peek #4 - A book by an author with flora or fauna in their name

For those unsure, flora is in reference to plant life, and fauna is in reference to animals.

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

And go!

Yay, I got a suggestion on the list. Some names to get you started:

Flora: Lily, Holly, Iris, Ivy, Jasmine, Marguerite, Daisy, Rose, Poppy, Heather, Ash, Willow, Fern, Rosemary, Basil, Moss.

Fauna: Robin, Fox, Hart, Roanhorse, Fowler, Lamb, Chevalier, Ant, Wolf.

I think I may go with either Ghost Wall or The Cruel Prince :D

I'm really happy to see this as a prompt! I have several books in my TBR. A few of them have been in my TBR for way, way too long so I might try and choose one of them.

The Hawkman: A Fairy Tale of the Great War by Jane Rosenberg LaForge
Before She Was Found by Heather Gudenkauf
The Bird King by G. Willow Wilson
The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan
Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
My Lady's Choosing: An Interactive Romance Novel by Kitty Curran and Larissa Zageris
Last Christmas in Paris: A Novel of World War I by Hazel Gaynor and Heather Webb

I'm crossing my fingers the third book in The Sixth World series by Rebecca Roanhorse is released next year for this prompt and just because I'm so ready for it.

I seem to have all fauna and no flora on my shelves. Some recs:

T. Kingfisher - Clockwork Boys (fantasy romcom), The Twisted Ones (horror)
Elizabeth Bear - Karen Memory (steampunk fantasy)
Scott Hawkins - The Library at Mount Char (modern-day fantasy)

From my TBR:

Caitlin Starling - The Luminous Dead

I have questions:

would you count things like Fields and Woods?
Would you count things like Tom? I assume yes since Hart is counted.
Would you count Chuck or Jay? (woodchuck/blue jay)
And would you count different spellings like Barry, Kat, Oakes, etc.?

I know I can do what I want for my challenge within reason but curious what other people think.

This is an interesting prompt - I kind of have too many options, so I can’t say I love it, because which one do I chooooose??

Peony by Pearl S. Buck is sort of like the trifecta of flora and fauna! (Since a pearl is an animal product.)

Tops on my TBR, though, is Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto. I reallllly meant to read it this year, but never got to it.

Other books I’m also excited to read:
Untitled book #3 by Rebecca Roanhorse
The Twisted Ones by T. Kingfisher (there’s still a chance I’ll read this one this year, but she has other books I haven’t read yet, including an ebook I got on a sale.)

And I keep meaning to re-read Soldier of Arete by Gene Wolfe, so I can finally read the third book in this series: Soldier of Sidon

SarahKat wrote: "I have questions:
would you count things like Fields and Woods?
Would you count things like Tom? I assume yes since Hart is counted.
Would you count Chuck or Jay? (woodchuck/blue jay)
And would yo..."

Personally, I wouldn't count woods and fields or different spellings unless it contained the word anyway (like Oakes). I probably wouldn't say "tom" without also specifying it was a cat. But if I said hart or stag, I wouldn't also say deer. So I'm not sure about that one. As you said, it's up to you.

Jay is fine. There is a whole family of jays, just like crows.

I think I will go with Ajax Penumbra 1969 by Robin Sloan. I am loving the prompts so far! I'm able to fit in so many books I own already so hopefully I can get a ton of books shifted from my TBR pile!

Sweet already own Princess of Thorns by Stacey Jay, so woot.

The only one on my TBR list is After the End by Amy Plum.

SarahKat wrote: "I have questions:

would you count things like Fields and Woods?
Would you count things like Tom? I assume yes since Hart is counted.
Would you count Chuck or Jay? (woodchuck/blue jay)
And would yo..."



Because I have so many choices, I’m restricting myself to proper spelling only (so Woolf doesn’t count), and a specific animal or plant (so not Greenwood or Fields). I would not count Chuck or Tom or Jill or Jenny, because they are common names, and I don’t immediately think of an animal. But I would count Buck, Hart, etc, since I associate those with animal first. But that’s me!

Books in my TBR pile: Our Kind of Cruelty (Araminta Hall), Three Little Lies (Laura Marshall), Euphoria (Lily King), Astrophysics for People in a Hurry (Neil DeGrasse Tyson), The Luminaries (Eleanor Catton), Royal Holiday (Jasmine Guillory), and The Calculating Stars (Mary Robinette Kowal). One of those should work.

I'm going to go with Sourdough by Robin Sloan, as it's been sitting on my TBR shelf for a while and it was recommended by the PopSugar content director (:

Other options:
Happiness: The Crooked Little Road to Semi-Ever After by Heather Harpham
The Cruel Prince by Holly Black (or any other in the series)
The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory (or any of her other books)

I want to read All the Light We Cannot See
Twelve Angry Men or Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

I'm secure with Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, but what about Boris Pasternak? Pasternak is the Yiddish word for parsnip.

Ron wrote: "I'm secure with Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, but what about Boris Pasternak? Pasternak is the Yiddish word for parsnip."

I say go for it, if Chevalier counts, why not Pasternak? You should get credit just for knowing that.

Elizabeth Bear: Ancestral Night is on my TBR.

For a minute I thought this was going to be the prompt that I hate but then I saw I can use Jasmine Guillory for this one. Sweet!

Anything by George R.R. Martin could fit here: martins are types of swallows, including the purple martin, sand martin and house martin.

I happen to have a book on my shelf by sisters with flower names - Turning Tables by Heather & Rose MacDowell. If it turns out to be a stinker (no pun intended!) then I'm going with The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory.

Would you count Beverley? I did some research and it is originated from beaver meadow or beaver stream.

SarahKat wrote: "I have questions:

would you count things like Fields and Woods?
Would you count things like Tom? I assume yes since Hart is counted.
Would you count Chuck or Jay? (woodchuck/blue jay)
And would yo..."

I don't think I would field. I might possibly count wood because a tree is made of wood? No sure. I hadn't even considered things like Tom. I don't think I would. But, now I kind of want to count Joey (baby kangaroo). I don't know any authors named Joey, though, so that's kind of moot. I would count Jay, but I don't know about Chuck.

Here's what I'm trying to decide. I have a book by Sue Henry on my shelf. Henry contains hen. Should I use it since it's part of a longer word?

I personally wouldn't count field or wood because I don't see those as plant names, but I think everyone can decide for themselves. I'm the same as whoever it was above who said they need the name they pick to be a word that calls to mind an animal easily (ie. buck or robin).

Storm and Fury by Jennifer L. Armentrout



Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier



Eon by Greg Bear



Perfect Match by Fern Michaels




The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck

what about homonyms: Virginia Woolf (for Wolf) or Tymber (for Timber though that may be a stretch) Dalton The Reluctant Dom?

Amy J. wrote: "

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier"


oh, nice one, I forgot about Daphne!!

Shout out to everyone considering Euphoria by Lily King!!!! I LOVED that book!!! It really surprised me, because it didn't sound like my kind of book. I've never read anything else by her, but maybe for this prompt I will. Has anyone read Father of the Rain ?

Katy wrote: "SarahKat wrote: "I have questions:

would you count things like Fields and Woods?
Would you count things like Tom? I assume yes since Hart is counted.
Would you count Chuck or Jay? (woodchuck/blue ..."


I found you a Joey

Holding the Cards by Joey W. Hill

Amy J. wrote: "Katy wrote: "SarahKat wrote: "I have questions:

I found you a Joey

Holding the Cards by Joey W. Hill..."

LOL. That so does not look like my kind of book.

In my collection of unread ebooks I found The Perfect Child by Lucinda Berry or Along the Broken Bay by Flora J. Solomon for a literal interpretation of the prompt.

I might give one of those a try, or I might just end up reading something by Mary Roach.

I'm going to read Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson (and I think it is pretty cool that it has a monkey in the title and a robin in the author's name, haha).
This is exciting because I only found this book while searching for an indigenous author for another reading challenge. It looks like a great book, and it fulfills two prompts!

I'm so excited that I can read more Will Lavender and count it for this prompt. Obedience was superb, and I can't wait to read Dominance !

John Katzenbach, Paul Auster and Jussi Adler-Olsen would probably also work for this prompt. (German words for cat, oyster and eagle)

Does Rice count as flora, since is the seed of a plant? Just curious, I have others that are less controversial, but I noticed I have several Luanne Rice books on my shelves.

Others that might work:
Casino Girl by Leslie Wolfe
Against Authority by John Twelve Hawks
Z-Minus 1 by Perrin Briar
The Infinite Pieces of Us by Rebekah Crane
Toward the Celestial City: The Lives of Tom and Linda Bear by Thomas Bear

Tania wrote: "Does Rice count as flora, since is the seed of a plant? Just curious, I have others that are less controversial, but I noticed I have several Luanne Rice books on my shelves. ..."

I believe the plants are also known as rice.

Using only correct spellings (sorry Virginia Woolf), but allowing any part of a name to count, here's the list I scraped together from my library:

Algernon Blackwood
Alissa Nutting
Annabel Crabb
Bee Wilson
Cornelia Funke
Daphne du Maurier
Darcy Coates
David Burr Gerrard
David Conyers
David Longhorn
Dexter Palmer
Dugald A. Steer
G. Willow Wilson
Grady Hendrix
Heather Dixon Wallwork
James Tiptree Jr.
Jamie Oliver
Jeremy Fox
Jeremy P. Bushnell
John Fowles
Julian Clary
Katherine Crowley
Leonie Swann
Lindsay Currie
Magnolia Books
Mary Roach
Mary Roberts Rinehart
Mary Robinette Kowal
Maud Hart Lovelace
Melanie Crowder
Melissa Scott
Michael Shea
Naomi Wolf
Neal Stephenson
Neel Doshi
Neil Clarke
Norman Partridge
Olive Ann Burns
Oliver Burkeman
Oliver Jeffers
Oliver Onions
Oscar Wilde
Paula Hawkins
Peter S. Beagle
Peter Washington
Philip Hemplow
Phoebe Robinson
Phyllis Fraser
Robin Stevens
Robin D. Laws
Robin Hobb
Robin Jarvis
Robin Sloan
Sarah Moss
Scott Hawkins
Seth Casteel
Spider Robinson
Stella Gibbons
Stephen Briggs
Stephen Few
Stephen Fry
Stephen Graham Jones
Stephen Greenblatt
Stephen Jankiewicz
Stephen Jones
Stephen King
Stephen Kinzer
Stephen Richard Witt
Stephenie Meyer
Steven Hopstaken
T. Kingfisher
Ta-Nehisi Coates
Theodore Sturgeon
W.H. Pugmire
William Makepeace Thackeray
Wolf Erlbruch

And here's my cheat sheet for discovering flora and fauna in author names:

Look for flower/herb/tree first names:
Heather
Lily
Daphne
Rose
Daisy
Melissa
Basil
Olive(r)
Willow

Plant and animal names that are likely to be found within names:
Ash (lots of Washingtons out there!)
Crow
Wren
Robin
Swan
Cur
Roach
Roe
Doe
Buck
Hart
Oscar
Ass
Hops
Oat
Ray
Bush
Wolf
Ape
Chick
Cock
Hen (I hear there's a guy named Stephen who's written a lot of books!)
Lark (Clark(e) should yield a lot)
Hawk
Fox
Fish
Eel
Palm
Ram
Cat (I realize I totally failed to capture all the Catherines in my library - huge field there)

The thing I'm loving about this prompt is that finding books is a scavenger hunt within a scavenger hunt. Anyone else looked at someone's suggestions and went, "Huh? That doesn't work." And then you have a big aha! moment when you see the flora/fauna in the author's name? I'm having a lot of fun with this!

Anthony Horowitz
Greer Hendricks
Harriet Beecher Stowe
K.M. Shea
Mary Higgins Clark
Mary Oliver
Sophie Moss
Stephen Hawking
Terry Pratchett
William Shakespeare

Can't believe I missed StepHEN King. That's me sorted!

Some more suggestions I haven't seen mentioned:
Günter Grass
Paula Fox
Wally Lamb
Rose Macaulay
Iris Owens
Rose Tremain
Elizabeth Strout
Marilynne Robinson
Edwidge Danticat

Number 24 on the Listopia, Black Leopard, Red Wolf needs to be removed. Author name is not related to Fauna.

El wrote: "Anthony Horowitz
Greer Hendricks
Harriet Beecher Stowe
K.M. Shea
Mary Higgins Clark
Mary Oliver
Sophie Moss
Stephen Hawking
Terry Pratchett
William Shakespeare"

PRATtchett and ShakesPEARe are brilliant - can't believe I missed them!

Harry wrote: "Number 24 on the Listopia, Black Leopard, Red Wolf needs to be removed. Author name is not related to Fauna."


I’m guessing the person who added it was thinking: Marlon is close enough to marlin. Some of us are sticking to correct spelling and some are not.

I have 'De ansatte' by Olga Ravn on my TBR. Ravn=raven in Danish. It also works perfectly for doubledipping with a ATY 'geometric pattern on cover'. I love that cover.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...

I will be reading Sabriel by GARth Nix for this

Nadine wrote: "Harry wrote: "Number 24 on the Listopia, Black Leopard, Red Wolf needs to be removed. Author name is not related to Fauna."


I’m guessing the person who added it was thinking: Marlon is close enou..."

That's what I thought when I saw it listed.

And don't forget that Miller is a type of moth.

Mary Roach, Holly Tucker, Stephen Hawking, and Carrie Fisher are all perfect fits with plenty of books to choose from

Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose is a very quick read but a classic everyone should read

I may pick up Heather Morris's new book Cilka's Journey, something by Daisy Goodwin (Victoria), or The Ragged Edge of Night by Olivia Hawker.