Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/GeneralForum/2006ArchiveQ3

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Welcome - to our July 2006 – September 2006 GeneralForum archive

Archive
Archives
  1. pre January 2006
  2. January 2006 – March 2006
  3. April 2006 – June 2006
  4. July 2006 – September 2006
  5. October 2006 – December 2006
  6. January 2007 – March 2007
  7. April 2007 – June 2007
  8. July 2007 – September 2007
  9. October 2007 – December 2007
  10. January 2008 – March 2008
  11. April 2008 – June 2008
Current GeneralForum
updated 1 May 2008 — (changes • edit)

Contents

Critique (FA)

The infobox at the top of the project page it states that:

Critique (Featured Article): None current - "8 achieved"

Is there a list of those anywhere? Grey Shadow 05:14, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, they should all be on our Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Worklist. Alos they are within the new assesment catagory system that I am working on which can be found here, Category:FA-Class novel articles. Cheers. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 06:08, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Notability guideline for books

Sorry if this has already been posted but a few users are trying to propose a set of notability guidelines for books. Comments by users involved in the novels project would be very welcome. Pascal.Tesson 05:22, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Assessing the notability scale

Regarding this new addition to the WikiProjectNovels banner ... how can this be achieved while maintaining NPOV? For example, as a fan of the genre I consider Meet the Tiger far more notable than "fill in the blank" which I might consider overrated and not all that important. While someone might say "fill in the blank" deserves to the rated higher than Meet the Tiger because they might consider it an unimportant work... I'm a little puzzled. 23skidoo 23:48, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Have you reviewed the criteria being put together at the location linked to in the submission above. If you have and still have that question then the best thing is to indicate that on it's talk page as that is where the debate on all this is being worked out. Please do get envolved as so far none of the contributers seem to be part of WP:Books or WP:Novels although I may be wrong. Our voice needs to be heard. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:02, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
I have no idea where to look. It's rather confusing. The links I find just go to Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Assessment and all that's there is a comment by you saying there's more work to be done. Where exactly is the criteria being discussed? If I'm not alone in being confused, that might explain the lack of input. Personally I think rating notability is a terrible Pandora's Box of an idea. Rating the quality of an article isn't much better. Personally I don't think we should go there in either case and I will say so at the appropriate venue if I'm pointed in the proper direction. 23skidoo 22:28, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
This assessment aspect is outside of the remit of any one WikiProject to step out of, we need to be envolved to be able to contribute. Whilst I hear what you are saying and I have bundles of sympathy with your point of view and I in fact I find I am pretty much of the same opinion, however this is a overarchy Wikipedia thing. It relates to WP:1.0 and WP:V0.5 whic you might like to look into. And as it relates across "all" subject the idea of assessment might sit better with some subjects that others. Assessing the Arts (which Novels sit in) naturally becomes a might more subjective. However an encyclopedia like this must deal with these issues across "all" subject areas, or abandon WP:NPOV and wikipedia really goes some where other than an online co-operative encyclopedia. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:00, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
The Notability aspect is a related but different issue that again has been started outside the WikiProject and is just part of the Wikipedia push to pull to together standard policies for typing to agree notability. Wikipedia:Notability (books) is where this is being discussed. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:00, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
Neither of these issues are cast in stone (as with anything in Wikipedia), but you need to get stuck in and debate the issues in the appropriate arenas. The assessment thing is well established and we need to fit in with the global scheme. However the project assessment page is still "work in progress", on ice at least untill the structure is ready. Nearly but not quite. In brief the "importance" rating must be related to the issues of Literary significance and merit, which very much ties in with companion idea of notability. The "class" or "status" rating is related to how complete or good an article it is for the subject being covered. I.e. issues that affect whether we bung on a stub notice, expansion request, or rate an article as "Good" or "Featured". Does that help you untangle this at all. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:00, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
Well I've already seen one case where I take issue. Please explain (on the applicable talk page, of course) why you rank The Last Words of Dutch Schultz as "low-importance". Not that I necessarily would classify it any higher ... but really, where does that ranking come from? I'm not going to take huge issue with ranking the quality of articles (though IMO that opens the door to personality conflicts between editors). But when it comes to ranking the books I don't want to have anything to do with that and will simply not support it, regardless of the rationale. 23skidoo 13:42, 5 July 2006 (UTC)
Response, here. Talk:The Last Words of Dutch Schultz. As you point out an inexact science, art. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 14:04, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

Angels and Demons category

I suggest that we create articles for all the characters for the book just like The Da Vinci Code --SGCommand (talk • contribs) 10:45, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

If you think there is enough to say all these characters, but what about a Characters in "Angels and Demons" article. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 11:11, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Novel series & Novel sequences

Having recently been envolved with work on these as categories, I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on add these to our Project Scope. That is not all Book series, not Fictional series as there is a WikiProject for that; just novels series. Persnoally I think it makes sense for us to work on these articles and subject areas. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 12:27, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

Of course it does, those are just heirarchial categories... which I tagged last night with the project by the way! <g> // FrankB 20:26, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Announcing A Resurection

(forgive me for 'adapting this' from the Harry peoples talk message... RL is demanding attention!) This fellow (rather mature middle aged) fan of Harry has been buried in another favorite series, and it was suggested that I resurect the Wikipedia:WikiProject Fictional series project as one means of developing standards. My 1632 series articles have potentially far more characters, places, and historical matters (it's an alternate history set back in the 1630's, which makes it another sort parallel universe like Harry's and Honorverse (not to mention most speculative fiction genre that become series), another series I contribute some.) than Harry Potter books, assuming she stops after seven novels.

I'm just getting started on 'blowing off the dust' on the Project page, so can use some help, and I'm sure as mature as this project looks, you will have some interesting input and experience on how to juggle, arrange, and format the myriad details that go into a deeply developed complex milieu such as these have become.

1632 series has some unique issues in that it is currently about 75:25 short fiction to Novels, but that will change rapidly as it is also a collaborative fiction experiment that involves literally dozens of authors, most of whom have been active participants helping the principle author and editor define the canon for the series... essentially research and development in matters historical and technical, as the works are making a serious attempt to keep realistic assumptions given the series premises—a small town of about 3,000 souls, Grantville, WV finds itself confronted with the religion based Thirty Year's War, Machievellian politics, and large armies. At the moment, five hardcover book releases are planned to my knowledge in the coming year—which is saying a lot at at least 400pp per book.

To add insult to injury, the works (by design) aren't published in the order of any particular timeline outside the 'main storyline threads', of which there are five... so this makes it like five sub-series, but one's in which the short fiction anthologies are canonical, a very unusual feature in a shared universe setting. But that's part of the great scope of the milieu, which is fascinating if you are at all interested in history and how the modern world came about—the effect of all that research and pre-planning via the internet. (It's not too great a stretch to think of it as a wikiproject, save the issues are the talk forums, and the article outputs are generated by individual or teams of writers working their own sub-projects.)

Enough of my problem, what I need is help defining standards from others involved in similar wikipedia tasks like yourselves (WikiProject Novels in general) for such a mixed series. So watchlist the talk page, and WP:WFs, sign on, and integrate your project cats, templates, etc. into Category:WikiProject Fictional series, list your Project on the see also there, along with it's cats (Being a project cat, the navigation from project to project is for us editors to use, not the general public, so WP:Btw!) so other fiction related editors can find your stuff, secrets, and vice versa.

I'd also like to point out an oxymoron of sorts. The WPP:Books is parent to all these heirarchially lower projects (Novels, series, etc.), yet has the smallest membership list of the lot. Makes no sense! Please sign up and ditto WPP:Novels, and WPP:series for news and contributions. Best regards to all! // FrankB 20:08, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

On category pipesorting conventions

I need to add here, that I've done some organization stuff like the new shortcuts WPP:Books, WPP:Novels, WPP:series, and WP:WFs, and cross-linked some of the pertinent cats. Redirects (like those just listed) will show as '-' pipesorted (dash), Main daughters as space, templates under '!', though I haven't back tracked to verify consistancy yet, but it helps keep things straight. Technically, that sort of standard ought to be imposed from the WikiProject Books project and be consistant downwards. (As Pegship knows, I've been spending a lot of non-fiction edit time in the interwiki Wikimedia Commons and cross-project category organization and equalization, so these 'sort tokens' are fairly debugged, though a different 'system of symbols' is worth discussing... it just sort of happened over the last six weeks on the commons. Gotta run! // FrankB 20:32, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Template:NovelsWikiProject spam

I don't really oppose having these kind of templates on talk pages, they can be kinda useful, but using it to tell everyone what should be done about other articles is way too much, IMHO. If I go to a talk page, I don't want to be told that there's some other article that needs editing, and this really feels like spam for this WikiProject to me. So please, could this be removed from the template? --Conti|✉ 15:40, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

You could of course just ignore those lines. I can encourage work on similar articles and isn't unknown on other projects (see {{WPBeatles}}). Ok what does everyone else think, quite happy to go with majority opinion on this. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 16:39, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Encouraging people to work on similar articles shouldn't be the point of a talk page or the point of a WikiProject template. I don't know if other WikiProject-templates have similar "ads", I just think that's not a very good idea. And I don't see what I critizise on the Beatles-template. This is what I don't like. --Conti|✉ 16:55, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
Can you give a link to a talk page that has what you're talking about please? plange 17:42, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
I came here after seeing the template on Talk:Fight Club, if that's what you mean. That Travels with My Aunt needs an infobox might be true, but it just has nothing to do with the article and is totally irrelevant there. --Conti|✉ 18:02, 10 July 2006 (UTC)
I think that since the Novels Project is fairly new, that the template containing 3 lines that offer suggestions on how the reader can help is not too out of line. As the articles are worked on, and the Project comes into its own, those three lines could be merged into a "click here to see how you can help" link. So I think good for now, but probably remove/change in the future. PeregrineV 17:37, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
What you suggest about a "click here to see how you can help" seems like a good way to proceed, any objection to us doing that now!? :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:59, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
I wouldn't mind that. It lets the people decide and doesn't force possibly unwanted suggestions on them. --Conti|✉ 15:46, 12 July 2006 (UTC)
What you suggest about a "click here to see how you can help" has now been done - I trust everyone is happen with that. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 13:11, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Pattern Templates

I would first like to thank you guys for the pattern templates. I had been working on a group of articles with little idea of how to structure them, or what to include, but they make a huge difference. I was just wondering if anyone could point me to some good examples of articles using the article or character pattern templates? I would like to see how other people have used them, so that I can continue to improve my articles. Elric of Grans 05:26, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

A couple from a quick look at the worklist that stand out would be The Mauritius Command and Ice (novel). Grey Shadow 07:12, 11 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, those cleared things up a little! Elric of Grans 21:23, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Film and Book?

Came across an article on a book that had an info box for the movie-- what to do? The Postman plange 02:21, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

As it is a novel article primarily with no independant "film" article (for that one anyway). Add the Book infobox above the film one. It maybe that the article could be split, but looking at it's length that might not be justified. Have a word with User:Pegship who is hot on the issue of Film / Novel relationships. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:21, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Around the World in Eighty Days

Can someone from the project help to bring this book into the Novels project? Specifically add talk page templates, and clean up the section headers and ordering so it is standard. I've done some work on the article, and it is a very important book one of the most widely read in the world. Thanks. -- Stbalbach 14:17, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Made a start - more for others to do - should be more "allusions from other works". Also should be more to put in "lit. significance". :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 15:30, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Collaborations

What do people think of starting a Wikipedia:Collaboration of the Week or Month for Novels. Would anybody be interested. For more information on the notionc try looking at Wikipedia:Collaborations and look around other projects. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 10:20, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

A few points:
Everyone who wished to help would have to obtain a copy of the novel in question, preferably the same edition and then read it; and as I believe that we here at WP:NOVELS have fairly eclectic tastes, even reaching a consensus on which novel to collaborate on might be difficult. If we were to do this, I would have to say that a monthly collaboration certainly seems more feasible, possible biweekly.
Having said all that, I would actually like to do this if we could get enough people to assist and make it worthwhile. -- Gizzakk 12:48, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
I'm up for itplange 14:29, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
I would like to participate in this, but would like a sort of project assignment in mind when reading the novel. It wouldn't preclude adding information, but if I knew I had to work on the setting, for example, I could read the novel with an eye towards that.PeregrineV 03:10, 18 June 2006 (UTC)
Me three, at least for the novels I'm interested in. Throw up a page; if it doesn't make it, it doesn't make it, but there's no harm in trying.--ragesoss 14:56, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
My suggestion would be to make it monthly and have the new novel posted on the NovelWikiProject newsletter. Grey Shadow 01:35, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
And my two cents. Maybe we could try to establish a group of collaborations per month. Say, for example, a mainline novel, a romance novel, a science fiction/fantasy novel, and a detective/mystery novel. This would allow those individuals whose interested aren't as broad-based to participate as well. I however would be quite happy to take part, regardless of the format. And I would agree that it would be useful if we could all choose or be designated particular areas of specilization, like characters, setting, historical background, whatever. Badbilltucker 18:07, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Bringing this forward, as this is an ongoing polling for support - we are maybe just about close to the point where there are a few interested people who can work on this notion. Bear in mind you won't "have" to have read the book to contribute. However a unbiased, WP:NOR perspective is also very important here. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 13:29, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

sounds good to me, but we first we have to decide what novel(s) to work on. I was actually loking at The Mystery of the Yellow Room by Gaston Leroux - the origional locked room mystery; at the moment it is barely more than a stub. Any other suggestions anyone? -- Gizzakk 22:31, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
I'd suggest working on something from the list on the Worklist, but The Mystery of the Yellow Room is also a good choice as it's readable online for free at Project Gutenberg. Grey Shadow 03:03, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

List, or article?

I have a question on the difference between a list of characters and an article on characters. I am planning on making a page on the characters from the Boogiepop series (as per WP:FICT), and am considering using the format they have on the Japanese article (Characters of Boogiepop series). Should my article be considered a list ('List of characters in the Boogiepop series') or and article ('Boogiepop series characters') if I go with that format? Some of the more significant characters will likely get more text than the Japanese article does, but they will mostly be short one or two line descriptions. Elric of Grans 01:57, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

  • A list would probably be a better idea if you were going to use it to link to other pages on each character; if you are planning on having them all on the same page with descriptors on the same page as you said, it would probably be an article. -- Gizzakk 02:32, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
I plan to do a bit of both. I will link to full articles on major characters (eg Boogiepop), but others will just be described here. If the majority of the characters are only described on this page, with some having a paragraph and a link to their main article, would that suffice for article status? Elric of Grans 02:43, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
I would recommend an article in similar format to Recurring characters in the Aubrey–Maturin series. with links using {{Main}} article tags to the major character articles. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:01, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
That is pretty well what I was looking at doing. Thanks for the help! Elric of Grans 08:20, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Questions

Sorry about all the questions recently. I am not sure where to direct these two questions, but they indirectly relate to articles within this WikiProject, so hopefully this is the right place. Firstly, article assessment snuck up on me from nowhere a while back, and I do not really know how they work (beyond their descriptions of what they mean). I understand the process for GA/FA, but what about the others? Can anyone assess an article as Stub/Start (and possibly B-Class), or can only specified people do this? If the latter, how does that work? This could probably be answered by a wikilink, but searching has not helped. Secondly, I have had an article on Peer Review for a week without comment: is there something that can be done in a case like this, or do I just give up on PR and skip to nomination for GA to find out what is wrong with it? Elric of Grans 02:12, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

  • See Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Assessment for the assesment criteria and how to add the classifications, I am still not sure about the importance criteria, though. Also, for the peer review, it might be a good idea to post it elsewhere and ask people if they would mind reviewing the article. -- Gizzakk 17:24, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Even over on the WP:1.0 team fron there appears to be a push to change from the term "importance" to "priority2 Which far better reflects the meaning. i.e. the priority of the article for assessment purposes. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 20:56, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the page. I had been looking around in the general space and never once thought that the WikiProject might have a page dedicated to the topic! With the Peer Review, by "elsewhere", do you mean talk pages, or some sort of a broader community forum? Elric of Grans 23:08, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
Anywhere, I suppose - I was actually looking for the article you wanted reviewed, and I could not determine what it was (through you userpage.) It would probably be a good idea to mention it as well. -- Gizzakk 02:59, 19 July 2006 (UTC)
It was the Boogiepop series (the one marked `On Peer Review' on my Userpage). If there is no particular etiquette here, I shall leave this as an informal request, and drop a line elsewhere too. Thanks for your help! Elric of Grans 04:00, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Stub? You ain't kidding!

Just ran across the shortest stub I think I've ever seen! I just finished reading it and so thought I'd see if it had an article... Got to run to bed, but will work on expanding this poor thing... -plange 04:26, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

You know its bad when the article is shorter than the stub template... -- Gizzakk 02:59, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
Done something about it - what do you guys think! :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:17, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
Looks good! I'll try to pitch in this weekend-- sorry I hadn't gotten around to it! -plange 15:24, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Spoiler tag

Just ran across this. Wikipedia talk:Spoiler warning/RfC Grey Shadow 14:20, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Word spreads fast. Here's a bit more info:
There is a dispute on whether or not spoiler tags are appropriate for Wikipedia. Some editors wish to remove spoiler tags while other editors wish to keep them and/or update their guidelines and appearance. A request for comment has been started at Wikipedia:Spoiler warning/RfC with a structured discussion page on Wikipedia talk:Spoiler warning/RfC. All editors are invited to share their input on any or all of the issues being discussed. -- Ned Scott 03:08, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I have been working on the Agatha Christie novels, and there is no harmonisation in approach with regard to spoilers. In some cases, the basic spoiler tag is used when all that is given in the Plot Summary is a very basic bare bones account of the start of the novel, much as one might read in the blurb on the back of the book (Destination Unknown). In other cases, spoilers include the full solution to the mystery (Ordeal by Innocence) or a "teaser" summary highlighting the principal clues (Death in the Clouds). As a user, I feel that a Plot Summary should summarise to the end of the plot, but personally I have tended to keep the articles much as they are with regard to the degree of spoiling in each case. I would appreciate the input of other project members on whether there is a pragmatic or even a principled basis for proceeding. --Sordel 19:35, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Hi, If you check out the article template at the project you might see that the pattern allows for a "spoiler free" ==Plot introduction== that is intended for those who might like to read or be encouraged to read the novel. Then there is a ==Plot summary== that is intended to be comprehensive and should when comprehensive include what some would refer to as spoilers. If either are not present or minimal they should be provided or improved. Trust that helps. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:33, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

novel templates

These templates seem to be of use for us. Not sure where to list them. Grey Shadow 23:06, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

What to type What it makes Where it goes
{{isfdb name | id=Arthur_C._Clarke | name=Arthur C. Clarke }}
Talk

Arthur C. Clarke at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{isfdb series | id=The_Stainless_Steel_Rat | title=The Stainless Steel Rat}}
Talk

The Stainless Steel Rat series listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{isfdb title | id=2485 | title=2001: A Space Odyssey}}
Talk

2001: A Space Odyssey publication history at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{iblist name | id=2 | name=Arthur C. Clarke}}
Talk

Arthur C. Clarke at the Internet Book List

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{iblist series | id=69 | title=The Stainless Steel Rat}}
Talk

The Stainless Steel Rat series listing at the Internet Book List

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{iblist title | id=2 | title=2001: A Space Odyssey}}
Talk

2001: A Space Odyssey publication history at the Internet Book List

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{ibdof name | id=10| name=Arthur C. Clarke}}
Talk

Arthur C. Clarke at the Internet Book Database of Fiction

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{ibdof series | id=46 | title=The Stainless Steel Rat}}
Talk

The Stainless Steel Rat series listing at The Internet Book Database of Fiction

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
{{ibdof title | id=94 | title=2001: A Space Odyssey}}
Talk

2001: A Space Odyssey publication history at The Internet Book Database of Fiction

 Article (typ. in external links)
near bottom
Not quite sure what you mean - the obvious use of the data refered to in these template references would be on the author article or series articles. The use of the {{ibdof name}}, {{ibdof name}}, {{ibdof series}}, {{ibdof series}}, etc templates may well be worked up somewhere wiki wide, but perhaps also a general NovelsWikiProject "template" page that someone else has suggested, and / or as part of the ArticleTemplate documentation. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 10:36, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

First Edition Info

I know this has come up before, but I keep coming across articles where people have used the info from later editions in the infobox and havn't denoted it as such; just wanted to remind people to do this or look up the first edition info. -- Gizzakk 18:18, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Middle-earth

Middle-earth is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy 17:12, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Discussion of two extra fields on "Infobox Book"

Two more field have been proposed on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Books#Two new fields to infobox which warrent everyone's attention. Please get over there and place you views. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 09:16, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

The Giver

The Giver is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy 22:59, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Can anyone please take some time to review this article? It may lose its featured status if the concerns raised in the review are not addressed. Joelito (talk) 03:35, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Thunderball

Thunderball is up for a featured article review. Detailed concerns may be found here. Please leave your comments and help us address and maintain this article's featured quality. Sandy 22:59, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

It probably wouldn't have needed a review if the article had been kept intact. Just my 2 cents. 23skidoo 21:04, 30 July 2006 (UTC)
The review was raised before the split and this was partly what lead to the call for the split. Just the history of the thing. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 10:18, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
You are correct. I didn't realize that. I'll leave my comment up as I still stand by it, but obviously things changed. I think K1Bond007 did a good job in splitting the two articles. 23skidoo 18:37, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

New novels-related category

Just FYI I've created a new category, Category:Unpublished novels as there are some articles out there based on unpublished manuscripts. So far there are only 3 listed, but I'm sure there are more. 23skidoo 21:04, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Yeah there is definatly more of these... would you like me to generate a list for you on this. —— Eagle (ask me for help) 16:04, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
Sure. Or maybe there's a 'Bot that can be created to add the category to the applicable articles. If someone hasn't already done so, it might not hurt to create a list article of unpublished novels as well. 23skidoo 18:38, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Work In Progress Question

I am a new user to Wikipedia and this project and I have a question as to the proper etiquette for work in progress. If I am using the template provided by the project and I do not have time to complete the entire work in one sitting is it considered proper form to post the entire template with the missing information visible, to post only the completed parts with some kind of notice, or to work on the entire project offline and then post it in one sitting? Hopefully this is the correct place to post this question. --Ulysses411 01:28, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

welcome to the project - there is no one way of working. But just as a short recommendation, do place your work on line as soon as a basic article is possible. ideally when it is more than a short stub. Then please try to put something in the article which indicate why it is notable and if possible give as much supporting information and inline references as you can find time for. This will give eveyong an idea that the article is of value even if they don't know it or the author. I would probably add bits of the template as I go, but other like to place the whole article template to give guidance and notes for future additions. Then if the section is not "filled in yet" just use standard html comment tags to disable it's display. I trust that helps and welcome again. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 06:07, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
This was an issue I ran into. I posted one article with only the book name and a blank template, and wikipedia sent me a delete-o-gram, and it was gone in minutes. I try to do the infobox at least, and will put the whole thing in word to work on before posting. My latest thing is to put the half-article on my user workspace and then create the actual article when I have enough information. You'll find a way that works best for you. And welcome!! PeregrineV 18:20, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Can't complain about quality assessments, but importance?

Kevinalewis has reviewed three of the articles I worked on (mostly anonymously) about Henry James novels: The Ambassadors, What Maisie Knew, and Washington Square (novel). He gave each article a B on quality, which is fine with me because almost no articles are rated higher, and over 85% of articles are rated lower. But I can't figure out how The Ambassadors gets only a mid-importance rating while the other two articles get high-importance. James himself would beg to differ. Casey Abell 16:10, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I know what you mean, however James would hardly be an unbiased commentator. By the by, the label of the "importance" is being discussed over on the WP:1.0 project current thinking heading toward renaming is priority. Which is about priority for assessment. Anyway I totally aggree with you challenge and will up the importance of said novel. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 16:28, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for the quick response. If James were still around, he'd probably thank you, too (wink). Casey Abell 18:08, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Importance rating

As have many before me, I've also been wondering about the importance rating. I've been trying to come up with a proposal for some guidelines, which I have placed at Wikipedia Talk:WikiProject Novels/Assessment. I also believe that it is of the utmost importance that we agree upon the articles labelled as Top-important. These articles are the first to undergo improvement under the WP 1.0 project, and should be well-balanced. As it is now, they feature many Charles Dickens novels, whereas novels by other important authors like Ernest Hemingway are absent. I think this is a too important issue for one person to decide, and I've put up a page where participants can give their opinion about which articles should be Top-rated and which should not. Look here: Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Assessment/Top-important Here you can propose new articles which should have the rating Top-important. Errabee 15:19, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I was also trying to make sense of that. It seems to me that there are two distinct classes of books. Those that are topical now, and those that are still topical despite being published 50 years ago. Someone just tagged one of the Harry Potter pages, which attracted my attention, but I was also struggling with this with regard to another book, Left Hand of Darkness, which I would personally list as a very influential classic, but which very many people not interested in SF would never have even heard of. I would have to say the Harry Potter books are currently very important, because of the vast number of people who have read them. Whether they will still be so in 50 years is another issue, but maybe any explanations need to address this. Surveys of the public asking about good books frequently reflect those most recently published. Only with time do people determine lasting merit, but both current and lasting popularity seem iseparate grounds for inclusion. Sandpiper 11:40, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
I was reading Erabee's top-important assessment page today but note that it is now marked as "obsolete". Does this mean that we should discontinue using this page (which serves a very useful purpose) or should we simply regard it as out of date with reference to some of the novels listed. --Sordel 06:58, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

This page above appeared a while back with little fanfare - at a time when I didn't get much chance to look at it myself. However it contains a very good concept - that is to "agree" the inclusions to the "Top" importance / priority articles. Should this be reactivated (marked by it's creator Errabee as obsolete currently), discussed and promoted? :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:15, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

I made some contributions to it this morning on the off-chance that it would get going again. I'd suggest that a third section be added on novels that have been relegated from top-importance. Then members of the Project need to get working on it ... there are a number of obvious candidates not being discussed there. Good page/idea though. --Sordel 08:26, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
I've made some more changes to the Top-importance page. Note that the page is not yet up to date, so please check that the discussion is still relevant to the importance assessment on the novel's article Talk page before contributing. --Sordel 14:51, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Personally I think the page should be re-activated. I think that, whilst there is obviously a certain amount of subjectivity as regards grading, that top grade in particular requires discussion before assignment. That seems the fairest way to do things. I like the amendments Sordel made. Silverthorn 17:10, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

The Top-importance page is now more or less up-to-date, in the sense that the candidates for inclusion are all real candidates and the top-important list reflects the actual evaluation on the talk page for the relevant article. The top-important list is not quite complete, but is close to it. Of the current candidates, Tess of the D'Urbervilles, War of the Worlds and Tristram Shandy do not yet even have project boxes. More candidates would be welcome. --Sordel 09:08, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

Need for Literature WikiProject

Given the clutter in the categories and articles of literature in generally, do you think that there should be a Literature WikiProject. I think it would make some of the work of Novel project easier. --chemica 07:24, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Could create more confussion. Most of this type of activity is being picked up by "Novels" or "Books". Can I suggest you and anyone puts in their efforts in either of these WikiProjects. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 09:14, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

merger?

Shouldnt the three books Assassin's Apprentice, Royal Assassin, Assassin's Quest in the farseer trilodgy by robin hobb be merged into one article? considering the three individual pages are short. Culverin 08:28, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

I would disagree. My preference would be to expand the articles, filling in other sections of the article template that have not yet been touched upon as yet. Silverthorn 10:37, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I also would disagree - these need to worked up, not down. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 12:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Precedent is separate articles for each book. There are a number of articles that are overall articles about trilogies, series, etc. that need to be split into separate articles. 23skidoo 12:55, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Searching for critique and edition info

I apologize if this has been addressed elsewhere, but I wonder if someone could point me to places with information on literary critiques and lists of editions for novels. Google searches have not been helpful. I am working on the Flashman novels. --Joelmills 00:39, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Someone else here - As I don't know an answer for this one :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 13:27, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
If the book was released in the US, the Library of Congress [www.loc.gov website] will have every(?) US edition listed; and as for valid literary critiques...? Gizzakk 15:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

What is a Novel?

How does the project define what a "novel" is, for purposes of inclusion? Certainly not fiction since even a well told joke is fiction. Is it based on the length? Where does a short story end, a novella start and end, and a novel start? Or is it a loose defined "you know it when you see it"? -- Stbalbach 01:25, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

According to my dictionary, a novel is defined as "a fictious tale in book form", with a novelette or novella being "a short novel". This would suggest that length is one of the primary factors in differentiating between the two. Silverthorn 10:26, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
This is really up to the author as far as I can tell, the major distinction is length, but as to when a short story becomes a novella and when a novella becomes a novel, there is really no set definition as far as I know. Gizzakk 15:37, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
At the moment, novellas are also being included in the project, especially since many novellas are often considered novels (Heart of Darkness is a good example). I have also added some short story collections to the project with no apparent objections, although I'll only do this if the short stories are related -- as in they form an arc or feature the same characters. (Examples include numerous titles in the Simon Templar series.) I don't know if any cut-and-dried criteria for inclusion has been set based upon length, except that I would imagine individual short stories, poems and similar short works on their own probably wouldn't qualify. 23skidoo 19:55, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Novel Template - Characters

It has been brought to my attention that in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style (headings)#Wording it says Avoid restating the subject of the article or of an enclosing section in heading titles.

I bring this up because in the Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/ArticleTemplate, the heading for the characters section is currently listed as "Characters in "~title of novel~"", where the Manual of Style implies that it should merely read "Characters". If I (and the individual who brought this to my attention) are interpreting this correctly, then we should probably change the article template to avoid further confusion. - Runch 03:36, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Interesting that this has only just come up we have been using this pattern template for ages now!.

Ok my take on this is that the heading is the only one that we do this on and it is often sub divided into "Main characters", "minor characters", "Recuring characters" and others. This 'Characters in "~title of novel~"' as the general heading is sufficiently different to be a nice change of wording style. Bear in mind that the MOS is a "guidance" not a rule and as I said before this is thos only heading that we use this way. This is not cast in stone (obviously) so please comment freely. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 10:22, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Personally, I've always been fine with "Characters in "~title of novel~" as the heading title. I only brought this up because another individual was changing the titles to just "Characters". I think the way I will deal with it is that I will continue to use the heading as specified in the template, but if someone changes the heading title in an article in which there are no subheadings in the characters section, I will leave that change alone. Just my opinion. - Runch 15:20, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Yeah, the repeat of the title doesn't bother me horribly when only done once. The way the section is used in the A Song of Ice and Fire books' articles put me over the top to change it. Obviously each article doesn't recap all the important characters from the series that make an appearance, so the section is used only to list the point of views used in the book (e.g., A Game of Thrones#Characters), in which case "Characters in ____" doesn't quite fit. I don't know if this sort of thing happens with other books. — Laura Scudder ☎ 14:15, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Extremely unusual - I fact at present I cannot think of another one - that is not to say it does not. This is a special case I think. In fact this section (or sections) are not really character section at all but a viewpoint summary, so the criticism should arguably be of the use of the word "characters" rather than "veiwpoints". :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 14:38, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Might take a more positive tack myself to the use of our "pattern", however it is nice to see a straightforwardly pragmatic attitude to things. Nice to see! :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 09:20, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

First Revision Feedback Request

Hi all. I just attempted my first major revision of a novel in support of WikiProject Novels. It is Anne Rice's Servant of the Bones. I used as much of the template as I could; it's very complete and easy to use! Could someone give me a bit of feedback on my work? Thanks in advance!Estreya 16:49, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Response with novel, on talk page. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 09:25, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Feedback request

I have been working slowly on some articles for the novels of Clive Cussler which were mostly added as stubs by another user. So far I have worked on Night Probe! and Vixen 03 and would appreciate some feedback on how I am doing before I continue on to other books. Thanks! --Ulysses411 23:23, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Looking good to me - the first could do with a "spoiler free" ==Plot introduction== as with the second also the series isn't linked on the first. Only other obvious thing is the Cussler doesn't appear to have his own category yet. Something like Category:Clive Cussler to link together all article relating "cussler" relate material. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:51, 11 September 2006 (UTC)


J'Accuse

Good day, WikiProject Novels people. I just attempted to learn something about Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and the paucity of that article, on the novel sometimes called the greatest in American literature, and which is included on almost every list of the top half-dozen, should be a source of great shame for the Wikipedia. -- Writtenonsand 15:24, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

responded direct :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 15:57, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Templates and Infoboxes

I posted this on the talk page for Stephen King's Cell because I thought about it while viewing the page, but wasn't sure where the question should go. A little digging and I found this cool little project.

My question was, why don't the novels/authors have those template/infoboxes at the bottom of their entries that give a full bibliography, like we find at the bottom of every album entry for musical artists? I find those templates very useful when browsing a particular musical artists' complete body of works and would really like to see this happen for authors as well. I'm just unsure as to how to create them and what the standards would be. Like, I think they should have all their novels included, in chronological order, along with a list of short stories or editing they've done for outside compilations, etc.

Thoughts? What can I do to help? Alanlastufka 15:01, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Firstly, you might like to sign up to the project. See the main page and particpants section.
Next, I agree with you, however the biographies are not strictly part of this project but the perview of WP:BIOGRAPHY, however don't think most would object the such templates being added.
Thirdly, some author already do have such templates added on their biographies.
Fourthly, if one doesn't already exist try creating one. If you need a hand take the source of an existing one you like and create a copy / in the name of the target author. Then edit it to include the titles of the new author. If you want others can help check out what you have done. Even ask me to take a look.
After that there are plenty of things to do. A good place to start is the project Worklist. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 09:13, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Importance tag

Just saw that someone has put the {{importance}} tag on the top of Christopher Moore's books? He's definitely a notable author so the books themselves warrant having an article, right? --plange 00:56, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Particularly since many of them also qualify as series books of some form or other. I really liked all of them myself. Maybe they just need to have some indication of their notability in the text, though. I think at least one or two of them were chosen as "best books" of some sort or other. Maybe that's what's needed in the articles to establish "importance". Badbilltucker 01:10, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
I know, I love his books! Just added 2 reviews to Fluke and removed the advert and importance tag (after also trimming out POV) - I'll try and see if I can hunt down awards... --plange 01:59, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
I believe that is exactly what the tag means. These novel articles need a lot of work to warrant any credibility. NPOV text, introductions and plot summaries, ==Literary significance & criticism== and ==Awards and nominations== sections. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 08:29, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Short Story Collections

I have just read The Collected Stories of Vernor Vinge and I am interested in creating an article for it. I see that the collection is already described in the Vernor Vinge article itself, but a seperate article seems appropriate to me. Looking through various articles I have seen short story collections included in the authors page and in their own pages, but with no mention of any preference or guidelines for creating these articles in WikiPedia:WikiProject Books or WikiPedia:WikiProject Novels. (I will be happily corrected, if someone can point out that I have missed something.) If these really do not exist, is this project an appropriate place to begin a discussion for creating templates and guidelines for short story collections? -- Andrew Sullivan Cant 23:58, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

No guidelines as such as they don't fit in as novels. You could use our pattern and adapt it! which is what most appear to do. Just leave off the project banner on the talk page. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 10:21, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
As you suggested, I have already started using the Novels template to write an article for the Vinge book. I will bring this up in WikiPedia:WikiProject Books and see what people say about establishing a template and some guidelines. Looking through the existing pages there is alot of variety in how short stories collections have been represented. It would be nice to have something like this project to give some more consistancy to how they are represented. Thanks! -- Andrew Sullivan Cant 12:25, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
This question is also relevant to Little Altars Everywhere. That book is a collection of short stories, but it currently bears the WikiPedia:WikiProject Novels banner. If a project for single-author short story collections is created, that would be more appropriate. Pat Berry 16:26, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
I have added a message regarding short story collections to Wikipedia talk: WikiProject Books, since as User:Kevinalewis correctly pointed out they do not really fit into the novel category. -- Andrew Sullivan Cant 05:36, 03 October 2006 (UTC)

Characters designed by public contest

Hi, I'd like to get Category:Characters designed by public contest populated. I don't know of any other characters myself. --GunnarRene 21:14, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Me either ... why do you want the category, exactly? It sounds more like a TV category than one connected with novels. --Sordel 21:31, 25 September 2006 (UTC)
I did ask this in the TV project too. The category pre-existed as the far too specific Category:Fictional characters who won Japanese art contests which might fit Ayato Kamina, but not what the creator had in mind. Any ideas for other types of fiction where there might have been public character design/idea contests? --GunnarRene 23:43, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Questions about "Infobox incomplete" template

I'm requesting some clarification on infoboxes--are they "incomplete" if they're missing only one element? If they're missing a required element? It seems a little ridiculous to say that an infobox is incomplete if it doesn't include, say, the illustrator. (Or the translator, if the book is already in English!) The Publisher tag is problematic as well; for a novel like Anna Karenina, is the publisher the name of the periodical it was serialized in? (Even though the periodical didn't finish publishing it?) AK's infobox looks pretty complete (it has the most relevant information, without including specific-edition information like ISBNs or publishers), but it's listed as incomplete. In my opinion, "publisher" shouldn't be a required field--a lot literary classics are produced by several, if not dozens, of publishers, and the originating publisher of the work is often no longer around. Feedback? Help? -- Merope Talk 18:10, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Generally speaking, I've only seen the "infobox incomplete" banner added to the talk page on articles where there isn't one. Occasionally someone forgets to remove it after adding an infobox. As to how much of an infobox is needed for the tag to no longer apply, that's a good question. I agree that it shouldn't be considered incomplete if we can't supply the name of a cover illustrator (a rather useless piece of info anyway in the case of books with many editions) or even an ISBN number as sometimes we're working with editions that don't have one (as is the case, in my example, with many of the Simon Templar books in my collection published before there was an ISBN). 23skidoo 20:57, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
I'd be okay with infoboxes that had a picture, a title, an author, and a date. Translator is useful if there's one primary or prominent translator, but some classic novels have several translators. Publisher irks me (especially for books that predate Gutenberg), but I can deal. I guess I wanted some guidance from other members of the community as to how to proceed. -- Merope Talk 21:07, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Assesment of prize winning novels

I just went through the talk page of The God of Small Things, a Booker prize winning novel, and saw that it was rated "Low" on importance scale. Surely a Booker prize winner deserves more than that. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 16:23, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree! I believe the best thing to do would be to change it, leave a note on the associated talk page, and let Kevinalewis know your reasoning on his talk page. I think most of the assessors (and Kevin in particular) are pretty good about welcoming other input. -- Merope Talk 16:32, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Actually I also wanted the community to reach on a consensus of what should be the assessment rating of novels winning different literary prizes. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 16:53, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
In that case, you might want to address the issue here as well. -- Merope Talk