BOTM Change

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BOTM Change

Post by Scott »

I am considering a change to the Book of the Month nomination policies. It looks like Divergent is going to win by a landslide. This is fine, but I imagine it is mainly because a movie has just been made about it. Some of my favorite books of the month have been ones that I wouldn't have heard of and read otherwise. Many previous books of the month have been turned into a movie after it has been book of the month, even though the plans to make it a movie may not have been in the works when we first read it. This was exciting to get a book that was just on the verge of trending, rather than to jump on the bandwagon of a book everyone is reading and discussing anyway. Also, it avoided the issue of people who only saw the movie wanting to discuss it, or feeling left out because they don't want to read a book when they already saw the movie adaptation. So the change I am considering is to prohibit nominations of books that have already been turned into a movie. Thoughts?

At the same time, for those very popular trending books like Divergent, maybe we could make special subforums to discuss them anyway up in the regular forums. Or I could probably program a database script that will be able to count the number of topics for a book and create an organized list so for instance if there were 5 topics about a book in the appropriate genre forum, they would be listed together on this "Popular Books" page. This of course would depend on people actually following the guidelines in that section to include the title of the book in the title of the topic, which I could easily program my script to automatically connect.

What do you all think?
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Post by gali »

I was one of those who have voted for that book, but it wasn't because of the movie. I chose it since it was on my to read list anyway and I have no intention to watch the movie.

What you are suggesting makes sense. I also prefer to read books before all the hype around them. Subforums for popular trending books sound like a great idea.
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Post by Fran »

I'm inclined to agree Scott & it will be interesting to see how many of those who voted for Divergent come back and actually engage in a discussion about it as distinct from just one line/one word comments! Divergent isn't my kind of book, as you probably guessed, but as a matter of interest is it not a series?
Personally I favour the BOTM being a place for reading an unusual, original book or a book that a member feels has been overlooked or hasn't gained the popularity they feel it deserves.
I don't see the point of a sub forum for popularly trending books (that's kind of a vague term anyway, what defines popularly trending?) but in any case the option already exists for a member to set up a topic for a specific book in the existing forums or sub-forums & take the discussion from there.
What I do think we need is a sub-forum for YA please :)
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Post by gali »

Fran wrote:I'm inclined to agree Scott & it will be interesting to see how many of those who voted for Divergent come back and actually engage in a discussion about it as distinct from just one line/one word comments! Divergent isn't my kind of book, as you probably guessed, but as a matter of interest is it not a series?
Personally I favour the BOTM being a place for reading an unusual, original book or a book that a member feels has been overlooked or hasn't gained the popularity they feel it deserves.
I don't see the point of a sub forum for popularly trending books (that's kind of a vague term anyway, what defines popularly trending?) but in any case the option already exists for a member to set up a topic for a specific book in the existing forums or sub-forums & take the discussion from there.
What I do think we need is a sub-forum for YA please :)
It is part of a trilogy. I like that genre myself and hope the book is good. I am for Sub-forum for YA as well.
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Post by Scott »

Young Adult?
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Post by Fran »

Sorry Scott, yes Young Adult .. there's an awful lot of it about :lol:
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Post by Aubinelizabeth »

I think if the book won by a landslide it should be the book of the month no matter what. It is an amazing book and the back story of the author is extrodenary. I was surprised to find out that it was herfirst book. I do think that a popular book forum would be great. And popular is not hard to define... a lot of people are talking about the book therefore it is popular. Being popular does not make a book better in quality than a book that may be great but isnt getting much praise. And I think I have gone beyond a one word or short statement response as a young adult and I am confident that other readers of the divergent series will have a lot to say about the book as well.
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Post by PashaRu »

Sounds like it might be a good decision. (Not just because I didn't vote for Divergent and probably wouldn't read it. I voted for The Absolutist.) The YA pop-culture books which are trending are likely to get a lot of votes, but it's a flavor-of-the-month kind of thing. A subforum would be good, as I think the audience is a somewhat limited demographic. I agree with Fran; I'd like to see books offered for BOTM that aren't so much in the mainstream.
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Post by Aubinelizabeth »

I think the audience is not just limited to young adults and movie goers. I am 24 but I know people in their 50s who habe completed the series
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Post by TrishaAnn92 »

PashaRu wrote:Sounds like it might be a good decision. (Not just because I didn't vote for Divergent and probably wouldn't read it. I voted for The Absolutist.) The YA pop-culture books which are trending are likely to get a lot of votes, but it's a flavor-of-the-month kind of thing. A subforum would be good, as I think the audience is a somewhat limited demographic. I agree with Fran; I'd like to see books offered for BOTM that aren't so much in the mainstream.

I agree. I would like to see more books that aren't as mainstream. I am 22 and still haven't read the Divergent Series and am not really all that interested in it. While I will read it, and it is on my list to read eventually I didn't vote for it. I definitely think there should be a sub forum for all the popular books.
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Post by Fran »

@Aubinelizabeth
I wasn't suggesting Divergent shouldn't be the BOTM - it was nominated, Scott accepted its nomination, it got most votes ... end of as they say!
What I was suggesting is that the criteria for nominating a book be changed to favour books that are not on the best seller lists but that's just my personal opinion.
As it happens I have two stacks of books to get through so it kinda suits that I have no interest in reading the June book or the last couple of BOTM books, gives me chance to catch up with my list.
I suggested a sub-forum for YA as it seems to be quite a popular genre & having it's own sub forum would make the site easier to navigate for members interested in that particular genre. No way was I suggesting anything negative about readers of the YA genre.

@TrishaAnn92
Personally I would not favour a sub forum for popular books as I think it's just a)too broad a term & b) too subjective & would probably just be a duplication General Book & Reading Forum (again just my opinion) :)
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Post by TrishaAnn92 »

:) I see what you mean. I do think a sub forum for the YA genre would be a good idea.
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Post by S dot Lennon »

I've read Divergent and finished the series but it wasnt a favorite of mine. It is getting a lot of publicity right now and I am interested in seeing how the discussion goes for that particular book. Make sure to put in a disclaimer so that people dont give away the rest of the story line. I'm not sure of the best solution for this except for having bestsellers nominated one month and then not as popular books nominated the next month. If you try that maybe the lesser known books will have a chance of getting more attention here on the forums.
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Post by kio »

I read Divergent and liked it, but I'd like to try one of the lesser known ones myself.
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Post by Scott »

Okay, I created a subforum for the genre of young adult fiction.
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