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October Group Read Nominations
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Jim
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Aug 31, 2013 03:29PM
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I'd like to nominate The First Days by Rhiannon Frater :-)
I'll nominate the Zombiefighter Jango series. The Road to Hell is Paved With Zombies Jango's Anthem I want to start the second anyway.
I'd like to nominate Savage of the Dead by Joe McKinney
Stephanie wrote: "I'd like to nominate Savage of the Dead by Joe McKinney"I've never heard of Savage of the Dead. Thank you for the heads up. I absolutely loved McKinney's Dead World series.
I love Joe McKinney. I didn't know he had a new book come out. Looks like it was release yesterday. Thanks for the info!!!
I'd like to nominate Tankbread again: 
I promise to vote tankbread, Netanella.You have been faithful in your nomination for it and its been on my to read list for a long time now. :-)
Mod
Sorry, where do I find the poll?
If you go to the upper right-hand corner of this page, you'll see the links for the group. One of them is "Polls". Which goes to:http://www.goodreads.com/poll/list/90...
The Amazon reviews for The First Days: As the World Dies has me cringing if it becomes a BOTM. That many low ratings can not be wrong. This month's The Reapers are the Angels was horrible! It got the 2nd most votes, and so far of all the BOTM that the zombie1 group has had, it had the lowest number of actual participates.
I am begging you people, please do not vote/nominate for a book unless you are fairly certain it is a good book.
Please, do not stack the BOTM in such a manor as to guarantee their continued failure as a group activity.
I would hate to see BOTM fade out, but am not willing to simply join in to be a good sport and more.
The First Days did get a ton of positive reviews, too, and is selling well for an 8.99 e-book. Could go either way.I fell way behind on Mountain Man. Hopefully I can get caught up in time for October's read.
I'm going to bring this topic over to the chat thread so that if someone should close this thread on us, the topic can be discussed.
So I'm voting that Tankbread book again, because I really do want to read and I've been enjoying the groupreads, which is something that I've never done before. However, if another book is selected as a winner, even if I've read it before, such as First Days or The Road To Hell is Paved with Zombies, I'll probably re-read and join in the discussion for the fun of it.
You know, I nominated First Days because I love the author and I thought it was a phenomenal book. Yes, I've already read it. I just thought it would be fun to read it again in a group setting. So sorry if the book doesn't sound like your cup of tea.
Heather if you're good on the book, that's cool. My plea was generally speaking.
My concerns about the book based on reviews on Amazon.
I imagine that you'll be in the BOTM to share your thoughts.
It does help when their is a mixed of participants willing to share their experiences/interpretations.
I am happy to see First Days nominated as I have also read it and loved it, though it was quite sometime ago, and I'm looking forward to joining in on a group read. I avoided the last ones after checking out each book nominated and reading the samples available assured me that I would never finish them as they were not my cup of tea. If either First Days or The Savage Dead wins I will definitely be participating.
Well vote away, everyone, and let's get some groupread going!
Netanella wrote: "Well vote away, everyone, and let's get some groupread going!"With all the new members whom have spoke up for and voted for First Days, it should have a very active BOTM discussion :-)
Tammy... I love "Tankbread" and am a big fan of Rhiannon Frater's "As the world dies" so don't be disappointed, it's a good un xx
Sara wrote: "Tammy... I love "Tankbread" and am a big fan of Rhiannon Frater's "As the world dies" so don't be disappointed, it's a good un xx"I appreciate you thoughts on these too titles.
I am not sure how you and I compare in our ranking of books, if we have the same expectations or not but thank you for expressing your sentiments to me (us).
Honestly, with all the votes that First Days got it should be THE most active BOTM the group has had. (Unless of course the BOTM's are currently being stacked by authors/book promoters, which I suspect they are, we shall see in the next BOTM participation level, eh?)
This next statement is not about the title First Days ok.
When I first decided to write reviews of my own it was because I had grown frustrated with seeing a title with tons of 5 star and 4 star reviews, purchasing that title based off those reviews, only to find when I was reading that title it was rubbish.
I had suspected (and later it was confirmed) that many self published and indie authors are having friends/family publish reviews for them. They also have their friends and family vote up and down reviews to improve their books appearance.
That might seem to make sense on a business level, but once an customer has been burned enough times word gets around that that author and his or her fans are stacking the reviews.
I would much rather go into a book knowing that it was an 'average' 3 star book, than have my hopes built up for a better than average book- 4 stars, or an excellent book- 5 stars. (just my views there)
One goodreads author whom is on my friends list and whom I like a great deal, told me about a goodreads author group that they belong too, where the authors "support" each other through goodreads and amazon reviews/voting.
One mans support is another mans stacking.
I still like that author, but have lost much respect for their integrity. I keep note of which authors belong to that particular group as well.
Now without naming names, another individual recently shared with me an experience they had with another goodreads author whom they considered a friend and enjoyed that authors books.
The author told that individual about a review of their book on amazon which was a low star review, indirectly implying that the reviewer should get a "not helpful" vote. Which that individual did for the author.
So with all this and a few horror stories of authors behaving badly of my own, when I see a book with a fair amount of 4 & 5 star ratings my eyes immediately go to the lower star ratings.
I look to see who is actually writing a review about the book's content and their reading experience and who is writing a review about the author, how great the author is, and vague statements of their reading experience.
Whether you loved the book or hated the book or anywhere in between, you should actually be able to say something about the book and your reading experience.
A review that says something like
"It's great. I loved the author's writing style." is not (in my view) a review worthy of a 4 or 5 star book.
just as
"It was horrible. Do not buy a book by this author." is not (in my view) a worthy review.
So as I go looking for good books, I explore the reviewer(s) as much as I explore the book.
One more comment about writing reviews: It was not until I committed too and continued with writing reviews that I began to really understand what (in my mind) makes up an average (3 star), better than average (4 star), and excellent book (5 star) read.
I had to really think about why one book was better (in my mind) than another.
I came up with my own system, that I use to measure up each book.
My goal is for a fair, honest, and direct reviews. I write my reviews with the potential reader/purchaser in mind. With no favoritism to any author. If I am a fan of the author, I always try to add that as a disclaimer in my review somewhere. Integrity is important to me. I only get one voice and I want my views to reflect my true reading experience.
--
I do not pick up all free books just because they are free. I have a finite amount of space on my kindle and in my amazon cloud. Why collect rubbish?
And if I am paying for the title, I really can not afford to be wasting my amazon allotment money that I give myself.
Anything over 2.99 is pretty steep for me, because there are so many good books that are free or under 2.99.
Now if you are still with me after all that rambling..
When I looked again at First Days here on goodreads, I looked at the 1 star reviewers.
If you have not, you may wish too.
There are a couple pretty honest reviewers, one of which gets slammed by on of the titles fan in her comment section. (Which is another thing that I look for, Book Bullies).
The overall goodreads rating of the book has it as an average read, 3 stars.
Knowing how I usually measure up with the crowd, that is likely what I will find the book to be (average).
In conclusion, I will look forward to reading the book of the month thread for this title. I am not certain one way or the other if I will participate (not that that is relevant).
Tammy K. wrote: "I have a finite amount of space on my kindle and in my amazon cloud."I don't think you can fill the Cloud, at least spacewise. I suspect they just have pointers to where the book is stored on their web site. It wouldn't make sense to put a copy into each person's personal area.
But, there is a lot of problem with the "Manage Your Kindle" web page if you have a lot of books in the Cloud.
I wish I could go to the book's web page and tell it to send it to my Kindle from there, instead of having to go through loading everything at the MYK page.
I would think it would be a lot less overhead for Amazon as well.
Maybe I'll have to do some hacking and see what I can come up with. I already figured out how to quickly get to my book for reading it with their online reader.
Randy wrote: "I don't think you can fill the Cloud, at least spacewise. I suspect they just have pointers to where the book..."I hope you are right on that, but I've got thousands of kindle books.
I've even got books which I have purchased on other websites that I sent to my kindle account via my kindle documents for reading (I assume that those are in the cloud as well?).
Managing my kindle cloud is a nightmare! I have long forgotten which books are up there, so I have to go in and browse via kindle cloud reader. Ugh!
It used to be that I wanted to see if I owned a title I could look it up in the kindle store via my kindle fire and if I owned it, where it would normally say purchase, it would say download.
That no longer is the case.
I knew that I owned TankBread. I went to look it up the old way, and it said purchase, not download.
I was 100% certain I owned it, so I went back to books-library-search to look up the title. Sure enough it was in my cloud, so I downloaded it.
(because even if it is not picked as a BOTM, I plan on offering a buddy read of it to Netanella)
There needs to be a clear, simple way to access our amazon kindle cloud.
Tammy K. wrote: "There needs to be a clear, simple way to access our amazon kindle cloud."I don't think they anticipated people having more than a few hundred books.
But I suspect the average number of books people have in the cloud is fairly low.
Randy wrote: "I don't think they anticipated people having more than a few hundred books.But I suspect the average nu..."
Laugh Out Loud!
You are probably right!
:-)
Heather wrote: "I'd like to nominate The First Days by Rhiannon Frater :-)"I really enjoyed the "As The World Dies" series even though I LOATHED the character Jenni more than any character in any book I have ever read.
Tammy, I really hope that you will take part because I look forward to hearing your thoughts on it. Whether I agree with your opinions or not, I know that they are always well thought out. I liked this book, it was not a perfect book by any means, but I have read a TON of zombie reads (I don't even want to use the word "literature" because some are soooo bad)and so I tend to stack how much I like the book by comparing it to other books I've read in the same genre. For you this may well be a mediocre read over all, or even less, but I'd still look forward to hearing your thoughts on it. I do hope that there will be a good number of participants. I'm also looking forward to re-reading it and seeing if my take on it is different the second time around.
Lana,I am rather vocal, aren't I? ;)
I do try to "add" to the group's discussion but I also recognize that I am just a single member and that my views are no more/less important than another member.
While I tend to ramble on in both my comments and reviews, I have no illusions about my amateur reviewer status.
Every reader has different expectations of the books that they read based off a lot of things like exposure to the genre, personal beliefs and fantasies just to name a few variables.
I have several things that I look for in a book that others might not find relevant. I can be somewhat prickly, headstrong on my views and @ Times rather 8itchy. Meh. Don't take me too seriously.
I don't know whether I'll do the BOTM, but as I said before I'm looking forward to reading all of comments/interpretations of those who do.
Tammy K. wrote: "The Amazon reviews for The First Days: As the World Dies has me cringing if it becomes a BOTM. That many low ratings can not be wrong. This month's The Reapers are the Angels was horrible! It got ..."
I TOTALLY agree with you! I actually just now went and changed my vote to "Tankbread". I HAD voted "Apocalypse Cow," because it sounded funny and different, but I was torn between that and "Tankbread" to begin with, and seeing as how "Apocalypse Cow" got next to no votes, and the top two books get read, I wanted at least one to be something people that actually post a lot want to read. I've been skimming back over the group nominations and agree with you that Netanella has been loyal with this nomination, so I'd LOVE to give it a go. Also, in a latter comment, you talked about authors 'stacking' their ratings. This is absolutely true, and I think we all know it, even if people don't wanna admit it to themselves. Good job for speaking up on a controversial subject that a lot of people wouldn't have had the stones to do! ;-) I don't know you well at all, but from what I DO know of you, you certainly don't seem like the type to say things you don't believe or to keep your opinions under wraps just to pacify others, and I greatly admire that. I'm the same way, but I think you already know that, huh? Once again, I REALLY hope you have no hard feelings about Zombies, Inc. I still wish you'd post something; I've read some of your comments in other BOTM threads, and they always seem well thought out and very comprehensive (perhaps even rambling, like mine lol :-) ). I honestly think we are more alike than different, and while two such strong opinioned people are all but bound to butt heads once in a while, I would like nothing more than to share in a BOTM discussion with you. "First Days" does not exactly sound like my cup of tea either, and I loathe spending that much on a book I am less than enthused to read (there are simply too many books I'd rather read that I'm sure I'd enjoy more- like "Tankbread"). So I'm not sure I'll participate in that read. But correct me if I'm wrong: we get to read the top 2 most voted on books, correct? I will DEFINITELY participate in "Tankbread;" but I'll only participate in "First Days" if the library has it, or if someone is willing to lend it to me via the Kindle. Anyway, this is me extending the olive branch...I really hope we can be 'friends,' or at least share a group read together. As I said, we're definitely more alike than either of our headstrong selves would probably like to admit ;-) I so desperately hope "Tankbread' wins at least second place so we can share a read; I think that would seriously fix the rift that seems to have split us from the get-go. I wish you well! Happy reading...hope to see you on the "Tankbread" thread (assuming it wins, of course!)
A tie for second place - exciting stuff - better than the Coney Island Hot Dog Eating Contest!
Mod
Teresa wrote: "Tammy K. wrote: "The Amazon reviews for The First Days: As the World Dies has me cringing if it becomes a BOTM. That many low ratings can not be wrong. This month's The Reapers are the Angels was ..."
I'm not sure how to respond to this....OK.
Stick around and I'm sure we will end up sharing more than one group read.
As for Zombie Inc. I've completed the read and posted my review.
I will wait until the discussions last day then I'll add any final thoughts about the title with those in the BOTM.
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Does someone need to volunteer to moderate the first place book? I would but I'm not exactly sure how to moderate a group read or what all it entails, which is why I wanted to take part in a group read, to get some experience with it under my belt and see how I liked participating. I was kind of hoping for the other second place book, since its one on my "to be read" lists but maybe I'll make myself read Tankbread...even though just the title turns me off. Plus, maybe I'll even like it and learn not to judge a book by its cover :-)
Lana wrote: "Does someone need to volunteer to moderate the first place book? I would but I'm not exactly sure how to moderate a group read or what all it entails, which is why I wanted to take part in a group..."I must admit that the title tankbread isn't particularly appealing to me either, but the books description was.
Another great way to get practice leading a book discussion is to lead a Buddy-Read.
;-)
Just got this text: Amazon.com: Your package with Tankbread has been shipped. Expected delivery: Tuesday, 01-Oct by 08:00 PM. YAY!!!! I can hardly wait! Since it was almost $6 for the Kindle version and less than $9 for the hard copy, I chose the hard copy instead. I ALWAYS prefer 'real' ink and paper books to e-books, but I'll admit that sometimes I like my Kindle for night time reading with the lamp off. What I'm wondering, though, is when Amazon is going to start giving digital copies away with the purchase of a hard copy. They do it with Blu-Ray DVDs, a lot of CDs come with digital copies, so when is it going to be our books' turn? Amazon is one of the few marketplaces that can KNOW you've purchased certain hard copies of books, and they could deliver a digital copy straight to your cloud. It going at least be an add-on option. What do you all think about it?
Sorry...I meant to say it 'should' at least be an add-on option, not it 'going at least be an add-on,' but my phone won't let me edit the post for some reason, and I just HAD to clarify (my ole buddy OCD rears its head again!).
Teresa, that's actually a brilliant idea! I would love that, but I have a feeling Amazon might be a little bit too stingy to see it our way...
They are already planning on doing that Teresa. I got an email not long ago saying that they are soon going to make it possible for you to download the e-book version of any paper book you have bought in the past. I can't wait. Then I can have an e-book version of the paperbacks that I have sent to my Mom at her assisted living facility without paying the full price for both.Edited to say: It will apply to any books you've bought back to 1995 and SOME will be free, but others will be discounted with the highest price at $2.99. The program will kick off in October.
Also announced...a new Paperwhite Kindle with a faster processor that will integrate with Goodreads.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/20...
Mod
Lana, if you are willing to moderate First Days, we'll have that one in the second half of the month starting 16 Oct. If you decide to do the Tankbread group read, maybe it will give you the opportunity to see what they are like before moderating yourself.
Interesting. My Kindle copy of Tankbread is no longer the one that Amazon sells. It appears to have a new publisher, and a new entry on Amazon:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006...
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BVRQN0W
Books mentioned in this topic
Tankbread (other topics)Blood on the Sand (other topics)
The Road to Hell is Paved With Zombies (other topics)
Jango's Anthem (other topics)
Apocalypse Cow (other topics)
