[2021] Close Call Poll Results

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

Happy Friday everyone!

Top
A book with an ensemble cast
A book with six or more words in the title

Bottom
A book related to one of the United Nations 2021 "International Year" themes

Listopias
A book with an ensemble cast
A book with six or more words in the title

Results for Poll 17 will be posted tomorrow, so go vote for that poll if you haven't already! Suggestions thread for Poll 18 will be up on Sunday.

*7 prompts left before our 2021 list is complete!*

[Thomas]

I am surprised how few made it but I am not unhappy with the winners. Although I may need help on ensemble cast

[Avery]

I’m super happy that Ensemble Cast made it! I think I suggested it last year after reading The Immortalists and Crazy Rich Asians so I’m excited for it! Poor UN International Years :( I loved that one and I thought it was a great positive prompt, but I knew people wouldn’t vote for it!

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

Same, Avery. I voted for it, but I figured it wouldn't make it.

I was not excited about ensemble cast, but I think I'm going to look for an audiobook that is read by a full cast. That excites me a bit more!

[Ellie]

Third time lucky for ensemble cast. Avery, I picked it from my rejects list when it came to suggestions so it probably was your idea!

I don't even remember six words or more in the poll but long titled books aren't uncommon for me so I'm sure that will be an easy one.

[Kristina]

I'm not thrilled with the results, to be honest. None of my 5 upvotes made it and the UN prompt, which was one of my upvotes, is now in the bottom.

The winning prompts are okay, they just didn't really stand out to me. Fortunately, I have some good book options for them.

Now I have to really think about what I will do for the "prompt that didn't make it" prompt.

[Johanne]

I didn't participate in the original discussion, but is the understanding of ensemble cast, books with more than two main characters that shift perspective? Like some fantasy where you follow several characters.

[Avery]

I don’t think it needs to shift perspective necessarily. But I would agree it would need to be at least three main characters that the book follows, or that the author assigns roughly equal reading time to.

[Thomas]

So the alliteration prompt will now be my prompt that did not make it. I was never going to miss that one.

[Ellie]

The definition I found for it was that multiple main characters that are equally important, rather than a big cast supporting a main character's story. So there is a lot of it in high fantasy, yes. Friends is always the TV show that comes up in examples for ensemble cast.

[Nadine in NY]

Good question - how many people makes up an "ensemble"? The dictionary just says "a group." Wikipedia says six or more, but it's talking about musical ensembles.

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

I'd think it would either be multiple perspectives that shift equally (Currently read The Paris Hours that divides the chapters between four different people), or a third person POV that follows the perspectives of a few different characters. I'd say any more than 3 or 4 would count, but that's just my arbitrary number lol

[Ellie]

Three or more is my arbitrary number.

[Kim]

I didn't vote for either of the winners, but I am surprised how easy the 6 or more words in the title is to fill from my WTR list. I thought it would be difficult to do without counting subtitles, but nope, I had dozens using just the title proper.
The ensemble will require more research, though.

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

I think I'm definitely not counting subtitles for the 6+ words. I feel like that would open it up to almost any nonfiction lol

[dalex]

For ensemble I'm planning to do a book that has a group of three or more characters mentioned in the synopsis. Until you've read the book, it's pretty much impossible to tell if it's written with multiple perspectives and/or if each character gets equal "stage time."

Six+ words in the title is super easy. I'm not sure how I'm going to narrow down my many choices to choose a book for the prompt.

[Nicole]

I’m perfectly happy with the two winners, but there were so many others that I liked more, and I was really hoping we would get four or more winners out of this poll. *sigh*

[Edie]

Avery wrote: "I’m super happy that Ensemble Cast made it! I think I suggested it last year after reading The Immortalists and Crazy Rich Asians so I’m excited for it! Poor UN International Years :( I loved that ..."

I voted for the UN prompt and am sad it didn't make, especially since we have yet another title prompt. At least this title prompt will let me pull something off my too long TBR list.

[Alicia]

I have never participated in the voting before, never knew about it really, so does this mean these two go into the 2021 regular list (after female villain)?

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

They will go on to the final list, but the order is not necessarily the order that we vote the prompts in. The mods have been working to put the prompts in an order that makes sense to the group and spaces out similar prompts (so we don't have 4 title prompts back to back, for example).

We will probably have the final list published before the end of October, and when we post it, we will open up the planning threads and weekly threads for people to start planning for 2021!

(Which I'm excited about, even if I'm two books behind on 2020 ATY lol)

[Thomas]

Alicia yes it does. They join female villain and all other prompts picked so far

[Alicia]

Thomas wrote: "Alicia yes it does. They join female villain and all other prompts picked so far"

Thank you

[Robin P, Orbicular Mod]

A lot of us who have been discussing each week liked the UN prompt but it came out on the bottom. My understanding is that we are a small sample of the actual voters. Some of them don't read all the comments and may have just found it too unusual and no obvious book sprang to mind. That's why I thought it was interesting, myself.

[Jill]

I didn't vote for either of these but am happy with them

[Alicia]

But luckily, the people that were so excited for (example) the UN prompt (or I was just reading through all the 2 degrees of separation) can use that prompt in the one that didn't make it.

[Nancy]

I will likely use my book about books for the prompt that didn't make it.

I voted for ensemble, and while I didn't vote for 6 words in the title I will have no problem filling it. Gotta love Flavia de Luce books for the long titles.

[Thomas]

Alicia wrote: "But luckily, the people that were so excited for (example) the UN prompt (or I was just reading through all the 2 degrees of separation) can use that prompt in the one that didn't make it."

Yes mine will either be the alliteration prompt or the mystery/ thriller tough choice

[Nancy]

Mystery or thriller is in poll 17 so could still make it through.

[Thomas]

Nancy wrote: "Mystery or thriller is in poll 17 so could still make it through."

It could, in which case I will defiantly pick the alliteration prompt

[Jette]

I'm good with these two. I voted for the title with more than 6 words and down voted the ensemble cast. I'll be using the listopia to fill it.

[Johanne]

Avery wrote: "I don’t think it needs to shift perspective necessarily. But I would agree it would need to be at least three main characters that the book follows, or that the author assigns roughly equal reading..."

Thanks that's actually what I meant, I didn't mean three first-person narrators, just that there at least three main characters who get a decent chunk of space each.

[Johanne]

Ellie wrote: "The definition I found for it was that multiple main characters that are equally important, rather than a big cast supporting a main character's story. So there is a lot of it in high fantasy, yes...."

Thanks Ellie. That explanation makes sense.

[Hannah]

I'm very happy about ensemble cast! I tend to love books like that and some of my all-time favorites would count: Anna Karenina, Cloud Atlas, East of Eden (and most multi-generational family sagas). There are lots of books that follow families, friend groups (I just read and loved If We Were Villains), or work groups (like The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet), so if you're into reading about relationships/group dynamics, this is a great prompt for you.

I didn't vote for more than six words in the title, but I'll probably use it to add a good nonfiction to my list!

[Beth]

Not too excited by these results. I didn't vote for either of the winners and one I did vote for is in the bottom.

The title one should be fairly easy to fill. Ensemble cast might be a bit more tricky - I'm going to check the Listopia for inspiration :)

[Alicia]

I'm surprised with the results. I wouldn't have guessed the 6+ words title. I can't remember if I voted for ensemble or trapped together, but I was happy with either.

I've made a new personal goal of eventually completing all past challenges (for ATY and PopSugar). While I was mapping all the past prompts, I started to understand why so many people here are sick of past prompts. Because 2020 was my first year, I felt the UN was a bit too out there. Now looking at all the past prompts, I wish I would have upvoted it because it is really creative and different. There's always next year!

[Rachel]

Ensemble cast was one of my votes so I'm happy that made the list. 6+ words in the title was also a prompt I really liked, but didn't vote for. I had a few other prompts I liked a bit more, and I didn't think another title prompt would be that popular.

[Traci]

Almost made it - this was the first time one of my upvotes made the bottom. (Plenty have been nothing or polarizing). These prompts should be good for my TBR.

[Ali]

Sorry for all those disappointed by the UN prompt. I have to say that I at least considered downvoting it (can't remember if I actually did....) mainly because it seemed like a load of very random things!! I'm much more likely to go for things if it was like one or two of those options, but they seemed so unrelated to each other....

Having looked it up, I see most years don't have 4 things it's the year of. Kind of sad I've let International Year of Pulses pass by without note haha!

I don't mind these two prompts although they're both the kind of thing I would fill several times over without actually trying which isn't really what motivates me with a reading challenge.

[Becky]

I didn't vote either way on the international year prompt, I think because it seemed like so many disparate things that were already each very broad. It looks like 2022 is currently the year of aquaculture, with a resolution in progress to also make it year of glass.

[Serendipity]

Didn’t vote for either of these two. Ensemble cast will be fine. Disappointed but not surprised to see another title prompt make it. This group seems to love it’s title prompts. Off to check my TBR to see if I have any long titles there.

[Pamela, Arciform Mod]

I thought we were going to get more from this, there were such good ones! I upvoted more than I normally do. Oh well! I'm started to think I should vote opposite- for the ones I don't want and vice versa. Although I don't think I voted either way for the top or bottoms here

[Angie]

I voted for ensemble but no the title prompt. Should be easy enough to fill.

[Edie]

Serendipity wrote: "Didn’t vote for either of these two. Ensemble cast will be fine. Disappointed but not surprised to see another title prompt make it. This group seems to love it’s title prompts. Off to check my TBR..."

I will be amazed if you don't have books that fill this from your TBR list (unless it only contains a dozen books). I had more than a dozen that I have read and another dozen are on my TBR list... allowing for the fact that several titles seem to be listed more than once.

[Serendipity]

You’re right Edie, I do. Six words sounds longer than it is , especially when you factor in all the little words like “a” and “of”. Despite my furious reading efforts I’ve not managed to whittle the TBR down to just a dozen titles.

[Irene]

I'm ambivalent about the 6+ words in the title prompt because even though I have 10ish books on my TBR that could work, I'm just not excited by it. On the flip side, I'm super excited about the ensemble cast prompt but only have a couple on my TBR (at least at first glance). It looks like it'll be harder than I expected to know if a book has a true ensemble cast, or just a main character with important friends!

[[deleted user]]

Irene wrote: "It looks like it'll be harder than I expected to know if a book has a true ensemble cast, or just a main character with important friends!"

struggling with this a little too! i love a good ensemble cast but it's a little hard to know for for sure while planning

[Johanne]

Maybe this is a good opportunity to put a note in the listopia vote.

[Thomas]

annie wrote: "Irene wrote: "It looks like it'll be harder than I expected to know if a book has a true ensemble cast, or just a main character with important friends!"

struggling with this a little too! i love ..."

true