[2022] Poll 4 Voting

[Jill]

I down voted a classic and a retelling as I don't want to read a classic again to enable me to read a retelling of it.

[Alicia]

I also ended up going with ones that I could make into themes. For this year's past/present/future, I made them all related to books about books (I was sad Nancy's prompt didn't make it in) and for beginning/end I'm doing Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West and The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee: Native America from 1890 to the Present. I love multi-weeks so much, I even made my "prompt that didn't make it in" into a 4-week prompt that didn't make it during the voting round!

My upvotes for this week were the ones that I can impose a theme from prompts that don't make the list, but I love.

Upvotes:
- same word in both titles
- famous pair
- different continents
- rock, paper, scissors

Downvotes:
- family relationship (I don't know any I'm interested in, although I appreciate the suggestions that have been discussed)
- eat, drink, be merry (food/drink prompts are usually immediate turnoffs for me
- land and sea (I also didn't know how I could make the land part creative, since almost all books I read are on land)
- despite just voting I can't remember the 4th one I downvoted ::smh::

[Nancy]

Alicia wrote: "I also ended up going with ones that I could make into themes. For this year's past/present/future, I made them all related to books about books (I was sad Nancy's prompt didn't make it in) and for..."

I am doing a Close Calls challenge, partly so I could use my book about books! I also shoehorned it into a few of the Pop Sugar prompts this year.

I might suggest it later on in the voting process so we may yet have it next year!

[Robin P, Orbicular Mod]

Since this is only my 2nd time going through this, I must have remembered wrong. I thought only one multi-week prompt would be selected, whichever one came out on top. It's understandable that people don't want 4-6 weeks tied up. Well, we'll see how it turns out.

[Emily, Conterminous Mod]

Last year, people voted to have as many make it in as have the votes to win, but limiting the voting to just one poll. We had two multi-weeks on the 2019 list, but only one made it to the top last year (beginning/end were two separate prompts voted in, although lots of people treat it like a multi-week).

[Pam]

I feel like I can make any of the prompts work. Some are more challenging but interesting! I’m going to base my vote on which prompts work w books I own.

Re: the land and sea prompt, I would interpret land more specific than just set on land. Maybe a journey across land (explorers, settlers, travel, hiking) or working the land (farm/rural/ranch), nonfiction (environmental topic) or “land” in the title. My first thought with this prompt was using the one-two (rather than land-sea) combo. E.g., a cover with 1 person and one with 2 people; first and second in a series or a duology.

[Jackie, Solstitial Mod]

Just a reminder to people that the results are reviewed by the mods. We're not going to have 12 weeks of multiweek prompts. Upvote the ones you like, downvote the ones you don't, and trust that if we absolutely have to we'll do a run off.

[Marie]

Mairéad wrote: "As I have already decided I want to read all LGBT books/authors for ATY 2022, that is really influencing my decisions...
2 books by authors who share a family relationship' - again like the first suggestion, I think finding two books with LGBT rep/authors written by family, that I'm interested in would be quite difficult
..."

Charlie Jane Anders and Annalee Newitz are long term partners, so would work for you, assuming you want to read their work, obviously :)

I love discovering connections between authors. My favourite literary family connection is Jeff Lindsay, creator of Dexter, is married to Hilary Hemingway, the niece of Ernest Hemingway (whose son, John Hemingway, was also a writer).

Margaret Drabble and A.S. Byatt are sisters, Janet Evanovich and Stephanie Evanovich are related through marriage, Diana Gabaldon is the mother Sam Sykes, Laini Taylor and Jim Di Bartolo are married, Nick Hornby's sister is married to Robert Harris, and Lee Child persuaded his younger brother, Andrew Grant to change his name to Andrew Child and take over the Jack Reacher series, and I nearly forgot to include James Lee Burke is Alafair Burke's dad, and Rhianna Pratchett, daughter of Terry Pratchett published a book fairly recently.

[NancyJ]

Chrissy pointed out the famous pair could include words or ideas that go together, but there was nothing in the notes on this prompt on the first page, which is unfortunate. It's really hard to read everything.

If I'm interpreting it correctly, famous pairs would allow us to choose for ourselves which two related topics we wanted to read. It sounds perfect, or too easy, but I like it means that I could choose(later) from:

Flora and Fauna
Light and Dark
Fake and Real (though true and false is more "famous")
Sun and Moon
Science and Nature
Science and Technology
Land and Sea
Good and Bad (but not ugly)
Fun and Games
Best of times and Worst of Times
Revolution and Evolution
Adapt or die
Adaption v Extinction
Love and Marriage
Husband and Wife
Bill and Hillary
Climate and Change (well maybe not)
Convergent and divergent
Fast or Slow (short time period v long time period
Once and again (Classic and retelling)

[NancyJ]

Jackie wrote: "Just a reminder to people that the results are reviewed by the mods. We're not going to have 12 weeks of multiweek prompts. Upvote the ones you like, downvote the ones you don't, and trust that if ..."

That makes sense.

[Angie]

I haven't voted yet (saying this for myself so I remember to do it tomorrow). I wanted to "think out loud" about these prompts.

I am intrigued by:
*A classic novel or story and a retelling of that classic (I would prefer it to be "retelling of a classic" so I could read any retelling)
*2 books by authors who share a family relationship (I've been meaning to get to Joe Hill)
*2 related books written in different centuries
*2 books with the same word in the title

Random thoughts:
*2 books related to a famous pair (like it but prefer it as a single-week topic)
*2 books related to flora and fauna (not sure about this one beyond using it as a cover prompt)
*3 books related to the three primary colors (I've done this kind of prompt many times. I think I'd prefer it as a single-week prompt.)

The others I have to think more on. Multi-week prompts, in general, aren't my favorite, but I'm sure I can come up with something for most of them.)

[NancyJ]

Angie wrote: "I haven't voted yet (saying this for myself so I remember to do it tomorrow). I wanted to "think out loud" about these prompts.

I am intrigued by:
*A classic novel or story and a retelling of tha..."

Hi Angie, I was just browsing some retellings lists to get ideas. There are so many new ones!

Flora and Fauna has a lot of great possibilities:

*You could read any books with a plant or animal name in the title or the author's name: such as Tiger, lion, dog, tree, bird, robin, bees, flower, daisy, shark, fly, ladybug, fish, week, grass, daisy, etc.
*You could read any book about plants, animals, nature, or even cats or dogs, fish, or bugs.
*You could read one of the newer books on the best-of nature/science lists at the end of the year. They always have something surprising. Like how trees can communicate and protect other trees. Or the new discoveries about evolution, extinction. The new book Phallacy would be perfect for " You read what?"
*You could read one of the books on climate change or climate fiction (they all involve plant and animals). I plan to read more climate fiction.
My favorite fiction book early this year was related: Migrations, and she has a new book coming out soon:Once There Were Wolves which is getting great reviews from the early readers.
Others I liked or want to read:
Lab Girl
Prodigal Summer
Oryx and Crake
The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate – Discoveries from a Secret World

[Ellie]

Nancy wrote: "Alicia wrote: "I also ended up going with ones that I could make into themes. For this year's past/present/future, I made them all related to books about books (I was sad Nancy's prompt didn't make..."

Have you seen today's Goodreads blog is all about books about books?! https://www.goodreads.com/blog/show/2...

[NancyJ]

What do you mean? It didn't get in last year? I started working on the rejected prompts and I don't remember it.

Awesome. I haven't visited the Wild Discussion lately. Do you know if anyone is planning to submit a suggestion for the next vote for Books about Books?

I like your approach to plan space for your own themes. I'm really interested in climate fiction for a theme for Flora or fauna or for where ever I can make it work. Famous Pairs might be the solution. I haven't voted yet. I want to hear what others are thinking (those who didn't already vote.)

I hope to see other one book suggestions for some of the multiweeks that don't make it.

[Nancy]

A book about books was a close call last year. I suggested it twice, I believe, but it didn't make it. A lot of people don't love it as a prompt, not sure why. It could have been because 2019 had a similar one - A book about reading, books or an author/writer. And 2016 had A book about books.

I can for sure suggest it in round 5.

[Jillian]

One problem with a book about a book is that those of us who do lots of challenges have seen it so many times and it feels really repetitive.

[NancyJ]

Nancy wrote: "A book about books was a close call last year. I suggested it twice, I believe, but it didn't make it. A lot of people don't love it as a prompt, not sure why. It could have been because 2019 had a..."

I would love it. I don't do pop sugar or other prompt challenges, so I doesn't feel repetitive to me as it might to others. Maybe it will have a better chance this year. I wonder if there is another way to phrase it that will feel fresh (without confusing people). Or maybe a better way to freshen it would be to include a short list of new and super popular books that fit the prompt. Some might have added recent books without recognizing they would fit this prompt. That's one thing that always sways me when voting.

[NancyJ]

Jillian wrote: "One problem with a book about a book is that those of us who do lots of challenges have seen it so many times and it feels really repetitive."

I see. It's fairly new to me. Was it in other challenges this year? If not, maybe there are some new books that would get people interested in it again.

[Nancy]

Let's take this to the Wild Discussion thread.

[Angie]

Finally voted. Boy, I had a tough time with this one. I wound up going 4/4, and my upvotes weren't necessarily what I thought they'd be.

My upvotes

~3 books set on three different continents (wasn't planning on this one, but when I started doing the research, I found lots of options)
~3 books related to eat, drink, and be merry (another I had not originally planned to vote for but did)
~2 books by authors who share a family relationship (I read a lot of Stephen King. This could be a push to read Joe Hill.)
~2 books set in two different centuries

My downvotes were for those I had trouble coming up with books/ideas for...

[Becky]

I gravitated toward the prompts that force some connection between the content of the books. That seems like the point of a multi-week prompt to me, but a lot of them end up feeling more like multiple similar prompts that get selected at the same time. Based on that, I upvoted:
- A classic novel or story and a retelling of that classic
- 2 books with the same word in the title (excluding articles and conjunctions)
- 2 related books written in different centuries
- 2 books related to flora and fauna (I considered famous pair, but it felt too loose to me to actually encourage the connection)

I upvoted two others because I just like them :)
- 3 books related to the phrase "Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil, See No Evil"
- A book set within a short time and a book set within a long time

And I ended up downvoted relationship between the authors because that felt too limiting to me, despite all the suggestions so far. I'm sure I'll figure it out if it gets in--I seem to end up enjoying a lot of unexpected prompts!