[DONE] Request to fix up the "Little Lunch" mess

[RM]

Little Lunch is a "series" of books created by Danny Katz and illustrator Mitch Vane. The Goodreads entries are a mess, in part because the books were published and republished using different titles at different times and in different sub-series.

Goodreads presently features 2x separate lists:

1. https://www.goodreads.com/series/2649... - contains 2 books

2. https://www.goodreads.com/series/1543... - contains 14 books, including at least one compendium.

In fact, there have been 12 distinct books published across what might be considered to be 3 "series":

**SERIES 1 (2001-2006)**
The first "series" was published between 2001 and 2006. The individual titles in this series were simply called Little Lunch [One], Little Lunch Two, etc:

1. Little Lunch (One) (2001): https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6... -- confusingly, this was republished as Little Lunch: The Slide (2015) as part of Series 2 (see below).

2. Little Lunch Two (2002, ISBN 1876372125): not yet on Goodreads. NLA catalogue entry here: https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/catalog/... Confusingly, this was republished as Little Lunch: The Monkey Bars (2015) as part of Series 2 (see below).

3. Little Lunch Three (2003, ISBN 1876372206): https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... -- this was republished as Little Lunch: The Bubblers (2015) as part of Series 2.

4. Little Lunch Four (2005, ISBN 1921104325): https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6... -- republished as Little Lunch: The School Gate (2015) as part of Series 2.

5. Little Lunch Five (2006, ISBN 1921167335), not yet on Goodreads. NLA catalogue entry: https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/catalog/... Republished as Little Lunch: The Old Climbing Tree (2015) as part of Series 2.

**SERIES 2 (2015, reprinted 2023)**
In 2015 the stories were adapted into an Australian TV series, and no doubt to capitalise on this, the publishers began to both republish Series 1 under new titles, and publish all-new entries by Katz and Vane:

1. Little Lunch: The Bubblers (2015, ISBN 1925126676, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... ). This is a 2nd edition of Little Lunch Three (2003) above; these distinct entries on Goodreads can be merged/combined as different editions of the same work.

2. Little Lunch: The Off-Limits Fence (2015, ISBN 1742032370, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... ) -- this was an all-new work.

3. Little Lunch: The Slide (2015, ISBN 192512665X, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... ) -- this was a republication of Little Lunch One (2001) above. These entries can be merged/combined as editions of the same work. The Slide was also reprinted in 2023 with a different ISBN (1760656771) and cover (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1... )

4. Little Lunch: The School Gate (2015, ISBN 1925126684, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4... ) -- this was a republication of Little Lunch Four (2005, above), and these separate entries can be merged/combined as editions of the same work. Was also later reprinted in 2023 with a different ISBN (1760656801) and cover: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

5. Little Lunch: The Monkey Bars (2015, ISBN 1925126668, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... ) -- this was a republication of Little Lunch Two (2002), above, and these separate entries can be combined/merged as editions of the same work. Reprinted in 2023 under a new ISBN (176065678X), https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

6. Little Lunch: The Old Climbing Tree (2015, ISBN 1925126692, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... ) - this was a republication of Little Lunch Five (2006), above, and these separate entries can be combined/merged as editions of the same work. Reprinted in 2023 under a new ISBN (176065681X), https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

7. Little Lunch: The Block B Roof (2023, ISBN 1760657050), https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1... -- an all-new work.

8. Little Lunch: The Bin Shed (2023, ISBN 1760657069). All-new work. Not yet on Goodreads; Amazon site here: https://www.amazon.com.au/Little-Lunc... -- but Goodreads does have a Kindle edition (ISBN 1760657093, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1... )

**SERIES 3 (Novelisations, 2016-2018)**
To capitalise on the TV series, Katz and Vane created a 2nd series of 4 books (published 2016-2018) which adapted the scripts from that series. Some of the individual stories had the same names as those in the 1st series, but the texts and illustrations were new:

1. Little Lunch: Triple the Treats (2016, ISBN 1925126900, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3... ). Republished as Little Lunch: Triple Treats (2019, ISBN 0763694711, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4... ). These separate entries can be merged as different editions of the same work.

2. Little Lunch: Triple the Laughs (2017, ISBN 1921977396, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4... ).

3. Little Lunch: Triple the Trouble (2017, ISBN 192538182X, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4... ).

4. Little Lunch: Triple the Games (2018, ISBN 1760650277, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3... ).

[Tami]

RM wrote: "Little Lunch is a "series" of books created by Danny Katz and illustrator Mitch Vane. The Goodreads entries are a mess, in part because the books were published and republished using different titl..."

Alright, I think I've managed all the combines/separations. Please check. Now, regarding the series pages:

Here's the original series: https://www.goodreads.com/series/4016...

The updated series, are you sure the numbering changed? Where are you getting that information? I'm finding conflicting information on this. I only found the conflicting information after I had already created the other series as per usual 🤦‍♀️: https://www.goodreads.com/series/1543...

I left Big Stories from Little Lunch there as a non-primary work. Per worldcat it's 15 stories, check where it says "contents" https://search.worldcat.org/title/319...

The best practice now that I look at it would be to list all the books in publication order, that way we preserve the original order and we don't have multiple series.

I also found The Bin Shed paperback, which a bot had marked as invalid: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

The novelisations series: https://www.goodreads.com/series/2649...

I have a question about the novelizations. Where would Triple Snack Pack: Little Lunch Series fit in? From what I see, it is a novelization, and it's included in the collection Little Lunch: The Collection, which only has four books, not five. It's missing Little Lunch: Triple the Games. I haven't added Triple Snack Pack or The Collection to the series yet, as I wanted to ask first.

If we go by publication dates and the collection then it would be:
1. Triple the Treats
2. Triple Snack Pack
3. Triple the Trouble
4. Triple the Laughs
5. Triple the Games.

Maybe for this one it would be best to also keep them in publication order. It's usually what works best.

Edit: If there's no reply by Monday or Tuesday, I'll delete the superfluous series I created and will organize the existing series by publication order to maintain the original numbering. I found the same order on the illustrator's site: https://www.mitchvane.com/books/the-l... It follows the publication order. I couldn't find any source for the order of SERIES 2. If any librarian comes across this and would like to give their input on the request, please feel free.

[RM]

Amazing work Tami!

From what I can tell so far:

1. The "original series" you've linked to - https://www.goodreads.com/series/4016... - contains the correct publication order, as indicated by the titles of the original publications (i.e. Little Lunch One, Little Lunch Two, etc). However the actual editions displayed in this list are the 2015 re-publications (The Slide, The Monkey Bars, etc). There may be no way around this if Goodreads simply displays the editions that are most rated/popular.

2. The entry for Little Lunch One (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...) default-displays its 2015 republication (as The Monkey Bars), which means it's also marked as the 3rd entry in the series. Again, there may be no way around this.

3. Big Stories from Little Lunch (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...) is in fact a compilation of all 5 books in the original (2001-2006) series (One, Two, Three, etc). It is currently included in the 'Series 2' list, but if we're retaining separate lists it should properly be included in 'Series 1'.

4. All things considered, your suggestion to simply list all the books in publication order makes a lot of sense. If nothing else, that means the compilations can indicate which particular entries they include.

5. I'd missed Triple Snack Pack entirely: I've sourced a copy from my local library, so I'll be able to double-check its contents when it arrives. But on the face of it, it does appear to be a 5th entry in the 'novelisations' series.

Again, amazing work!!

[Tami]

RM wrote: "Amazing work Tami!

From what I can tell so far:

1. The "original series" you've linked to - https://www.goodreads.com/series/4016... - contains the correct publication order, as indic..."

1 and 2. Goodreads defaults to displaying the edition with the most shelvings. Unfortunately, librarians don't have the ability to choose which edition is shown as the default.

3. Thank you for clarifying! I understand now that each book contains 3 stories, so 3x5=15

4. I agree, and this aligns with what the illustrator's site shows. I’ve deleted the duplicate series I had mistakenly created, so we have:

The original book series: https://www.goodreads.com/series/1543...
The TV series adaptations: https://www.goodreads.com/series/2649...

Both are listed in publication order. The description for Triple the Games also includes the adaptation series in publication order.

It seems the confusion might have come from someone mixing up the adaptation series with the original books. Everything should be sorted now, though some changes might take a little time to appear correctly on the site.

5. That's perfectly fine. You can double-check with a physical copy if needed. The "Look Inside" feature on Amazon, as well as the publisher's site, shows that Triple Snack Pack has unique content compared to the others in the adaptation series. It is a unique entry within the series.

Thank you for the compliment! I’m glad you think my work is great <3