Goodreads Librarians Group discussion
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Serieses!
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Tips for working with series
message 51:
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Sandra
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Nov 05, 2010 05:30AM
I've just been adding/fixing the most popular edition, so it shows up where needed.
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rivka wrote: "That's the hope/plan."Might I ask what the rationale for that plan is? I *like* seeing the series # in the title, as both a reader and a librarian. But there's probably some issue I haven't thought of...
The plan is when the series shows everywhere the title does, it won't be needed, it will just be duplicated information. So the series information won't be missing, it will just be in a separate field beside or below the title instead of in the title.
Velma, the whole of the plan is to remove the series information from the title field as soon as the series name and number shows next to the title field everywhere on the site. :)
Cait wrote: "Velma, the whole of the plan is to remove the series information from the title field as soon as the series name and number shows next to the title field everywhere on the site. :)"Ah! So, if I search for, say, "Harry Potter", will the series # of each volume still show up in the list returned, or will I have to go to the individual book record?
Yes, just as it shows on the book page now, eventually the primary series (and number if there is one) should show everywhere the title is shown.
Deborah wrote: "Yes, just as it shows on the book page now, eventually the primary series (and number if there is one) should show everywhere the title is shown."Yay! That IS good news, thank you Deborah.
Is anyone else having problems removing books from a series list? The remove button is no longer showing on my screen. Not sure if its just me?
Sandra wrote: "Is anyone else having problems removing books from a series list? The remove button is no longer showing on my screen. Not sure if its just me?"It looks like there's a bug in the formatting on that page -- using Chrome I can just barely see the "n" in "note". We should report this on the Feedback group, I think.
Thanks for reporting that Cait, it was late & I had to sign off.
Has anyone else been adding nonfiction series? Are those okay to add?I did one that I'm reading now already, but it seems like most series are fiction, so I wanted to check before I spent a long time working on something really time-consuming like 33 1/3.
Mod
I can't see any reason for non-fiction series to be excluded.
Thanks. I figured that would be the case, but I didn't want to start on one that included so many books if it would need to be deleted.
I've done some nonfiction series work, which can be really a pain with the subseries and the variations in series names through time! I think there are more fiction series done so far because they're a lot easier to do. :)
Cait wrote: "I think there are more fiction series done so far because they're a lot easier to do."Also, is it still the case that only one series can be added per work, for the foreseeable future? For academic non-fiction it's pretty common that a book be published in more than one series (sometimes even the same edition counts in more than one), whereas in fiction that rarely happens because series is more usually something inherent to the book (except for publisher reprint series). But at the same time, those characteristics mean that many fewer people actually seek out nonfiction based on its series. I'm just curious about how the issue stands.
Nickname wrote: "Excuse me but I don't understand a thing.Can I insert for example Maigret's novels of Georges Simenon as a serie? These books have not a precise order. Sorry for my English, I'm a new Italian user"
There is a better description of how to add and edit a series at this link: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/4...
Yes you can add that series, a series does not have to be numbered.
Mod
Many books have multiple (sometimes overlapping) series. We even have move-up/-down buttons to change which series appears first on a given work.
Nickname, a series does not have to be numbered; if a set of books ties together, you can list them as a series without numbers (although you might want to sort them on the page alphabetically or by publication date).Catherine, a book can be part of multiple series. Only one shows up next to the title, but all of them are listed with the book details. You can change which one is listed with the title by changing the sort order on the edit page: the series in spot #1 shows up with the title.
Oh, good! I'll have to get back to working on a few more nonfiction series sometime.
I'm in need of a bit of policy guidance more than tech help:I'm working on The Dialogue of Catherine of Siena - which has many editions (some distinctly different in content, depending on the secondary author or editor). What I discovered is that because I added a particular edition to a series (Classics of Western Spirituality), the site then started to consider all of the other editions as part of the CWS series - which they are definitely not. I either had to remove the series that I had created (and then the CWS series is no longer properly complete) or I have to separate the CWS edition/s from all of the other editions of the Dialogue. (And then it won't be ovbious why those editions have not been combined with the others).
I understand that technically a book can belong/be added to multiple series, but I'm sure it will be very confusing to the average user to have series information coming up next to editions that are definitely not part of a particular series.
Does anyone have any thoughts about this? Has anyone had the same dilemma - especially with "older" works that have been reproduced in many different incarnations.
Is there any way I can get a particular work to rightly belong to a series without forcing all of the other editions to belong in error?
Mod
No. And partly because of this, only books where all editions of a work are part of a series should be added to series. (This was determined after quite a bit of debate.)
No. And partly because of this, only books ..."Thanks for your answer, it helps! I suppose that for now I will fight my impulsive urge to do series classifications, and leave things be, rather than cause a muddle. (I'm glad the debate was had!) :)
Mountie wrote: "Thanks for all the series tips Librarians. Now that we have this lovely series machine on Goodreads is it important for us to label each book in the title (Series, #?) since now that is included ..."I didn't see this specifically addressed?
I'd like to create a series for an author who has eight books, with several entries for each; I'm willing to add that info to the many titles manually, but don't wish to if not necessary.
Thanks!
John, it's helpful to add it to the default book. That's the most popular book, but no need to add it to all editions.That way it shows in various places that the ghosted Series info doesn't yet.
How do I know which one is the "default" - the first one in the list on the combine page?
Question that I thought should stay in this thread: I have a series that goes by different names in different places. Do I just make a second series, or is there some method of indicating that the same series has multiple names?
Evan wrote: "Question that I thought should stay in this thread: I have a series that goes by different names in different places. Do I just make a second series, or is there some method of indicating that the..."Please don't create duplicate series; just put the alternate names in the description. It is OK to make a second series if the order is different.
Almost gave me heart palpitations there Evan!LOL
I've done that, but I worry that if someone is searching for that particular series that it won't show up anywhere. I'll give the current example: the Flavia de Luce series is known as The Buckshaw Chronicles in some localities. Furthermore, the titles of individual books are easily forgettable. They tend to be both long and rather random--not really related to the subject of the books at all. The author's name is forgettably dull. So when users try to search via series (which should be trivial), they get nothing. If this is too far-fetched to worry about, that's fine. I just like a well cross-referenced database. Thoughts?
They will show up in search if you put it in the description. You can test it using Southern Vampire. Here is the search page:
http://www.google.com/cse/home?cx=002...
My publisher changed the name of my series to "Unbound" but I cannot get the first book in the series to stop showing the old series title, "Gothic Revival." Since I am not a librarian, it wouldn't let me change the series name under "Work Settings." Can anyone help? I left a librarian note on my "Edit Book" page. Thanks!http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10...
Eve wrote: "My publisher changed the name of my series to "Unbound" but I cannot get the first book in the series to stop showing the old series title, "Gothic Revival." Since I am not a librarian, it wouldn't..."I've fixed it. For future reference, any editing requests need to be made in this group. Librarian notes are only to keep people from making incorrect changes, only someone trying to edit the book can see those notes.
Thank you very much, Deborah. I appreciate it!
Eve wrote: "Thank you very much, Deborah. I appreciate it!"You're welcome
Question: An author requested that her books be put into a series. I did. So when you click on it, it takes you to a series page with the works. BUT on her author profile, there is no sections that say Series by XXXX like it says for other authors. Is there a different way to go about setting that up? Thanks!
It's a caching issue Lady Jaye. It will just appear there like magic. Not sure, but I think it can take 24-48 hrs.
I've tried to fix this series, but something just isn't working right. It's Robert McCammon's Matthew Corbett series. When you view his series, it says there is only 1 book and it only shows 1 picture. However, when you click on "Matthew Corbett" you see that all 3 books in the series are there. What's up?
My guess it's a caching issue Debra, you've only just added them. All 3 are listed as being in the series.
Sandra wrote: "My guess it's a caching issue Debra, you've only just added them. All 3 are listed as being in the series."gotcha! I'll check on them tomorrow.
Hi everyone, hoping someone more expert can give me a little direction here - Regarding Brian Jacques Redwall books, they have been edited into 2 series (Published order and Chronological order) the published order is the primary series and the one in the title display
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/79...
however the chronological order is the more coherent way to read them.
Should I change them?
If you're sure that is the better way to read them, then yes.
Being a little OCD about reading series in chronological order; i have been wondering today, to what extend should we follow the order listed by some authors? I have noticed, with a few series that i have read; that some authors list the order according to publication release, because they don't feel their series need to be read in any particular order. I of course, would disagree, because even the smallest presence from an already established couple (whose story i have not read) would make my eye twitch.
So if they have a preference for a particular order, but I (having read the series), don't think that is the correct order. Should i keep it to their preference? Make a note somewhere, or can i change it to the readers chronological order?
Rossy, if there is already a published order, there is no impediment to you establishing a chronological order series, if you feel it needs one.But don't delete or change the published order except to edit it - to say that it is the published order. As there will be OCD people who prefer that way over the chronological style.
Good luck ;)
@Danielle (msg 94) - I would actually leave the published order as the main series. The coherency of a published vs. chronological reading is extremely subjective. For Redwall, the published order is the order listed on Brian Jacques' website, and in the FAQs the website addresses the chronological order by saying "Webmaster's note: Although we recommend reading the books in the order in which they were written...the chronological order of the books is:"Which says to me that the published version should remain the original one.
@Rossy (msg 96) - Same as above, published vs. chronological order is subjective and the order the author/publisher/etc gives is more of an official order than a fan created chronology (even if correct). Definitely don't change the current series order.
I don't think we have an official policy on it, but I would rather see a note on the main series saying "the chronological order is..." then having two series for every series that was not published in chronological order.
The Black God's War (Splendor and Ruin, #1)How do I fix the series in this one? Times like this I want to get at the MARC code :P
Shows as:
The Black God's War (Splendor and Ruin, #1) (Splendor and Ruin #1)
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