Category talk:Novel sequences

message: How is this different from :Category:Series of books? -Aranel ("Sarah") 22:03, 1 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: I just added these lines (or emphasis) to the page header:
::For groups of novels where the order does not matter, see :Category:Series of books.
::...
::Note this distinction is backwards from the terminology in common use in Speculative Fiction and all its common subgenres. In fantasy, sci-fi, and alt-History, series generally connotes that order matters (very much thankyou!) unlike for example, in a set of detective mystery novels, which by the given distinction is a series Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer, Virginia Wolfe, and numerous others.
*As justification, consider the various honorverse articles, a very profitable and popular science fiction series per  Baens Books, the 1632 series article, where plot development is multithread, yet sequentially significant as its an alternate history. Similarly most books by John Ringo fit into sequential series of 3 to 5 books. (All Baen Books)
::As a consequence, I'd like to propose the category Sequential series be the name of this category. Even old time action adventure series like James Bond and Ian McDonalds' Matt Helm spy novels were expected to be read in order.  So where did this awkward sounding title come from? No usage I've seen in 51 years of prolific eclectic reading. Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, Tom Swift,...,  I can type a lot of fiction series where chronology matters to both reader and writer.
*Which brings up another distiction disagreement. The definition on this page refered to by the author, which I modified to 'by the author/editor' because of a new phenomenum— pioneered in the  1632 series books. Author Eric Flint, having written 1632 (novel) as a single novel, when nearly overwhelmed by the huge success of that work, gambled and threw the development of the milieu open to ideas on the net on the publishers net forum Baens Bar, then invited other published authors to play in his new playground under the rules generated by that first generation of on line respondents. Subsequently the 1633 (novel) and Ring of Fire (anthology) were co-developed and concurrently written by no less than (at least) seventeen previously published or 'name' authors, not counting editor/author Flint in that 2nd opus. The great and growing commercial success of this method is sure to be copied time and again going forward from 2002. The Series is currently up to ten books in five years, and there are co-writing contracts for at least five more just by 1633 co-authors Weber and Flint. Two others between DeMarce and Flint, and another two between David Freer and Flint. The demand for these works is not quite parrallel to Harry Potter, but its trending that way, and Flint has finally frozen the 1632 Tech Manual which means even more publishing in less development time.
::<B>Fra</B>nkB 05:19, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cultural Collision with Popular Term 

message: I think that currently :Category:Novel sequences and :Category:Series of books are confusing, even with the description in them. I'd recommend either:
1) renaming of: :Category:Novel sequences to :Category:Series of books (sequential) and :Category:Series of books to :Category:Series of books (non-sequential), or
2) defining :Category:Novel sequences as a category for books in sequence and a subcategory of :Category:Series of books, and possibly creating a category for books not in a sequence but sharing some common theme.
Also, it is not clear whether novel sequence HAS to be read in order, SHOULD be read in order of CAN be read in order. And the categories of Novel sequence and Book series need to be unified. Finally, :Category:Series of books should be renamed :Category:Book series to have the same name as her article (or the article should be moved).--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 17:09, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that making a distinction between a set of novels intended to be read in a particular order and a set of novels NOT intended to be read in a particular order (but having the same setting, characters, etc), is at worst a completely unnecessary distinction, and at best a premature distinction. There should first be a category to distinguish connected novels from other book series types (such as Choose-Your-Own-Adventure, or For Dummies, or anthology series). That's what I first assumed this category was for. Also, confusingly, the article novel sequence defines this term exactly the opposite as the category does; as novels NOT intended to be read in a particular order. MakeRocketGoNow 23:13, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Marcel Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu (1913–27; Remembrance of Things Past) had no time for fresh beginnings. Evoking the vanishing world of fashionable Parisian society of the Third Republic, the novel sequence explored the ways in which memory, imagination, and, most of all, artistic form could be put to work together to counter the corrosive effects of time. 
So there IS an easy solution—pull anything out of the category which cannot be defined as a 'Novel Sequence' per (WP:V and require member-articles to carry explicit cites as footnotes) such by an external reference calling it such—we are talking about a small exclusive club here. In essence, the follow-on novels aren't crafted to be stand-alone according to Brittanica— thus they can be viewed as a single serialized very long novel. (Perhaps like the Never Ending Story... <G>)
# This satisfys the colloquial usage of series, and the technical needs of literary arcana. This would remove Harry Potter, honorverse, and 1632 series for sure, imho.  
#And remove the unnecessary distinction that I agree with MakeRocketGoNow about—the new criteria for :Category: Novel sequences  thus becomes whether there is a third-party who has reviewed/studied/commented about the work that has called it a 'Novel sequence', which can be footnoted. 
#That may cause a few such to be categorized as series, but being a technical niche, they instead of the one's collected by :Category:Novel sequences will have the likelihood of being seen and explored by many more possible browsing readers.
#It also solves another problem: What to do with series that should be read chronologically but also contain short fiction collections that aren't novels. Series does not cause collision with those anthologies, so they fit into the niche quite nicely.
#Lastly, I concur with Piotr: rename the bookseries  cat s.t :Category:Series of books s be renamed :Category:Book series to match . This should be done initially with a redirect for later deletion, then have that cleaned up by AWB or a BOT.
The other renaming ought to be forgotten about per MrDarcy. 
Best regards to all, <B>Fra</B>nkB 05:13, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

text: I'm with FrankB on just about all of those points. "Novel sequence" is a technical term, not a Wikipedia distinction, and it should be preserved. We may miscategorize a series as a sequence or vice versa, but over time those mistakes will be ironed out. | Mr. Darcy talk 14:30, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Rename to avoid confusion

message: Thankyou Mr Darcy!!! This is much as I suspected five weeks ago when posting above. Novel Sequences are a technical term; if I understand the below and MrDarcy above, it essentially means one novel over many volumes—as some have considered Lord of the Rings—reading The Two Towers w/o reading either of the others would be fairly unsatisfying, I would suspect. Quoting (Encycl. Brittanica from link by MrDarcy): 
:::Marcel Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu (1913–27; Remembrance of Things Past) had no time for fresh beginnings. Evoking the vanishing world of fashionable Parisian society of the Third Republic, the novel sequence explored the ways in which memory, imagination, and, most of all, artistic form could be put to work together to counter the corrosive effects of time. 
So there IS an easy solution—pull anything out of the category which cannot be defined as a 'Novel Sequence' per (WP:V and require member-articles to carry explicit cites as footnotes) such by an external reference calling it such—we are talking about a small exclusive club here. In essence, the follow-on novels aren't crafted to be stand-alone according to Brittanica— thus they can be viewed as a single serialized very long novel. (Perhaps like the Never Ending Story... <G>)
# This satisfys the colloquial usage of series, and the technical needs of literary arcana. This would remove Harry Potter, honorverse, and 1632 series for sure, imho.  
#And remove the unnecessary distinction that I agree with MakeRocketGoNow about—the new criteria for :Category: Novel sequences  thus becomes whether there is a third-party who has reviewed/studied/commented about the work that has called it a 'Novel sequence', which can be footnoted. 
#That may cause a few such to be categorized as series, but being a technical niche, they instead of the one's collected by :Category:Novel sequences will have the likelihood of being seen and explored by many more possible browsing readers.
#It also solves another problem: What to do with series that should be read chronologically but also contain short fiction collections that aren't novels. Series does not cause collision with those anthologies, so they fit into the niche quite nicely.
#Lastly, I concur with Piotr: rename the bookseries  cat s.t :Category:Series of books s be renamed :Category:Book series to match . This should be done initially with a redirect for later deletion, then have that cleaned up by AWB or a BOT.
The other renaming ought to be forgotten about per MrDarcy. 
Best regards to all, <B>Fra</B>nkB 05:13, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm with FrankB on just about all of those points. "Novel sequence" is a technical term, not a Wikipedia distinction, and it should be preserved. We may miscategorize a series as a sequence or vice versa, but over time those mistakes will be ironed out. | Mr. Darcy talk 14:30, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Thankyou_Mr._Darcy

message: I've gone over the Wikipedia entry for novel sequence and the discussion above. Unfortunately, defining what is and what isn't a "novel sequence" seems highly problematic. The category also has great potential for confusion. Hell, I'm still confused. Unless someone can explain what is and what isn't a "novel sequence" to my satisfaction, I suggest this category be scrapped, and some more general category be created that encompasses all interrelated novels/series of novels. Or create an even MORE general category for interrelated fiction so that a book of short stories is not excluded from its brother novel(s).  Perhaps :Category:Fiction series or :Category:Fiction book series or :Category:Sequential series or :Category:Sequential book series.  MakeRocketGoNow 00:35, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: To me, "series" is a subset of "sequence", but I'm not ready to die in a ditch over that argument.  However, I'm very concerned that anyone could consider "book" to be a synonym of "novel".  A book could be history or any other type or non-fiction.  It could be poetry, children's picture books, or pretty much anything that goes between two covers. Deb 12:00, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If you read the discussion above, you'll see the suggestion that the category only include those works defined by reliable sources as novel sequences. It's more than a suggestion, actually - it's a rule. Since third party sources do make this distinction (cf. the reference to Proust's works as a novel sequence above), then Wikipedia can and should make this distinction as well. I'm not clear why this one user is pushing so hard to delete the category. | Mr. Darcy talk 13:22, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Deleting the category is not necessary. I'm also fine with restricting this category to externally defined "novel sequences." But to alleviate confusion, I'd like to see a new category created that is a subcategory of :Category:Series of books that would encompass all connected novels/fiction. Suggestions? MakeRocketGoNow 16:14, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Start over

message: I hope I have got the sorting correct but please someone sanity check the work. This category should now only have the articles relating to groups of novels, that is "loosely" associated novels refered to as a "Novel sequence" see debates above. Others have been moved to :Category:Novel series or even elsewhere. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 10:29, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, Kevin, for a terrific job. I had lost hope. <g> ♥ Her Pegship♥ 16:23, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Articles sorted

message: Just a thought but the [[Novel sequence] article itself doesn't make clear the line of distinction between sequence and series. Any thoughts  and / or ammendments please. :: Kevinalewis : (Talk Page)/(Desk) 11:47, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Novel sequence article