Knowledge talk:Notability (books)

4301:"This guideline applies to series of books, and to multi-volume books, as well as to single-volume books. Where a source contains coverage of one of the books in a series of books, this coverage is deemed to be coverage of the series of books, in addition to being coverage of that book. Where a source contains coverage of one of the volumes in a multi-volume book, this coverage is deemed to be coverage of the multi-volume book, in addition to being coverage of that volume. Where a book in a notable series of books, or a volume in a notable multi-volume book, is not independently notable, it should be merged to the series or multi-volume work. Editors may use their discretion to merge a book into the series of books of which the book is part, in cases where the level of coverage the book, and the rest of the series, has received is such that the book can be conveniently covered in the parent article, without the parent article becoming unbalanced or too large. Editors may use their discretion to merge a volume into the multi-volume book of which the volume is part, in cases where the level of coverage the volume, and the rest of the multi-volume book, has received is such that the volume can be conveniently covered in the parent article, without the parent article becoming unbalanced or too large. The general notability guideline, in its application to series of books, and to multi-volume books, shall be interpretated in accordance with this paragraph." 3406:"This guideline applies to series of books, and to multi-volume books, as well as to single-volume books. Where a source contains coverage of one of the books in a series of books, this coverage is deemed to be coverage of the series of books, in addition to being coverage of that book. Where a source contains coverage of one of the volumes in a multi-volume book, this coverage is deemed to be coverage of the multi-volume book, in addition to being coverage of that volume. Where book in a notable series of books, or a volume in a notable multi-volume book, is not independently notable, it should be merged to the series or multi-volume work. Editors may use their discretion to merge a book into the series of books of which the book is part, in cases where the level of coverage the book, and the rest of the series, has received is such that the book can be conveniently covered in the parent article, without the parent article becoming unbalanced or too large. Editors may use their discretion to merge a volume into the multi-volume book of which the volume is part, in cases where the level of coverage the volume, and the rest of the multi-volume book, has received is such that the volume can be conveniently covered in the parent article, without the parent article becoming unbalanced or too large." 426:

whole, so NOTINHERITED is not intended to apply here. Furthermore, I think that putting this all in the article for the first book would result in one of two scenarios: the series is either given undue weight (making a spinoff page a necessity) or it would result in us covering the series less than we could in a properly sourced and written series page (where the notability type coverage is more for the reviews and NYT listings). This is also beneficial in cases where there are multiple sources for the individual books where we could create a good series page, but not really enough to establish notability for the individual books. (IE, a series has 4-5 books. Each book manages about 1-3 reviews, there's 1-2 sources about the series as a whole, and a plethora of primary sources discussing the book's development and release. Enough to where we could establish notability for the author, but the series is their only notable work and people would more want coverage for the series, not the author.)

1919:. There is no difference between a series of books; the volumes of a multi-volume book; and the chapters of a book. Saying that we should have separate articles for notable individual "books" instead of an article for the notable "series" is like saying that we should have separate articles for notable individual "chapters" instead of an article for the notable "book". Subdivisions of topics like "volume", "book", "chapter", and so on, don't necessarily have any importance, significance or meaning whatsoever. They are sometimes arbitrary. In most cases, it is far better to have an article on a parent topic (which would be the "series") than to have multiple random orphaned articles on subtopics (the individual subdivisions of the "series"). You don't want a stack of articles like 4737:), often reliably published book reviews. In the case you mention, this appears to have been demonstrated both in reviews linked in the AfD and in the current references of the article. I agree, though, that #3 is suspiciously specific, and should probably be changed. I imagine what it was really intended for is some kind of inherited notability: if a book is adapted into a notable motion picture, then the book should also be notable. The parts about "other art form, or event or political or religious movement" seem tacked-on and maybe applicable to only a very small number of cases. There are books that have made (rather than merely documented) significant contributions to science and technology; whether there are any that do not also pass #1 is a different question. 2166:, eg. "the first book in a new trilogy by..." etc etc etc. What do we want to do in that case? Provided coverage largely discusses it in the context of it being an in-progress series, does it make sense to create a series page for the entire series (and redirect pages for individual books to there), even when only one book exists? If not, would we create a page for the first book, then later merge it into a series page once the second book actually exists and gets reviews? I feel that handling this carelessly could result in a bunch of instances of the series and the first book both having pages, with no page for any other books; or a weird series page that is mostly about the first book because it was originally written that way and then moved / merged. Of course 2669:

classification of the example. I should point out that that the Penguin Classics was "A Library of New Translations"; it had an editor; the imprint that was named on the title page was "Penguin Books" (not Penguin Classics); the printer's imprint on the reverse of the title page was neither; and there are a very large number of books in Google Books that refer to the "Penguin Classics series" using those words exactly. I can also see sources refering to "Penguin Classics imprint". I do not profess to know why this is. Perhaps there is an overlap between "series" and "imprint". Perhaps the series changed into an imprint.

3935:'s suggestion for the wording. I think it's a good idea to start with a series article and then branch out as personally, I tend to find series articles more helpful than individual articles - at least when it comes to your average book. That said, it definitely needs to be a recommendation and not a rule. As Jclemens said, series start out with a single book. While in most cases that first book typically won't gain enough notability for a whole article, there are definitely notable examples where that first book gains enough attention for an article so it should be explicitly stated that it's not a hard rule. 4718:: "The notability criteria for books are insane in my mind because they are clearly written by people who had absolutely not thought about the very existence of science books: the criterion “the book has been considered by reliable sources to have made a significant contribution to a notable or significant motion picture, or other art form, or event or political or religious movement” for example, clearly fails to take into account the possibility that the book made a significant contribution to a scientific field (the words “science” or “scientific” don't even appear in the criteria)". 422:, is arguing that the series is non-notable because there is little to no coverage for the series itself and as such, there should only be pages for those books that pass notability guidelines. Any other information should be on the page for those books (or just the first book) and that the series page should redirect to that main book or to Weber's bibliography, where the series is listed. Orchastrattor further argues that there is no specific criteria for series and, if I'm understanding correctly, it should be judged based on GNG and that NOTINHERITED should apply. 1737:

notice that a long block of text is multiple replies from multiple people, instead of one reply from one person. The tendency to prioritize "which single comment is this a reply to?" has the downside that editors occasionally mistakenly attribute the whole long block of multiple replies to whichever editor's name appears last in the list. Look above for a comment about the Warhammer Fantasy; depending on your screen width, that could look like just part of your own subsequent comment, especially if an editor is just skimming through.

4843:

adapted into a documentary film, television documentary or other non-fiction work. I do not think there is any reason why the adaptation should need to be "artistic" if it is notable. It suggest the text "motion picture, or other art form" be replaced with "motion picture, opera, ballet or other work". I think the addition of opera and ballet is reasonable, as the coverage notes say that "music-specific publications" are not books for the purpose of this guideline, and it would make it easier to understand what "other work" means.

1281:. I think perhaps it would be helpful to have two separate points about book series articles. "A book series is presumed to be notable if at least two books in the series are notable" is a decent rule of thumb to keep, but we may also want something like "The notability of a book series can be established based on coverage of individual books in the series, and does not necessarily require coverage of the entire series as a unit." But I'm hoping someone will workshop that, since the wording is a bit dreadful. -- 1924:

individual volumes of works like Britannica do get separately reviewed, that is exactly the kind of mess you could end up with if you decide that a "series" is not a book. A series should be considered a type of "book" for the purpose of this guideline. A lot of "series" of non-fiction books are very large, very uniform and do resemble an encyclopedia. We do not, for example, want to divide the "for dummies" books or the "eyewitness guides" into their separate volumes, with no parent article.

305: 1407:

and another text then it's a distinct object, that's what the entire concept and format of reviews is founded upon. It's not infinitely subdividable like a multicellular body or physical landmass. Narrative texts will also be written to take place one after another on a shared chronology, they are not co-present like the components of a machine or organization, in which context an single book is indeed closer to a song than an album.

858:, and Pete Seeger's notable version, and Enya's notable version, plus all the non-notable versions, we should have one article for all of the versions. To me, the obvious takeaway here is: we should merge up, which means gently preferring a reasonably complete article about an entire book series over separate articles on whichever bits and pieces of the series that an editor believed were notable and took the time to write about. 1487:, as a literary scholar I find this argument hard to follow. Books are often the subject of research, not just reviews (though of course it is humanist rather than scientific research), and it is often the case that individual parts of books are subdivided for analysis and could be so subdivided near-infinitely (though of course, as with the cells in a body, we are unlikely to have SIGCOV of all such subdivisions). For example, 236: 3737:

reliable, like random book blogs. It's actually far more common for a series' popularity to never quite translate into coverage in reliable sources - Sunny and her Monere series (Mona Lisa Awakening, Mona Lisa Rising, etc) is a good example of this. The series was fairly popular back in its day, but it never gained any traction in RS. The most it tended to get would be passing mentions in relation to her husband

177: 3410:

reviews, these reviews must contain "non-trivial treatment" which is more than "nonsubstantive detail treatment" (see footnote 1 to criteria 1). That means the two or more reviews must contain "significant coverage" within the meaning of GNG, or at least something equivalent or very similar. If, for example, the two reviews are both ten pages long, that twenty pages of coverage easily passes GNG and NBOOK.

4775:. I think that a significant contribution to the arts should be capable of including something like a treatise on architecture that has made a significant contribution to that art, and should not be confined to the book being adapted into a theatre play or opera. For example, "The Seven Lamps of Architecture" appears to have made a significant contribution to what is sometimes called "Ruskinian Gothic": 3595:: I think this would be good as one of the aspects of a NSERIES section. I don't know that this should be a criteria per se - but I'm not opposed to it. I think that this should be one of the footnotes, like mentioning this as a common sense thing to keep in mind while looking for sourcing so that we don't have people arguing that a review for a book can't establish notability for the series. 226: 208: 146: 730:

different situation from three books in a thirteen book series being notable, which a reasonable run-down of the entries would overwhelm any one entry. There are already cases where a notable books unnotable sequels are described on the book's page. We have different ways of looking at a serialized larger work -- we have entries for the three individual books that make up

1654:(a) because they have already been reviewed in earlier issues (ie when they came out) or (b) because there was no room for a review in the relevant number and it is now considered "too late" to publish one) and 1976 to 1985 (because it is impossible to review something that will be published in the future), does not mean that we should automatically have an article for 1348:- i.e. in situations where we have some notable book in the series, but there is no coverage of the series itself outside passing mentions that it exists and is composed of such and such books. Perhaps a solution would be as simple as a list of book in a series? A list does not have to be purely navigational, it can have reasonably detailed entries on each entity (see 900:

enough sourcing to where even basic coverage would overwhelm the rest of the article. Sections on themes and development are either minimal or nonexistent because there is not enough info on these as it applies to the main book - but there is coverage for some of the other books, adding to the issue of the series section overwhelming the rest of the article.

1263:

not. It would illogical and inconsistent to create a situation where fifty reviews of fifty volumes produces no article, but two reviews of a single volume produces an article, as a result of a technicality. That outcome would be the exact opposite of notability based on coverage, and would be so arbitrary as to be indiscriminate.

4796:), I will add the humanities and the arts to criteria 3. I don't think it would be consistent to include the disciplines taught and researched in a university Faculty of Sciences but not those studied in a Faculty of Humanities and/or the Arts. I do not think the word "science" is sufficient to include the humanities and the arts. 831:) has a songwriter, who wrote the words, but a song is embodied in the singing. If you sing it one way, and I sing it another way, it's still the same song. If I change the tune, it's still the same song. If I add or subtract words from it – even a quite substantial number of words, as has happened in the case of songs such as " 462:

and making it less likely that people will try to create individual pages for the books - or at least giving us a reason to argue against them doing so. I personally prefer series pages to individual book articles unless there's a ton of coverage to justify scattering the information at this point, honestly.

4842:

While we are at it, the expression "motion picture, or other art form" in criteria 3 could do with being rewritten. I think it is clear that the reference to "other art form" means the book is adapted into art form other than a motion picture. However, it occurs to me that a non-fiction book could be

4459:

With the limited exception of books from academic presses and works from authors who are topics of courses at a university level, the mere publication of a book does not confer notability. The normal trappings of book publication (such as that it has been assigned an ISBN number, has been listed in a

4398:

Maybe more notable, but that would still need to be demonstrated by in-depth coverage of the series in reliable sources. I do not think that, in such cases, coverage of individual books can be used as coverage of the series, because such coverage is not likely to say much or anything about the series

3830:

According to the wording, it appears to be a description of possibilities and permission ("may be interpreted" = others might or might not do this; you have permission to do this). In practice, it will be likely be interpreted according to the POV of the person quoting it (either "we have permission

3558:

I think that the example is misleading, as it focuses on the number of sources. What we really need is enough independent sources to write a decent, neutral article. If you can do that with two independent sources (plus whatever non-independent sources may be available and useful), then great; it's

2784:

of NOTINHERITED in question is an unsound interpretation, because nothing is actually being "inherited" in the "series and its books" case, which bears absolutely no resemblence whatsoever to the famous relative (eg "X is not notable just because his uncle was notable") case on which NOTINHERITED was

2179:

get individual treatment in reviews and coverage at the moment of release, and otherwise to get lumped together and covered as one topic. (The underlying issue here is that, since they're the easiest way to find coverage and demonstrate notability, we tend to lean heavily on release announcements and

2174:

common for fantasy series to be marketed and covered as part of a series even when only one book exists, to the point where that's probably satisfied. The "two notable books" standard above makes me a bit uneasy because my perception is that, in fantasy series, it is very common in coverage for books

1740:

I think the solution is for editors to use some common sense and basic communication skills, which means that if the comment in question is "under" yours but (a) is not obviously relevant to your comment and (b) is relevant to a prior comment, then you should assume that it isn't about your comment.

1526:

Well then I would argue a work of literary research is inherently more "significant" than a review, if people are breaking down a work into minute parts as is the case here or with Whatamidoing's example of Bible passages that usually implies that the original overarching work has already been looked

1302:

So yes to series pages for me and sometimes I'd be in favor, as an editorial decision rather than a strict NBOOK notability decision, of having that even when 3+ entries could justify their own pages. Others have explained the advantages that these series pages have above and I agree with them. Best,

910:

Limiting it to the sole book severely limits what we can have in the article. It would also run the risk of eating up more editor time because we'd potentially have to keep explaining why the series isn't notable and why there can't be more series information in the article. We'd also have to explain

899:

For an example, let's say Merlin's Magic is a 4 book series. The series has received a cumulative total of 6 sources that can grant notability. Individually the sourcing could maybe justify an article for one of the books, but it would be weak. There are also additional issues. The series section has

895:

My personal recommendation is that we allow NBOOK to cover series. We allow cumulative coverage to establish notability, but double or triple the minimum amount of sources needed to establish notability. So rather than a 2 source minimum people have to supply 4-6 RS (or show that one of the books has

554:

and do not inherit one from the other so it would make sense for an equivalent policy on literature to function accordingly; The idea is that there are things that go into the creation of an album that do not go into the creation of an arbitrary collection of single songs, the same way that there are

485:

books in the series and not for the series). I simply don't think it makes sense to have articles for, say, 3/5 books in a clear set, but not the series itself, and I think it will keep prompting editors to write articles for the missing two books, only to have them AfD'd. What readers are we helping

4690:

correlate (albeit imperfectly) with notability. That is why criteria 1 takes into account bestseller lists. A book that sells an exceptionally large number of copies is likely to be reviewed and to satisfy GNG. Likewise, a historic book that sells for an exceptionally high price at auction is likely

4445:

A book's listing at large online bookstores such as Barnes & Noble's bn.com and Amazon.com is not an indication of notability, as such websites carry most books available through distributors with little discernment. Sales rankings at these sites do not indicate notability, both because sales in

2740:

while the series is still publishing new entries, because no-one can review a book that will not be published until next year or until whenever in the future. The interpretation of NOTINHERITED fails to understand the difference between a periodical and an encyclopedia, and is mistaken in suggesting

2368:

series of Ace Books, which again included large numbers of books unrelated except in format, genre, and publisher. For a large publisher book series, notability of individual books does not reflect on notability of the series, notability of the series does not reflect on notability of the books, and

1653:

of periodicals, because their organisation, and the scope of their articles, is not necessarily encyclopedic. The fact that a monthly periodical issue published in December 1975 has to review books published in 1975, and cannot review the other books in the series published from 1970 to 1974 (either

1459:

So if we interpret your comments as only applying to specific implementations of a narrative, then I might agree. It seems to me that Perrault's version of Cinderella is closer to Enya's recording of that song than to an album. The fairy tale itself (=all the versions, by all the authors) seems to

1262:

If a non-fiction "series" has fifty volumes (and I will not even use the word "book" to describe volumes that are about equivalent to a large article in a periodical), and each volume has one review, then that series is very notable with fifty reviews, notwithstanding that the individual volumes are

988:

I'll also add this: if my nightmare situation occurs and a series like LA Banks's comes up to AfD, then the media outlets will assume the worst of Knowledge. I brought up Strickland because some outlets incorrectly assumed that the decline was a result of gender bias on the part of Knowledge and the

891:

I've got a few concerns about mandating that 2+ of the books must be individually notable in a series. My thought here is basically that there are series out there where the individual books have maybe 1-3 notability-granting sources. Individually these are perhaps not enough to establish notability

842:

A book has an author, who wrote the words. That's where the similarities end. A book is much more like a music album: the same things, rearranged in a different order, is a new thing. That's because making significant changes to a book, even if all you're doing is re-ordering the chapters (which

593:

we want them to have had two notable roles, otherwise they get put in the article of the one thing they starred in. Following this logic, two books of note should be enough to make the series of note. Makes sense to me, and it creates a place where we can point titles of other volumes that may be on

4422:

A book's listing at online bookstores Barnes & Noble.com and Amazon.com is not an indication of notability because the websites include large numbers of vanity press publications. A listing at any other online bookstore that includes large numbers of vanity press publications should be treated

3736:

If we have a higher minimum threshold (like 4-6 minimum) for sourcing then it would actually be tougher to pass than you'd think. Unless they're very mainstream or become a media darling to some extent, books are kind of ignored and really only covered in places Knowledge would typically not see as

3389:

Add this statement: "Sources addressing individual works in a series may be treated as sources 'on' the series for NBOOK, allowing for series articles even where no individual book meets NBOOK." For example, if there are seven books and the first two each has one review, this criteria would allow a

1975:

Yes, I agree with this. There's no point in having seven individual stubs on a seven-book series. An article on the series will do. If one of the books is notable in its own right, and someone wants to write a full article for it, great! Then we just turn one of those redirects into a full article.

1406:

Well books primarily generate notability from reviews, not from scientific research as is the case with anatomy or geography, or business news as is the case with consumer electronics or incorporated organizations. A book will not exist except as a text, if a given text distinguishes between itself

1301:

I am generally in favor of finding ways to cover topics more fully in a more limited number of articles. This way we still serve the information needs of our editors while also increasing the chance that vandalism and misinformation is found rather than stay buried on some page no editor discovers.

1132:

By Knowledge's policies and guidelines, all reliably sourced content that is relevant to an encyclopaedia is to be included in article space in a proportionate manner and following the best available sources on a topic. There is no question that books passing NBOOK are to be included. The question,

914:

To be honest, I think we'd come across as looking pretty silly or at worst, far too exclusionary. Especially when you consider for larger, ongoing series (10+ books) we might have 20-30 sources but only enough coverage to establish notability for the first book. I'm worried for smaller articles but

729:

Also, having something sufficiently notable for a page does not mean we need to have a page for it; it may be more conveniently covered by a placement within another page. For a two-book series in which they are both notable, it may be easiest to put the content in one of the two articles; that's a

461:

I also wanted to add this from the AfD - from a deletionist type viewpoint, having a series page would cut down on the amount of useless pages and reduce the amount of information that is scattered over multiple pages that technically pass notability guidelines, instead condensing it into one place

429:

I'm worried that this could be detrimental to overall coverage on Knowledge, as it's kind of the norm for us to have a single, stronger page for a series rather than lackluster articles for single books. It could also go beyond books and into other forms of media, like films, music, and so on. It's

425:

My argument against this is that series should qualify under NBOOK as the individual novels make up a single whole. None of the books were written to be standalone pieces, although the first could be read by itself. This is a case where notability for the individual parts make up notability for the

4527:

Would you be fine with "Sales rankings at these sites (as with sales figures in general) do not indicate notability." I'd like to have something in there connecting it to larger policy, as many have used silly Amazon rankings and I'd like the sentence to have a convincing bit of the "why" in there

4425:

That's a bunch of nonsense, because we would not set notability to a book for being carried by these places even if they carried no vanity press books; being carried at any bookstore is not a sign of notability, and that goes double for sites that are essentially taking the distributor's database

3538:

I agree with the others that this is too little. I would recommend setting the bar at 4-6 sources at least. This is going to be for a series rather than an individual book, so as such I'd expect the minimum amount of sourcing to be doubled or tripled. If this is brought up lower than my apologies,

2861:

In the section "Derivative articles" add the sub-section "Book series". Add this statement: "Articles on book series may be created in some cases where there are no series-level sources, drawing on the sourcing of the individual books." Also include any more specific examples/criteria for which we

2074:

I do not understand what you mean by "a great way containerize either entirely notable entries, or a mix of notable and NN entries. Obviously if no entries are NN, it's entirely pointless". "Containerize either entirely notable entries" seems to mean that it is acceptable for all the entries to be

1559:

Again, this is mostly going to affect episodic genre fiction rather than scripture or the sort of classical lit L is describing. They're all very different regions of the literary market, it makes sense that differing trends will arise in how they can or cannot establish notability, hence Reader's

1421:

I don't know now accurate this framing is, frankly. I am thinking for example of the writings of JRR Tolkein or of Antonio Gramsci, published posthumously. When the amount of work published during one's lifetime is "outweighed" by that published posthumously (definitely the case with Gramsci) then

1230:

As asilvering notes, having seven stubs for a seven-book series is annoying. And I'd say that having four stubs for only the four notable books in a seven-book series is even worse. I think James500 is on the right track too with the idea that writing can usually start at the series level and only

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2. If inheriting N from constituent books is to be applied as an actual policy then it will need some very strict minimum requirements; If you're trying to add something on a new series to WP but only the first one or two books have had any significant discussion in RS then you obviously shouldn't

3810:

I suppose I'm just confused as to whether it's supposed to be a general statement or a requirement. If it's a requirement then it would need some clarification. If it's a general statement that is then followed up by the requirements for series notability then it's absolutely fine. I guess I just

2779:

NOTINHERITED is an essay. It is not a policy or guideline and, as far as I am aware, there has never been an RfC on it. It is *not* consensus and therefore cannot be "violated". I have seen "bad" AfD votes on such topics with the rationale of "it is not notable because the essay NOTINHERITED says

2626:

I don't think anyone here is arguing for basing the notability of reprint series on the books reprinted. How about adding the following words to the end of proposal 7: "The preceding paragraph does not apply to reprint series, but does apply to coverage of original translations, or other original

2501:

In such cases, we would presumably think that neither the authorship (all unrelated, if individually famous, authors) nor the subject matter (all unrelated, if individually famous, books) are connected enough to make them a "series" in the sense that we are thinking about here. Instead, we would

2008:

I think it should apply to series. There's a few book articles I was working on where the first and fourth book fulfilled NBOOK - but none of the others, or they barely scraped by, which had one or two reviews each. Even then, it's more cohesive and better to cover it as a series when there isn't

1093:

I've been considering the articles for different book series that I'm familiar with. Some have book + series articles (but not an article on every book). Some just have book articles. One just has a series article and one only has an author article. And I think all of those choices make sense for

965:

Eh.. you'd be surprised. LA Banks has gone on to influence more writers than you'd think. Even before her death she was seen as a pioneer in the UF genre, as the genre has and still pretty much is dominated by white authors. You see more on the shelf now, but when she was alive and publishing her

919:

fails notability guidelines because only 1 of the books is notable - but the 11 books have about 15-20 cumulative sources. The page is put up for deletion. The fanbase discovers that the page has been deleted and replaced with a subpar article for the first book. We then have to explain why those

791:

I have some twitches around the term "series" in certain examples. An earlier poster referred to a set of encyclopedias as a series, but to me, a series requires some sort of sequence, either in release (and an encyclopedia is generally released and purchased in a single go) or in content (having

433:

So my question is this: would the individual books count towards overall notability in this case? If so, do we need to update NBOOK to cover this? (And if that's yes, then we may need to consider what is required for series notability, but that's another discussion.) If an update is not required,

4542:

Yes, that's basically what I had in mind when I said there isn't really a need for a "because". To be clear, I don't feel particularly strongly, since I think "sales figures don't indicate notability" is the core issue, and even the current wording gets that across. If I ever saw people actually

2198:

I think that until there are two books, we don't have a series, and that once a second book exists, we can judge whether it's notable enough for its own page, whether it best mentioned simply as a continuation on the original's page, or whether the original page is best moved to the series name.

1098:

those choices in a consistent way that could be applied to other series. I think an article about a series that contains notable books is often useful for readers when there is information about the series as a whole, but before I wrote one, I'd want at least one source that discusses the series

4440:

carry weight in notability, which it does not. It may be possible that there is some bookstore that carries such a specifically curated set of books that we would consider the mere carrying a sign of notability, but if so, there is no indication in the article that that is true. So I suggest we

2311:

I think the general feeling here is that we are just spelling out what NBOOK already means, rather than changing the criteria itself. I'm not really familiar/comfortable with the process for a wider consensus conversation, so if that seems warranted I'd appreciate if any more experienced editor

1877:

I think this is the wrong way to think about coverage. As an editorial decision we can say that our readers are better served by grouping multiple topics, which could have their own article, into a single article precisely because it allows us to include information that, on its own, would fail

1804:

The problem with such analogies is that they cut both ways. Multiple anime conventions in country XYZ are notable - does it mean we should have an article about it? Having recently looked into a literature on this particular field (specifically, anime and manga fandom in Poland, which I need to

1736:

Since the advent of the Reply tool, that style has become somewhat more popular. However, it's a departure from our long-standing practices. Our traditional approach is better in one respect: Having multiple comments visually aligned makes it more difficult for people reading the comments to

1234:

I think two books is the right threshold for logistical reasons: if only one book in a series is notable, OK, we have one article on that book and a section that says 'there was more in this series (but no one cared)'. Once two books are notable, it's much less clear where to stash series-level

3409:

If a series has two books, and each of those has one review: that is entirely equivalent to one book with two reviews. We have to allow such a series to satisfy NBOOK to avoid indiscriminate exclusion of topics. I should point out that, while criteria 1 of NBOOK can be satisfied by two or more

3209:

Add this statement: "When at least two books in a series individually pass NBOOK, they may be covered at a series-level article alongside any non-notable books in the series. The series-level article may be in addition to or instead of individual articles for the NBOOK-notable books, following

1923:

etc, but with no articles for volumes 3, 6, 8 or 12, and none for the 19YY edition, etc, instead of an article on the Britannica as a whole. That would drive readers and editors crazy. The result would be an incomprehensible mess that would be impossible to navigate or make sense of. And since

994:

Now imagine what some of those same outlets would do in a situation where people are arguing that a well loved series written is non-notable, particularly if the author is part of a minority group. They'll point towards those 10-15 sources for the other books and ask why those aren't enough to

950:

This seems reasonable and the issue of NBOOK "skipping" an entry or more in a series was also something I was concerned about on the AFD, however I think your reasoning is rather biased towards episodic SFF fiction rather than anything with actual literary significance - Strickland was a major

1391:

plus all the related anatomy articles). In other cases, it makes sense to have an article about the whole instead of the individual pieces (thousands of television programs, rather than millions of individual episodes). But I can't really think of a situation in which it makes sense to have

1238:

So, I support adding a mention of series to NBOOK. Something like, "A book series is presumed to be notable if at least two books in the series are notable. Non-notable books in a series may be covered at the series article." We could even explicitly say "An article on a book series is not a

1755:

It is not a departure from long-standing practice. I've been editing here since 2006, and while I've seen people miss the boat at times, I've seen more of placing the response one indent more than what one is responding to more often than not. It is also the method that has been recommended

1630:

I haven't decided on a clean Support/Oppose yet, it is just that a lot of the arguments being made in favor don't jive with my intuition as a regular contributor on AFC. I do not see how PAGEDECIDE is relevant here if we're discussing an NG, my point was that the types of literature you are

506:

Interesting question. Until you brought it up, I didn't realize that NBOOK doesn't even mention "series". I do think that NBOOK should provide some level of guidance on notability for a book series article. Some are clearly notable, such as when the series itself wins a major award (such as

4419:

The article repeatedly expends effort targeting vanity-press and self-published books as not getting notability on the basis of their publication, when the requirements for their notability are no different than books published by any non-academic press (and I raise an eyebrow even at that

2570:

is another; and I assume that many more exist "in the wild". Neither of the examples I gave are in any danger of failing WP:N, but presumably other collaborative projects exist that are also betwixt and between, so it is worth a bit of thought IMO how we would prefer to handle such cases.

2668:

If you do not like that particular example, it can be omitted or replaced with an example that we all accept is a series. I have struck those words and added the word "otherwise", for the time being, because the rest of the wording is sound and should not be delayed by disputes about the

4460:

national library, may be found through a Google Books search, and may be sold at large online book retailers) do not provide indications of notability. This is true whether the work is offered by a major mainstream publisher, a small niche publisher, a vanity press, or self-publication.

1137:

treatment will sometimes mean creating a page for the series (or band or whatever) that includes all reliably sourced entries, whether they are independently notable or not. By contrast, the question "is the series notable independent from its parts" only really comes up in cases like

1611:, I feel like I still don’t follow; I can’t mentally connect your observations to a proposed application of NBOOK. Can you spell your position out for me more explicitly? Do you take issue with the proposition that 2+ notable books in a series should allow for a series-level article? 2275:

since there has been a good bit of discussion I thought it would be useful to start identifying concrete proposals to adopt. I have outlined below the key ideas that I have seen suggested above. I think all of the following language is flexible and can be refined through discussion.

1662:(using all the reviews). I feel this entire discussion (and the AfD nomination that led to it) is based on a complete misunderstanding of what periodicals are, namely, they are periodical. And also, on a complete misunderstanding of what Knowledge is, namely, we are not periodical. 1589:

PAGEDECIDE is the opposite of mindless rule-following, or of editors proclaiming that because this particular SNG does not "codify" acceptance of book series, then such pages are banned unless separately notable from their constituent parts. Nothing about PAGEDECIDE is a case of

1649:. Knowledge should be "encyclopedic" in the sense that Knowledge articles should have something not entirely disimilar to the kind of (logical and convenient) scope and organisation that one would expect to find in an encyclopedia. Knowledge should not automatically follow the 1422:

there aren't "given" texts in the sense you describe: more of an oeuvre. I recognize that reviews accrue to books as they are published (even published posthumously) but as far as the writings themselves are concerned, they may be more "rhizomatic" than you are crediting here.

771:

To be honest, I've never come across a case where the unofficial name for a book/novel collection has been proven notable enough for its own article. Toni Morrison's books are probably the closest, but even then the coverage for them as a collection is still too informal.

1527:

over enough to provide basis for this level of detail, otherwise if you had a collection of sonnets and only one generates any significant coverage it would be perfectly reasonable to only have a page on that one sonnet and redirect the collection there or to the author.

3867:

Add this statement: "When books are in a series, it is usually more useful for the article to begin at the series level. Articles for any individually notable books can be split out from the series article when there is sufficient material to require it, in keeping with

2009:

particularly extensive reception. I think it should maybe be an either or situation with less popular series, either an article on the series and maybe the most notable book, or just individual ones. IMO you can often create better articles working from a series format.

763:

An exception can be made for those cases where a collection of books has been explicitly identified as a series in reliable, independent sources and has received coverage for the books as a series, but has never been explicitly identified as a series by the publisher or

1958:

I am suggesting you should start with the series article, and then split that as and when appropriate. Some items in a series may demand a separate article due to the sheer number of reviews they have, and the fact the parent article is too long (WP:TOOBIG), etc.

4033:

Neutral. Most new series don't start out as series: they start as a single book. Existing series may be currently covered as individual books, as a subsection in a bibliography, or a series article. I don't know that we need to dictate which option is preferred.

3721:

I am unsure. I think there's some modification of this that would be a good idea but as is I feel it's too lax. Maybe one notable book and then some coverage for others? I feel like in that case you can't have both an article on that book and the series, though.

2143:, most of us never learn that it's an essay with advice (IMO most of it good advice), rather than an enforceable rule, and even people who do click through rarely scroll past the examples to see the ten paragraphs of explanations, exceptions, and limitations. 1322:

The circumstances under which merging most/all books into a single article would be preferable to having separate articles (e.g., uneven coverage of different parts of the series by reliable sources; reducing redundant content; giving readers full context and

4454:

that focuses on such things as that an ISBN or listing at a bookstore doesn't make a book notable... all facts which hold true for traditionally-published works as well. I suggest that we replace this with a section called "published status", which reads:

1133:

then, is in each case what is the most encyclopaedic treatment - it seems to me that if particularly "jagged" edges occur where some books in a series (or albums by a band, or installments in a games series) are clearly notable and others may not be, the

689:

redirect to their respective flagship game lines. All three are fully standalone IPs covering dozens of games and hundreds of novels and stories, however one has been demonstrated to pass notability outside of its primary work where the others haven't.

2161:

A related question worth considering. In many genres, especially fantasy, a series is often basically just one book broken up into multiple volumes and published one at a time. In those cases, it is normal for coverage to talk about the series

4606:

Yes, I understand what he is saying, I'm just saying that we can get to the point rather than indicating in more words that this is based on some intermediate point that we assume the reader either already understands or needs to seek out. --

4562:

If you want to keep some "because" language, then I'd suggest replacing "because sales in general do not indicate notability" with something like "because sales rankings do not correlate with the availability of independent reliable sources".

2524:

I think that "series" could be defined appropriately to distinguish between a series that has continuity in subject matter vs one that doesn't. It's also possible that most of the problem could be avoided by specifying that this is only for

2629:

For example, the Penguin Classics is notable because, amongst other reasons, the series includes original translations, and there is significant coverage of those original translations (such as coverage discussing the merits of the original

2296:

Since the idea seems to be to change NBOOK, this should really get the RfC tag and perhaps even be on CENT. I will return to this when I have some more time to participate because 6 proposals is more than I can handle at the moment. Best,

1343:

Another food for thought. While as I am said I remain favorable to developing an inclusionist-flavoured policy about book series, currently I have trouble justifying why we should have articles about a topic (here, book series) that fails

2811:, which surprised me on first reading because it contains almost no discussion of what works were actually published in the series, even though this information is readily available in RS. The article takes the form, essentially, of 923:

Let's also go one step further here as well. Let's say that the fanbase makes enough of a fuss that the media picks up on this. Then we have to explain why 15-20 sources weren't enough to justify a series page. People bring up the

2780:

so". I don't think we should have to revisit such discussions, in the absence of an RfC on NOTINHERITED, which would be the minimum step necessary to establish consensus for something as drastic as that. Further, the particular

3776:

I prefer this as well. As far as prop 1 and this goes, I do think it might be better to have more clarity than less. The vagueness of NBOOK and what is generally expected/implied is kind of what sparked this off, to be honest.

2199:(There would be no great problem with setting up the series name as a redirect to the first book's article when that book is issued.) It doesn't need to be one-size-fits-all. I like having the "two notable books" rule in place 796:

rather than a series. (But then, I have no problem with referring to, say, all 12 episodes of an anthology show being dumped on Netflix simultaneously as a "TV series"... and I would have a problem with it being called a "TV

3089:

an individual book in the series. Except perhaps for sentences that directly mention more than one of these things ("Martin began writing the first book in the series in 1991"), the source only demonstrates notability for

1204:

Telling editors that they can't have an article about a book series if that article would mention any books that aren't separately notable goes completely against both the letter and the spirit of this long-standing rule.

3618:

the principle that coverage of a book is coverage of the series of which it is part for the purpose of GNG, and such coverage may make the series notable, even if none of the individual books are independently notable. I

3287:: This is more than reasonable as one of multiple options to establish notability. It would be good to have this more explicitly stated, although as others have written it was generally assumed to be implied in the past. 4104:

Something else came to mind: this could be especially useful for children's books where the first 2-3 books are somewhat set in stone. For example, children's chapter books tend to be released pretty close together. The

2055:

series' notability derives from the individual books' notability, and even if it weren't, a series article is a great way to containerize either entirely notable entries, or a mix of notable and NN entries. Obviously if

4591:

The real reason sales figures do not provide notability is that notability (in this case and most cases) is based on in-depth published reliable sources, and even if reliably published sales figures are not in-depth.

1381:

The company's headquarters is notable, the factory is notable, the CEO is notable, the labor union is notable, the product is notable – but don't make an article about the whole business; only the separate pieces are

2075:

notable, but "obviously if no entries are NN, it's entirely pointless" seems to mean that it is not acceptable for all the entries to be notable. I assume that one of these two clauses must contain a typo. I wrote

4657:

That said, I do think that there could be some explanation somewhere about why these lists (and by extension sales figures) are not reliable. It's just figuring out how to explain it in the easiest way possible.

2723:

The Guardian article does not cover Penguin Classics published after 2013, and is actually primarily about Morrisey's autobiography. If we followed the interpretation of NOTINHERITED, we would get an articles on

414:

The status of the article at this point in time is that some of the books in the series pass notability guidelines per NBOOK by way of reviews and placement in the main NYT Bestseller list (hardcover fiction).

2940:

I'm not sure if the following makes me a support or oppose but reliable sources may be used to verify series information even if/when they would not be considered an acceptable source to establish notability.

2757:

PS. I've seen "bad" AFD votes on such topics (series similar to PClassic above) with rationale "it is notable because notable books were published in it/notable authors are included", which obviously violates

602:

series -- a five novel series of which the first and third get the bulk of the attention -- should suffice for an article. (We may need to clarify what a "series" is in this context; it may not apply to, say,

995:

establish notability. It would honestly be a PR nightmare for Knowledge. I know that this isn't always a guarantee that such a nightmare situation would happen, but it's not like it's an impossible scenario.

4346:

Same as above. We should not treat multi-volume fantasy novels the same as multi-hundred-unrelated-book technical monograph series and this wording makes no distinction between those very different cases.

4055:

was meant to be a one-off book that ended up being a series with 20+ books due to reader demand, but I see a lot of mystery novels introduced as "book one in a new series", even from first-time authors.

3080:

In this story, a given source (or part of a source) can only demonstrate notability for a single thing. A source (or its parts) must be parsed to determine whether it indicates notability for the author

1574:

Are you familiar with PAGEDECIDE? It's part of the main notability guideline. It basically says that editors should use their best judgment and common sense when deciding whether Knowledge should have:

4547:

the implied loophole that you observed in the current wording, I'd feel otherwise. In general I prefer direct and concise because I think that's easier to read and less attractive for wikilawyering. --

896:

received a major award or is the subject of instruction and so on, I suppose). Series would also have to be labeled as such by the publisher or author. A primary source could be used for this last part.

3077:

that doesn't demonstrate notability for the whole series, separately from the individual components. The individual books are notable, but there should be no overview article about the whole series."

571:

publish an article on the whole series, you would publish independently notable articles on however many entries is appropriate and then briefly mention the rest elsewhere as part of a bibliography.

2369:

there is no reason to prefer one order or the other for article creation. I cannot support any of these proposals if they are worded so generally as to appear to apply to publisher book series. —

1631:

discussing will usually have their notability obvious from the start but we can't make the sorts of pages Reader is proposing without deviating from the format of how the RS discuss the subject.

3583:, allowing for series articles even where no individual book meets NBOOK." For example, if there are seven books and each book has one review, this criteria would likely allow a series article. 2180:

reviews as sources; and those are much more likely to treat volumes in a series individually than any other source, because they're breaking-news sorts of things. IMHO this means that there's a

2076: 4217: