GENERAL GUIDELINES AND RULES (How will this book club operate?)

**Jack** · March 15th, 2006, 08:47 PM

I'm abstaining from discussion on the voting process, as I'll read anything that gets nominated, and furthermore I don't think the crux of the problem is with who votes or the reason behind their voting.

Keep in mind I speak not from a voice of experience specificially with the book club, as I've only been posting there for the past few months. Rather I'm coming from a background where I was taught to critically read and be ready to discuss a book in a group environment.

I am by no means a perfect reader, but the solution to livening up the discussion of a book, IMO, lies not with entangling the nomination / voting process up with more tape Erfdawg & Co. have to wade through, but rather with me, the reader / forumer. I can add fruitful dialogue to the discussion by changing the way I read.

I read for pleasure, and in many ways am stuck in the way I read and think about a book. But when it comes to a book club selection, a book I made a commitment to read by participating in the voting/nominating process, it is my responsibility to read that book with a critical eye and come up with discussion topics while I'm reading. I personally need to write these discussion topics down as I come across them, not so much to refer to them but because an idea stays in my head if I put it down in ink. Once I have that topic in mind, I mentally refer back to it as I am reading to see if my hypothesis about that topic has changed.

Then when the first comes around, I have something to talk about. I guess what I'm saying is that the success of the book club is on the readers' shoulders. There have been a lot of long arguments about how the book club should be run in this thread, so we all know how to properly participate in a discourse community. Let's channel that positive energy into Tim Lebbon's Dusk for April!

**Erfael** · March 16th, 2006, 09:50 AM

Just want to mention you folks have us discussing a few things in the back: Voting options, scheduling, discussion leadership. Any other good ideas are welcome. We'll see if we can come to some sort of agreement about things behind the scenes.

**Yobmod** · March 16th, 2006, 10:48 AM

Another idea - is it possible to have the current months discusion in the bookclub forum AND the main forums, with the same thread?

Just wanted to reiterate this. I think it should be easy to do, and doesn't require much more work by mods, and wont scare anyone off. i've linked to bookclub discusions many times in the main forums, as some forumites clearly don't click on this forum, but they still want to talk about books we've already done.

**Erfael** · March 16th, 2006, 11:03 AM

Originally Posted by Yobmod

Just wanted to reiterate this. I think it should be easy to do, and doesn't require much more work by mods, and wont scare anyone off. i've linked to bookclub discusions many times in the main forums, as some forumites clearly don't click on this forum, but they still want to talk about books we've already done.

Yeah, I meant to mention that. I need to see if you can double-post somehow....not sure if it's possible or how to do it. I'll look into that, as it's a good idea if there's a way to do it.

**Yobmod** · March 16th, 2006, 11:09 AM

I think thread titles in the main forum can be made to be links that would take you to the bookclub thread. But whether posting will bump the thread in both forums is for the mods to discover

**Erfael** · March 16th, 2006, 11:12 AM

Originally Posted by Yobmod

I think thread titles in the main forum can be made to be links that would take you to the bookclub thread. But whether posting will bump the thread in both forums is for the mods to discover

That's exactly the question I just posed to the tech people.

**Rob B** · March 16th, 2006, 11:56 AM

Originally Posted by Yobmod

Just wanted to reiterate this. I think it should be easy to do, and doesn't require much more work by mods, and wont scare anyone off. i've linked to bookclub discusions many times in the main forums, as some forumites clearly don't click on this forum, but they still want to talk about books we've already done.

I'm pretty sure this can be done. Start the topic in Fantasy (or SF), sticky it, then do the whole "move thread to destination forum" and select "leave redirects in place."

That should do the trick.

**Erfael** · March 16th, 2006, 12:05 PM

Originally Posted by Rob B

I'm pretty sure this can be done. Start the topic in Fantasy (or SF), sticky it, then do the whole "move thread to destination forum" and select "leave redirects in place."

That should do the trick.

I'll try this for next month's books.

**Yobmod** · March 16th, 2006, 12:25 PM

Yay!

I'm changing the world - one (very) tiny step at a time

**Saulus** · September 22nd, 2006, 08:04 PM

Is there going to be a set reading schedule either by page or chapter that we will be advised to go by so that we don't ruin anything in our discussion of the book for somebody who may not have reached that point in the book?

**Rob B** · September 22nd, 2006, 08:41 PM

Generally, we've been going on the assumption that people have finished the book when they start posting in the book club topic. If you haven't read the book at all, then you may want to wait a bit before jumping into the discusison.

On the other hand, many of us do jump in and put our thoughts in before having finished the book.

However, many people will use spoiler tags to hide anything that might spoil the book for those who haven't read the entire book.

{spoiler}

Spoiler

{/spoiler}

Just replace the "{" and "}" with "[" and "]" and it will look like this:

Spoiler:

If you scroll your cursor here, then you are reading the spoiler: Colonel Mustard did it in the Kitchen with the Candlestick.

Scroll your cursor over the black line to reveal the text.

**Yobmod** · September 28th, 2006, 07:16 AM

I noticed that the Bookclubs at Fantasy Bookspot and SF chronicles have even less contributors than us, and both now seem to be defunct. Any regular members here active enough in these or other forums that they could invite people to join in here?

In an inclusive, were-all-fantasy-fans type way of course.

**Eventine** · September 28th, 2006, 06:56 PM

My post count from FBS could probably be counted on 2 hands - Rob has posted there a little more than myself though.

I tend to see some similarities in current reading threads as well, so maybe there are some posters here using different names there.

**Geldsero73** · October 16th, 2009, 09:15 AM

Kates been kind enough to send me a copy of this too and Ill be reading it asap, reviewing it for our blog and definitely butting in to the book club conversations...

**Bastard** · July 16th, 2010, 12:21 AM

Originally Posted by williams8899

we'll probably find that the number of books in the poll self-limits to four or five. I say, give that a trial period, if the number of books going in is still to high (or turns out to be too low) then we can revise it for the following month.

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Excellent suggestion. Forgive me from removing the spam from your quote.