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Project news

• The Margaret Atwood novel The Penelopiad reached Featured Article status on June 29 and then appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on August 26. It is the first article created through Wikipedia:Articles for creation to become Featured.
• To Kill a Mockingbird appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on July 11.
• I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings reached Good Article status on July 1.

Member news

• The members list is currently under review so we have moved all past active member's name to a Incumbent List and are doing a Project Roll Call. If you still consider yourself an active WP:NOVELS editor, please add your name back to the Active Members List. You may also wish to add your name to any of our many Project Task Forces.

Task force news

• A Fantasy Literature task force has been proposed. Comments are welcomed on that proposal since we already have our own WikiProject Novels/Fantasy task force which is covered under our Novels WikiProject.

Novel-related news

• Devil May Care, written by Sebastian Faulks ("writing as Ian Fleming"), has become Penguin Books fastest selling hardcover fiction title. It is the latest installment in the book series about British secret agent James Bond and was released to coincide with the 100th anniversary of late Bond creator Ian Fleming's birthday on May 28, 1908.
• Me Cheeta: the Autobiography, written by a ghostwriter, is the autobiography of Cheeta the Chimp who is listed in the Guinness World Records as the oldest recorded non-human primate at the age of 76. He has appeared in various movie roles which included twelve Tarzan movies and even battled addiction to alcohol and cigars. The book is not published until October 1, but judges for the 2008 Guardian First Book Award were sent a early version and were so impressed that they have included it on the 10-strong longlist.
• Stephenie Meyer, who is listed by Time magazine as one of its 100 most influential people of 2008, has decided not to continue with writing her draft for Midnight Sun after 12 chapters of the unfinished manuscript were leaked on the internet.

Current debates

• Categories for Discussion has a series of discussions about whether to categorize certain specific types of fictional characters: double agents, dictators, characters with eidetic memory, etc. Advice from any Novels project members would be valuable in assisting them.
• WikiProject Media franchises aims to help editors with the coordination of articles within the thousands of media franchises which exist and has requested input from our members. They are currently discussing a naming convention for franchise articles. Since this may affect one or more articles in our Novel project, they would like to get opinions before implimenting any changes.

From the Members

With the Newsletter being almost three months overdue, I have decided to take on the position of Editor to make sure it reaches you regularly on time each month. The Newsletter is meant to inspire and encourage our team of Editors and so my goal shall be to make it informative and interesting each issue.

We now have many positions vacant in our Project Team, so we are looking for members who have the time and interest to take on the various roles, details of which can be found at the Job Centre. Shortly a Coordinator nominations notice shall also be sent out to all members, which will commence the annual Coordinator selection process.

Next month's Newsletter will include a message from our Coordinator Maria, who will introduce herself and speak on our forthcoming elections for extra Coordinators.

Boylo (talk), Editor

Collaboration of the Month

• This month's Collaboration has been selected by popular vote and is
  Look Homeward, Angel.
  The next collaboration is due for selection on 14 September, 2008 so cast your vote.

Newsletter challenge

Our last newsletter's challenge The Pure Land was completed by our member Maclean25, who also provided us with tipline news for this newsletter.

• The first person to start the article is mentioned in the next newsletter. This month's article is Leslie Ann Moore's first book in her fantasy 'Griffin's Daughter' trilogy, which was named by the Independent Book Publishers Association as the 2008 Ben Franklin Award winner for Best First Fiction, Griffin's Daughter.
  Note: This article was previously deleted due to lack of notability, but that now can be established since winning this award.

Project news

• A Did you know fact from the new article The Masks of Time by Robert Silverberg appeared on the main page on 19 September, 2008.

Member news

• Nominations have now commenced for Coordinator Candidates for the Novels Project. Any member of the project may nominate themselves. Nominations close on October 27, so if you wish to run make sure you add your name before then. Details on the election process and the role of Coordinators can be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Coordinators/October 2008. The voting and question phase of the election will open on October 28 and end November 28.
• After the recent roll call, the Novels Project now has 74 active members.
• 15 positions still remain unfilled at the Job Centre, members who are interested are encouraged to apply.
• Pyfan has taken on the position of coordinator for the "Fantasy", "Science fiction" and "Shannara" task forces plus joined the "Style team".
• the_ed17 has also taken on the position of coordinator for the "Shannara" task force and joined the "Peer Review team".
• Coordinators are still required for the "Australian", "Chronicles of Narnia", "Crime", "Lemony Snicket" and "Short stories" task forces, which may be applied for at the Job Centre.

Task force news

• A new task force has now commenced under the Novels Project known as the Twilight task force, based on the Twilight series of vampire-based fantasy/romance novels by author Stephenie Meyer. You may join by adding your name to Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/Twilight task force/Participants or contact founder Bella Swan for more details.

Member in Focus

• Yllosubmarine (talk · contribs) has been a member of the Novels WikiProject for nearly two years, and a coordinator since May. Aside from her work outside the project (including four FAs and six GAs in various areas), she has been active in the Project's Assessment and Peer Review departments. She hopes to continue in these roles as well as help encourage more activity and community research within the Project. With the upcoming coordinator election, she hopes that others will volunteer to become more active in their roles as Project members so that we can continue to provide quality articles to the readers of this encyclopedia.

María (habla conmigo)

Current debates

• A collection of Wikipedia articles is being collected together as Wikipedia 0.7. This collection will be released on DVD, so we have been asked to review the articles selected from this project. Revisions are requested before October 20. More details can be found at Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels/GeneralForum#Wikipedia 0.7 articles have been selected for Novel.

From the Outreach Department

On the advice of Coordinator Maria, the newsletter is now only distributed to active listed members of the Novels Project. A new section has started with this issue called 'In Focus', which will feature various members and task forces each month.

Members are requested to post any news items to the Tip Line (found above) to make sure it reaches the next newsletter before closing date, which is always the last day of the preceding month. Any task force news should be added by the coordinator of that task force. Having news items helps inform members of what is happening at the various task forces and so can be a way of encouraging more membership and participation.

Editors are required to assist with the newsletter for Task Force News and Peer Reviews & Assessments News, which involves the gathering of news items from the main project and the various task forces. These positions may be applied for at the Job Centre.

Boylo (talk), Editor

Collaboration of the Month

• This month's Collaboration has been selected by popular vote and is :
  Steppenwolf (novel).
  The next collaboration is due for selection on 1 November, 2008 so cast your vote.

Newsletter challenge

Our last newsletter's challenge Griffin's Daughter was uncompleted.

• The first person to start the article is mentioned in the next newsletter. This month's article is The Cater Street Hangman. This is the first published novel by historical detective fiction author Anne Perry whose early life featured in the Peter Jackson movie Heavenly Creatures.
  Note: This article currently redirects to Thomas Pitt (fictional character).

Member news

• Coordinators election voting and question time is now open. Project members should vote for any candidates they wish to support by November 28 at the Coordinator Elections. Yllosubmarine, aka Maria, has decided not to be reappointed, her work as sole Coordinator since the last elections in May is highly appreciated by all members of the project.
• The Novels Project now has 88 active members.
• 18 positions remain unfilled at the Job Centre. Members who are active project contributors are encouraged to apply even if they can only do a position for a short time.
• Ladywitchthought has taken on the position of coordinator for the "Lemony Snicket task force".

Project news

• On September 26, a fact on Shea Ohmsford, the protagonist of Terry Brooks novel The Sword of Shannara appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column.
• On September 29, the expanded article about the novel Thrones, Dominations written by Dorothy L. Sayers and Jill Paton Walsh appeared on the main page in the DYK section.
• On October 11, the new article Going, Going, Gone written by Jack Womack appeared on the main page in the DYK section.
• On October 18, a fact from The Dragon Lord by David Drake appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column.
• On October 22, the expanded articles The Sirian Experiments and The Making of the Representative for Planet 8 written by Doris Lessing appeared on the main page in the DYK section.
• On October 25, the new article A Real Basket Case by Beth Groundwater appeared on the main page in the DYK section.

- Contributors are the_ed17, Maclean25 & Captain-tucker (who searched the archives).

Task force and related news

• WikiProject North of the Rio Grande has begun. WP:NRG is an educational project aiming to "improve a selection of articles on Chicano and Latino literature to featured article status (or as near as possible)." Among the articles they are working on are How the García Girls Lost Their Accents and Who Would Have Thought It?. They welcome any advice or help that members of WikiProject Novels may be able to offer. If interested drop a note on their talk page.

– Position of editor for 'Task force news' is still available at the Job Centre.

Peer review and assessment news

• Peer Reviews are still open for three articles – At Swim-Two-Birds, The Emberverse series & Flowers for Algernon. Feel free to submit any novel-related article that you are working on for review, and please consider stopping by and reviewing an article, as we need more reviewers for our articles!

– the_ed17 (talk), Editor – Peer review and assessment news

Member in Focus

• Hi, I have been around this project for quite some time now. Bit of a hiatus earlier this year, but back now just contributing. The Novels WikiProject wasn't started by me but my interest in the subject initially attracted me to what was here. It has developed substantially in the last few years and now takes in all forms of Narrative Prose Fiction within its scope. We are about the content not the format of the prose so WP:Books differs a little in that an implied format is entailed; also they can also focus more clearly on non-fiction. WP:Literature are the "new boys on the block" and are a little more focused on the "quality" aspects of literature, and again they have less emphasis on pure fiction and the prose aspect. Our biggest problem is to maintain a certain focus of interest across such a broad subject area and we need workers who can develop task forces, teams for assessment, teams for peer review and so much more. "So much to do, so little time, I'm late, I'm late, I'm late" to misquote from Alice in Wonderland.

Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk)

Current debates

• The featured list Narnian timeline has been nominated for removal. You can comment here. The Narnian timeline is a featured list, which means it has been identified as one of the best lists produced by the Wikipedia community.

Novel related news

• Indian writer Aravind Adiga wins the Man Booker Prize for his debut novel, The White Tiger.

From the Outreach Department

As I shall be leaving Wikipedia, this will be my last newsletter. Any member who is interested in taking over the role of editor can sign up for the position at the Job Centre.

Over the last month I have been working on a portal for our project. So am happy to announce that the Novels Portal is now up and running.

Boylo (talk), Editor

Boylo:
Thank you for getting this newsletter back on its feet and going again. No Boylo equals no Novels Portal...heck, without you, we wouldn't have had a newsletter for these past months...so, for all of the members of the Novels WikiProject, I want to thank you for the time and effort you have put into this project, and I wish you the best of luck in all of your future endeavors. Thanks, pal.

the_ed17 (talk)

Collaboration of the Month

• This month's Collaboration has been selected by popular vote and is : Novel.
  As this is our Project's premier article, all members are asked to assist.
  The next collaboration is due for selection on 21 November, 2008 so cast your vote.

Newsletter challenge

Our last newsletter's challenge The Cater Street Hangman was uncompleted.

• The first person to start the article is mentioned in the next newsletter. This month's article is Mindplayers by science fiction author Pat Cadigan.

Announcements and open tasks

From the Coordinators

As you can see, this is about as bare-bones of a newsletter as you can get. The reason for this is that the newsletter has and will be inactive, but we wanted to get a last one out detailing the current state of our project. The truth is that WP:NOVELS is in bad shape. Only a few editors are active in editing inside of our project. Our Peer Review section, this newsletter, our task forces, and our collaboration center are all dead; although a collab is picked each month, not a lot of work seems to occur.

Out of these ashes, we are proposing that the project start an A-class review system. This will hopefully bring people together for reviewing, and will perhaps get the project some sorely-needed attention from others who can come in and help rehabilitate it. Final plans have not been established, but we will see about getting a mass message out to all of the project members if/when it is set up; discussion of this can be conducted on the General Forum.

This newsletter will probably be the last we will have for a long time, as neither Ed nor Kevinalewis have the time to create these every month. However, if any editor is willing to step up and create one, we would be glad to assist you in making it up.

If you don't want to create a newsletter, but would still like to help, there are plenty of things that can be done. As detailed on the right, the Novels Peer Review section has four articles needing attention, but only one review has been done; one from May, one from November, and one from December have not had any comments left on them. Please consider helping out there; even a 15-minute review would help.

Your coords,

–Kevinalewis (talk · contribs) and the_ed17 (talk · contribs)

Member news

• Talk between Kevinalewis and the_ed17, the two project coordinators, has led to us deciding to suspend elections for coordinators indefinitely. With the exceedingly low amount of participation in the last elections (five total votes), we do not feel that it is worth it to try to set up another election.
• 20 positions remain unfilled at the Job Centre. Members who are active project contributors are encouraged to apply even if they can only do a position for a short time.

Collaboration of the Month

• This month's Collaboration has been selected by popular vote and is : Shantaram (novel).
  The next collaboration is due for selection in April, so cast your vote.

Peer review and assessment news

• Peer Reviews are still open for four articles – Sector General, Petals of Blood, Scenes of Clerical Life, and Flowers for Algernon. Feel free to submit any novel-related article that you are working on for review, but please consider stopping by and reviewing an article; we need more reviewers for our articles (there is a PR that has been open since May)!

– the_ed17 (talk)

Announcements and open tasks

Member news

• Coordinators election. An election has been long overdue, and therefore one will begin shortly. If you wish to stand, please put your name in by June 28, when voting will start. Members are encouraged to vote for the candidate they wish to support by July 21 at the Coordinator Elections. The Ed17 has decided not to stand for re-election. His work as Assistant Coordinator, along with Kevinalewis, since the last elections in October is highly appreciated by all members of the project.
• The Novels Project now has 128 active members.
• 17 positions remain unfilled at the Job Centre. Members who are active project contributors are encouraged to apply even if they can only fill a position for a short time.
• The His Dark Materials task force has been set up, and the role of coordinator has been undertaken by Pmlinediter.

Project news

• On April 7, a fact about novelist Karin Bang appeared on the main page in the DYK section.
• On April 10, a fact about Pride and Prejudice and Zombies written by Seth Grahame-Smith appeared on the main page in the DYK section.
• On April 23, a fact about the protagonist Cousin Betty in Honoré de Balzac's La Cousine Bette appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column.
• On April 25, a fact from the article Blanca Olmedo written by Lucila Gamero appeared on the main page in the DYK section.
• On June 9, a fact from The Fox and the Hound by Daniel P. Mannix appeared on the main page in the DYK section.
• On June 15, a fact from The Road to Yuba City by Tracy Kidder appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column.

- Contributors are Alan16, (who searched the archives).

Task force and related news

• His Dark Materials task force has begun. This task force is dedicated to improving all articles in the scope of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy. The main purpose of this taskforce is to expand, cite, and promote all articles in scope of the series. They welcome any advice or help that members of WikiProject Novels may be able to offer. If interested, drop a note on their talk page.

– Position of editor for the task force has been undertaken by Pmlinediter.

Peer review and assessment news

• Peer Reviews are still open for seven articles – The Last of the Masters, The Kindly Ones, Flowers for Algernon, World War Z, Sector General, Petals of Blood, and Scenes of Clerical Life. Feel free to submit any novel-related article that you are working on for review, and please consider stopping by and reviewing an article, as we need more reviewers for our articles!

– the_ed17 (talk) and Alan16 (talk)

Member in Focus

• Hi, I have been a member of this project for a few months now, and after finally gotten to grips with Wikipedia I have decided to take on the role of writing this newsletter (currently by myself, but any help would be appreciated) with some helpful tips from The Ed17. After undertaking this I realise why it was so difficult to keep it going. I will, however, persevere. From the members, I would encourage you to vote in the Coordinator elections, and take up roles at the Job Centre. The project has struggled recently, and I am hoping to try and revive it. If, with the publication of this newsletter, there are a couple of things that aren't quite up-to-date (like the Collaboration part), you can be certain I am working on it. I will be trying to get a newsletter out on around the 21st of every month. Finally, thanks for the help Ed. Regards, Alan16 (talk) 23:41, 20 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

Current debates

• A Kenneth Oppel task force has been proposed. You can comment here. Oppel is a Canadian author who specialises in Young adult fiction.

Novel related news

• American writer Michael Hemp wins the 2009 Next Generation Indie Book Award in the Action/Adventure category for his novel, The Nadjik Pheromone.

From the Outreach Department

This is my first attempt at the newsletter, and I hope it at least gets close to the previous high standards set by Kevinalewis and The Ed17. I will once again encourage you to vote in the Coordinator elections, as I hope it could be the springboard to revitalise the project. I'll keep working on the newsletter, partially because I like the stress, and partially because we need it to get members and would-be members interested. Hopefully the start of great things. Regards, Alan.

Collaboration of the Month

• Because there has been little activity on our Collaboration page for a long time, I have made an executive decision, and chosen The Tin Drum as our Collaboration of the month.
  All members are asked to assist where they can.
  The next collaboration is due for selection on 21 July, 2009 so nominate and vote.

Newsletter challenge

This month's article is Mindplayers by science fiction author Pat Cadigan. It is a previous, uncompleted challenge.

Announcements and open tasks