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Old Book Club Thread - Check out the New One!

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  • RipuAncestorRipuAncestor Posts: 2,332 Member
    edited June 2017
    Regarding my previous comment: I really, really didn't mean to make it sound like the reading circles are bad. I love the circle I'm in, and it feels like a place where I can talk about anything and I don't have to feel shy or scared of social interaction. I was just saying that book club has its own pros, and it really is it's own thing despite the reading circles sometimes doing something similar.

    Not sure if someone got that impression (probably/hopefully not), but I got a feeling my words could be taken that way. Sorry. :(
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    Forget-Me-Not - some things just refuse to stay buried; an Ambrosia Challenge story (Forum thread HERE)
  • Simslover163Simslover163 Posts: 2,833 Member
    edited June 2017
    Hi, all!

    I see we're discussing how Book Club will run once there's enough interest. I did mention that I'll be co-hosting with @CathyTea. I also like that idea that one or two people can volunteer to host should me or Cathy get busy. Regarding questions, I'm okay with questions CT has been asking for the stories where no one volunteered to be Coffee Hour host. I saw that Jes suggested that we can PM the questions to the host. Love that idea. Like she said, the host can have many kinds of questions to ask

    Here are my ideas on how to improve Book Club (I already shared this with @CathyTea )

    Frequency
    Before Book Club went on break, I've discovered a drop of participants, with the exception of some popular works. Reading one story a week can be exhausting and there are two reasons I can come up with. One is that there might be not enough people who are familiar with the work and two, there's the case that there are lots of people who are familiar with the work, but some don't have the time to do so. I suggest doing two stories a month. That way, for those who haven't had time during the weekend to answer the questions.

    Coffee Hour
    If we do two stories a month, here's how Coffee Hour should work. It'll start on Friday and end the next Sunday. Either Cathy or I can be the coffee hour host if no one volunteers. For example, Coffee Hour for Story A begins on Friday. Participants have the Saturday, Sunday, the whole next week and weekend to answer the posted questions.
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  • Jes2GJes2G Posts: 13,032 Member
    Hi, all!

    I see we're discussing how Book Club will run once there's enough interest. I did mention that I'll be co-hosting with @CathyTea. I also like that idea that one or two people can volunteer to host should me or Cathy get busy. Regarding questions, I'm okay with questions CT has been asking for the stories where no one volunteered to be Coffee Hour host. I saw that Jes suggested that we can PM the questions to the host. Love that idea. Like she said, the host can have many kinds of questions to ask

    Here are my ideas on how to improve Book Club (I already shared this with @CathyTea )

    Frequency
    Before Book Club went on break, I've discovered a drop of participants, with the exception of some popular works. Reading one story a week can be exhausting and there are two reasons I can come up with. One is that there might be not enough people who are familiar with the work and two, there's the case that there are lots of people who are familiar with the work, but some don't have the time to do so. I suggest doing two stories a month. That way, for those who haven't had time during the weekend to answer the questions.

    Coffee Hour
    If we do two stories a month, here's how Coffee Hour should work. It'll start on Friday and end the next Sunday. Either Cathy or I can be the coffee hour host if no one volunteers. For example, Coffee Hour for Story A begins on Friday. Participants have the Saturday, Sunday, the whole next week and weekend to answer the posted questions.

    This is good. There have been many stories I began to read but did not participate in Coffee Hour because I didn't finish it. I'm the slowest reader on the planet on top of balancing these stories with all the others I read.
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  • AsaoyoruAsaoyoru Posts: 247 Member
    I was away over the weekend and just read this. I can't even express how happy this makes me. For now I'll keep my answer short ... YAY! I'm so looking forward to doing this. <3
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    Thanks, everyone, for the kind words yesterday, the suggestions, and the interest in rekindling the Book Club!

    The Book Club's two-year anniversary will be July 10, so let's take this week to go over the suggestions and make any new ones, then next week, let's start taking nominations for our upcoming readings, and then we can have our grand reopening on July 10!
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • AdamsEve1231AdamsEve1231 Posts: 7,035 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »
    Thanks, everyone, for the kind words yesterday, the suggestions, and the interest in rekindling the Book Club!

    The Book Club's two-year anniversary will be July 10, so let's take this week to go over the suggestions and make any new ones, then next week, let's start taking nominations for our upcoming readings, and then we can have our grand reopening on July 10!

    Sounds great!
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  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    Hiya! Got a bit busy at the office this past week, so I'm here now to collate the suggestions we've received so far on Book Club Operating Procedures! :D

    Co-Hosts and Coordinators
    @Simslover163 and I will be the coordinating co-hosts. This means that when no one else has stepped in to host, one of us will fill the role. We'll also coordinate the schedule and check in with each other or the group whenever we have procedural things that need tweaking. I'd like my role to shift more towards the secretarial/coordinator (meaning, keeping up the thread and schedule) and less towards the hosting.

    Nominators as Hosts?
    I would love if we had a general practice of the person who nominates a story being the one who hosts it. This would remove my main pet peeve, which is when readers nominate stories but then don't even show up to participate in Coffee Hour. It also cuts down on having too many nominations (which has happened before) and it increases of the chance of people nominating works they're so excited about that they're willing to host.

    What do you think?

    Questions for Coffee Hour
    I LOVE the suggestion of having readers submit questions, either here through the thread or through PM. It would then be the host's job to order, sort, and if needed, select the questions. This is a task I'd be happy to help with as coordinator during times when the hosts are too busy or don't feel comfortable with organizing the submitted questions.

    Schedule
    I really love @Simslover163 and others' suggestion of a two-week cycle (with a slight addition, which I'll toss in below):

    Week One: Reading, submitting questions, informal conversation
    Week Two: Coffee Hour Q & A for Readers and Writer

    The one toss-in is this: One of my friends PM'd me an idea of having short selections, too: The writer could submit five-minutes' worth of reading (a short chapter, for example) and the writer then submits questions for the readers about this selection.

    I like to call this "Tasty Reads".

    A few things I love about this idea: 1) it allows people to participate who have limited reading time; 2) it allows the writer to ask the questions (always awesome!)--and readers can always ask the writer questions back... 3) it lets us cycle through more works! 4) Variety! :)

    What do you think? If you like the idea of "Tasty Reads," then our cycle would look like this:


    Week One: Reading, submitting questions, informal conversation
    Week Two: Coffee Hour Q & A for Readers and Writer
    Week Three: Tasty Reads (A different writer selects five-minutes' worth of reading, and we have Q & A on that for the week)

    And then the cycle begins again!

    What are your responses and feedback?

    Did I miss other suggestions that you want us to be sure to include?

    And most importantly, what's for snack?
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    Oh! I also wanted to share with you what I call "The Reader's Bill of Rights"

    1) Just as writers know what they want to write, and when they want to write it, readers know what they want to read, and when they want to read it.
    2) Readers do not need to feel obligated to read works their friends are reading, works that are popular, or works that their friends are writing 3) Readers can skip any reading at any time.
    4) Readers don't need to read works in order, or to complete works, or to start from the beginning.

    In other words, it is always the reader's right to choose.


    (And that's especially important for us to remember in Book Club. Just because a work has been nominated, if you choose not to read it--for any reason or even for no reason--that's your choice! :) )
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • swcheppesswcheppes Posts: 3,027 Member
    edited July 2017
    @CathyTea I agree with everything you've put forth above. I feel like these suggestions will help this book club have it's resurgence it needs. One thing I wanted to comment about is nominations. I'm not sure what the solution but i think there should be guidelines for nominating. Maybe you can only nominate one story during the reading cycle or only one story from a writer can be nominated at a time. I feel this would give many writers a chance to be showcased and help from us getting too backed up.
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  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    swcheppes wrote: »
    @CathyTea I agree with everything you've put forth above. I feel like these suggestions will help this book club have it's resurgence it needs. One thing I wanted to comment about is nominations. I'm not sure what the solution but i think there should be guidelines for nominating. Maybe you can only nominate one story during the reading cycle or only one story from a writer can be nominated at a time. I feel this would give many writers a chance to be showcased and help from us getting too backed up.

    What would you all think about only nominating works by people whose works have not yet been nominated for Book Club?

    (Of course, that might not work because I want to nominate Super Dating--and I think we've already read one of your stories? And I want to nominate SimsLover's San Myshuno series, and we've read his restaurant challenge...)

    I'm all for coming up with guidelines! My goal is to give attention to sleepers--those gems that are fun to share with more readers!

    Let's talk about ideas for guidelines for nominations...
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • friendsfan367friendsfan367 Posts: 29,362 Member
    yeah i went already. last time sissy nominated me while i was sleeping.


    okay not helpful but kind of funny.
  • swcheppesswcheppes Posts: 3,027 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »
    swcheppes wrote: »
    @CathyTea I agree with everything you've put forth above. I feel like these suggestions will help this book club have it's resurgence it needs. One thing I wanted to comment about is nominations. I'm not sure what the solution but i think there should be guidelines for nominating. Maybe you can only nominate one story during the reading cycle or only one story from a writer can be nominated at a time. I feel this would give many writers a chance to be showcased and help from us getting too backed up.

    What would you all think about only nominating works by people whose works have not yet been nominated for Book Club?

    (Of course, that might not work because I want to nominate Super Dating--and I think we've already read one of your stories? And I want to nominate SimsLover's San Myshuno series, and we've read his restaurant challenge...)

    I'm all for coming up with guidelines! My goal is to give attention to sleepers--those gems that are fun to share with more readers!

    Let's talk about ideas for guidelines for nominations...

    I say definitely no nominating works that have already read but i dont see any problem with reading something by an author we've never discussed. Every story is different so I don't see that being an issue.
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  • KismetRoseKismetRose Posts: 302 Member
    Hello,

    I don't currently have a story in Sims yet but I hope it's ok that I read along here. I'm a member of two different book clubs irl so this is fun. I have lots to catch up on but I'm an avid reader so hopefully I'll get up to speed soon.
  • MadameLeeMadameLee Posts: 32,748 Member
    @swcheppes @CathyTea but what if an author only has one story they're working on? Or when their story had been showcased previously there were like only two readers, the Host, and the author participating in the "questions"?
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  • InfraGreenInfraGreen Posts: 6,693 Member
    edited July 2017
    Will the "host what you nominate" rule stop self-nominations? Mostly because those gave me a slightly bad taste in my mouth. I think it's a good way to almost always have a host though. Even if @Simslover163 is taking the reins, I know he has a life and college too.

    Limiting nominations per author is...tricky. I don't think it should be a hard "once" at all (tbh I'd hate Eight Cicadas being my one and only Book Club feature :tongue:) but there should be a cool-down period. Like once in six months or even once a year. And I thought that the re-run schedule got a little ridiculous after a while.

    I do like the "Tasty Reads" feature. Though I think the maximum length could be bumped up to one chapter, even if it takes more than five minutes to read.
    A thousand bared teeth, a thousand bowed heads

    outrun / blog / tunglr
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    InfraGreen wrote: »
    Will the "host what you nominate" rule stop self-nominations? Mostly because those gave me a slightly bad taste in my mouth. I think it's a good way to almost always have a host though. Even if @Simslover163 is taking the reins, I know he has a life and college too.

    Limiting nominations per author is...tricky. I don't think it should be a hard "once" at all (tbh I'd hate Eight Cicadas being my one and only Book Club feature :tongue:) but there should be a cool-down period. Like once in six months or even once a year. And I thought that the re-run schedule got a little ridiculous after a while.

    I do like the "Tasty Reads" feature. Though I think the maximum length could be bumped up to one chapter, even if it takes more than five minutes to read.

    Oh, you know, "Tasty Reads" actually opens things up, in terms of the nominations guidelines. I like it to be a chapter, too!

    So far, we have these suggestions:

    1) No self-nominations
    2) No repeats of works (no more summer re-runs)
    3) If an author has already had a work read in Book Club, it's fine to nominate a different work by that same writer
    4) An author won't be featured more than once a year


    (I think we can safely limit it to a year now, as opposed to six-months, since we've got so many, many writers, and since we're now giving two weeks to a piece. Remember when we first started, before Coffee Hour, when we read three-four pieces per week? That was crazy fun! My goal then was that we'd read something by everyone back then--that was before we had so many TS4 writers.)
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • MadameLeeMadameLee Posts: 32,748 Member
    edited July 2017
    @CathyTea I don't like number 3 since it singles out people who only have one story and no other so what are they suppose to do?.. and I know from experience people are more "available" in the summer then you know the other 9 months of the years.
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  • InfraGreenInfraGreen Posts: 6,693 Member
    I think re-runs are okay if we cover a story that is still actively being written and later on it finishes and there's new stuff to talk about. There were just instances last summer of re-runs for legacies that were still just a few generations in and I'd like to avoid that.
    A thousand bared teeth, a thousand bowed heads

    outrun / blog / tunglr
  • friendsfan367friendsfan367 Posts: 29,362 Member
    MadameLee wrote: »
    @CathyTea I don't like number 3 since it singles out people who only have one story and no other so what are they suppose to do?.. and I know from experience people are more "available" in the summer then you know the other 9 months of the years.

    but it also gives people who haven't been featured yet a chance to be featured.
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    MadameLee wrote: »
    @CathyTea I don't like number 3 since it singles out people who only have one story and no other so what are they suppose to do?.. and I know from experience people are more "available" in the summer then you know the other 9 months of the years.

    #3 just means that it's OK for a writer whose work has already been discussed to be nominated again, for a different work. For example, since your Swanson's Legacy was read, you could be nominated again for your History Changelle, once it's up and running. If we didn't have #3, then you wouldn't be eligible since we've already read and talked about Swanson's....

    Make sense?

    (And I'm totally up to changing any and all of these--I'm just trying to express what people are saying in one place so we can look at them. I'm also OK [actually, good] with thinking of them as guidelines, rather than hard-and-fast rules, and realizing there will be occasional exceptions.)
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • CathyTeaCathyTea Posts: 23,088 Member
    InfraGreen wrote: »
    I think re-runs are okay if we cover a story that is still actively being written and later on it finishes and there's new stuff to talk about. There were just instances last summer of re-runs for legacies that were still just a few generations in and I'd like to avoid that.

    With longer works, like legacies or stories with seasons, we could treat each generation or season as its own work. For example, if we covered Season 1 of Discovering Juliana one year, we could select Season 2 the next year.
    Cathy Tea's SimLit Anthology

    Do you also play The Elder Scrolls Online? You can find me there as CathyTea, too!
  • MadameLeeMadameLee Posts: 32,748 Member
    CathyTea wrote: »
    InfraGreen wrote: »
    I think re-runs are okay if we cover a story that is still actively being written and later on it finishes and there's new stuff to talk about. There were just instances last summer of re-runs for legacies that were still just a few generations in and I'd like to avoid that.

    With longer works, like legacies or stories with seasons, we could treat each generation or season as its own work. For example, if we covered Season 1 of Discovering Juliana one year, we could select Season 2 the next year.

    like that idea
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  • InfraGreenInfraGreen Posts: 6,693 Member
    edited July 2017
    CathyTea wrote: »
    InfraGreen wrote: »
    I think re-runs are okay if we cover a story that is still actively being written and later on it finishes and there's new stuff to talk about. There were just instances last summer of re-runs for legacies that were still just a few generations in and I'd like to avoid that.

    With longer works, like legacies or stories with seasons, we could treat each generation or season as its own work. For example, if we covered Season 1 of Discovering Juliana one year, we could select Season 2 the next year.

    It could ease the burden of having to plow through a whole legacy in a week (even two would be a challenge for some).
    A thousand bared teeth, a thousand bowed heads

    outrun / blog / tunglr
  • swcheppesswcheppes Posts: 3,027 Member
    I second or maybe its third about treating legacies generations as seasons. Sometimes knowing that I have to read a 4 gen legacy deteres me from joining in the discussion that week.
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  • RipuAncestorRipuAncestor Posts: 2,332 Member
    I'm liking these ideas a lot. Especially the extended time for each story, the informal discussion, and the readers posting questions. I also like the nomination rules and treating legacy gens as separate stories. Would that also work for a longer non-legacy story that has clearly defined story arcs? I personally don't care if my work isn't featured again, but it would be interesting to revisit some stories here, after a lot has happened in them.

    The Tasty Reads sounds interesting. I also think it might be better to not limit the submission for that to five minutes, as there's plenty of wordy writers here, whose short chapters will take more than five minutes to read.

    I'm getting excited about Book Club's return! :)
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    My Sims stories:
    The Fey of Life - fairytales in life are few and far between (Forum thread HERE)
    The Chrysanthemum Tango - a story about life, death, magic, and how to be a good landlady (Forum thread HERE)
    Forget-Me-Not - some things just refuse to stay buried; an Ambrosia Challenge story (Forum thread HERE)
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