Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Recollection

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was merge to Gareth L. Powell. Jenks24 (talk) 17:31, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Recollection

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Literature-related deletion discussions. Cliff Smith 18:37, 15 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This book does not seem to meet WP:NBOOK or WP:GNG. It has not received any particular critical acclaim, nor has it been cited as a work of great cultural or historical significance. The only coverage seems to be general book reviews and resellers listings. BenTels (talk) 11:41, 15 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. Well... book reviews do count towards notability as long as you can get enough of them. That the article already has two by Locus and the Guardian is a pretty good start, although since the book was only released in the UK (from what I can see so far) does sort of hurt when it comes to looking for sources. So far I've only found one other usable-ish review to help bolster claims of notability. There's mention of it being nominated for a BSFA, but since anyone can nominate those (and besides, it didn't win) I can't use that to show notability. It's not really looking good so far, although this could be redirected to the author's page. I'm seeing that there might be just enough notability for the author to warrant him having an article (which is currently unsourced, if anyone wants to work on that other than myself) but perhaps not enough for all of his books to have articles.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 20:28, 15 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Science fiction-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 02:13, 16 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Can I propose a merger rather than deletion? If the articles in question had content merged into the Gareth L. Powell author page, in the manner seen in the Ian McDonald page, then the useful information would still be accessible while the references might be able to back up Powell's notability. Also, what would you regard the notability criteria as being with regards SF authors and books?--Wyvern Rex. (talk) 10:00, 16 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There's really no set thing for any specific genre, just a general guideline for notability for books (WP:NBOOK) and authors (WP:CREATIVE). The biggie is that you have to show a lot of sources that are considered to be independent and reliable per Wikipedia's guidelines. What this unfortunately means for many authors is that the bajillion interviews, reviews, and such on various blogs can't be used unless the blog is written by someone who is considered to be an absolute and complete authority. (Which also unfortunately is almost never the case, regardless of how long the blog has been running or how respected the site is.) This has frustrated me a lot sometimes, as there's a lot of good review blogs out there that have been running for an insanely long period of time and are known within the various communities, but just don't fit into what Wikipedia considers to be a reliable source. This is especially frustrating when you get into the genres that don't get as much mainstream attention (romance, sci-fi, urban fantasy- anything that isn't Nicholas Sparks franchise stuff, basically) and/or aren't released in the States. So long story short, you just have to find tons of sources that Wikipedia considers to be reliable. Fortunately, reviews do count towards notability, although there is contention over whether or not stuff like Publishers Weekly or Kirkus Reviews would count or if they'd be trivial sources since they're so short. (I say they do, but I can see where the other arguments come from.) Generally my rule of thumb is that if you have 4-5 reliable and in-depth sources, the article is golden. There's one or two exceptions to this, but generally that's what I go by. Recollection is thisclose to being at a place where I'd say it's keepable, but the pickings are slim enough that someone with a good argument could say that there isn't enough coverage, which is why I like merging/redirecting to pages about the author: at least that way we can keep some of the stuff around. Anywho, hit me up on my talk page if you have any questions. Also, if you're interested then you might want to see about moving a copy of the book articles into your userspace (WP:USERFY) so you can continue to work on them over time. You never know when the books might get released in another country (getting more reviews & such), so there's always hope that the articles can be brought back into the mainspace.Tokyogirl79 (talk) 11:40, 17 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Merge to Gareth L. Powell. The Guardian and Locus reviews go some way towards establishing notability but not, I think, far enough to justify a separate article (though they contribute very nicely towards confirming the author's notability). PWilkinson (talk) 15:09, 21 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, — Crisco 1492 (talk) 05:29, 23 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, BusterD (talk) 14:51, 30 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Merge unless someone finds significant new coverage. It's only a small article, and I'm not sure that having the back-cover blurb constitute the majority of the article passes either copyright requirements or rules against advertising on Wikipedia. --Colapeninsula (talk) 17:03, 30 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.