Goodreads Librarians Group discussion

Two related questions. I've been trying to combat the proliferation of subject tags in title fields (e.g., 'bbw') unless they're actually part of the title of a book or its series. Amazon allows them in the title field, so there's a never-ending number of them on GR now. However, sometimes an author might undo my change, and then I'm stuck. It gets especially dubious when there's a pseudo-sub title, like 'a bbw romance'. Do I remove? Or leave it as the author wishes?

This problem is especially compounded by the problem of serials, which may not have distinct names for each part. E.g.,

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...

Obviously this title already has issues, and the latter half (currently in parentheses) should go, I think we can all agree. But what about the rest of it? It has been my policy to title such serials something like 'Romeo Alpha, Book 1', but I suppose it does have 'A BBW Paranormal Shifter Romance' on the cover. Does that count as a legitimate subtitle? Should it be the title of the series, as currently implied by the wording on Amazon?

Serials are not exactly series, but I'm having trouble adapting the GR series framework to serials...

I completely agree that tags are not series and do not belong on the title line. However, it looks like the official title for that series is "Romeo Alpha BBW Paranormal Shifter Romance". Which is a bit much, I agree, but nonetheless.

And serials work on Goodreads more or less ok as series, but often with the only difference in the title being "Part 5) or whatever.

Thank you Rivka. And Z-squared for asking.

Like Z-squared these bug the heck out of me, and it's a good wind-down while half watching TV task. But apart from feeling like it's trying to stop a waterfall with a teaspoon, I have been a little conservative with the actual series names and serials.

Thanks for the clarification, Rivka. What about in the case of pseudo-subtitles that appear on the cover? E.g.,

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...

I would remove that, and most such. (For CreateSpace and Kindle-only books, I sometimes check if there is any series info on Amazon. Their guidelines are different, but they do have the ability to mark a book as being part of a series.)

thank you!

Kind of in the lines of this questioning. I ran into a few "Series" that were episodic and have ones listed as book now. Should I leave them the way they are or change some numbering around?

Example: https://www.goodreads.com/series/1184...

I think that one looks fine.

Sounds good, always find those interesting to work with.