You'll love this one...!! A book club & more discussion

I recently made a suggestion to our lovely leader, Jenny, and she has asked that I put it out here for everyone to weigh in on...

Increased participation in the monthly book discussions is my biggest desire. I always feel like I'm behind here. A book gets announced, I start reading it and before I've even finished, nominations and voting begins on the next book. I'm wondering if we selected themes and books several months in advance and laid out the schedule, if more people would chime in to the discussions?

Members could plot out their reading better. That way, everyone could have the book read by a certain point in time and the discussion could begin with all involved for a longer period of time. Does that make sense?

i.e. people nominate themes for the next 3 months. Then we vote on them - top 3 win. Then we nominate books for each theme. Top votes win for each. Then a schedule is posted - theme and book for each of the next 3 months. And discussions begin the 1st of each month, with the idea that everyone will have completed the book by that date. This might take some of the pressure off the flurry of nominations and voting each month.

Let me know if you'd like to see this idea implemented or if you have other suggestions. Until then, be sure to join in with June's Fantasy book selection!

I think that sounds like a good idea. When Brave New World was picked for this month I had to reserve it at the library and I'm still waiting, maybe if I'd reserved it months before I was going to read it I might have had it by now.

Oh please yes give us more notice!

FANTASTIC idea.

I thought this idea would go down well :D

Yes please do this. Like a number of other members I also need to get to the library to be able to read the monthly choice.

Ilike the idea, gives more time to obtain book, either from library or amazon etc.

Sounds like a really good idea, that's a yes from me!!

Well - since thus far everyone seems to want to switch to the advance selection method, let me get some opinions about implementing it.

-We need to nominate and vote 2x - once for Themes and once for Books.
-Do you want the nomination process to continue to be done publicly via Comments in a Topic?
-Or do you prefer to e-mail nominations privately via Goodreads to myself?
-Regarding voting, we will no longer be able to use the Poll system for voting as it only allows for 1 vote and we will be selecting 3 books. Do you want the voting system for book selections to be done publicly via Comments in a Topic or via private e-mail via Goodreads to myself?
-How much time do you want to allow for Theme Nominations, Theme Voting, Book Nominations and Book Voting?
-I assume each person could nominate up to 3 Themes and 1 book for each Theme.
-I assume each person could vote for 1 book per Theme.

Since it likely will take 2 weeks or so to complete the nominating and voting process, we should probably start next week. That would not give much advance notice for the July read but going forward we could start 2 months in advance - so in August we'd do the nominations and voting for October - December. Then again in November for January - March, etc. etc.

Or do you want to vote in advance for a 6 month schedule instead of 3?

I know - I'm full of questions. But just want to get it right.

Hello Molly,
Yes, rather a lot of questions there.
Speaking for myself, I think it might be easier to continue nomiating publicly. The discussions this brings up are really quite interesting to read, even if I don't want to contribute.
Its a real shame we can't use the Poll system. That worked well. Private email probably makes sense, but would possible mean more work for you. Not sure what to suggest for this one.
It might be better to make the whole process from nomination to book voting a little longer for planning ahead like this. I do like the idea of keeping the process fairly speedy, since it keeps those of us who like to vote watching those messages so we don't miss out.
I like the idea of planning a three month schedule. Thanks for taking charge of this for us.

No worries about any work created from voting via e-mails - that is not an issue for me.

I was only hoping for a week or two advance notice, but the idea of 3 or 6 month ahead all set up sounds intriguing & possibly quite beneficial to those of us who buy from half.com etc. I'm totally flexible on everything else.

I like the idea of keeping the nominations public that way people could see what themes and books had been nominated before they made their own suggestions. As for the voting I'm happy either way and I like the idea of a three month schedule.

Molly wrote: "...Or do you want to vote in advance for a 6 month schedule instead of 3? ..."

I think 6 months is too far ahead.

We need a balance between immediacy and time to locate the selected book - and finish what we're currently reading.

Consequently, I think the best option is to nominate every month for a single month, probably two (or possibly three) months ahead. So in early June, we'd select a theme and book for August 1st, and in July we'd do September.

The advantages include:

1. Maintaining momentum.
2. We could continue to use the polling system, which most of us like.
3. There's less danger of getting confused about what is coming up when.
4. Newbies can be involved in nominations and voting within a month of joining.
5. When people are away they will miss no more than one month's nominations.

That's an interesting idea Cecily! Thank you :0)

So now, that a second option has been presented, I need to hear from folks about their preference between the two:

1. Advance nomination & voting quarterly to set the next 3 months' monthly discussion schedules (May (now June) vote for July, August & September discussions)

2. Monthly nomination & voting 2 months in advance before discussion begins (June vote for August discussion)

Maybe Jenny could create a voting poll for this? And we could give it a few days for everyone to chime in here and in the poll?

Whatever the result, I would really like to recommend that the discussion begin on the 1st of each month with the intent that everyone has finished the book by then, since we'll have plenty of advance notice now. That will give us the full month to discuss it together instead of spending that time waiting for everyone to receive, read and finish at their own paces.

I like the advance notice and voting quarterly. This would certainly help me with the final point - starting the discussion about each book on the first of the month.

Right the poll is set up! Nice to see so many responses, reassures me that there are loads of you that want to take part in the monthly reads.

Going back to Molly's suggestion, it is possible to have as many polls up as you like so I don't see why we couldn't keep using the polling system, unless I've misunderstood something, which is always possible :D

Thanks Jenny! Can you put a link to the poll location here?

Jenny wrote: "Going back to Molly's suggestion, it is possible to have as many polls up as you like so I don't see why we couldn't keep using the polling system, unless I've misunderstood something, which is alw..."

Well - if we were doing the quarterly idea, voting for Themes couldn't be done by Polls since everyone would get to vote for up to 3 different Themes of the ones nominated - 1 for each month.

Voting for the books to match the themes could be done via separate polls though.

Link to the poll ~ http://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/34...

Not many votes so far. Do you think it would be a good idea for me to invite everyone in the group to take the poll? I haven't as yet because I didn't think this would be a fair representation of what the monthly readers want.

Jenny wrote: "Not many votes so far. Do you think it would be a good idea for me to invite everyone in the group to take the poll? I haven't as yet because I didn't think this would be a fair representation of w..."

Since we are trying to get more members involved in monthly discussions - see what people think of the options by broadcasting the poll.

I agree with Molly, though I suggest you make it clear it's not the "normal" monthly poll, but one about changing the way it works. If you can, I'd include a link to this discussion as well as the poll itself.

I too vote to give all a chance to vote so long as an attempt is made to clarify what's actually at stake.

I have a feeling though that most people don't really care all that much. I know I don't vote if I'm flexible, in order to let the people who really feel vested have a stronger voice. (In any poll and in some electoral races too.)

I have sent out the invite. Hopefully we will have a decision by the 10th. Unfortunately this does mean that July's read is still going to be short notice, but after that we should have a more organised way of choosing our monthly reads :)

Jenny wrote: "I have sent out the invite. Hopefully we will have a decision by the 10th. Unfortunately this does mean that July's read is still going to be short notice, but after that we should have a more orga..."

Or we could just skip July entirely - devote more time for those doing the June selection while we transition to whichever new method? That might be less confusing instead of voting now for July and also now for selection(s) beyond July at the same time.

I'd be fine with skipping July. Lots of people are on vacation, which yes means maybe more time to read, but also more time away from the computer (I hope). :)

That is fine with me. I know the June discussion hasn't really begun as people are finding the book harder to get hold of.

Jenny wrote: "Not many votes so far. Do you think it would be a good idea for me to invite everyone in the group to take the poll? I haven't as yet because I didn't think this would be a fair representation of w..."

Hi Jenny taken awhile to work out which i prefer. think the two monthly best as we can still vote

The poll closed yesterday about which advance selection option the group prefers, and the 3 months at a time selection received a greater margin of votes than the monthly selections done 2 months in advance.

I will be opening a new topic to collect nominations for Themes for August, September and October.

In light of this transition, we have decided not to select a group read for July.

Thanks for all of your input and participation. Hopefully this new method for advance selection will allow more people to participate in our great monthly discussions. Happy reading everyone!