Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy discussion

This is the place to nominate a Contemporary Fantasy or Science Fiction work for our June group read and discussion (beginning June 21.) A contemporary work would typically have been first published in the 21st century.

You need not have read the title you are nominating; after all, you'll be reading along. Feel free to say why you are making the nomination, if you care to. Note that if your nomination is selected by the group, we'll be expecting you to take the lead in the discussion.

We read & discuss up to three different SF/F works each month: One is a "Contemporary" SF/F novel, anthology, novella, or other work, which was written after 2000; that discussion starts on the 21st of each month. One is a "Classic" SF/F work which was written before 2000; that discussion starts on the 1st of each month. We may also read one book from a series each month, a step in reading the entire series; that discussion starts the 11th of the months. You can always check on our upcoming SF/F works discussion topics by scrolling down on the Group Homepage to the "Upcoming Reads” section.

You can review past group selections in the "read" section of our Group's BookShelf. If you wish to continue a discussion of one of those past selections, all those discussion topics are still open in our Book Discussions area.

Note that these are nominations for our June discussion topic. The Calculating Stars has already been selected as our May Contemporary Novel discussion topic.

Nominations will be open through Sunday, May 5, when I'll collect the nominees and post a poll so members can choose among them.

Since Tor just gave it away for free, what about Walkaway by Cory Doctorow

That one should make for a good discussion!

Rachel wrote: "That one should make for a good discussion!"

Oooh, good! I just randomly picked it since I never get around to reading those free Tor books otherwise :) Had no idea if it was any good or not.

Reminder: Today, Sunday, is the final day to nominate a Contemporary Fantasy or Science Fiction work for our June group read and discussion.

I'll nominate We Are Legion (We Are Bob) by Dennis E. Taylor. Space exploration & more with excellent characters, especially Bob. This book is the first of a trilogy & stands well on its own, but I'll bet most will want to go on to read all 3. I sure did.

Thank you for the nominations. A poll to select our Contemporary Science Fiction / Fantasy Work discussion topic for June is now open. If you're interested in participating in the discussion of one of our nominees, you can vote here for your choice.

Please only vote if you plan on participating in the discussion of that book.

Note that these are nominees for our June discussion topic. The Calculating Stars has already been selected as our May Contemporary Novel discussion topic.

This poll will be open through Sunday, May 12.

Reminder: For those who are interested in discussing one of the above nominees with the group, today, Sunday, is the final day to vote for one of our Contemporary Fantasy or Science Fiction novel for our June group read and discussion.

Our selected contemporary scifi novel discussion topic for June is...

We Are Legion (We Are Bob) by [author:Dennis E. Taylor|12130438

The discussion will begin June 21.

I guess we'll see if maintaining discussions with such limited apparent enthusiasm is worthwhile.

G33z3r wrote: "I guess we'll see if maintaining discussions with such limited apparent enthusiasm is worthwhile. "

Maybe cut down to one read per month and alternate between classic and contemporary?

How is the participation in the series read? Maybe that pulls more folks?

Rachel wrote: "How is the participation in the series read? Maybe that pulls more folks?"

I think it's only me and G33z3r still doing the series read so that's having no effect right now since I'm still nominating and voting and G33z3r never nominates and only votes as a tie breaker so our behaviours haven't changed.

I wouldn't blame buddy reads either since I haven't seen that much activity there recently either.

Out of curiosity, if people are not interested in a given set of nominations why not nominate some alternatives? Or are people just not interesting in this group anymore and are busy on other groups? Or are they just going to be on vacation during the summer and don't want to vote on something they won't be around for?

As a mod, I'm interested in figuring out why participation has been dying here lately to see if we can make changes to get people interested again. We used to get around 5 nominations or more, and we'd have a lot of votes. But now we're lucky if we get even two nominations (if it weren't for me nominating the first day and Jim on the last there wouldn't be any nominations at all the past couple rounds...assuming he's still waiting to nominate against my current classic...otherwise it's just me)...I mean I don't mind the lack of competition, means my nomination has a better chance of winning, but no point if I'm the only one in the "group" read. ;)

And if you ignore the nominators we can only get 3 people to vote out of a group that has 6k members! (Ok, I realize many people join, post once, and then never come back but still, are there really only a handful of us that are actively participating in group reads these days?)

I was also wondering about if the summer changes behavior- less known schedules or too many trips or? I frequently feel like my nominations are dominating what the group reads and so I’ll sit out a month.... the. You get just the two,

One other group I’m in sends out a monthly message that gets sent to email with what is being read and voted on -sure that would help grab the attention of Infrequent members? More work for mods.

Rachel wrote: "One other group I’m in sends out a monthly message that gets sent to email with what is being read and voted on -sure that would help grab the attention of Infrequent members? More work for mods."

Wonder how that works, I know I had to turn on notifications in my own settings to get notifications for every post to the group (I chose just to have them sent to the "bell" icon in GR and not to email but I think you can configure that too). Didn't think anyone was allowed to blast an email out if people didn't turn on email options in the first place.