SFF Hot from Printers: New Releases discussion

Nominate a 2023 book - a novel, novella or anthology for the first month of the year 202

The Circumference of the World by Lavie Tidhar

The Navigating Fox by Christopher Rowe

I re-nominate Gods of the Wyrdwood by R.J. Barker, for while I prefer SF over fantasy atm, right now I like the author's other books

Oleksandr wrote: "I re-nominate Gods of the Wyrdwood by R.J. Barker, for while I prefer SF over fantasy atm, right now I like the author's other books"

That's a very nice cover but also a huge book, not sure I'd be able to manage it this winter.

The Lost Cause by Cory Doctorow.

MH wrote: "The Lost Cause by Cory Doctorow."

MAGA 'red hats' 30 years from now? It is as if today's folks with Reagan badges (whose campaign btw had original MAGA slogan). But Cory is always a good choice

I’ll nominate A Study In Drowning by Ava Reid, I’m on my phone so sorry there isn’t a link.

Rebecca wrote: "I’ll nominate A Study In Drowning by Ava Reid, I’m on my phone so sorry there isn’t a link."

A Study in Drowning

For January, I nominate the new Murderbot, System Collapse-#7 in the series-by Martha Wells

there are 49 people in line ahead of me at the library!!

I also want to read A Studing in Drowning and The Circumference of the World

Kateblue wrote: "I also want to read A Studing in Drowning and The Circumference of the World"

Great to hear that you can return and even actively comment :)

Kateblue wrote: "For January, I nominate the new Murderbot, System Collapse-#7 in the series-by Martha Wells"

I just bought my hardcover preorder today (some damage to the dust jacket, grumble grumble) -- def can't wait until Jan.

Hi All

I would like to nominate my first book, Novikov Windows: A Time Travel Novel

It's a substantial read (over 540 pages) but has received good feedback overall.



For more information on the book please visit

www.chriscosmain.com

The poll is on: https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/2...

I planned on buying The Lost Cause but it was $40 and I'm feeling outraged by book prices currently, so I put it back on the shelf... maybe later.

Kalin wrote: "I planned on buying The Lost Cause but it was $40 and I'm feeling outraged by book prices currently, so I put it back on the shelf... maybe later."

Wow! $40! I grumble when I buy audio for $12 instead of $7.99

The price of paper books has gone up a lot in the past two years. By nearly 25% in some cases. And the quality seems to be decreasing, Tordotcom can't seem to print a dust jacket properly to save their lives.

$40 Canadian, right? It is $30 USD.

I try not to buy print copies because currently I have a large library gathering dust collected by my parents and then by me. And I even cannot give them to a library because most of them are in russian and now libraries try to get rid of russian books plus my old stuff won't get a lot of reads...

I've noticed a somewhat problematic pattern with our voting in this group -- we have TONS of options to choose from among new releases, and lots of nominators but not really more voters than nominators. It turns out we're nominating books and then voting for our own nominations, which leads to what we're seeing in this poll at the moment: a tie of 1 vote for each nominee (probably voted by the nominator).

Ed wrote: "$40 Canadian, right? It is $30 USD."

Yep, Canadian, though I imagine $30 USD doesn't feel too good either, unless you're buying like 3 books a year.

Perhaps the problem is just too few voters.

I just bought The Wolfe at the Door for C$40, but I justified it as a Christmas present to myself. Not a price I’m happy paying.

I also got a copy of The Circumference of the World, which of course I’ll read regardless of the poll result. Tachyon trade paperback, C$22.95.

Kalin wrote: "I've noticed a somewhat problematic pattern with our voting in this group -- we have TONS of options to choose from among new releases, and lots of nominators but not really more voters than nomina..."

While I can easily solve it by sending all members mail with a link to vote, sadly the cure is worse than the disease - these additional voters rarely join the discussions even if their book won. I understand that we can build up our active membership by both regular all members mails and direct contact of active people in other groups, but I'm burned out at the moment to really care. I anyone wants/can do it, contact me

One solution would be to give everyone two votes, but since Goodreads doesn't support that, we could make a rule that no-one can vote for their own nomination.

I was thinking two votes too; like Allan did for December's poll, we can do two polls, one where you can vote for your own, and one where you're not allowed to. That way people still get to vote for what they wanted to read badly enough to nominate.

Acorn, I understand your thought process around not inviting the silent majority to vote on polls, and since you've made that decision I don't want to just keep on doing it; just highlighting a new issue here to problem solve. I'm not convinced it's mods role to stoke participation from otherwise inactive members -- people join GR groups for lots of reasons.

Kalin wrote: "Acorn, I understand your thought process around not inviting the silent majority to vote on polls, and since you've made that decision I don't want to just keep on doing it; just highlighting a new issue here to problem solve.."

Just to clarify: my decisions are far from final. Moreover, I discuss them there, where active members may read and participate exactly because I agree that the current situation isn't perfect.

Two votes is an interesting solution, we can try it next month.

There may be other members like me who are so busy that we don’t often participate so dont feel like we ought to mess with the voting but who still lurk and read what’s going on? I dunno the solution tho

Rachel wrote: "There may be other members like me who are so busy that we don’t often participate so dont feel like we ought to mess with the voting but who still lurk and read what’s going on? I dunno the soluti..."

Just to give you a perspective - by the number of comments, which I guess is a good indicator of group's activity, you're #13 out of 270 members - a quite solid participation (yes, I'll gladly read more from you!) - there are over 200 members with zero posts, I assume that people just browsed, joined, but never returned

One group I am in sent an email to everyone and said come talk to us (with a link to a discussion page) and said "Come talk to us before x date or we are cutting you out of the group." We could do that.

Or not. I think it was a lot of work to cancel all the people.

I see no need to exclude anyone - if the goal is to limit say voting to active members then we already do it by not sending group mails.

Should also note that in many of the polls all of the nominees are good, so I'm not that fussed which book wins :) I can always get to the other ones later, and meanwhile its an effective discovery mechanism for things which I might otherwise not notice.

Huh - didn’t realize I had participated that much!

I don’t have the ability to engage on Goodreads weekly, so I love to get emails about the polls. I vote in the polls as often as I see them, but like many others, enjoy all the nominations. With that said,I totally understand the desire to have voters that participate in book discussions, which, again, I am unable to do consistently. I have been devouring books this year - maybe escaping reality - and reading most of the nominated books including the poll winners.

Kimberly wrote: "I totally understand the desire to have voters that participate in book discussions, which, again, I am unable to do consistently. ."

This is perfectly fine, after all, we all are here because we enjoy reading, so in no way it should turn into a chore. I greatly enjoy all the discussions and I'm saddened that quite a few formerly active members are out. I hope it isn't because I run the group wrongly

The poll is over and Gods of the Wyrdwood won

Oleksandr wrote: I'm saddened that quite a few formerly active members are out. I hope it isn't because I run the group wrongly"

No, you're running the group well. People just get busy, or tired.

Kateblue wrote: "
No, you're running the group well. People just get busy, or tired."

I'm glad to hear that!

I picked up The Lost Cause so I am in for that one on the next poll if we nominate it.

Kalin wrote: "The Navigating Fox by Christopher Rowe"

I just read that. It is fun and different and can be easily read in one day.

Yeah, it looks fun, and I liked his last novella too. I'll probably read it solo at some point in the winter and stick to nominating (or seconding) novels.

Acorn, I agree with Kate. Life gets in the way sometimes, but I think you are doing a great job running the group.

Kimberly wrote: "Acorn, I agree with Kate. Life gets in the way sometimes, but I think you are doing a great job running the group."

Thanks! You're all great fellow readers!