Talk:The Quest Begins/GA2

GA Reassessment

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I do not believe this is up to GA level. Maybe it was in 2011, but not now. Major problems:

1. Poor sourcing: there's only fourteen sources, five of which are from the publishers, one is to some Russian website. One is a chat from a fan site.
2. Poor citing: titles missing from journal articles (I don't know how the reviewer wasn't bothered by that--but it was a very cursory review).
3. Vagueries: the Russian link supposedly verifies that some books in the series were translated into Russian, but that's hardly clear from that page, and it begs the question of what was released in Canada and the UK (this book? some books of the series?) and what was translated.
4. Poor prose: throughout, the writing is very pedestrian (one example out of many: "Kirkus Reviews praised how 'Hunter creates ...'"), with repetitive syntax and too many instances of "also". Note "Somewhere is the Rocky Mountains in southern Canada", which was there already in 2011.

In all, this can be fixed, but it's not of GA level. Pinging User:Bobamnertiopsis and User:Brambleclawx. Drmies (talk) 19:30, 4 January 2019 (UTC)

Pardon me as I slowly make a foray out of semi-retirement; I can't really recall if I should be replying to each point below them, or just separately like I've opted to do here. Anyway:

For the sourcing, source one is a transcript of an interview conducted with the authors by said fan site; i.e., it is a primary source, and the information does not exist elsewhere. The references to the publisher are used only to reference the publication dates for the various formats of the novel. If there is a preferable source for such information to use, please let me know.

I'm actually surprised that titles are missing from the references; I don't exactly recall my level of involvement on this particular article prior to its GAN, but I would not have expected to miss that. Anyway, I will find some time to correct that soon.

Titles added. Brambleclawx 04:45, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

I'll also clarify the material about other countries, and brush up the prose.

Copyedit done. I unfortunately haven't actually read this particular book before, so I was only able to give the plot summary a basic clean-up. Brambleclawx 04:45, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

Brambleclawx 00:06, 5 January 2019 (UTC)

@Drmies: In case the replies have been missed. AIRcorn (talk) 23:21, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Aircorn--I hadn't seen the replies. I'll get on it, after more coffee. Drmies (talk) 02:00, 10 March 2019 (UTC)

Finished the coffee yet? Drmies Let me know if you need a hand to keep things moving here. AIRcorn (talk) 00:24, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

• User:Aircorn, this article certainly has improved, thanks to Brambleclawx and esp. Yngvadottir, but I'm not seeing GA here. The prose is better and the other errors have been fixed, but we still have just a really brief article with very meager sourcing. I mean, this is in a weekly newspaper of 7,500 copies. The article, if we count verified prose, is about 22 sentences (and in "Critical reception" a couple more should be cut, since the prose there is still not GA level). So in a way one could argue it approaches GA level because the content that needs to be verified is mostly verified, but only because it's a topic that has generated very, very little coverage in the first place, and that coverage consists exclusively of reviews--no studies or comparisons or whatever. No, I'm sorry, and I appreciate the writer's effort but I do not think this is a GA. Drmies (talk) 02:32, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
  • Drmies Before you close as a delist let me spend some time, which I would hope to do no later than this weekend, seeing if I can increase the number (and possibly quality) of sources. I have not read the book so if you have issues with the plot I would not be able to help with that but since it seems like you have other concerns I'm happy to do a dive and see what's out there. However, in terms of studies or comparisons or whatever as you saw with This is Not My Hat it is not uncommon, in my experience, for a book to be able to reach the GA level, that is it broad in its coverage, through reviews alone. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 02:45, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
    • Barkeep49, I am absolutely fine with that. I wasn't in a hurry before, and I'm not in one now, and I'd rather have a reworked GA than a delisted former GA--thank you so much. Drmies (talk) 18:17, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
      • Drmies and Brambleclawx I have taken a pass at improving the article. While I rewrote some sections, added a little detail, and removed the Columbus Dispatch and Half Moon Bay paper coverage, I did not find any substantially different coverage. This book seems to have received critical reviews in-line with many children's books - that is coverage by trade publications but little of note outside of that realm. Best, Barkeep49 (talk) 14:33, 6 April 2019 (UTC)
        • Drmies, could you finish this GAR? --MrClog (talk) 18:18, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
          • MrClog, sorry, thanks, yeah--Barkeep did a good job. Can you close it? It would take me hours to find the paperwork... Drmies (talk) 19:01, 3 June 2019 (UTC)
            • Drmies, done. Based on your comment, I'm assuming the article is kept as a GA. If I'm mistaken, please ping me. --MrClog (talk) 19:05, 3 June 2019 (UTC)