User:NuclearWarfare/Sandbox19

Notability
"Notability not asserted" is a lot nicer than "not notable", don't you think? I'm not passing judgment on the topic of the article, I'm passing judgment on the article itself. The article didn't say anything about why the book is notable. About why it matters to anyone other than you.

"Here's a book! I wrote it! Who am I? I'm the guy who wrote the book! Here's what the book is about! It's utterly wonderful! I wrote the book, and you can trust an author to tell you that his own book is wonderful! I was inspired by Mark Twain! Here's a bit of trivia about Mark Twain! You can buy the book on Amazon! The book was published this year!"

Who published the book, Greg? Was it published by one of the big companies, the ones that get thousands of submissions every year and reject most of them? Well, no. Was it published by one of the niche small-presses, the ones that get dozens of submissions every year and reject most of them? Well, no.

It was published by.... Lulu.com. What are the criteria for being published by Lulu? Well, um, you have to give them money, and the book has to be... um... well, I don't think they'll publish illegal material, but aside from that, they have no criteria for selection. I could sit my cat on the keyboard for five minutes, and get that published by Lulu. I'm not saying that "published by Lulu" means a book is "not notable" - Atlanta Nights was published by Lulu, for instance - just that it does not mean that the book is notable. What makes your novel any more notable than five minutes of my cat sitting on a keyboard? The fact that you wrote it? What makes you any more notable than anyone else? The fact that you wrote this novel?

That's not a rhetorical question, by the way. What makes it notable? Has it won any major awards? Has it gotten any reviews in major venues or from major reviewers? Do you-the-author have a regular column in a major venue? If yes, then you should have said so. You should have asserted the notability. If no, then you see my dilemma. DS (talk) 14:47, 18 September 2010 (UTC)